Dead Heat (33 page)

Cautiously she tried the glass door and, finding it unlocked, started to open it and follow Daniel inside. She thought she
heard someone call her name and turned to see Daniel racing down the starboard steps. He seemed to be mouthing, “No, no,”
and she felt a spurt of panic and tried to shut the door again but it was too late because the next second there was a distant,
rhythmic beeping that made her heart clench. An alarm. Jesus. She’d tripped the sodding alarm. The code, what was the code?
And where the hell was the keypad?

Daniel threw back the door and darted across the saloon for the bridge, legs pumping. Georgia surged after him.

Dear God, she prayed, please,
please
let him make it in time.

The beeping increased as she tore after Daniel. She saw him yanking open an innocent-looking cupboard opposite the galley,
and she was slowing, seeing the bright green glare of the alarm system, and Daniel’s fingers reaching to punch in the disarmament
code, knowing he’d made it, that he’d disarm it in the next second . . .

The beeps suddenly turned into a deafening howl.

Daniel punched in the number and the sirens abruptly cut out, but it was too late.

“I’ll cast off!” he shouted and pushed two keys at her before spinning for the stern. “You start the engines! Fast as you
can!”

Georgia sprang for the bridge, thrust the keys into their ignitions, and turned. Nothing happened.

She stared at the array of dials before her. Took in the brass plaque stating the yacht was a Ferretti. An Italian boat. Shit.
She was in the nautical equivalent of a Ferrari and hadn’t a clue how to turn on the engines. She swung around, snapped open
a glass door with two rows of switches inside, thanking God everything was marked in English. Flicked two down, marked “engines,”
then the next two labeled “blowers,” and spun back and turned the two ignition keys again. A hideous shrieking alarm informed
her she’d gotten it right so far. What else, something else . . .

God, the micro-commander. She hurriedly pressed the small square button marked “control” and punched the two huge red start
buttons. There was a brief, thundering rumble, then the twin Caterpillars roared into life.

She looked outside. Daniel had freed the bow and midsection, and was racing down the pontoon to the stern. Two shadows were
rushing for him. God, they were close, too close.

Georgia sprang across the bridge for the port window and yanked it open, yelling, “Look out!”

Daniel whirled, and she knew he’d seen the two gunmen, yards away, running hard and fast straight for him. Adrenaline must
have given him wings, because one second he was on the pontoon and then he was sprawled on the stern deck and scrambling up
and she immediately spun away and slammed open the twin throttles.

She wasn’t prepared for the surge of power.
Songtao
sprang forward, her bow rearing, stern digging into the water, and Georgia lost her footing, regained it, and kept the throttles
wide. There was a groaning, creaking sound, and
Songtao
dug in further, straining against her leash that was the marina, and Georgia spun the wheel to starboard, muttering, “Come
on, girl,
come on.
”

As if she’d heard, the boat suddenly shivered, and there was a great tearing and splintering noise like a tree being felled
as the yacht tore her berth from the marina and charged forward. Georgia shoved the inboard throttle to kick the stern sideways,
narrowly missing the forty-foot racing yacht berthed opposite, but the stern was still swinging and she heard an almighty
crash, which she took to be the port side hitting the neighboring yacht,
Micky’s Dream.

Songtao
surged out of the harbor, for the horizon. She could feel that the boat was unbalanced, still dragging the marina’s debris,
but she didn’t lessen the power. She was racing for the open sea, knowing they needed every second’s advantage should the
gunmen pursue them.

She allowed herself a quick look to check on Daniel, to make sure he wasn’t hurt, or that one of the gunmen hadn’t managed
to fling himself on board, and saw him racing outside with what looked like a hacksaw, preparing to saw free the remaining
marina planks, which were bounding and slamming in their wake. Wow, she thought. What a team we make. Me driver, he he-man.

