At length, the streetlights flickered on outside and it was time.
Lee sat down by her again. "Let me have a few extra steps every time we get to a blind spot. If we get separated, find a boat with keys tonight, and get back to the mainland. From the open water side of that last buoy before the dock, Istanbul is north northwest, but anything north will get you to the mainland. If a boat tonight is a no-go, find cover and take the ferry back early tomorrow. Watch the passengers board, and if you don't see that guy, you be the last one on. If he corners you, unload on him and run. If all else fails, call Billy and he'll send someone for you. Billy can probably get you back from the Turkish government, but not if you're dead."
"Being honest here, I've had my fill of getting separated."
"I know," Lee answered softly. "But don't ever let that keep you from getting home to your boys."
Amanda glared at him. "Now you're just playing dirty."
Lee smiled. "When it comes to getting you home safe, I always will."
She sat there a moment longer, eyes closed and blew out a long breath. Amanda nodded to herself. "Let's get off this island."
One step at a time, they cleared the hallway, the stairs, and the lobby. At the front door, in the diminishing light, Lee looked left and Amanda right. Taking her hand, they backtracked two blocks and cut four blocks over, giving the last known location of their assailant a wide berth. Eventually they had to turn north, and by a zig zagging route, drew up to the end of the long wharf, well away from the ferry slip. They picked their way silently and carefully between the scattered crates, stopping often to listen. Much smaller boats were moored along this section of the dock. It was dark, and the nighttime lighting was luckily rather poor.
Lee carefully led Amanda into the space between two stacks of shipping crates and knelt down. "Let's watch for a little while," he told her in a barely audible whisper. Amanda nodded and they settled in to observe. Other than the slap of the water against the boats and pilings, and the occasional call of a gull, it was absolutely dead.
Amanda pulled the pashmina down around her shoulders. "You weren't kidding when you said this place shuts down at night."
"It's a ghost town without the market going." Lee squinted and scanned the boardwalk. Behind them, the gates to the bazaar were shut tight and the storefront windows were dark. In the stillness, it would be hard to imagine a place this dark and desolate crammed with panicking tourists and gunfire, if he hadn't seen it firsthand.
Lee scooted over to peek around one of crates. "How do you feel about taking a swim?
"It's not my first inclination," Amanda admitted. "What's on your mind?"
"We haven't seen our man, but we need to assume he's waiting for us out here somewhere. If we cross in the open, we'll be sitting ducks. If we go back out and to the end of the last block behind us, we can get into the waist deep water off the beach, swim back in under the dock to grab a boat from the water side. Less chance he sees us."
"Maybe so," she pondered, biting her lip. "But what if I can do you one better?"
"I'm listening," Lee said.
"Okay, do you see that hatch in the pier over there? And the same thing, like twenty yards past it?" Amanda pointed off to their right. In the dim, orange glare of the sodium lights, a square access door in the decking was faintly visible. "If that row of hatches runs the length of the pier, that means there's one right in front of us, and another about twenty yards off to our left. It looks like the overhead light down there is out, it's pitch dark. I don't think we want the big fishing boats down there at the very end, but if we double back and cut through that grassy area next to the warehouse parking lot and hop that little fence, we should be practically on top of the spot where the next hatch is, completely in the dark. If it's open, we can go down the ladder and swim back up here under the dock, and right up to any boat we want. And never have to cross under a light."
Lee nodded. "Much closer. And if there's no hatch, we go out to the beach and swim back in."
"Let's go," Amanda said.
Lee drew his gun for insurance, and making sure Amanda was ready to move, started back the way they came, again stopping carefully before each open space and looking for a moment before crossing. Once they were past the corner of the last warehouse, they turned into a little parking lot. The lot was all but empty, and out of the shadow of the building, it would be their longest exposure. They raced across the open lot and ducked behind the only car and got very still.
For two full minutes they listened for a sound other than the water, but there was nothing. Past the car, they inched into the short grassy lawn between the parking area and a low rail fence that marked the start of the pier. Lee slid under the bottom rail on his belly and felt around on the deck boards for an indication there was a hatch. Amanda did the same. They inched around in the dark for a little while, board to board, back and forth.
"Amanda, over here." Lee felt around the edges of the door inside the frame and found a cutout handle.
She crawled over to him, looking in both directions as she went.
"Let's hope this thing is quiet," he whispered. Getting to his knees, Lee pulled up, and after a little resistance, the hatch gave way almost noiselessly.
"Please tell me there's a ladder," Amanda whispered.
"Yes," Lee confirmed, reaching down, and finding the first rung. "Me first."
"Give me your gun."
At this point, Lee was ready to accede to any request. He handed it over, and Amanda zipped both pistols up in her bag. She tied the strap up very short, so she could thread her arm through and cinch the bag up on her shoulder. It might not work but it was worth a try to keep it up out of the water.
Lee eased over the side and started down the ladder just far enough that he could still reach the top of the hatch. Amanda joined him, and together they lowered the door until it closed flush with the wharf. They huddled there together out of sight, an arm each slung over the rung next to them. Amanda finally allowed herself the liberty of snaking her free arm around Lee's neck and hugging him hard.
He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close. "Thank you for being so observant. And brave. And tough. And focused. For the disaster today has been, you've been perfect, Amanda. Nobody could have done better. Absolutely no one."
Amanda drew in a long breath and held it. Finally letting go of it, she rasped a two word reply into his neck. "Shut up."
"Yes, ma'am."
