Page 74 of Last Ticket to Paradise

Bones dug his fingers into her bottom through the thin material of her shorts. “Don’t cry. I can do something that’ll make you feel real good.”

Georgette stiffened and bucked against the hold Bones had on her.

Gunther clicked his tongue. “That’s not what we’re here for, Bones.”

Bones snorted. “Maybeyou’renot.”

After several minutes of Gunther leading the way, slashing a path through the tropical brush, and her bouncing upside down over Bones’ shoulder as he followed, they stopped in a clearing.

“Put her down on the rock.”

Bones flipped her right side up and set her on a flat rock, not unlike the one she’d investigated on Palumba. Pulling her top back into place, she listed to the side. Gunther parked himself beside her and propped her upright.

“I know you’re woozy, but you shouldn’t be too woozy to tell me where the drugs are.” Gunther wrapped his arm around her shoulders.

“I-I don’t know what you mean.”Drugs. It all came back to drugs, but she didn’t have any idea what he was talking about—couldn’t be Jamie’s small stash.

He pinched her arm. “That idiot Fiso told his wife about the drug shipment I was expecting on the island, and Hallie, who’s ten times smarter than Fiso, intercepted it and stole it from me. Or maybe her lover told her, but we haven’t been able to find Lalas.”

Georgette shook her head. “I don’t know anything about that.”

“Sure, you do.” He rubbed her bare back with his soft hands, which was worse than the arm pinch. “Hallie enlisted your sister and the Frenchman, Jean-Claude, to help her sell it—and sell it they did, undermining my business, undercutting my control of the drug trade—spending all my money.”

“Jamie never told me. I don’t know anything.”

He grabbed the back of her hair and yanked up her head. “You’re lying. You and Kincaid have been traipsing all over the island—snooping.”

“But we didn’t find anything.”

“You kept the rumors alive with your questions. Now everyone will know Hallie died here on the island when they ID those bones.”

“Hallie? That was Hallie?” Georgette put a hand to her mouth. Her gaze shifted to Bones, who was leaning against a tree and smoking a cigarette while watching them. “Hallie was your sister. How could you kill her?”

Bones lifted one shoulder and dropped his cigarette butt in the dirt. “Half sister, and she got what she deserved. Slut.”

Georgette swallowed the sour fear lodged in her throat. Bones had an issue with women.

“We got rid of Hallie first because she claimed she didn’t know where Jamie and Jean-Claude hid the stash.” Gunther smoothed a thumb over one eyebrow. “Then we had to go after your sister to put the fear of God into Jean-Claude.”

“That obviously didn’t work, as you tried to kill him, too.”

Gunther pushed off the rock and swept up a skinny tree branch from the ground. “We killed the wrong person. He claimed Jamie hid the drugs, and he didn’t know where they were. I believed him because that coward would have said or done anything to save his own life at the end.”

Georgette braced her hands against the rock. “What did you do to my sister?”

“Do you really want it spelled out for you, Georgette? We drugged her, much like I did you tonight, and told her we were going to a real Palarosa ritual. She was excited until she found out she was the sacrifice.”

She drew in a quick breath and scraped her nails against the rock. “Y-you burned her alive?”

“If it’s any consolation, she died from the drug overdose first.”

A sob tore from Georgette’s throat, and she covered her face. “What did you do with her body?”

Gunther spread his arms. “We dumped her remains out at sea. Should’ve done the same with Hallie. We buried Hallie out here, but Jake allowed a diving expedition to camp out on the island for several days, so we had to move her body. The animals and environment had done a number on her flesh, but Bones lived up to his name and made sure nothing butherbones were left when he stuffed her in that suitcase.”

Georgette’s stomach knotted. Avuncular Gunther had morphed into a ruthless killer before her eyes. His words made him even look different—the bald pate now sinister, the soft hands creepy.

“It seems as if you’ve killed everyone who could’ve told you where the drugs were hidden.”

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