Dawn Patrol (7 page)

I glanced over my shoulder at Kevin. He was carving, rushing ahead of the barrel. I focused on the shore, feeling the press of the massive wave behind me. The wave slowed, and I glanced back.

Kevin was gone.

chapter fifteen

I carved out of the wave and lay down on my board. My heart was thumping. But I didn't have long to rest. The next wave was coming in, and it looked angry.

I couldn't see Kevin anywhere, just white foaming water where the wave had crashed. I looked toward the shallow reef and spotted a surfboard, just the tip, bobbing in the foam. But I didn't see Kevin. I started to swim back out. Where was Jose on his Jet Ski? He was supposed to make sure Kevin came up on the other side.

I heard the whine of an engine, and Alana was beside me, standing tall on her Jet Ski. “Where's your friend?” she yelled.

“I don't know. He didn't come out. There's a bit of his board over there.” The next wave crashed down. I clung to the side of the Jet Ski until the surge passed. I looked at the rocks once the water had receded. Something moved. I paddled out to get a better look. It was Kevin, clinging to the side of a rock.

“He's over there!” I yelled.

“There's another wave coming in. He's going to get battered,” said Alana.

“We have to go get him,” I said, releasing my board and pulling myself up on the Jet Ski.

“There'll be no room for him if we both go,” Alana said. She rolled off the Jet Ski into the water. “You go get him.” She grabbed hold of my board, pulled herself onto it and started paddling to shore.

I slid forward, clamped the gas and shot off. The reef was almost entirely exposed. The bottom of the Jet Ski hit the coral briefly and whined as the jets sucked air. The next wave was pulling hard. I could feel the force of it under the Jet Ski as I drew closer to the rocks. Kevin tried to climb on top of the rock to avoid being crashed by the incoming wave. I turned sharply and cut toward the rocks.

“Kevin!” I yelled. I was twenty feet from the rock. The wave was beginning to break. “Get ready to jump!”

The Jet Ski smashed into the reef again, bounced into the air and landed in deeper water. It struck another bit of the reef and screamed to a halt.

Kevin looked at the wave. “Get out of here, Luca! You're not going to make it.”

I rocked back and forth, fighting with the Jet Ski. It was stuck on a cleft in the reef. I needed to tilt it off. I didn't look at the incoming wave. There was nothing I could do but get the Jet Ski off the reef and move out of the way.

“Get ready to jump!” I yelled again.

I stepped on the reef and felt the slice of a sharp edge on my ankle. Water trickled under the ski. Soon the wave would smash on top of us, plowing Kevin and me into the rocks. There was no way we would survive. I had to get the Jet Ski off the reef.

I jammed my foot painfully onto the coral. The Jet Ski didn't move. I got off, gunned the gas and pushed as hard as I could. Somehow the ski shifted off the reef into deeper water. I flung myself back on and leaned forward. I was five feet away from the rock. “Jump, Kevin. Jump!”

Kevin dropped down and landed on the back of the Jet Ski. The impact of his weight on the rear of the Jet Ski thrust us forward. We cleared the rocks just as the wave swept in. I turned toward shore, and we cruised in on the wave's power.

I let the Jet Ski glide in to shore. When we reached shallow water, Kevin jumped off and sprinted up the shoreline. I pulled the key from the ignition and took off after him. Kevin and I had played this game before. Tag, touch football, soccer, it didn't matter—I was faster than him. Even with torn-up feet, I caught up with him and knocked him to the sand. He rolled over and pushed me off.

I pinned his arms down with my knees and leaned back on his stomach. “What the hell are you doing?” I yelled at him.

“Get off. He can't see you with me.”

“Who? What are you talking about?”

Kevin struggled to get free. “Man, I never should have ridden that wave. I knew you'd be out there.”

“Kevin, what are you talking about? What's wrong with you?”

He was looking out to where the other Jet Skis bobbed in the water. “Follow me into the jungle,” he said, trying to shift me off him again.

“What? No way.”

