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Back Deception Cove Save as PDF
Chapters (78)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Epigraph
  6. Prologue
  7. One
  8. Two
  9. Three
  10. Four
  11. Five
  12. Six
  13. Seven
  14. Eight
  15. Nine
  16. Ten
  17. Eleven
  18. Twelve
  19. Thirteen
  20. Fourteen
  21. Fifteen
  22. Sixteen
  23. Seventeen
  24. Eighteen
  25. Nineteen
  26. Twenty
  27. Twenty-One
  28. Twenty-Two
  29. Twenty-Three
  30. Twenty-Four
  31. Twenty-Five
  32. Twenty-Six
  33. Twenty-Seven
  34. Twenty-Eight
  35. Twenty-Nine
  36. Thirty
  37. Thirty-One
  38. Thirty-Two
  39. Thirty-Three
  40. Thirty-Four
  41. Thirty-Five
  42. Thirty-Six
  43. Thirty-Seven
  44. Thirty-Eight
  45. Thirty-Nine
  46. Forty
  47. Forty-One
  48. Forty-Two
  49. Forty-Three
  50. Forty-Four
  51. Forty-Five
  52. Forty-Six
  53. Forty-Seven
  54. Forty-Eight
  55. Forty-Nine
  56. Fifty
  57. Fifty-One
  58. Fifty-Two
  59. Fifty-Three
  60. Fifty-Four
  61. Fifty-Five
  62. Fifty-Six
  63. Fifty-Seven
  64. Fifty-Eight
  65. Fifty-Nine
  66. Sixty
  67. Sixty-One
  68. Sixty-Two
  69. Sixty-Three
  70. Sixty-Four
  71. Sixty-Five
  72. Sixty-Six
  73. Sixty-Seven
  74. Sixty-Eight
  75. Acknowledgments
  76. Discover More
  77. About the Author
  78. Also by Owen Laukkanen

They would find out, Harwood knew. One way or the other.

Fifty

Fifty

Lucy was gone.

Mason pushed himself to his feet, brushed dirt and pine needles from his knees, his chest. He picked up the shotgun and looked around the forest, listening to the drone of the helicopter fade away into nothing.

Beside him, Jess stood as well. “Where’s the dog?” she asked.

“Ran off.” He gestured to his right, along the south side of the lagoon, where the terrain rose gradually toward the pass and the dogleg. “Soon as that asshole blew a hole in your boat.”

“Ty’s boat,” Jess replied absently. “Not mine.”

Mason rested the shotgun on his shoulder and started off toward the waterline, the landing where they’d tied the skiff. He imagined he knew what he would see when he got there, and sure enough, the skiff was destroyed, shot clean through with six or seven rounds, lying deflated and ragged there on the rocks.

Shit.

Jess was calling Lucy’s name in the forest. Mason worked his way back to her, found her tracing the dog’s path around the south side of the cove, her rifle slung across her back and both hands to her mouth as she hollered.

“Skiff’s ruined,” he told her. She didn’t answer, just kept pushing her way through ferns and bog, climbing up the incline and calling for the dog.

“You hear me?” Mason asked her. “That skiff is destroyed. The troller’s settling in the stern too, where the grenade hit, and the wheelhouse is matchsticks. I don’t know that it’s not going to sink.”

Jess still didn’t respond. Took hold of a root and swung herself up a four-foot patch of wet rock, looked around the top and kept going.

“You sure she went this way?” she asked over her shoulder. “That damn dog is such a baby sometimes.”

He pulled himself up the rock after her. Muddied his pants, his hands. “Jess,” he said. “Are you listening to me? We need to find another way off this island, before they come back.”

She took another step. Then she turned around, slow. “There’s no other way, Burke.” There was something flat in her tone, in the way her eyes met his. “That’s the point. We’re stuck here until they come back to get us.”

“Bullshit,” he replied. “It’s only a mile to the mainland. We salvage what we can, make some kind of raft.”

“Current’s too strong. Even in the skiff, we’d get swept out to sea.” Jess turned around again. Pressed forward. “Lucy!”

“So, what?” Mason hurried to catch up to her. “You just want to sit here and wait?”

She didn’t answer, kept moving. Kept calling for the damn dog. Mason put his hand on her shoulder, light, and she spun around fast and knocked that hand clear.