He smiled. “We have always been together for as long as I can remember. But she is devoted to her grandfather and I’m afraid that as long as she is taking care of him she won’t marry me.”
“Have you asked her grandfather for permission to court her?”
“Not yet. I’m not sure I would like the answer. What about you? Do your parents know about . . . ?”
“Definitely not.” Considering her sheltered East Coast upbringing—her physician mother and architect father making sure she was exposed to only the finest members of Boston society—Sam was an anomaly. A dreamer who wasn’t caught up in the trappings of social standings or privilege. Someone who would take a chance. Even a risk. And if that didn’t work, he’d come up with Plan B.
That’s it. That’s what she needed. A Plan B. Wait a minute, first she needed a Plan A.
She took another sip, then looked over at Dimitris. “It’s settled then. As soon as it’s dark, we’re cutting these ties and getting out of here. And when we do, you’re going to find Zoe. And I’m going to find my North Star.”
“Remi?”
“What?”
“Exactly how are we getting out?”
She shifted around, eyeing the cases of soda behind them. Until this afternoon’s visit with Ilya, they’d seen only one guard at a time tasked with watching them. She hoped that arrangement wouldn’t change. “We could hit a guard over the head with one of those cases. Between the two of us, we can take him down.” She looked over at Dimitris and outlined her Plan A.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Sam was heartened when he learned that Nikos’s cousin Valerios actually owned a cigarette boat and was willing to let him borrow it for the night—as long as he promised to take good care of it. About twenty minutes later, plans made, they walked out to the dock to find Valerios disembarking from the oldest, most derelict-looking cigarette boat Sam had ever seen. Sam could only stare, wondering how it could still be seaworthy.
“She is a beauty, yes?” Valerios said, his accent even thicker than Nikos’s.
“She’s definitely . . . unexpected.”
“I take the engines out and put them together myself. Good as new. Better than new.”
Judging from the shape and condition of the hull, new had to have been a good thirty or more years ago, Sam thought.
Valerios, not noticing his reaction, grinned. “Wait until you see her fly across the water. You will never believe it, I promise.”
Had the situation not been so dire, Sam might have shared in Valerios’s enthusiasm over what he could only assume was a labor of love. Anyone who knew anything about boats could surely recognize that it had been, a long, long time ago, a thing of beauty.
“Exactly how fast can she go?”
Valerios shrugged. “Eighty? Probably ninety. Who’s to say. I never go that fast. Come, come. I’ll show you.”
Sam hopped in, putting his hand on the cracked leather seat back, hoping to get a look at the engines. But before he had both feet in the boat, Valerios was turning the key. Fully expecting the engine to sputter and die, the twin engines gave a low rumble. Then they roared like a lion.
Valerios clapped Sam on the back. “Like I say, she will fly.”
* * *
—
Approaching the Mirage unnoticed in the borrowed old but well-loved cigarette boat had taken Sam far longer than he’d anticipated. The larger vessel was anchored a few miles offshore, the bow facing inland. Two guards took turns making periodic rounds before meeting up again. In the hour that Sam and Nikos had been watching them, both seemed more concerned with looking for threats coming from the island than from the open sea. To make sure their attention stayed toward the shore, Nikos enlisted a few of his friends to drive their boats in a manner that deserved scrutiny so that Sam could approach the yacht from behind.
So far it had worked, and when he was within hearing distance Sam cut the motor, allowing his boat to drift forward until he reached the swim dock at the stern of the Mirage. He tied the boat to the rail, climbed aboard, then made his way up the aft steps, coming out on an upper deck with a Jacuzzi, a bar, and plenty of plush chairs filled with colorful cushions for guests to take in the view.
Hiding behind the bar, Sam waited for the guard to make his rounds. From his observations, the guard made regular ten-minute checks on something located mid-deck on the starboard side. Anything in there warranting that sort of attention was exactly where Sam wanted to investigate first.
He waited for the man to resume his rounds. The moment it was clear, Sam crossed the deck, and headed down the stairs into a narrow hallway. After guesstimating it as the potential location on the boat to keep captives, he worked his way down the hallway checking doors until he reached the last one. It was secured with a slide-bolt lock.
He listened and, hearing nothing, slid the bolt, then partially opened the door, whispering, “Remi . . . ?”
The room was dark and Sam opened the door wider to investigate. He whispered again, “Remi.” From the corner of his eye, he saw something large and square flying down at him. The object squarely struck his head, then exploded. Cans burst out, clattering to the floor, and he right along with them. At the same time, someone came at him from the opposite direction. Dazed, his hand shot out, blocked the blow, catching Remi by her wrist, holding tight. “It’s me,” he said.