“Please, Luca, you don't understand. It's…My parents are alive. I am so close to…”

“What?” I shifted off him slightly.

Blood dribbled down his forehead. He was breathing in quick gulps. His arms were all marked up from where he had smashed against the rock.

“He has my parents, Luca. They're alive.”

chapter sixteen

I rolled off him into the sand as Alana walked up with my board under her arm.

“You survived?” she said.

“Just,” I said.

“And this must be the mythical Kevin.”

Kevin looked at his arms and legs. Blood mixed with the salt water on his skin.

“What are you talking about, Kevin? Your parents are alive?” I said.

He looked out at the surfers and Jet Skis again. “Just come into the jungle, Luca. We'll go behind those palms so he can't see me.”

“Who, Kevin? Who can't see you?” I asked.

“Delgado.”

I followed Kevin into the jungle and sat on a log. Alana stayed on the beach with the Jet Ski and my board.

“What is this all about?” I asked.

Kevin peered around a palm. The beach was still empty. A few surfers were being pulled in, either beaten and worn from riding the waves or having decided they weren't good enough to be out there in the first place.

“Where is he?” Kevin asked.

“Who?”

“Delgado. You were with him, right?”

“He's still out there, as far as I know. He wouldn't tow me into the wave.”

“And where's Esme?”

“With him, I guess. Why?” I asked.

Kevin stared at me. “He…he has my parents. They came down here to get away from that stupid investigation. They didn't die in the plane crash. Are you sure Esme didn't come in?”

“Who told you they're still alive?” I asked.

“Delgado. But it makes sense. My dad is a good pilot. He would have known how to crash land a plane in bad weather.”

“Wait,” I said. “Back up. Delgado contacted you? When?”

“About six months ago. He called and told me my parents had survived and were in hiding. He was protecting them. He said they couldn't contact me because they thought I was being watched and my phone and email monitored.”

“But no one noticed he called you?”

“I don't know, Luca. Delgado was very cryptic. I came down here so I could talk to him.”

“Why didn't you contact the police?”

“If I had talked to anyone in the US and they found out my parents were alive, they would have arrested them.”

It all seemed so crazy. “So, Delgado contacted you and…what? What does he want from you?”

“He wants to finish my parents' hotel on the other side of the island.”

“We saw it,” I said. “I didn't know your dad had invested in a place here.”

“The plan is for Delgado to run it. This area is becoming a destination spot. And with the waves here, the hotel will be filled with surfers year-round. The hotel wasn't part of my dad's business. It was something he was doing on the side. My parents wanted to retire down here. But Delgado said they had to get away from the investigation, so they staged the plane crash. But after the crash, construction had to stop.”

“What exactly was the investigation about?”

“My dad was being investigated for some kind of fraud. I guess he figured eventually someone would find out about the hotel and it would be taken away from him, like everything else was. So he put it in Delgado's name. Not that my dad is guilty. The whole investigation is bogus anyway.”

“I figured it was. Your dad is a good person.”

“Exactly. The government thinks my dad has been defrauding a group of investors. But he didn't know anything about it. Before they came down to Panama, he caught one of his managers doing something illegal. But it was going to be impossible to prove my dad didn't know what had been happening. So he and my mom came down here for a while. Until things calmed down.”

I didn't understand the business world Mr. Taylor moved in. He was a great surfer and a good guy. He wouldn't have been involved in something underhanded. “Why didn't you come here with them?” I asked.

“I was supposed to meet up with them later, after graduation.”

“I don't get it. If your parents are here, what does Delgado need you for?”

“Because of my parents' life insurance.” Kevin looked away. The waves were coming in heavy, heaving swells. I watched as a surfer was tossed off his board and disappeared into the angry, frothing mess of a wave.

“What about the life insurance?” I asked.

“Who's the blond you're with?” Kevin asked.

“Alana. We just met the other day.”

Kevin winked at me. “She's hot.”

“Yeah, and back to you, Kevin. What about your parents' life insurance?”

