Free Jumper: Griffin's Story by Steven Gould Page B

would've remembered a man that tall.
    That meant they'd left someone at the house.
    Maybe more than one. Don't assume you saw them all.
    I thought about Alejandra, then, and the rest of the Monjarraz family. I wanted to go check, but nothing would lead the bastards to her–to them all–faster than me jumping there.
    Phone, I thought. Later.
    Meanwhile, I had questions.
    They had fishing poles and an ice chest. I felt my ears get red and my throat got tight.
    Did they think I was stupid!
    I don't know why this made me so mad. Hell, it would probably have been a great deal of help if they thought I was some dumb kid.
    I watched them from the higher part of the island, where the brush began, just inland from where the spit that formed the cove joined the main part of the island. I was sitting down in the shade, having found a flat rock to park my arse on. Except for the sandy beach, every place else I'd sat on the whole island seemed to consist of poky bits of lava.
    I wondered if they knew the difference between someone jumping to a spot versus jumping away or if it was all the same to them. It's not like they sensed me when I wasn't jumping, or I'd never have been able to get onto that balcony.
    They left Ortiz by the boats, with one of the rods, and they headed down the beach, toward me. They also brought fishing rods, carried in their left hands, but their right hands stayed close to the bags slung over their right shoulders. I jumped ten feet to the right, my eyes watching them.
    Both of them reacted, looking right at where my head now poked above the brush . . . but Ortiz hadn't flinched a bit. He was still pretending to fish from the beach, by the boats.
    Ah. He doesn't feel it. They do.
    I turned around and ran briskly off, straight up the middle of the island. Well, straight as the brush and boulders let me. The shrubs tore at my shirt and I ended up with a few scratches on my bare forearms but I was probably doing better than them. They were bigger and would have to force their way through and they'd dressed like tourists.
    Shorts, for God's sake.
    I was out of line of sight in thirty seconds. They'd still been working their way up the rising rock at the end of the beach–not quite a cliff–but not something you go up without grabbing a handhold here and there. I pushed on until I was at the far end, right at the edge of a real cliff. There was a boulder that stuck up a bit from all the rest and I climbed up its backside and peered over. I needed the visual cues– the waves hitting the cliff below drowned out any chance of hearing them move through the brush.
    They came, Kemp right down the middle, like I'd come, but the other man, the big one, came along the cliff's edge, from the right. He'd come quickly and I guess there wasn't as much brush to fight through, but he'd also come along the edge.
    I jumped right there, right beside him, and he flinched off the edge. I didn't have to touch him but he almost snagged me, going over the edge; he was so much taller, his clawing hand whipping through my hair as I stepped back.
    He didn't land on the rocks, though it was only a matter of luck. A wave hit just before he did, and he was kicking and splashing, head mostly above the water, as he washed back out over the tide pools at the bottom of the cliff.
    One.
    If I'd hesitated, Ortiz would've been warned. His radio was crackling as I brought the rock down from behind, and Kemp's voice said, "Ortiz, look out!" as Ortiz dropped to his knees. I'm sure it's a crimenal federal to strike an agent of the AFI. I didn't succeed in knocking him completely unconscious but I had his own handcuffs on his wrists before he was able to do more than moan.
    I towed the second boat away from shore with the first, making a bad job of it going out between the rocks. My boat cleared but a swell swung the second craft into the rocks and scraped paint and fiberglass down the side.
    Too bad. Maybe they'll lose their deposit.
    I dropped the