Hijack, page 17
“Still, it’s a possibility. If they’re determined enough to follow you to the Seychelles, then they won’t be far behind in the Maldives either. So stay alert.”
“Will do,” said Connor. “I’ll contact you as soon as we reach harbor again.”
“Okay,” she replied. “And, Connor, be careful applying that suntan lotion.”
“What?”
But Charley had already ended the call.
Connor stared at his phone, unable to believe Ling had reported that incident. Now Charley had the completely wrong idea and, judging by the tone of her voice, wasn’t too happy about it. Furious with Ling, he shoved his phone into his top pocket and headed across the main deck to the salon. As he slid open the glass doors, he heard someone else on the phone.
“Anything could happen at sea. The girls are on their own. I understand your concern, Joey, but I can handle them.” Amanda turned around, brushing a lock of golden hair from her eyes, and spotted Connor. “Listen, I’d better go. Ciao.”
Switching off her pink diamond-studded phone, she perched herself on the edge of a leather couch. With the setting sun streaming through the window behind her, Amanda’s pose was straight out of a high-class fashion shoot.
“Can I help you, Connor?” she asked, dazzling him with her smile. “I was just on the phone to my agent.”
For a moment, Connor was struck dumb by her beauty. “No . . . I was simply going to make sure Chloe and Emily were okay.”
“Ah, that’s sweet,” she said, sauntering over and ruffling his hair. “But I don’t think we have anything to worry about, do you?”
Connor’s eyes followed her departing figure as she strolled out the door and disappeared on the deck.
“Careful, Connor. She’s a real siren.”
Connor spun around to discover Brad standing at the other end of the salon, a wicked grin on his face.
“A siren?” Connor queried.
“Yeah, the femme fatales of Greek mythology. Beautiful yet dangerous creatures who’d lure unwary sailors onto the rocks with their enchanting voices and looks.” He beckoned Connor over. “Speaking of danger, since Mr. Sterling’s departure with Dan, we’re a man down on the watch. And with Ling gone too, I definitely need you to keep an extra-sharp lookout while we’re at sea.”
Connor nodded. “No problem. I can take one of the shifts if you’d like.”
Brad patted him on the shoulder. “Good of you to volunteer. Since you’re so keen, you can do dawn duty, four till eight tomorrow morning.”
Connor made a face.
“I know it’s early, but ideally that slot won’t draw attention to your true role. So, best get your head down while you can, tiger.”
Wishing he hadn’t been quite so eager, Connor headed down to his cabin on the lower deck. As he passed a door to the tender garage, he thought he heard a noise. A clunk. Out of curiosity, he opened the bulkhead door and peered inside. The automatic lights were already on.
“Hello? Geoff?” he called, thinking that it might be the ship’s engineer.
But there was no response. On a quick inspection, he found the garage to be empty, save for the tender, the remaining Jet Ski and an array of diving gear. Yet Connor’s sixth sense was tingling—a sensation he wasn’t alone. Then he spotted the inflatable doughnut on the floor. It had come loose from its fixing. Connor put it back on its hook and returned to the bulkhead. Before shutting the door behind him, he took one last look around, but any feelings of being watched had vanished as quickly as they’d appeared.
50
Spearhead stood on the prow of the skiff, staring out at the darkened horizon. The sun had yet to make its mark in the predawn sky, and the stars still glimmered overhead. The tiny boat, no more than a piece of flotsam in the vast expanse of the Indian Ocean, rocked and rolled, but Spearhead rode the waves with a fisherman’s ease.
“See anything yet?” Big Mouth called over the steady rumble of his skiff’s outboard motor.
Spearhead didn’t bother replying. He’d let them know when it was time.
They’d sighted the Orchid the previous day and trailed their prey through the night. It had been easy to follow the Orchid’s navigation lights, but nobody aboard the yacht would have been able to detect their small flotilla of unlit skiffs.
