Crystal Blue (Buck Reilly Adventure Series Book 3), John Cunningham [top fiction books of all time TXT] 📗

“You find Baldy?” I said.

“Who’re your friends?” He wasn’t smiling.

“These guys have been helping me search—”

“They’re hoodlums,” he said, “some of the worst in the islands—your islands.”

He wasn’t whispering, and he clearly had no fear of these men. He stared at them a long moment, then finally stood up. I helped him off the boat and onto the dock.

“My legs mighty stiff,” he said.

He glanced toward Foxy’s and raised an eyebrow at the hordes of people crawling over the dirt road and beach on their way to the main event.

“Where’d you find the Cigarette?” I said.

“Soper’s Hole.” He shrugged. “Keys were in it, so I figured I could strand him over there and come find you.”

I smiled. “You think he’ll stay there?”

“Not for long.”

“What do you mean?”

Valentine pointed at the horizon. The moon was now in view above the water. It looked huge now that the sun had nearly set.

“Full moon,” he said. “Baldy never misses the full moon party at the Bomba Shack. Sells mushroom tea, gets tourist women all trippy and takes ‘em down the beach for funnin.’”

Light was fading fast. “Can you get us there in the dark?”

“Shoot, boy.”

Right. I smiled and turned back toward my team of misfits. Moment of truth.

“You guys ready for some action?”

Boom-Boom and Diego looked at each other, then turned back to me.

“If Baldy can lead us to the Russians,” Diego said, “we’re in.”

“Long as my shit’s safe in your piece-a-shit plane, damn straight, brudda,” Boom-Boom said.

“Right.” I said. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”

VALENTINE NAVIGATED BY MOONLIGHT so bright it seemed like silver daylight. Ray and Lenny remained on Jost Van Dyke in case celebrities needed to be shuttled off later, but it would have to be by boat since Lenny had spotted the bales in the plane. His political aspirations and Ray’s spastic colon made them risk averse. They had no intention of going near my old Goose.

Once we cleared Great Harbor, Valentine pressed the throttles down and the Cigarette surged forward. Whether it was from the wind or the thrill of driving the water rocket, my octogenarian friend smiled. The rest of us were pressed into our seats and holding on for dear life as the boat cut through the water and roared like the start of the Indianapolis 500. The dark hulk of Tortola filled the western horizon, with only a smattering of lights on the otherwise colorless silhouette. Valentine didn’t need lights, and he didn’t need GPS. He knew every road, hill, and contour on his native island, so he aimed the Cigarette toward Capoons Bay, the location of the Bomba Shack. The moon had risen well off the water now and lost that trompe l’oeil effect when close to the horizon. The night was clear, warm, and would have otherwise been a wonderful one for Adoption AID.

The armada of lights coming toward us from other boaters on their way to Foxy’s left me hollow. Not for me, but for what Crystal must be feeling with her show going forward while her husband was being diced up. I wondered if she felt a twinge of guilt at letting it go forward, but Crystal was Crystal. If the price of realizing hers and John’s dream was his being tortured and killed, so be it.

I was surprised at the sudden glow cast off the white beach of Sandy Spit ahead. The moon’s brightness should draw Baldy to the Bomba Shack. Every muscle in my body felt knotted as the zero hour for the concert got closer. We had to find Baldy and get a lead to Thedford before the show started, and the burden was on me. That’s all there was to it.

The North Shore of Tortola consisted of several wide and loosely defined bays. Capoons Bay was in the middle, and as we got closer to the island, Valentine steered us hard to the south. After running in that direction a few minutes, I tapped him hard on the shoulder and leaned in close—

“Where’re you headed?” My words were lost into the roar of wind.

He squinted at me and shook his head. I yelled my question again.

He pulled back on the throttles and everyone fell forward out of their seats.

I pointed east. “The Bomba Shack’s that way—”

“We go straight there, Baldy’ll see us and know to skedaddle,” Valentine said. “He ain’t stupid and you can’t hide this devil machine.”

“So what’s the plan?”

“My car’s over at the West End ferry dock.” Valentine smiled. “We can sneak in from the road a lot easier.”

With that, Valentine jammed the throttles forward. After we passed the western tip of the island, he again cut the wheel and aimed us between the mainland and Little Thatch Island. Just past that, the bars, restaurants, and marina of Soper’s Hole lit the southern area of the bay.

“What makes you so sure Baldy wouldn’t still be at Soper’s Hole?” I said. “Wouldn’t he be trying to find out who stole his boat?”

Valentine shook his head.

“Didn’t steal it. Left word with the dock boy I was borrowing it. Good or bad, everybody knows me on this island, so no way I could sneak off with the boy’s boat.” He shrugged. “Anyways, he knows the police been looking for him, so not like he was gonna call them.”

Once past Soper’s, I spotted a dark silhouette in the back of the harbor—the big blue yacht I’d originally seen days ago in Charlotte Amalie.

We pulled up to the ferry dock. There was a ferryboat at the pier along with a few boats and some dinghies, but not a soul in sight. The Customs office was closed.

Once the Cigarette was tied up, we assembled on the dock.

“I’m gonna miss that boat.” Valentine laughed. “First time I driven one in twenty years.”

“Now what?” I said.

“Let’s go find Bomba.”

Bomba, the shack’s proprietor, was a recluse of a man but also a native, so hopefully