Trapped (23 page)

She leant back over the pontoon and scraped up some of the sea mud left in between the slats by the high tide and smeared it over her bare arms and her face then checked her watch. Three minutes to eight. Any time now.

On the dot of eight, she heard the first
thud, thud
of the helicopters as they flew in formation out from the hills behind the town and swooped low over the harbour, heading out to sea to hover over where
The Good Times
was moored. A few seconds later, Cate watched as huge flares lit up the sky, fired as a first warning by
The Good Times
' powerful anti-aircraft system. Marcus hadn't let her down.

As arranged, the helicopters were holding their position and
Cate heard a terrifyingly loud crackle as
The Good Times
fired electricity into the air to disrupt the helicopters' flight. She watched the mayhem for a few seconds longer and then opened the hatch in the deck which housed the powerful inboard engine. There was just enough room for her to squeeze safely alongside the metal block without danger of being trapped on the propeller. Good old Marcus. He had done his research well. Cate slipped in and pulled the hatch over her head. A minute later, she heard the sound of running footsteps on the pontoon.

Tass was onto the boat first, she could tell by his lighter tread. Then two heavier sets of footsteps: Ahmed and Mikey. They were cursing and shouting, struggling to get the ropes undone and the engine started. Cate pulled out a pair of earplugs from her pocket and shoved them into her ears just as the engine roared to life beside her. As the boat pounded at top speed over the waves, Cate hugged herself in the dark, her heart pounding and her mouth dry. She concentrated hard. For the next few hours she had to be razor sharp and she couldn't let the fear of what she was headed into overpower her mind.

As the boat slowed to a stop, Cate pulled her earplugs out. She could hear Tass's men shouting, trying to be heard over the clatter of the choppers, the whizzing of the flares being dropped from the helicopters and, even more ominously, the rattle of bullets.

It's chaos
, thought Cate. Her adrenalin was pumping and she was no longer scared, her mind cool and focused.
It's time to get to work
.

She looked down at the black trainers she was wearing,
remembering what Marcus had told her as he handed them to her earlier that day.

‘Look at the soles,' he had told her.

Cate had turned the shoes over and stared at the bottom of them. They looked completely normal. She pushed and prodded. Nothing.

‘Twist them, Super Spy!' said Marcus, sounding exasperated.

‘Ooops, sorry,' said Cate, grabbing one of the studs and turning it. It came away almost instantly, leaving a hollow space beneath it. Nestled into it was a shiny black vial. Cate went to touch it.

‘Don't,' said Marcus sharply. ‘It's carborane acid – a superacid hundreds of times more powerful than, say, sulphuric acid. There's a vial in every stud and they are perfectly safely packaged there. Only take them out when you are about to use them.'

‘Once the vial is opened the superacid becomes active within sixty seconds. You understand? Once that process is started there is no turning back.'

Cate stared at him, enthralled and repulsed at the same time. ‘You mean I'm walking around with a highly destructive acid in my shoes?'

Marcus grinned. ‘Yep. Terrorists would trade their own mother for this stuff.'

His eyes softened. ‘Cate,' he began. ‘I really wish there was another way. If I could get into that powerboat instead of you, you know I would do it.'

‘It's OK, really. I'm the one small enough to stow away and I know the layout of
The Good Times
. It has to be me.'

Marcus tried to smile, gave up and patted her gently on the shoulder. ‘Good girl,' he said quietly. ‘When all this is over I'll take you for a slap up meal in Le Ricochet and I'll get Henri to pay.'

There was a short silence, then it was back to business.

‘Don't try to be too smart,' he warned her. ‘Don't waste time working on the computer security or trying to disable the external systems. Just go straight to the radar and sonar centres, smash massive holes in them and pour the acid in.' He smiled grimly. ‘Short of blowing up the bridge with a missile, I guarantee you there won't be a quicker way of crippling that boat. Oh, and speaking of which, if you can disable the missiles as well that would be great. We'd rather not have them whizzing past our ears.

‘Once you've done that, let us know and we'll be there with you. We'll have you off that boat in seconds, I promise.'

