longer?”
“It better be soon, before you decide to draw any more attention to yourself.”
I stared at the vent, recognizing the voices immediately.
“Cool your jets, bro. I’ve done nothing to implicate myself.”
“Says you. I saw the looks in people’s eyes last night. They think something funny’s going on.”
“Hey, if you stick to the script, no one’s gonna suspect a thing. I’ve got news for you. This isn’t my first time out. I know what I’m doing.”
“Stu’s going to be pissed about the collateral damage.”
“Isobel and Dolly? Look, Stu’s always pissed about something. He’s a pig-headed SOB with a foul temper. But he knows what it’s like in the trenches. He’ll be singing a different tune once we pull the trigger.”
I sucked in my breath. Trigger? Oh, my God. They were packing guns?
“No more mistakes. We have to strike, and get out. So … we’re doing it today.”
“Change of heart?”
“Yah, the Miceli broad scares me. She’s a ticking time bomb. I think if she gets a hair up her butt and starts snooping around, she could ruin everything.”
Two toilets whooshed at the same time.
“Not a chance. If she sticks her nose where it doesn’t belong, I know exactly how to deal with her.”
“You must have a damned death wish to—”
“Not my idea, bro. It’s Stu’s.”
Water running. The sound of paper towels being ripped from dispensers.
Erik Ishmael laughed a truly evil laugh. “Hey, I’m pumped. Let’s wrap it up. I’m ready to put another notch in my belt.”
I stood frozen in place as the door banged shut again.
OhmigodOhmigodOhmigod. Erik and Alex. They were both killers! There was no ancient curse. These guys were hired killers with a contract to take out someone other than the two women they’d already killed. And they were doing it today!
As the ferry boomed into a trough and climbed the next swell, the deck pitched beneath my feet, slamming me face first into the stall’s metal partition, backward against the wall, then flat onto my butt. I smacked into the toilet bowl as we bucked another wave, and as I felt a stream of warm liquid ooze from my nose, I realized with horror that someone on our tour was being targeted for murder.
One of us was going to be taken out today.
The question was, who?
SEVENTEEN
WE STAGGERED OFF THE ferry like the bedraggled survivors of the original Poseidon Adventure, only with drier clothes. The group had exhausted the supply of motion sickness bags halfway through the forty-five minute trip, but the staff promised to have a fresh supply on hand for the return journey. Not that it mattered. If the majority ruled, we’d be returning to the mainland by a method of transportation less traumatizing than the ferry.
“I don’t know about the rest of you, but me and Helen are taking the train back,” vowed Dick Teig as he and Helen shuffled onto dry land.
“Me, too,” said Osmond, whose coloring was slowly starting to pinken up.
I walked beside them, arm in arm with Alice, whose complexion was still only slightly less green than creamed peas. “I hate to be the one to break it to you, guys, but there’s no train.”
“Are there any plans to get one?” asked Dick Stolee, who was pausing every couple of steps in apparent hopes that the pavement would stop shifting.
“It’s kind of hard laying track across a six-mile stretch of ocean.”
“That’s all right,” announced Helen. “We don’t mind waiting.”
I was fortunate not to have lost my cookies on the ride over, but my nose had bled all over my raincoat, and I could feel a lump forming on my forehead, so I looked as bad as everyone else, if not worse.
Our bus was waiting at the end of the quay. The wind was still gusting, the sky had clouded over with storm clouds, and the damp sea air was sending a chill through my bones. It was a miserable day to be anywhere other than in front of a cozy fire. And if it started to drizzle, I suspected we’d have a hard time convincing people to even step off the bus, which meant they wouldn’t get to explore the Italian Chapel, or the Ring of Brodgar, or Skara Brae.
I glanced toward the sky and prayed for rain.
“Open seating today,” Wally announced as I delivered Alice to the base of the stepwell. “So, sit anywhere.”
As I waited for Alice to clear the stairs, I felt Bernice close ranks behind me. “Are you planning to climb aboard or are you waiting for a