Land of the Gods

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

When they got to the harbor, Bryce Cobb was easy enough to find. Way past midnight now and heading into the early hours and there was only one small area of activity down on Pier 38. A man was illuminated by a couple of lights, unloading some boxes from the back of a Hilux and walking down to a boat moored at the end of the pier. High above the craggy ridge of Mount Tantalus in the east, the first signs of dawn were appearing as a peach-colored ribbon in the Hawaiian sky.

They walked casually down the pier, knowing the man had nowhere to run, and approached him with a cheery wave and smile.

“Who the fuck are you?”

“We’re your worst nightmare.” Hawke piled a fist into his face and knocked him down hard on the wooden pier. “Help me pick him up, Vincent.”

“It’s Reaper,” he said with a knowing smile. “We’re on a mission.”

“This is an in joke, am I right?” Nikolai said.

“You could say that,” Lea said as Hawke and Reaper picked up the unconscious man and walked him down the pier. They dragged him over the gangway and into the wheelhouse of the boat. Nikolai scanned the marina for any signs of trouble while Lea opened the hatch leading to below decks.

Hawke, who was holding the man by his arms, went first. Reaper had the man by his knees and he followed him down the stairs. When they were down below decks, Lea and Nikolai killed the lights up top and joined them as Hawke and Reaper tied him to a pillar with some nylon winch rope.

Hawke saw a cup of cold coffee sitting on the side of the cabin. He picked it up and hurled the contents into Cobb’s face. In response, the man gasped and coughed and blinked his eyes wildly as he tried to work out where he was and what the hell had just happened.

“Wakey wakey, asshole,” Lea said.

Another gasp and more confused blinking as he slowly got his bearings. “What the hell’s going on? Are you those freaks?”

“Who do you mean?”

“The dudes in the black suits!”

“Do we look like them?”

“I guess not.” His voice was hesitant and confused. “So if you’re not them, then who are you and what do you want?”

“We want McKenna,” Lea said. “Or more accurately, we want something McKenna has.”

“If this is about the coke, I swear to God he’s blackmailing me. He threatened to kill me if I didn’t ship it for him.”

“Spare us, dickhead,” Hawke said. “We’ve already read all your emails. He’s not blackmailing you. You’re the best of friends.”

“True story,” Lea said. “In fact I’d say the two of you are practically sleeping together.”

“Cosy, eh?” Hawke said.

Cobb got nasty and lashed out with his leg, almost hitting Lea with his boot.

Hawke leaned in and gripped his throat. “Try that again and I’ll beat you black and blue, got it?”

Cobb snarled, but backed down. “All right man… who the fuck are you?”

“My name’s Hawke and I’m with the British Government,” he lied.

“Shit.”

“Right. And you’re a coke smuggler looking at life in prison in any one of a dozen countries, unless you cooperate with us.”

“Okay, okay… you got me real good, man.”

Lea crossed her arms. “You bet your arse we did, you friggin’ gobdaw. Now just tell us what we want to know and we’ll be on our way.”

A defeated and broken man, he gave a sullen nod and slumped down against the pillar.

“Where’s McKenna?” Hawke asked.

“I swear I don’t know. He was supposed to be here a half hour ago.”

“You’re lying.”

“I swear…”

Hawke punched him in the head and split his nose open.

Cobb screamed with rage and spat a wad of blood on the wheelhouse floor. “Fuck!”

“There’s much more where that came from, wanker,” Hawke said. “See, I’m in a bit of a rush, and my commando training emphasized power over finesse.” Another punch and a dislocated jaw.

Cobb tried to scream but it came out as a garbled moan.

“C’mon, friend,” Lea said. “Where’s McKenna? I can’t guarantee Joe here’s going to get any nicer.”

Hawke pulled back his arm and clenched his fist.

“Wait! Wait dammit!”

They turned to the voice behind them and saw McKenna climbing up the steps from a lower deck. “Jesus, just stop beating him. I’m here.”

“McKenna, how nice of you to show yourself.”

He jutted his chin over at the broken Bryce Cobb. “How did you know that wasn’t me?”

“Simple,” Lea said. “All the pictures of you back at your place. Unless you keep cheesy soft-focus photos of ship captains in your house, the conclusion wasn’t hard to reach.”

“You went to my house?”

“Sure.”

“Then you saw what those freaks did.” The drug baron approached them sheepishly. “What do you want with us?”

“What do you think?” Reaper said.

McKenna took a deep breath and slipped his hand in his pocket.

Hawke drew his Glock and aimed it two-handed in the center of the man’s face. It took less than half a second. “Careful what you bring out of the pocket, son.”

“You want the fucking ring, no?”

“When I see it, I’ll believe it. Now, easy does it.”

McKenna pulled his hand out slowly to reveal he was holding the third ring. “Happy now?”

Hawke lowered the gun and slipped it back in his holster. “I’m always happy, mate. Guess I’m just am optimist.” He took the ring from the man and held it up to the light. “How about you?”

“Not any fucking more.”

Hawke tossed the ring to Lea who caught it with one hand.

“The real thing?”

She gave it a quick study and took Razak’s and Alexander’s rings from his pocket. “Fake as a Hong Kong Seamaster.”

Hawke raised his gun. “Last chance, friend. Where is the ring?”

“All right, all right! Lower your gun. They took it. The freaks.”

“Why lie about it?”

“I just wanted you off my backs so I could work out a way to get my ring back. My old man got that ring back in Vietnam. Guy who sold it to him said it came from Egypt. Belonged to some dude called Akhenaten. It’s important to me.”

Lea tossed the ring back to Hawke. “We’re not getting the map with this thing.”

Cobb looked up, sharp eyes squinting. “What map?”

Hawke elbowed him in the face. “When I want you to talk I’ll rattle your cage.”

McKenna’s eyes widened. “Who the fuck are you guys?”

Cobb spat more blood and a tooth came out. “They say they’re from the British Government.”

Hawke shook his head. “What did I literally just say to you?”

“Sorry.”

“Apology accepted.” He turned to McKenna. “How many guys came to your plantation earlier today?”

McKenna paused before answering. He was searching for a way to speak without giving anything away, and they all knew it.

“How many?”

“Around twenty.”

Hawke and the others shared a glance. “Quite a force.”

“But it felt like a hell of a lot more, man. They move like frigging ninjas.”

“And they wanted the ring, am I right?” Reaper said.

McKenna nodded. “They were supposed to be buying it, man. I swear it. They turned up like a goddam army and tell us the deal’s off and if we valued our asses then we’d better just turn the goddam ring over. I told them to fuck off. I told them no one messes with me like that.”

Hawke crossed his arms and leaned back on the galley cabinet. “And how did that work out for you?”

“You know how — you saw my property. They went crazy and killed all the men in the room except me. They put a gun to my head, took the ring and then they set fire to the entire plantation. I only got away because I knew about a secret escape tunnel that my grandfather built into the property years ago in case the Japanese invaded during the war.”

“A charming story,” Lea said, “but it doesn’t help us get the ring back. Do you know where these guys are now?”

“The terms of the deal were they paid me half a million bucks for the one poxy ring and then got out of my life, but in my line of work you have to be suspicious to survive so I checked them out. I can tell you that they have a private jet fueled up at the airport. I guess they’re planning on getting out of here as fast as they can, especially now they have what they came looking for, goddam thieves.”

Hawke glanced at his watch. “When are the first flights out of the airport?”

“Just after five a.m.”

“Shit,” he said. “that’s less than twenty minutes away. We’d better get running.”