Georgia returned to the helm. The sea was beautifully calm, and
Songtao
sliced through the water like a cheese wire through butter. Keeping the prow pointed at the horizon, she pulled out a slim
drawer on her left and yanked out a handful of nautical charts. She checked the first blankly, not recognizing any part of
it. She peered closer.
Fujian.
It was a chart of China’s southeastern waters. Hurriedly she shuffled through the next few. The South China Sea, Vietnam,
Indonesia. Ah, here it was, Queensland’s northeastern coast. Pulling out the chart table, she spread the map across, quickly
found Nulgarra, and checked the GPS. A few calculations, taking in their speed and time of departure, and since she reckoned
they had less than twenty minutes before they reached the Great Barrier Reef and grounded, she swung north.

Setting the autopilot, she shrugged off her handbag and dumped it on the bridge. Her hands were trembling as she sank onto
the pilot’s chair. She took a deep breath, then another as she gazed at
Songtao
’s broad hooked beak swooping over the water. All the tanks are full, she told herself. We’ve water for weeks, fuel for hundreds
of miles. We’ll outrun them, no problem. We’re safe now.

W
hen Daniel returned to the bridge he was breathing hard and he had blood on his hands.

“Are you okay?” she asked him.

“Rope burns. Not a problem.” He pulled the chart around to look at it straight.

“We’re about here,” she said, sticking a finger firmly on a bit of blue just north of Nulgarra. “I think,” she added.

“Well done,” he said. “Very well done, in fact.”

“I’ve set the autopilot,” she told him, feeling obscurely proud of herself, “and we’re headed for Cooktown at the moment.”

He studied the chart some more before standing back and gazing through the huge windscreen and at the sea unfurling beneath
the hull.

“They were shooting at me.” His voice was steady. “To put me out of action, so they could grab you. The chief told me the
Chens want you badly, especially since you appear to be the only person who might know where Jon Ming’s gone.”

She waited for him to ask where Jon was, but he didn’t.

The boat gave a small shudder and while Daniel quickly checked the bridge, Georgia looked at the sea. It was more choppy now
that they were in open water, with long, high swells that
Songtao
took easily. The boat quickly resumed her smooth ride. Just a patch of dirty water.

“Time to call the coast guard,” said Daniel.

“A nerve-steadier would be nice,” she said and, thinking of a bracing shot of scotch, looked around for a drinks cabinet.
No way would a boat like this not have one stuffed to the brim. With thick cream carpets and lacquered wood the color of honey,
gleaming chrome fittings and cushions wrapped in milky Italian leather, she didn’t doubt that crystal glasses and ingredients
for margaritas and whiskey sours came as standard. Nothing like doing a runner in a floating gin palace with bidets in every
bathroom, if Bridie was to be believed.

Glancing across at the electronic weather chart, she groaned aloud.

“What is it?”

She pointed at the storm unfurling in the southeast and moving steadily north.

“Not nice,” he agreed, and she watched him hurriedly adjust their course to swing farther west before resetting the autopilot
once again. He glanced aside and said, “Ah.”

Georgia said, “What is it?”

“I’m wondering where the sat phone is.” He pointed at the empty cradle.

“I’ll get another,” she said, and bolted for the galley.

Her breathing increased when she saw another empty cradle. Telling herself not to panic, Georgia began to search the yacht.
She found two more empty cradles in the staterooms and another missing in the saloon. She tore back to Daniel, and although
she tried to look calm, she knew she didn’t.

“All the phones are gone,” she panted. “Every single one.”

To her horror, she saw the blood drain from his cheeks.

“What is it?”

“The Chens,” he said in a strangled tone. “We’re on Lee’s boat. I should have thought . . . Jesus.”

“The Chens have swiped the phones?”

“We’ve got to go back. Who knows what else they’ve done? They would have heard he was planning to set sail . . . Christ. The
nav equipment might be sabotaged too.”

Face pale and strained, he glanced at the wake behind, shining like ice-cream foam beneath the moon. She watched him check
the GPS and compass. Easing the throttles back, he swung the wheel around.

Songtao
spun lazily in a full circle, settled gently on her own turbulence, and nudged forward at half-throttle. Georgia tried to
gauge how long they’d been going full blast. Ten minutes? Twenty? Time had stretched, become elastic, and she couldn’t be
sure. She saw that Daniel was doing the same. He was glancing at his watch, then staring at the compass and GPS.

“Can’t rely on them,” he said, and looked through the huge windscreen into the sky, as though checking the stars.

