Purgatory Ridge

Grace stared in disbelief. “You… killed Edward?”

“I thought that with him out of the way, I’d have a chance. But he still had you, even dead.” Lindstrom waved it off, as if it were really nothing to him now. “The point is that when it became clear to me that you would never love me, it also became clear that someday you’d leave me. Now, that was a thing I couldn’t abide. For many reasons.”

“You… planned all this?”

“Meticulously, Grace.”

“How’d you know Wes?” John LePere asked.

“He told you a story once, I believe, about a covert operation he was involved in as a SEAL that sank a Libyan tanker. That was my operation. Wes impressed me as a man with many skills and few scruples. I tracked him down when I decided to get rid of Edward.”

Cork coughed and groaned. Jo longed to hold him, to give him some comfort, to ease his pain. She glanced at Stevie and saw that his eyes were glazed. He stared at her as if he didn’t see her at all, as if he saw nothing anymore. She understood. How could so brief a life, so protected an existence, comprehend such horror as he’d been through?

Bridger opened the door and stepped in dripping rain. “All set. Here’s the remote detonator.” He handed the device to Lindstrom.

“We’re going for a boat ride,” Karl Lindstrom said to Jo and the others. “I’ll tell you up-front that you won’t be coming back. Now, I can kill you right here, or you can walk to the boats and have a few more precious minutes of life. I’d prefer not to have to carry you down to the dock, but the choice is yours.” He glanced at his watch. “You’d better decide fast. I have to get back to Grace Cove before I’m missed.”

He waited. LePere finally stood up. So did Grace and Scott. Stevie, who’d never sat down, stood blank-faced and rigid.

“You have to get up, Cork,” Jo whispered desperately. “Please get up.”

Cork slowly worked his way to his hands and knees, then pulled himself up by holding on to one of the tables. He stood, wavering, leaning heavily against Jo.

Karl Lindstrom said, “Give him a hand, Wes.”

“He’s all bloody.”

“So buy yourself a new shirt tomorrow. You’ll be able to afford it.”

“Why don’t you help him?”

“Somebody’s got to hold the gun.”

“Shit.” Bridger worked his shoulder under Cork’s arm and walked him to the door.

“Let’s go,” Lindstrom said, and he followed behind them.

They stumbled into the storm, walking a muddy path to the dock. Even with her arms bound behind her back, Jo managed to grab hold of the front of Stevie’s shirt, and she pulled him along behind her. He followed like a zombie. Bridger had tied the stolen motor launch to the stern of the Anne Marie with a tow line. They all climbed aboard LePere’s boat. Bridger hauled Cork over the gunwale and let him drop in the cockpit.

“That’s as far as I take him,” Bridger declared.

Lindstrom herded the others out of the rain into the deckhouse of the Anne Marie, but he left Cork where he’d fallen. “Just get him out of the way so we don’t trip over him,” he instructed Bridger.

Looking back, Jo saw Wesley Bridger roll Cork against the side of the cockpit, where he lay like a dead fish waiting to be gutted.

Lindstrom directed them to the other end of the deckhouse where a companionway to the left of the helm station led below. At the bottom of the short flight of steps, they entered the small, forward cabin that had a V berth shaped to the bow. Lindstrom shoved LePere to the floor. Jo and the others crammed themselves onto the berth. Bridger stepped down and joined his cohort.

“I’ll take her out. You keep them out of mischief,” Lindstrom said. He headed up to the wheel inside the deckhouse. Bridger closed the cabin door and stayed with the others belowdeck.

The Anne Marie pulled away from the dock. On the relatively calm water of Purgatory Cove, the boat rocked gently. As soon as Karl Lindstrom headed it out beyond the protection of the rocks, the bow began to buck wildly. Stevie sat beside Jo, stiff as a plastic doll. Grace and Scott were in the bunk on the other side of the V berth. LePere sat on the floor with his back against a door marked storage.

Bridger braced himself against the pitching of the boat and grinned at them. “Feels worse than it is. The waves are only three or four feet. Nothing, really. Relax and enjoy the ride.”

“Where are you taking us?” Grace asked.

“Not far. A mile or so out, just beyond where the lake bottom drops away. We want you deep.”

Jo thought about the remote detonator Bridger had handed to Lindstrom. She considered the motor launch in tow, and she understood. They meant to sink the Anne Marie and use the launch to return to Purgatory Cove.

Bridger seemed to discern her thought process. “We’re not going to blow you up,” he said. “We don’t want to attract attention with a big explosion and we don’t want any debris. No, I’ve rigged just enough of a charge to scuttle her. I figure it’ll take fifteen minutes, maybe twenty. Then you and the boat and all the evidence will be gone. But you won’t have to worry about that, because you’ll already be dead.”