Traitor

Bulgarian were sitting on the long serving counter, guns across their laps.

‘Why aren’t you letting these blokes do their business?’ Deacon called out.

‘We are,’ Banzi answered. ‘Some of ’em couldn’t wait. The she-he is making food for them now.’

Deacon scanned the faces of the hostages. He saw the one he was looking for. The man was staring straight at him. Deacon checked the photograph to confirm the man’s identity, realising he was one of the men they had filmed on deck. ‘You,’ he said, pointing. ‘Get to your feet.’

Jordan struggled to comply.

Deacon indicated the entrance doors. He stepped aside to let Mackay pass into the corridor. When the doors had closed behind them he said, ‘What’s your name?’

‘Don’t you know?’ Jordan said coldly.

‘I know a name.’

‘Jordan Mackay.’ He turned his back to Deacon and offered his bound hands. Deacon took a knife from a sheath on his belt and cut the plastic bonds. The Lebanese wondered what was going on.

Jordan rubbed his chafed wrists. ‘Give me your pistol.’

Deacon looked at the man questioningly.

‘You were given instructions about me.’

‘They said nothing about you being in charge.’

‘You were told to give me anything I asked for.’

‘They said nothing about a weapon.’

‘A weapon comes under “anything I ask for”,’ Jordan said, holding out his hand. ‘You all have weapons. You have them for a reason. Give me one.’

Deacon considered the brief instructions on the sheet of paper. As the man said, anything meant anything. He reached inside his coat, took his pistol from its holster and put it in Jordan’s hand. Mackay removed the magazine, pulled back the top slide enough to see the round in the breech and replaced it.

‘So. What’s your part in this?’ said Deacon, curious.

Jordan levelled the pistol at the Lebanese thug’s face and pulled the trigger. The deafening report of the gun reverberated along the corridor as the bullet went through the Arab’s head and into the wall behind, followed by a spout of blood. His body went limp and dropped to the floor.

Deacon stiffened at the sight and sound but kept cool, wondering immediately if he was going to be next.

Jordan stuck the pistol into his trouser belt. ‘You can have his,’ he said.

The doors slammed open and Banzi crouched in the opening with his M-15 at the ready, his gaze flicking between the two standing men and the Lebanese thug’s corpse on the floor. ‘Is all okay?’ he asked, confused.

‘He was a wanker anyway,’ Deacon said.

‘Have you laid the charges?’ Jordan asked.

‘Yep.’

‘I want to take a look.’

Deacon took the Arab’s coat off a hook and handed it to Jordan. ‘Let’s go,’ he said. ‘Would you mind tossin’ ’im over the side?’ he called out to the Japanese mercenary. ‘Weigh ’im down a bit so’s he doesn’t float where someone might find ’im.’

Deacon led Jordan into the accommodation block. Partway along a corridor Jordan stepped into one of the doorways. ‘I need a minute,’ he said. Deacon paused at the end airlock. A moment later came the sound of a toilet flushing and Jordan stepped back into the corridor, buckling up his trouser belt.

Outside the weather hit them like a brutal ambush, heavy pelting rain and powerful winds that twisted between the sandwiched deck and through the grilles above and below. It felt like a typhoon was assaulting the platform. The men leaned into the storm as they moved across an exposed stretch of deck to a flight of rain-soaked metal stairs. They held tightly to the rails to maintain their balance.

Deacon stopped halfway down the steps and crouched to indicate the huge platform leg nearest to them. ‘There’s the first,’ he shouted above the wind. Jordan continued past him onto the next deck. The wind and rain lashed at him as he limped across the griddled flooring to the massive leg. He examined the linear charge, wrapped in black plastic sheeting, and followed it around its entire circumference.

Deacon joined him. ‘Is it okay?’

‘Looks it,’ Jordan shouted back.

‘The other charges,’ Deacon said, pointing.

Jordan leaned over a rail to look down between the lower struts. He saw a charge wrapped around a heavy link that held fast one of the dozen anchor cables that kept the rig in position.

‘There are five more like that. Can you manage a ladder?’

Jordan frowned at the implication and walked over to a ladder welded to the side of the leg. He grabbed hold of the cold wet rungs with his bare hands, swung his legs beneath him and began to descend.

Deacon grinned, amused by the man’s effort to prove himself. He rubbed his hands together against the cold, took hold of a rung and followed.

Jordan reached the lower deck. Here there were fewer equipment blocks and machinery to check the wind and rain, and the gale funnelled between the spars ferociously. He inspected one of the charges and eyed the others spread around the perimeter of the deck. He looked back to see Deacon partway down the ladder. ‘You have the detonating control?’

Deacon touched down onto the deck and removed a yellow box the size of a cigarette pack from his pocket. Jordan wanted to ask for it. But from what little he knew about Deacon he could sense that the man wouldn’t give it up. The bosses hadn’t been clear enough about who was in ultimate command. Splitting the leadership in this way was not very clever and could cause friction when final decisions had to be made. Jordan decided not to make his play just yet.

He took in the vast oil platform above, below and around them. ‘You think they’re serious enough to do this?’

‘I get the feeling they don’t bluff.’ Deacon wondered what Mackay knew. ‘Is this just about ransom money or is it something else?’

Jordan wondered in turn how much the other man knew, if anything. ‘I’ve got my piece to do, just like you. Other than that I don’t know.’

‘You’re the platform expert?’ Deacon shouted.

‘Not exactly.’ Jordan looked out to sea. ‘They’ll come at night.’

‘Who?’ Deacon asked.

‘Those whose job it is to take back the platform. They might come in force, one heavy assault, or send in a recce team first.’

‘When?’

‘Depends on the negotiations . . . Soon . . . Days.’

Deacon had an idea who - or, at least, what - Jordan was. ‘You ex-SBS?’ he asked.

Jordon nodded.

Deacon smirked. ‘We’ll be ready for ’em. I’m going to place booby traps on all the stairs and ladders coming from below.’

‘They won’t come the way you think. You won’t see them until they show themselves. If you’re still on board when they get here they’ll kill you.’

Deacon’s smile melted.

Jordan reached for a rung and pulled himself up the ladder. Deacon watched him climb, suddenly feeling less comfortable. He sensed that Jordan might be a problem. The man had the air of someone who thought he was in charge. Deacon would take the first opportunity to let him know who really was.

The Chinook cruised at several thousand feet above the English countryside, keeping the city of Sheffield on its left as it headed towards the coastline at Scarborough. Stratton had gone through every operational trunk and the team’s personal boxes to gather the equipment that he felt he needed for the task. It had been more an exercise to keep himself busy than it had been based on any great confidence that he would actually use it.

The crewman came over to Stratton and tapped him on the shoulder, looking concerned. ‘Charles is getting