Marcus's words echoing in her ears, Cate looked at her watch. Quarter past eight. She only had another five minutes of cover left.

She carefully lifted the hatch up a few centimetres above her head and peered out into the launch area. It was dark and empty. Tass and the bodyguards were nowhere to be seen. Silently, Cate pulled herself up through the hatch and slithered on her front to the edge of the mini harbour. Still no one. Keeping her head low she moved swiftly along onto the lower deck, watching for any guards that may have been posted there. But all the men seemed to be upstairs, no doubt deciding whether they could enter into a full-scale fight with the still swooping helicopters.

She paused, taking her bearings and trying to work out the quickest way to get up to the bridge and the radar and sonar centre without being spotted. It was far too risky to take the lift, Cate decided, opting instead to run up the metal staircase.

She reached the top deck and hid behind a small metal pillar, trying to work out where everyone was. The helicopters were no longer buzzing around the yacht but they were still close enough for the searchlight to pick them out in the black sky.
No markings
, thought Cate approvingly as she watched the choppers circle the yacht from a distance.

In front of her, the swimming pool glistened serenely amidst all the mayhem. It was hard to believe that, only the day before, Cate was sitting around it relaxing with the children. She forced herself to concentrate, remembering what Mikey had said when they first arrived on the boat. The pool, then the bridge which held the sonar and radar control and behind that the missiles. Through the sporadic light of the flares and the spotlights of the helicopters, Cate could see into the bridge room. She made out silhouettes of figures too dark to recognise.

Running from pillar to pillar in the moments of darkness, Cate worked her way along the deck. She had a near miss when a guard silently flitted past her as she paused behind one of the lifeboats, but he was too intent on looking upwards to see her. Now she was by the bridge and she had a clear view through the door. One man was at the centre of the activity, pointing at dials, giving orders. It was Bill.

Now, more than ever, Cate knew she had to be careful. Tass, Mikey, even Ahmed, she felt she had a good chance against.
But Bill, he frightened her. Really frightened her.

Moving slowly and silently, she lifted herself on top of the bridge unit, praying Bill would hear nothing above him. She crouched between the radar mast and missile launcher.

She remembered Marcus's parting shot as she had left the galley that evening. ‘KISS,' he had said. ‘Don't forget to KISS.' Keep It Simple, Stupid. She smiled to herself. Straight down the barrel of each of the missiles then. She slipped off her left trainer and unscrewed six of the studs, one for each missile, and carefully poured them down each of the launch tubes. The whole job was done in less than twenty seconds but already Cate could smell the liquid begin to burn away at the missiles.

Hoping that would do the trick, Cate slipped down and peered inside the bridge. There were only two men in there now. Bill seemed to have vanished – gone down to the security centre perhaps.

One of the men was wearing headphones, facing away from her and poring over a bank of screens. The other was close to the door with his back to her. There would never be a better chance.

She whistled and the guard looked over his shoulder out through the door. Cate whistled again and he left the doorway and walked curiously on. As he passed into the shadows, she launched a kick into his stomach. As he fell forward, winded, she came behind him, using his momentum to push him head first over the safety barrier at the top of the stairwell. As he pivoted on his stomach there was no air for him to shout. Cate bent down, lifted up his shoes and heaved him down the stairs, his body thudding down to the darkness below. She ran down
the steps and surprising herself with her strength, dragged his inert body into the shadows.

Cate paused for a minute, regaining her breath. With adrenalin coursing through her veins she had turned into a fighting machine, aggressive, powerful, ruthless even, almost as if it was someone else rather than her. But she had no time to analyse her feelings now, there was work to do.

She pulled out her gun from the rucksack and rested it against her left hand, her right hand on the trigger, and moved silently back to the bridge.

‘What the hell—' It was the last words the guard said for a good few hours. Cate hit him hard over the head with the gun, and his body slumped onto the desk behind him. She grabbed a clump of his dark, curly hair, lifted it up and checked his eyes. Definitely unconscious.

