Brute Force

9

Fuck knows what was happening on deck. I could hear helicopters in the hover.

I didn't know what I was looking for, but I went through his pockets anyway. They were empty. Maybe his wallet was with the rest of his gear in a cabin or up on the bridge. I rolled him over. The edge of a bloodstained piece of card peeped from the top of his shirt pocket. I pulled it out and turned it over.

Her face had been charred by the det cord, but she was as hauntingly beautiful in the photograph as she had been alongside Mansour on the gangplank. Thirties, maybe. Palestinian. Her piercing sea-green eyes gazed straight into the camera: passionate, obsessive, almost manic. Those eyes had burned into Lesser's with fierce love. They seemed to stare into mine with nothing but blame and reproach.

I legged it back to the door, across the corridor, and into the engine room. The engines were idling. I killed the lights. The stench of diesel fumes and grease was overpowering.

I tucked myself behind a couple of tool lockers.

I could extract myself when the ship had been towed into port. If I got lifted before that, at least I would be out of sight of the crew. I took deep breaths, sucking in the diesel fumes as I tried to re-oxygenate myself. What was left of Big Ben looked exactly like it should have done. He'd been cut almost in half by the det cord. To whoever found him, he must have gone in, cut the det cord to stop the ring main going off while he sorted out whatever the problem was, and the TPU had kicked off.

Shouts in Spanish echoed around the ship. Their search had begun. I sucked in more air and tightened myself up, as if that was going to make me smaller behind the lockers.

The doors opened and a torch beam flicked around the engine room. The main lights came on. Two seconds later, the muzzle of a 5.56mm assault rifle was pressing into my cheek.

I let them shout and holler. It was pointless trying to explain, even if they did speak English. I put my hands behind my head. It's always best to do that.

They pushed me down onto the floor, and gave me a proper going over. My hands were plasticuffed behind my back. A couple of unseen hands hauled me to my feet and dragged me towards the stairs. Lads were already at work on the device. I wasn't the only one who'd been well briefed. I just hoped I was part of their int.

I came out of the door into brilliant sunshine. I squinted like a mole. There wasn't a cloud in the blue Mediterranean sky.

The ship bobbed up and down in the swell. There were a couple of coastguard cutters tied up alongside. I looked down onto the deck of the first one and saw five pairs of eyes burning up at me. It didn't take a brain surgeon to work out what had happened. Duff's eyes burned the fiercest.

The Spanish boss looked over at me too. There was lots of nodding and more shouting. He had a series of pictures on a clipboard. He bellowed something at his troops and I was pushed to my knees. Then, like a fucking idiot, he gave me a nod and carried on. That was me well and truly fucked, even if there were a couple of lads in the crew who couldn't work out what I was.

I was helped down into the second cutter. As soon as I was aboard, the handcuffs were taken off and I was given a bowl of hot chocolate.

'You fucking shite! We'll get you one day!' Duff yelled his farewell as we pulled away.

He might have been right, for all I knew. But they'd have to join the queue.