“We’ve been shadowing them for hours,” moaned Juggs, his lanky body laid out across a wooden seat, oversized feet dangling over the water. “If we were in the Gulf of Aden, a hundred cargo ships would have passed us by now. Easy pickings.”
“I agree,” yawned Big Mouth, standing up and urinating over the side. “Why chase a dolphin when we can land a whale?”
“Oracle foresaw this bounty,” muttered a pirate as he tried to sleep beneath a red headscarf. “When has he ever been wrong?”
Having relieved himself, Big Mouth pulled up his shorts. “I just don’t understand why we couldn’t attack when we first found the Orchid.”
“Because,” Spearhead explained with irritation, “we need to hunt like sharks—attack when least expected, when the prey is least ready to fight back.”
His keen eyes spotted the pinpoint flash of light on the horizon. There were three more bursts in quick succession.
“That’s our signal,” he announced, and raised his assault rifle in the air to alert the rest of the gang.
The pirates in the other skiffs pulled aside the nets covering their weapons. AK-47s were ripped from their plastic wrappings and magazines rammed home. The harsh click and clack of assault rifles being primed and loaded punctured the air above the growl of outboard motors.
After several days of enforced idleness, there was an urgency to the pirates’ actions, all the men eager to sink their teeth into some violence.
Big Mouth pried open the wooden box containing his RPG. Loading a rocket into the launcher, he lifted it to his lips and kissed the tip.
“Time to earn your keep!” he said, resting the mighty weapon in his lap.
Spearhead checked his AK-47 one final time, ensuring the action was smooth. He didn’t want any jams during the assault. He’d known of too many incidents when salt water had corroded older weapons and left a pirate high and dry in the middle of an attack.
Twirling his finger in the air and pointing ahead, Spearhead signaled for the hijack to commence. The powerful outboards roared and the skiffs accelerated away, charging through the waves like a pack of killer whales in pursuit of their prey.
51
Connor yawned and looked at his watch—5:30 a.m.
Zipping up his jacket to fend off the chilly sea breeze, he paced the top deck. Through the night-vision lenses of his sunglasses, the stars appeared overly bright in the sky, like theater spotlights, and the sea shimmered as if awash with mercury.
Raising the binoculars to his eyes, he performed another sweep of the horizon. So far the only other vessels he’d sighted were a fishing trawler and the long, low profile of an oil tanker. Both had glided by in distant silence, no more than ghosts in the night.
Connor stifled another yawn. His lookout duty was progressing with painful slowness. He couldn’t believe that he still had another two and a half hours to go, but at least the sun would be up soon. The faintest of glows was now visible to the east, pushing back the curtain of night.
As he completed his sweep, his eye caught a glint of something directly to the Orchid’s stern. Adjusting the focus on his binoculars, he zoomed in on the point near the horizon, but the roll of the yacht made it hard to keep the image steady.
Was that a boat? A wave? Or just another whale?
He’d spotted a small pod of humpback whales within the first ten minutes of his watch. The spray from their blowholes had looked like fountains of silver through his night-vision glasses. It was his first encounter with these magnificent creatures, and he’d been spellbound by their appearance. Then the whales had dived deep and he’d lost them among the waves.
It seemed this was the case again. He scanned the ocean once more but saw nothing. Then his attention was grabbed by the faint reflection of a flashing light from the main deck below. He leaned over the rail, but couldn’t detect the source.
Descending two flights of steps, he made his way to the starboard side and discovered Emily standing beside the rail.
“Morning,” he said.
She snapped her head around in surprise, but quickly recovered and greeted him with a wry smile. “Barely,” she replied.
“Did you see a flashing light?”
Emily shook her head. “Only just got here. Maybe it was from the salon as I walked through?”
Connor frowned. “Possibly, but the beam seemed more focused than that.” He looked up and down the deck, but all was dark.
Emily stared at him, then waved a hand in front of his face. “Can you even see? Why are you wearing sunglasses at night?”
