119

 

THE SUPER-YACHT, ZEPHYR, 11:35 A.M.

Gwen looked down as the helicopter strained through the air, the engines screaming against the onshore winds. Whitecaps littered the ocean like debris. She could practically taste the brine. In the leaden sky, the cumulonimbus were racing in. They angled forward, the top anvils leading the lower-hanging darker base of the clouds. So many were grouping they looked in danger of forming one massive supercell. That meant thunderstorms. Huge ones.

Gwen suppressed a shudder. She knew from her pilot buddy that the violent conditions in and around thunderstorms could exceed rotorcraft structural limits and bring a helicopter down in seconds. The extreme updrafts and downdrafts could toss you hundreds, if not thousands of feet up or down. The pilot would rightly refuse to fly and she would be stuck on the yacht with Sheikh Ali and an even bigger storm bearing down on them. She had to get in and get out quickly.

Through the gloom she made out the gray hulk of Zephyr a quarter of a mile ahead. In the big seas the huge yacht looked like a child’s toy. Super wealth, super yacht meant nothing to a big storm.

The helicopter lost altitude, coming down into a hover above the pitching yacht. Gwen could see the pilot casting his eyes back and forth, trying to time the landing. The cords in his neck stood out in stress. Beside her, the other man said nothing. He just looked on with the kind of stoic resilience and stillness of someone who had experienced real fear and survived it.

Sometimes during the half hour flight, Gwen had felt his eyes on her. The scrutiny had felt like more than mere curiosity. She had shrugged it off, evaded his gaze, focused instead on what she was going to say to the Sheikh.

After a few false starts, the pilot brought down the helicopter. It slammed onto the deck, jolting Gwen and the silent man. She watched three men emerge from the yacht and run to the helicopter with what looked like guy ropes, to anchor it.

Once it had been secured, Gwen forced open the door, jumped out, and ran across the deck. The rain fell like sleet, arrowing into her face, soaking her. A door opened as she approached. She felt herself blow in, braced herself on the wall opposite. She let out a breath, laughed, half in alarm, half relief.

The majordomo type she’d seen before gave a slight bow, then led her into the stateroom. The silent man followed behind her.

*   *   *

Sheikh Ali stood with two of his men, one to either side. It almost looked to Gwen as if they were guarding him. They eyed her with hard, unsmiling eyes. Gwen could feel their hostility pumping across the room. Their presence, the frisking, Gwen wondered if they all thought she was going to attack the Sheikh.

She frowned, it didn’t make sense. She caught a look of uncertainty in the Sheikh’s eyes. He was regarding her with more than his usual intense scrutiny, but then the moment passed and he smiled.

“My dear Dr. Gwen! Thank you so much for coming, for braving what appears to be a growing storm.”

Gwen gave him a brief smile. This wasn’t a social visit.

The Sheikh beckoned and Gwen approached. Ali Al Baharna held out his hand, shook Gwen’s warmly, grasped it with the other and led her to the sofa. His two shadows followed.

“Please, sit. Coffee? Tea? Water?”

“No, thank you,” said Gwen. She wanted to get on with it then get the hell off the yacht onto dry land somewhere far away.

“Just a water then,” the Sheikh said to the majordomo. He turned back to Gwen.

“Please forgive my insistence. It’s a Bedu tradition. It is incumbent upon us to offer refreshment to any and all who come visit. Even our enemies,” he added, eyes no longer smiling.

“How inconvenient,” replied Gwen. She pursed her lips. This was going to be awkward, but she had no choice.

“Sheikh Ali, please forgive me but I need to talk to you in private.”

She kept her eyes on his, but remained peripherally aware of the men who flanked him. A small pulse of energy seemed to go through them. They widened their stance, loosened their limbs, exchanged a look. What the hell did they think she was going to do, she wondered?

The Sheikh paused for a moment. He turned to the majordomo, who had returned with a glass of water.

“Go,” he said sharply. The man set down the water and went. The Sheikh dismissed the other two men.

“Ali, wait at the other end of the room will you,” he said, adding something in machine-gun Arabic. The other man moved away, stood by a door, perhaps forty feet from them.

“He won’t hear us, and his English is imperfect too, so please,” his dark eyes warmed, “do not worry.”

Gwen nodded. At that moment, if anyone were worried, she thought it was the Sheikh. A current of tension seemed to flow through him. His body was restive, his fingers made small movements, shifting on his kandoora, smoothing it down, then adjusting his headdress. His glance flickered too, from her to Ali, to the windows behind her.

“OK, you have a problem. A major problem,” said Gwen. As the Sheikh sat forward in the sofa opposite, Gwen told him all about Gabriel Messenger, about her suspicions that he was Hass/Hans, and about his plans to attempt to ramp up a big winter storm into an ARk Storm.

The Sheikh listened in perfect silence. Only the arching of one eyebrow and the shifting fingers betrayed any reaction. Only the roar of the storm punctuated Gwen’s silences. When she had finished speaking, the Sheikh’s eyes ceased flickering and locked onto her. For the first time, she felt a flicker of alarm.