Tears shimmered in her eyes, prepared to spill across her blistered cheeks.
"You stopped in Nassau and at Caicos," he reminded her.
"I'm getting there," she said. "Who's telling this?"
"I'm sorry." Remo was encouraged by the flash of anger, the display of spirit.
"So, we stopped in Nassau, and at Caicos. Richard likes to gamble. He knows how to play. He's lucky. Used to be."
The first tear left a shining path across her face. If Kelly noticed it, she gave no sign. Her eyes were focused somewhere in the distance now, beyond the pale acoustic ceiling tiles.
"We had a great time, really. Nassau ...Caicos... Richard needed to relax. All by ourselves..."
"You went to Puerta Plata," Remo said.
The woman grimaced, flicking her eyes toward Remo with a reproachful glare, as if the very name left a foul taste in her mouth, but she didn't reproach him verbally.
"We went to Puerta Plata," she agreed. "And met Enrique."
"Filthy bastard!" Kelly startled Remo with her sudden vehemence. "He was a part of it, you know. Oh, yes. I didn't trust him from the first, but Richard told me everything would be all right. It wasn't. was it?"
"No," Remo agreed, "it wasn't. How'd you meet him?"
"Richard?"
"Enrique."
"Bastard!" This time, Remo wasn't sure if Kelly was addressing him directly, or referring to the missing crewman. "Richard found him. Tried to warn him, really. Didn't like the way he looked at me. He always smirked, the little shit! We never should have hired him."
"Where did you go from Puerta Plata?" Remo asked.
"East," she replied, "and south. Down through the passage."
That would be Mong Passage, Remo thought, the stretch of water separating Puerto Rico from the eastern coast of the Dominican Republic. He had learned that much from checking out a map in the in-flight magazine while airborne between White Plains and Bethesda.
"After that?" he prodded as gently as possible.
"It was supposed to be a real vacation," Kelly Bauer Armitage replied, slipping gears. "No plans, no reservations. Living on the water. It was just supposed to be the two of us, but Richard took him on, in case we hit bad weather. There was nothing in the forecast, but he worries. Used to."
Both of Kelly's sunburned cheeks were wet with tears now, but her voice was steady. One hand had worked its way out from under the crisp sheet that covered her, fingers curling around the side rail of her bed and tightening until the knuckles blanched. Remo noted that her nails were bitten or broken off down to the quick. Long scratches on the back of her hand had scabbed over, already healing, while the skin between her fingers was chapped from exposure to sun- and salt water.
Remo took a gamble, asking, "Where did the attack take place?"
"I don't know, dammit!" Fury and frustration mingled in her voice. "A day beyond the passage, was it? Maybe two. What day is this?"
He had to think about it for a moment. "Wednesday," Remo told her.
"Wednesday. No, that isn't right. It wasn't Wednesday. You're mistaken."
"When the men came-"
"Men? You call them men? Those filthy animals? You still have no idea." Her eyes were wild now; she was trembling on the edge of panic. "They killed Richard, did you know that? And they ...they..."
Her tears were flowing freely now, her shoulders jerking as she wept. Remo moved quickly, touching her gently on the neck before she could notice what he was doing. The woman relaxed into the bed like a deflating hot-air balloon. The hysteria drained out of her, but the horror still lived in her eyes.
"You said they dressed like pirates," Remo reminded her.
"They were pirates," she said, her voice like someone whose mind was far away now. "You didn't see them. You don't know."
"I'm trying to find out," he said.
"The island where they live ...it's like another world. Like nothing from this century. No lights except for fire at night. No roads. Those bastards... what they did ...you couldn't know."
"And no one mentioned a location, anything like map coordinates?"
"No, no, no, I told you no."
Remo felt grim. He couldn't help her. She was traumatized in some permanent, or at least semipermanent way. Maybe with time she would heal that part of her mind that had been locked up, but he couldn't do it for her.
All she had to tell him now was one word. "No, no, no, no," she said, her head shaking somberly back and forth. "No, no, no, no..."
Remo touched her neck again and gave her the gift of unconsciousness.
The shouting had attracted attention. The orderly was almost to the door of number 725 when Remo exited the private room. "What's going on in there?" he growled.
"She fell asleep," said Remo. "I suppose it was a waste of time."
The hulk glanced inside Kelly's room and gave Remo a glare. "I could have told you that."
"Next time I'll ask," Remo said as he strolled to the elevator, feeling a pair of eyes on his back. They weren't the eyes of the orderly. They belonged to a slim, attractive redhead he had noticed standing at the nurses' station, a prim frown on her face. He wasn't surprised when he heard her fall into step behind him and increase her pace when he hit the elevator call button. A moment later, when the door hissed open and he stepped in she was right beside him, stepping back against the other wall as he chose the button labeled L for lobby.
"Who the hell are you?" she challenged as the doors closed.
"Who's asking?"
"I'm Stacy Armitage. You were with my brother's wife, and I heard her crying, then it goes dead quiet and you make a beeline for the exit. Now, I want to know exactly who you are and what the hell is going on, or you can bet your ass you won't be getting past hospital security."
"I'm Remo, and I've been assigned to look into your brother's case."
"Remo? What kind of name is Remo?" Stacy Armitage demanded.
"Mine," he told her.
"Remo what?" the angry redhead challenged.
He thought about that for a moment. Who was he today? Oh, yeah. "Rubble."
"Remo Rubble of which agency?"
"CIS," he told her, picking the letters out of thin air.
''I never heard of it."
"That's good. You weren't supposed to."
"Cut the crap, okay? We've had the FBI in here, the Coast Guard, DEA, you name it. What are you supposed to have that they all lack?"
"A winning personality," he said.
"I must have missed it," Stacy said, sneering.
"You caught me on my coffee break."
They reached the ground floor and the elevator door slid open. Remo started for the exit, leaving Stacy Armitage behind, but she caught up to him at once, heels clicking on the shiny marble floor.
"You don't get off that easy, pal," she said.
"Oh, really? Maybe you should try a citizen's arrest," he said. "It's worth a shot, you want to make a total ass out of yourself."
"I don't like strangers badgering my sister!"
"Sister-in-law," he corrected.
Stacy grabbed his arm, and Remo let himself be turned to face her. "Listen, damn you! We were friends before she ever met my brother. Christ, I introduced them! Now, the cops and Feds are acting like there's nothing they can do about my brother's murder or the things those bastards did to Kelly, but I don't believe it. It's not good enough, you hear me? Someone has to pay!"
He stared into her blue eyes for a moment, seeing love and hate mixed up there. He didn't take the animosity personally. She just needed somebody to vent on. "Okay," he said, "let's take a walk."
Outside, she kept pace easily with long, athletic legs. In other circumstances, Remo might have complimented Stacy Armitage on her appearance, but today, it would have felt like hitting on a widow at her husband's funeral.