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“Ahh. Hard one. You try to trick me, but...but, the rights of many really bad people should not mean more than the rights of one little bit bad person. I say let the friends go to jail. Okay? Fixed?”
His was the viewpoint of the average good man. And well said too. Clear as day, none of the wishy-washy stuff I told myself.
“Fixed.”
“S’not just me saying this. You know? My son shot a man once and he wanted to run but I told him no. He was good boy. He got out of prison and now he’s got a good wife, a little baby coming. Hmm?” He peered at me. “See?”
“I see. Yes.”
I let him talk for a while longer before I decided I’d spent enough time being his new friend. Jaz was tied up at the hut. It’d be cereal this morning, not fish. I drew in a long breath and stood up. My offer to help get the boat out to sea was accepted.
“It’s going to storm again today. But late,” he said as we trudged down the sand.
I waded out after him and we pulled up the anchor.
“Get in.”
I gave the poor guy a shove to help him climb into his boat, while I steadied the vessel with my hand.
He peered back at me, saluted sloppily. “Thank you, sir. Small storm. Little one. I’ll be fine. I hope your moral problem is now fixed.”
“It is. Yes.”
The people you meet in the middle of nowhere. Life isn’t always a box of chocolates. Hand still on the hull, I fingered the paper in my back pocket.
“Sit down. Let’s get you out into deeper water.”
Chapter 33
I’d been dying to pee and managed to wriggle out of the straps, since they were looser than normal, and to go outside to pee. If I didn’t get back in them, I might be in trouble. My head was telling me that even as I held his rifle across my hands.
The fucking thing shone where the morning sun lit it up, but the metal of the barrel was cold and oily on my palms.
I had the means of my escape in my grasp. Shit, shit, shit. Deep breath. Think. I peeked about, terrified he’d return and find me like this. Past the shipping crate, the huts, toward the beach and the palm trees on every side. The fishing rod was missing. No. Nowhere in sight.
Kill him? God no, my soul shrank at that idea. He’d know that too. I wasn’t a killer. He’d been kind as well as scary. Shit.
Decide. I had to do this properly and with courage, or not at all. And fast.
Could I shoot his leg? That might kill him anyway. I’d seen plenty of gunshot wounds in my early days as a reporter on the police beat. But...yes, I think I could.
I could.
Check if it’s loaded.
As I looked for the catch to release the magazine, a shadow moved in front of me, coming up from the beach. Him.
He’d seen me, what I was doing. As he advanced, the stark expression – rigid mouth and eyes as still as stone – said a nuclear holocaust was a minor disturbance compared to his fury.
“What are you doing, girl?”
Dumb question. He was trying to get close enough to grab the gun, or me.
Shit.
Clutching the rifle, and aiming it at him as I backed several yards, I shored up my crumbling willpower. I can do this!
“Stay there or I shoot!”