She got to work, with no idea when the next guard would appear. She searched frantically for something indicating the radar and sonar computer system, checking above and below the desk and on the shelving which ran around the room. Cate cursed aloud. Of course, she remembered now. What José had said as she had walked past the bank of screens downstairs on the bottom deck. ‘The sonar system,' he had told her proudly, ‘is here.'

Cate groaned. Now she had to do what she could to retrieve the situation but it was taking a lot longer than she had imagined.

She grabbed her phone and texted Marcus.
Pull back until I say so
.

Immediately he was back to her.
We are getting you off now.

No can do. Sonar and radar still not down. Will call you. Trust me.
She turned to leave the bridge, moving silently in the darkness of the deck. As she left the confines of the small room she breathed deeply, taking in the sharp night air. Then she felt something cold and hard pressing into the small of her back.

‘Welcome aboard, Cate Carlisle,' said Bill.

Down in a corner of the bottom deck, Cate sat on a chair, staring angrily at Bill, Mikey and Ahmed who were standing in a semi-circle around her. Bill was going through her rucksack, pulling out objects and throwing them onto a table next to him.

‘A gun! Jesus, Cate, what the hell are you doing with a gun? And a knife. And what's this?' Bill had found the survival tin and was picking through the contents, trying to work them out. ‘OK, Cate, talk to me. I'm hoping you can give me a really good reason why you were on this ship at night, trying to sabotage our bridge and at the same time carrying a gun, because it looks really bad.'

‘I could say the same about you, Bill,' said Cate.

For a few seconds Bill was shocked into silence. He swallowed hard and tried again. ‘Who are you working for, Cate?'

‘You first, Bill.' She knew she was winding him up but she couldn't help herself. She desperately wanted to know why Bill was involved, wanted to hear what he had to say, but there was only more silence.

Ahmed walked up to Cate and slapped her hard around the face, so hard that she nearly fell off the chair. She turned back to face him and was taken aback by the hatred she saw blazing
in his pale eyes. ‘I thought she was trouble from the first time I saw her.' He turned to Mikey who was standing expressionless, not taking his eyes from Cate's face. ‘There was something not right about her. Too sharp, too nosy, always watching and listening and being in places she shouldn't be. I told you, Bill.'

‘You've been a really stupid girl.' Mikey spoke at last. ‘How're we going to sort fings out now?'

‘We could kill her,' Ahmed suggested helpfully. ‘Chuck her over the side.'

‘Hang on a minute, Ahmed.' Mikey was alarmed. ‘She's only a kid. We can get her to talk easily and then just dump her somewhere when all this mess is over.'

Bill was silent, considering the options. ‘No need to panic,' he said finally. ‘She'll be our insurance, our ticket out of here. She's got a gun and high tech equipment. She's not working alone. I'll ask you again, Cate. Who are you working for?'

‘No one.' Cate was playing for time, frantically working through the possibilities for escape. Cate knew that if she stayed the likelihood was that she would be killed, if not now then very soon. She had nothing left to lose, she had to try to escape.

‘I came out here because I saw the animals yesterday and I wanted to rescue them.'

Ahmed hit her again and this time Cate did fall off her chair. She landed painfully on her ribs, her face throbbing, and stayed there until Mikey picked her up and stuck her roughly back on the chair.

‘If you came on your own, where did the helicopters come from?' Ahmed demanded.

‘Don't know.' Cate was spitting out blood. ‘Nothing to do with me. I thought it was some of Tass's flash mates playing tricks.'

The three men were looking at each other, none of them willing to make the final decision. Cate saw her chance. She darted between Mikey and Bill and, before they could put out a hand to stop her, she was running for the rear of the boat and the stairwell. Halfway up the stairs she felt a hand grabbing at her foot and, turning sharply, kicked out hard at Ahmed's forehead. He groaned and fell backwards into Mikey who shoved him roughly aside before following Cate up the stairs.

She was heading for the sea-level deck and the safety of the water. She reached the top of the stairs, running out towards the mini harbour and up ahead of her she could see the outline of the power boat, and next to it the jetskis floating free in the water.