“I've been giving it all to Delgado to help finish the hotel. But I can only take out a certain amount every month. So it may be a couple of weeks before we can get the construction going again. And then I'll get to see my parents.”

“Kevin, how do you even know that…?”

He stared at me. “That my parents are alive?”

“Yeah.”

“I just know, Luca. I just know. Delgado says it's better if I don't see them. There was too much heat from the investigation. When the construction is done and the investigators have figured out what actually happened with my dad's business, then we can be together again.”

“So you are certain…?”

“Luca,” Kevin said. He leaned against the tree and stared at the ground. His hair had grown out and dangled in front of his face. “What else am I supposed to believe?” He spun around and looked back out at the break.

Alana came up from the beach and approached the log. “Are you two okay?”

“Yeah, but could you go out and see if Esme and Delgado are still at the break?” I asked.

“Sure.” She tilted her head to one side. “Are you coming with me?”

“No, I need to stay here,” I said, handing her the key.

Kevin looked at me again. “I'm not going anywhere. You caught me.”

Alana took off toward the water. A moment later she was bouncing out toward the break on her Jet Ski.

“It all makes sense,” Kevin said. “You have to admit it does.”

“I guess,” I said, but I was skeptical. I knew Kevin's dad, and he never would have run from a fight. Not even one with federal investigators. He loved LA. I couldn't see him chucking everything, including his only son, to run away from an investigation. “Do you have any proof they're alive, Kevin? Anything at all?”

He banged his chest. “I know it, Luca. They're here.”

Alana disappeared behind the waves. I felt a tinge of panic for her. The waves were big, and it wasn't easy to steer a Jet Ski through them.

“Why did you run away from us?” I asked.

“Delgado said not to speak to anyone for a while. He said anyone might have been sent to investigate me and the plane crash. This is a big money thing.”

“I don't doubt it.” I spotted Alana coming back in from the other break. She must have gone out one side, then cut across and searched the other line as well. She pulled the Jet Ski up to the beach.

“You can come out of there,” she called from the shore. “They're gone.”

“What?” Kevin said. “Crap. He must have seen us together. Now…Where's Jose? I need to talk to him.” Kevin came around the tree and down onto the beach. He tried to grab the Jet Ski key from Alana.

“He's not out there either,” Alana said, pulling the key to her stomach.

“Where did he go?” Kevin asked.

Alana stepped away from him. “I don't know. But all three of them are gone.”

Kevin looked at me, his face blank and beaten. Blood was smeared across his forehead. “Where did they go, Luca?” he said. “What's happened?”

“I think they've got Esme,” I said.

He looked up and down the beach. “Maybe they came in to shore and we didn't see them. Let's go to Delgado's house and see if they're there.”

chapter seventeen

We moved through the jungle to the edge of the beach in front of Delgado's hut. Delgado and Jose's Jet Skis weren't there, but two boats were.

“Can you see anyone?” Kevin asked.

There wasn't any movement around Delgado's. “No,” I said. “Let's go to my hut. We can see inside Delgado's from there.” We continued along the edge of the jungle and darted inside my hut.

“There's no one in Delagado's,” Alana said.

Kevin looked at me. “Luca, where did they take her?”

I didn't want to say anything, but it was hard not to point out the obvious. “I have a feeling Delgado isn't telling you the whole truth,” I said.

“What do you mean?”

“Isn't it clear? He needs your inheritance to finish the hotel for himself, to run on his own.”

“No, he's protecting my parents. He's hiding them from the investigators and helping them finish the hotel. He's keeping them safe, that's all.”

“So why would he take Esme?”

Kevin sat down on the bed and put his head in his hands. “I don't know. Maybe he thinks Esme is here to turn in my parents.” He looked up at us. “We have to wait. He'll be back. He wants to run the hotel with my parents. It means everything to him.”

“So much that he has taken your parents and Esme hostage?” I said.

Kevin shook his head and scowled. “Not hostage,” he said. “They're hiding in case someone comes down here to investigate. He's protecting them, covering for them.”