Serpent's Kiss. Alex Archer

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      T HE CABIN WAS SMALL . A miniature galley and wet bar occupied the area to the left. A bed and shower cubicle occupied the forward and right sections.

      A man, glassy-eyed in death, lay on the bed and rolled loosely with the pitch of the tethered yacht. He was in his thirties and looked American or European. Artificially blond hair was short and spiky. He’d been tall and fit, his skin bronzed by the sun. He wore brightly colored swimming trunks and was bare chested.

      He’d also been dead long enough that his blood had settled in the lower part of his body. Goraksh had seen such things on television shows but he’d never seen anything like it in person.

      The woman held on to the radio microphone as if it were a life preserver. She continued sending her message.

      Goraksh shoved the pistol into her face as if he’d been doing it all his life. His finger wasn’t even on the trigger.

      “Get away from the radio,” he shouted. Then he realized he hadn’t spoken in English and that she probably didn’t understand him. He repeated the order again as he reached for the microphone.

      The woman jerked away. In the tight confines of the ship’s cabin, she tripped and fell heavily. She had a death grip on the microphone and tore the unit from the wall in a shower of sparks.

      As she floundered on the bed next to the dead man, she cursed Goraksh soundly. Goraksh didn’t know what he was supposed to do next. He glanced back at his father as Rajiv came down the steps into the cabin.

      Rajiv’s eyes rounded in surprise.

      When he swiveled back to look at the woman, Goraksh was stunned to see that she had a small black automatic pistol clasped in her hand. She continued cursing as her knuckle whitened on the trigger.

      The detonation sounded loud in the cabin. Goraksh’s ears ached with the blast and he was partially deafened. Sparks from the gun barrel singed his shirt. The bullet rushed in a heat streak beside his head, and he doubted that it missed him by more than an inch.

      Goraksh pointed his pistol at the woman and fired back. He knew he’d missed, though. He’d hurried the shot and he’d missed. He barely even heard the reports because he was so scared. But there was more than one of them. He was sure about that.

      Something burned into the side of his neck. He dodged away from it, but he knew he was already too late. He’d been shot.

      The woman’s head jerked violently. Her blood splattered the interior of the cabin and landed warmly on Goraksh’s skin. He felt it ooze down his face as the woman fell over the dead man.

      For a moment, Goraksh’s knees wouldn’t hold him. He thought he was going to fall. He tried to take a breath and couldn’t. He wondered if he’d been shot in the throat. It would have been horrible to drown in his own blood.

      Then his father was there. Rajiv slipped an arm under his shoulder and kept Goraksh on his feet. His father turned his head gently with the heated barrel of the .357 Magnum and surveyed the wound in his neck.

      Goraksh felt his blood pulsing out of him. It soaked into his shirt. “Am I going to die?” he whispered.

      “Not today,” Rajiv replied in a choked voice. Tears glimmered in his eyes. “But I thought I had seen her kill you.”