Chapter 6 - The Broken Alibi
The silence of the Everglades closed in around them like a suffocating shroud, punctuated only by the low, guttural chug of Mercer’s idling patrol craft. The sawgrass rose eight feet high, slicing like serrated knives against Cody’s bare arms as he helped Maya step silently onto the squelching mud of the levee bank.
"Take Maya into the thick brush," Cody whispered to Logan, his voice barely a breath. "Brody, find two heavy branches. We aren't going to let them take her."
"Cody, they have automatic weapons," Logan whimpered, his eyes wide with horror, his muddy hands shaking. "We’re three teenagers with fishing gear. We can't fight these guys!"
"We don't have to fight their guns," Cody replied, his jaw locking into the stubborn, defiant set that had made him the most unrelenting linebacker in the county. "We know this swamp. They don't. They’re wearing fifty pounds of body armor and combat boots. Out here, that’s an anchor."
Mercer’s patrol boat bumped against the tangled reeds fifteen yards away. Two armed operatives in black tactical gear stepped off the bow, their combat boots sinking instantly into the deceptive, foot-deep black muck of the marsh. Their weapons were raised, sweep-lights cutting through the dense green canopy.
"Spread out," Mercer ordered from the deck of the boat, lighting a cigarette with callous indifference. "Check the skiff first. If the kids resist, put two in the chest and one in the head. No survivors, no loose ends."
Cody crouched behind the massive root system of an ancient bald cypress, clutching a heavy, knotty branch he had ripped from the deadwood. Through the leaves, he watched the first mercenary approach the abandoned skiff. The man leaned over the gunwale to inspect the empty laptop bag.
Snap!
Twenty yards to the left, Brody intentionally cracked a dry pine branch against a cypress trunk and let out a frantic splash in the water.
"Over there! Behind the palmettos!" the first gunman barked, pivoting quickly and sloshing through the waist-deep black water, his rifle trained on the sound.
As the second operative moved past Cody's hiding spot to provide cover, Cody struck. He didn't hesitate. He burst from the brush, driving his entire body weight like a freight train into the operative’s back, tackling him face-first into the deep, viscous swamp mud. The impact knocked the wind clean out of the man, his rifle slipping from his grasp and disappearing into the murky, bottomless silt below.
The operative thrashed, reaching for his combat knife, but Brody emerged from the gloom, bringing a heavy cypress club down across the man’s forearm with a bone-jarring crack. The knife dropped into the mud.
"Cody, get his sidearm!" Brody yelled.
Cody yanked the heavy Glock from the operative’s tactical holster, racking the slide with a clean, metallic clack. He had hunted whitetail deer and wild hogs with his grandfather since he was nine years old; he knew exactly how to handle a firearm.
Before they could breathe, the first gunman fired from the reeds. A three-round burst shredded the bark of the cypress tree inches above Cody’s head, spraying wooden shrapnel into his cheek.
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"Fall back! To the levee tower!" Cody shouted, grabbing Brody’s collar and dragging him backward through the dense palmetto scrub.
Behind them, Mercer’s cold laughter drifted through the trees. "Run all you want, boys! You’re on an island with no road out, and the storm of the century is rolling in!"