“Oh, these.” Connor flipped them back off his head. He wasn’t sure if Amir wanted the secrets of his gear revealed, so he replied, “They’re part of the standard-issue Guardian uniform. Sometimes I forget I’m wearing them.”
“Well, you’re missing out on the sunrise,” said Emily, turning to the rail and admiring the expanding halo of red fire on the horizon.
Connor joined her. “Is that why you’re up so early?”
“Not really. I was finding it hard to sleep.” She glanced timidly at him. “Nightmares.”
Connor nodded, but didn’t press any further. He could only imagine what horrors she dreamed of after her kidnapping ordeal.
The sun continued its ascent, heralding another glorious day at sea.
“I’m feeling a little hungry,” Emily announced. “Chef usually leaves some snacks in the galley. Can I get you anything?”
Having risen so early, Connor suddenly realized that he was ravenous. “That would be great. I’d kill for an orange juice and a piece of toast.”
“No need to go that far!” Emily laughed. “I’ll see what I can find.”
She headed inside, leaving Connor alone with the sunrise. Its first golden rays graced the ocean, streaking the tops of the waves a deep molten orange. Lulled by the view, Connor almost drifted into Code White . . . but was snapped back to full alert by the glimpse of several dark shapes on the horizon.
52
Connor hammered on Brad’s cabin door. He peered out, bleary eyed. “What’s up?”
Connor told him what he’d seen—or at least what he thought he’d seen. The shapes had been so small and distant that he couldn’t be absolutely certain—and he’d soon lost sight of them amid the crests of the ocean waves.
“Give me a minute.” Brad closed the door and then emerged, dressed.
They made their way to the upper deck. Connor pointed in the direction he’d spotted the suspect boats. Brad borrowed Connor’s binoculars and swept the horizon.
“I don’t see anything. Let’s check the radar,” he said, heading for the bridge.
Captain Locke had just come on duty. “Are you sure about what you saw, Brad?” he asked, glancing at the radar screen, which showed nothing within eight nautical miles of the Orchid.
“Well, I didn’t spot them,” Brad admitted. “Connor did. He was on watch.”
Chief Officer Fielding, who had the wheel, glared at Brad in astonishment. “This boy was on watch? What were you thinking?”
“Connor is more than capable of—”
“Oh, don’t bother,” he cut in, shooting Connor a withering glare. “I can’t believe you gave the responsibility of a watch shift to a boy. That’s a serious breach of security protoc—”
“Pardon for interrupting,” said the Second Officer, “but I’m picking up an unidentified vessel fast approaching our stern.”
Captain Locke rose from his chair and studied the radar screen again. A green dot was now traversing the monitor on a direct course for the Orchid. Then several more blips appeared, all converging rapidly on the center. A second later, the blips were gone.
“Whoever they are, they’re in our radar shadow,” said Captain Locke, his expression hardening. “Get me a visual confirmation.”
Brad ran back outside onto the upper deck, Connor close on his heels. The sun was now fully up, a burning ball of red in the dawn sky. They scanned the ocean to the Orchid’s stern. Half a mile directly south, five skiffs loaded with men surged across the waves.
Brad sprinted back to the captain. “Five skiffs. Pirates, by the looks of it.”
“How long to contact?” asked Captain Locke.
“Less than five minutes,” replied the second officer.
Captain Locke leaned upon the radar terminal, his jaw set firm. “If their approach is anything to go by, they mean business. Chief Officer, full speed ahead,” he commanded.
Chief Officer Fielding drove the throttle home. From deep within the bowels of the Orchid, a mighty rumble shook the super-yacht as the twin diesel engines were pushed to their max.
The captain picked up the yacht’s speaker mic. “Calling all crew. Calling all crew. This is the captain speaking. We have a Red Alert. I repeat, a Red Alert. All hands to the bridge.”
Brad turned to Connor. “Get Emily and Chloe to the citadel.”