Lee gingerly descended the ladder, which got slimier with each rung. Amanda followed at a snail's pace. Once they we both floating with a hand on the bottom rung, Lee let go and paddled as quietly as he could to the next piling. Amanda followed with a careful, one-armed stroke, keeping as much of her bag, and by extension their weapons, above the water as possible. For several minutes, they inched along and listened at turns, until they drew up to the smaller docks a few stairs down from the main wharf, where the smaller boats were moored.
Amanda hugged a piling from one side and Lee the other.
"Where to?" Amanda whispered.
"As far out toward the end as we can get." In front of them, three rows of smaller docks ran out into the small bay. He swam toward the first boat, which wasn't much more than a dinghy. One by one, they paddled under the mooring lines and passed further out into the water. Three boats from the far end, Lee grabbed the edge of the dock and waited for Amanda to catch up. "How do you like this one?" he asked.
In the limited light, Amanda could still tell that the hull was sturdy, and rather immaculate compared to the dozen others they had passed. In the slightly brackish water, a coating of green algae clung to everything in contact with the water. This boat's hull was scrubbed clean from bow to stern. Even the bow line was a pristine white. Somebody loved this boat. "It's beautiful," she mouthed, and he nodded.
Lee glided along the hull to the back of the boat. The was a short ladder and platform in the back. After he carefully pulled himself up out of the water, Amanda reached the ladder, and he helped her up. Staying low, they inched forward to the boat's controls. It was a keyed ignition. Before he tore it apart trying to start it, Lee took a minute to feel around under the seat cushions, hoping he'd get lucky and find a key. Amanda did likewise, checking the edges of the carpet and feeling under the dash, to no avail. In his exploring, Lee did notice that the battery cables under the back seat were disconnected. He quickly reattached them, and with power to the gauges, he moved forward and was relieved to see the fuel gauge was registering a little over half full. He rolled on his back and scooted under the knee space, wishing for the first time in the last hour that he had more light to work with. Just as he started feeling out the wires under the dash, a whispered "Yes!" erupted from Amanda.
Lee pushed up on his elbows. Amanda was smiling for the first time since they shopped in the market. A seat cushion was propped up along the back wall and she had pulled a lap full of life vests out of the under-seat storage. She was holding a key and pointing to a little Velcro pocket on the front of one of the vests. Amanda shoved the pile to the side and stretched out to hand the key to Lee, who wasted no time in inserting it in the ignition. It fit.
"I'm going to go out and push the boat away from the dock, stay here in case we need a quick start."
Amanda nodded, and prayed silently, for about the hundredth time in the day, as her partner slid off the platform and back into the inky water. She got up to the controls, stayed low, and waited. Key, choke, throttle, wheel. It wasn't any more complicated than the boat her father had used to take her fishing as girl. She had done this dozens of times. She could do it now.
Soon, she felt the boat start drifting away from the dock. It was extremely slow going, moving a 16-foot speed boat under Lee's paddle power, but move it did. It finally cleared the sterns of the boats on either side. She could hear Lee splashing a little as he swam fore to grab the dangling bow line. By centimeters, they turned left, crept forward and cleared the end of the dock. The whole exercise had probably taken 10 minutes of non-stop swimming, and Lee, who had spent all afternoon trying to ignore how badly his ribs and head hurt, had to be exhausted.
He pulled himself up in the back and lay there for a moment, panting for air. "Go pull in the bow line?" he asked.
Amanda crawled fore and pulled it onto the deck. The last thing they needed was to get it caught in the prop.
Lee scooted up next to her. "If this doesn't work and we have company, go over the bow and under the dock. It's nasty under there, and there's only about six inches of airspace, but it's cover. Work your way to the middle of the next row over and I'll find you. Are the guns dry?"
Amanda stretched out for the bag and snagged the strap. She unzipped it and pulled out both pistols.
Lee dropped the magazine from both and shook them. Miraculously, hardly a drop of water came out of either of them. "That is outstanding. How the heck did you do that?"
"Lifeguard training in college. You have to learn to swim with one arm so you can keep the victim's head above water on the other shoulder. It's just muscle memory," Amanda explained.
Lee loaded the clips again. He handed the CZ to Amanda. She was watching him with an inscrutable expression on her face.
It was now or never. Lee palmed the back of her neck and kissed her on the forehead. "We gotta go."
"Do you think Fred ever gave Francine good luck kisses?"
"Fred still has functional use of his limbs, so I'm gonna guess not." Lee winked at her and climbed into the driver's seat.
Lee pushed in the choke and started the motor. It rumbled to life effortlessly. He slowly released the choke and pushed up the throttle. It wasn't exactly a jet boat, but it pulled away at a good clip and they made for open water. He motioned for Amanda to come near. Over the noise of the motor, Lee shouted as he shut off the running lights. "If that guy is worth a nickel, he's already in a boat and about to follow us. Go back there and kick the stern light into oblivion. It's reflective, and it wouldn't take much of a light from another boat to see it. If he can't see us, it will be harder to follow."
Amanda did, and then pulled on a life jacket. She took another to Lee and held the wheel while he buckled into his. She stationed herself in the back, watching for any sign of traffic behind them. Running nearly flat out, they would be to the shore in 20 minutes. The lights of the coastline were visible in the distance, and the whole coastline was a highway, with easy access to the city. With no tail, they could motor farther west, all the way up to the marina located four blocks from their hotel.
All they had to do was get to dry land, and they would be on equal footing with anyone who might interfere, which was way better odds than they had enjoyed all day.