Georgia was impressed until he said, “What I know about stellar navigation I could write on my thumbnail, so let’s drop anchor
when we lose sight of our wake. People will be looking for us. The owner of
Micky’s Dream,
in particular, since we pretty much wiped them—”

His words were lost in a resounding dull
whump.

She looked at Daniel in horror, and he looked back, mouth dropping wide.

Before they could speak, WHUMP.

The yacht jumped violently forward, then listed to one side. Georgia was catapulted against Daniel and together they crashed
to the deck.

WHUMP.

A wall of flame reared through a gaping hole that used to be the saloon. In a split second, she knew they had less than thirty
seconds before the whole boat blew sky-high.

“Top deck!” she yelled and made to grab his wrist, but Daniel was already haring through the galley onto the portside deck.
She pounded after him. He rounded left and charged up the steps. Smoke was in her lungs, and the roar of flames was deafening.
As they burst onto the flybridge, she realized
Songtao
was already wallowing. Her stern already underwater and dipping, tilting hesitantly for the seabed.

Daniel yanked open a broad hatch and hauled the square white box of a life raft free. The brief feeling of cheer was instantly
swamped by the stern lurching down sickeningly. Down, down.
Songtao
was beginning to drown.

Her mind was screaming at Daniel.
Hurry!
He scrambled to the edge of the boat and was twisting his torso to fling the box into the ocean, when water thundered over
them as though they’d suddenly been thrown beneath Niagara Falls.

She was choking and shouting as sea washed around her thighs. “Hurry, for God’s sake!” she yelled at Daniel. “Chuck it overboard!
Inflate the bloody thing before it’s too late!”

“It should have activated!” he shouted back. “Something’s wrong . . .” He was yanking on the painter to trigger the raft’s
CO
₂
canister.

The water rose to her chest. She lunged for a life belt attached to an aluminum rail and fumbled with the ropes, desperately
trying to free it before they sank.

Behind her she heard a
swoosh
and glanced around to see that the life raft had inflated into an orange ball. Sea poured over the deck, and her hands fell
from the life belt as she suddenly realized that she had to launch herself for the life raft before it was too late. No time
to think. Just a desperate leap into the air, arms and legs reaching, fingers extended for the safety of the orange ball,
and she never knew how, through a wave that left her choking and spluttering, but she was hauling herself over the orange
rim and through the mouth of the canopy and inside the raft floating away from the boat, with Daniel clinging to it like a
limpet.

Georgia had his wrists, was trying to heave him on board. His legs were paddling furiously, his fingers searching for a purchase.
Georgia wished he was smaller and forty pounds lighter. Clamping her hands around his wrists, tight as she could, she heaved
with all her strength.

BOOM!

A fourth explosion.

The rush of sea. She saw Daniel rise high, then fall. His wrists slipped from Georgia’s grip.

“No!” she yelled.

“Georgia!” he yelled back.

“No!” she was shouting.

He was drifting fast away from her and the life raft. Sweet Jesus. Was there a rip current all the way out here?

She lunged inside the raft and yanked a life jacket free from its plastic tabs on the floor, scrambled to the opening, and
flung it as hard as she could for him.

It fell way short, but she thought he might have seen it, because he was swimming strongly in the right direction. Then suddenly,
she couldn’t see the life jacket anymore. Nor could she see Daniel.

“Daniel!” she yelled.

Silence.

“Daniel!”
she yelled again, searching for him, but all she could see was the sinking
Songtao.

Flames and smoke poured into the air; would anybody see? The yacht’s huge hawk’s beak was just visible, and for a brief, desperate
instant Georgia thought she might fight and remain afloat, but a second later a warning growl encompassed the air as her bow
gave in to the ongoing pressure. In a single swift motion, she sank. There was no breaking up, no shattering of wood. A single
low growl and that was it.

An eighty-foot mega-yacht, gone in less than two minutes. Christ.

“Daniel!” she yelled.

Still nothing.

Diving back inside the raft, she yanked at the bag strapped to the floor, pulled it open, and ripped the contents free, hands
shaking, heart pounding. There was a tin inside, of what, she wasn’t sure. A hard plastic square. A waterproof flashlight.
She switched it on and her heart lifted.