Without needing to be told twice, Connor turned for the door as Geoff burst onto the bridge.
“What’s going on, Captain?” said the engineer, frowning with deep concern when he saw the rev counter in the red zone. “The engines won’t keep this up for long.”
“Pirates,” Captain Locke explained. “Attempting to hijack us.”
“They’re still gaining,” announced the chief officer, nodding toward the radar where a swarm of green blips reappeared momentarily.
Captain Locke grimaced. “Prepare to send a distress call.”
Realizing there wasn’t much time, Connor headed below deck to look for Emily in the galley. As he raced from the bridge and down the steps, he caught a glimpse of the skiffs cutting like sharks’ fins through the waves. He could make out the pirates, bristling with weaponry. This was the nightmare scenario they’d planned for—yet prayed would never happen.
Dashing along a corridor and into the sleek white galley, Connor found Emily by the fridge pouring out a glass of fresh orange juice.
“I’ve got your breakfast,” she said, smiling at him as she put the glass on a tray, along with a plate of buttered toast.
“No time for that.” Grabbing her arm, he pulled her out of the galley and hustled her over to the stairwell.
“Hey! What’s the problem?” she cried.
“Pirates. We don’t have long before—” The Orchid slammed hard against the swell. The impact was bone shattering. Emily lost her footing, and Connor barely kept her from tumbling down the stairs.
“Keep hold of the rail,” he urged as they descended the staircase to the lower deck.
Rushing along the corridor to Chloe’s room, they could see the walls vibrating from the thrum of the engines. Connor hammered on the door. “Chloe! Chloe! Open up!”
“What is it?” came a sleepy reply.
With no time for discretion, he threw open the door. She sat bolt upright, clutching the bedding around her. “Sorry, but this is an emergency. Grab some clothes. We need to get you to the citadel fast.”
“Citadel?” said Chloe, staring at him wide eyed and confounded.
“Safe room,” explained Connor. “We’re under attack from pirates. Now hurry.”
Too stunned and terrified to protest, she bundled some clothes into her arms and allowed herself to be herded into the corridor. Connor pushed the two sisters along and up the stairs. At the bulkhead to the crew’s quarters, they met Amanda being escorted by Brad.
“Stay in there until I give the all clear. Understood?” said Brad.
Amanda nodded mutely, her angelic features pale with shock. Connor ushered Chloe and Emily in after her, then turned to follow Brad.
“Where are you going?” Chloe cried, a look of abandonment on her face.
Connor hoped his nerves didn’t show as he replied, “To fight off the pirates.”
53
Standing on the main deck, Connor clutched the rail, the wind whipping at his face and hair. Below him, the water rushed past like a surging torrent and the Orchid left a huge foamy wake in her trail. But fast as she was, the pirates doggedly closed the distance: 1,000 feet . . . 800 feet . . . 600 feet . . .
“Those are powerful engines,” remarked Brad. “They’ve got to be doing over thirty knots.”
He spoke into the two-way radio. “Captain, you need to fishtail.”
There was a crackle of static. “We’ll lose speed,” came the reply.
Brad pressed the Transmit button. “We won’t outrun them in a straight sprint. We need to make it difficult to board.”
“Understood.”
A second later, the Orchid lurched off course, veering hard to port. Connor gripped the rail, then was thrown against the chrome bar as she cut back toward starboard. Each switch sent a heavy wash in the pirates’ direction. The skiffs rode them like bucking broncos, seawater breaking over their bows and sending spray high into the air. The pirates clung to their seats, in danger of being tossed from their craft. But, like a waterborne wolf pack, the skiffs hounded the Orchid on all sides. As one fell back, another took its place.
Connor’s mouth became dry, a mix of adrenaline and fear. He licked his lips, but tasted only salt water. He could feel his heart pounding and imagined this to be like the blind rush of panic a fox felt during a hunt.
A skiff came level with the Orchid’s port side. A pirate waved an AK-47 for them to slow down.
