Island of the Sequined Love Nun

blood.
    Tuck was stunned. He'd never seen such courage or such slaughter before, and he was getting the willies thinking about all the time he had spent swimming in these waters at night.
    Malink walked up the beach dragging a leopard shark by its gills. His Buddha belly was dripping in blood. He looked up at Tucker and risked a smile.
    "That's the chief," Beth Curtis said. "He's really too old for this, but he won't stay on shore."
    "Do the sharks ever get any of them?"
    "Sometimes. Usually just a bite. A lot of sutures, but no one's been killed since I've been on the island."
    No one hunting sharks, anyway, Tuck thought. A little girl who had been helping her mother shyly peeked over the carcass of a big hammerhead, then ran up to Tucker and quickly touched him on the knee before retreating to the safety of her mother.
    "That's strange," Beth Curtis said. "The women and girls won't have anything to do with a white man. Even when they come to Sebastian, they talk to him through a brother or husband-and he speaks their language."
    Tuck didn't answer. He was still looking at the little girl's back. She had a massive pink scar that ran like a smile from her sternum, under her arm, to her backbone at exactly the place where the kidney would be. Tuck felt sick to his stomach.
    "I think I've seen enough, Beth. Can we go?"
    "Can't deal with the sight of blood?"
    "Something like that."
    As they walked back through the village, Tuck noticed a woman and a little boy sitting outside of one of the cookhouses. The mother was holding the boy and singing to him softly as she rocked him. Both of his eyes were bandaged with gauze pads. Tucker approached the woman and she pulled the child to her breast.
    Beth Curtis caught Tuck's arm and tried to pull him back. Tuck shook her off end went to the woman.
    "What's wrong with him?" Tuck asked.
    The woman slid across the gravel, away from him.
    "Tucker!" Beth Curtis said. "Leave her alone. You're scaring her."
    "It's okay," Tuck whispered to the woman. "I'm the pilot. Vincent sent me."
    The woman seemed to calm down, and although her eyes went wide with wonder, she managed a small smile.
    Tuck reached out and touched the child's head. "What's wrong with him?"
    The woman held out the boy as if presenting him for baptism. "He is chosen," she said. She looked at the Sky Priestess for approval.
    Tuck stood and backed away from her. He was afraid to look at Beth, afraid that he might strangle her on the spot. Instead, calmly, deliberately, although it took all his effort to keep from shaking, he said, "We'd better get back." He led the way through the village and back to the compound.

54 – Selling Tucker
    The Sky Priestess threw the straw hat across the room, then tore at the high-buttoned collar of the white dress. She was losing him. She hated that more than anything: losing control. She ripped the dress down the front and wrestled out of it.
    She stormed across the room, the dress still trailing from one foot, and pulled a bottle of vodka from the freezer. She poured herself a tumbler and drank half of it off while still holding the bottle, then refilled the glass while her temples throbbed with the cold. She carried the bottle and glass to a chair in front of the television, sat down, and turned it on. Nothing but static and snow. Sebastian was using the satellite dish. She threw the vodka bottle at the screen, but missed and it bounced off the case, taking a small chip out of the plastic.
    "Fuck!" She keyed the intercom next to her chair. " 'Bastian! Dammit!"
    "Yes, my sweet." His voice was calm and oily.
    "What the fuck are you doing? I want to watch TV."
    "I'm just finishing up, sweetheart."
    "We need to talk." She tossed back another slug of vodka.
    "Yes, we do. I'll be up in a moment."
    "Bring some vodka from your house."
    "As you wish."
    Ten minutes later the Sorcerer walked into her bungalow, the picture of the patrician physician. He handed her the vodka and sat down across from her. "Pour me one, would you, darling?"
    Before she could catch herself, she'd gotten up and fetched him a glass from the kitchen. She handed it to him along with the bottle.
    "Your dress is torn, dear."
    "No shit."
    "I like the look," the Sorcerer said, "although I'd have preferred to tear it off you myself."
    "Not now. I think we have trouble."
    The Sorcerer smiled. "We did, but as of tonight at midnight, our troubles are over. How was your walk this morning, by the way?"
    "I took Case to see the