the person playing the music must be beyond the wide stairs.
Joona motions for Niko to follow and cover his back as he points to the captain’s bridge overhead.
The violin stops abruptly in the middle of an ascending, beautiful run.
Very suddenly.
Joona throws his body behind the stairs at the same moment automatic fire slams out. Quick, hard bangs. The full metal jacket bullets splinter the stairs where he’d just been standing and are now ricocheting in all directions.
Joona crouches farther back, behind the stairs, and feels an adrenaline rush. Niko has found cover behind a lifeboat crane and is returning fire. Joona, bent over, sees the row the bullet holes have made in the dark glass, like frosted rings around black pupils.
113
The gray-haired bodyguard continues down the stairs with his weapon steadily aimed at the windows. Smoke trickles from his rifle and the casings are still bouncing down the stairs.
Peter has curled into a ball and holds his hands over his ears.
Silently the bodyguard slips out a side door.
Axel is backing away between the tables, holding the violin and its bow, and retreating as Raphael points at him with the knife.
“How could you ruin everything?” he roars as he tries to catch up to Axel. “I’m going to cut up your face, I’m going to-”
“Pappa, what’s going on?” screams Peter.
“Get my gun and get on the helicopter! We’re leaving this boat!”
The boy nods. His face is pale, his chin wobbles. Raphael skirts around tables toward Axel. Axel moves backward and throws down chairs between them.
“Load it with Parabellum, hollow-point!” commands Raphael.
“How many?” the boy asks. “One magazine?”
“Yes, that’s enough-but hurry!” Raphael yells as he kicks aside a chair.
Axel is trying to get through the door on the other side of the room. He turns the lock one-handed, but the door won’t open.
“I’m not finished with you!” howls Raphael.
Axel shakes the door again with his free hand and then sees the bolt high up. Raphael is barging closer. The knife glistens in his hand. Axel reacts impulsively and whirls around to hurl the beautiful violin at Raphael. It tumbles in the air, red and glowing. Raphael jumps aside and trips but still lunges as he tries to save the instrument. He almost catches it, but fumbles although he’s broken its fall. The violin skitters across the floor with a sibilant whisper.
Axel has gotten the door open and rushes out into a cluttered hallway. There’s so much trash he can hardly get through. He clambers over a heap of lounge-chair pillows and over a pile of diving masks and wet suits.
“I’ll get you!” Raphael is following him with the knife in one hand and the violin in the other.
Axel’s foot gets caught in the mesh of a rolled-up tennis net. He crawls away, kicking at it as Raphael draws nearer.
Short, hard bursts of automatic fire can be heard outside.
Raphael pounces, driving the knife down at Axel, but he misses as Axel kicks himself loose. He scrambles to his feet and knocks over a foosball table to block Raphael, then rushes again down the hallway to the door at the end. His hands fumble with the lock and the handle, but something blocks it shut. He shoves. The door opens a crack.
“You can’t get away from me!”
Axel tries to press himself through the gap, but it’s too narrow. The edge of a large shelving unit stacked with clay pots is in the way. Axel throws his whole weight against the door and the unit beyond scrapes a few inches. He can feel Raphael behind him. He shoves once more and finally can squeeze his body through. He tears his hand on the lock but he can’t notice. He must get out of there.
With a scream, Raphael stretches out and swipes down with the knife. The blade rips Axel’s shoulder. It burns with pain.
Axel stumbles into a room with a glass ceiling that looks like a forgotten greenhouse. He runs again, feeling for his shoulder, covering his fingers with blood. He stumbles over a withered lemon tree in a pot and rushes on, bent over, along rows of dead plants with dry, rustling leaves.
Raphael is kicking powerfully at the door. He grunts at every kick. The pots shake as the shelving unit is shoved aside, bit by bit.
Axel searches frantically for a hiding place. He crawls under a dirty plastic sheet hanging down from one of the banks of plants. He keeps crawling past buckets and tubs. He prays Raphael will give up soon and escape from the boat with his son.
There’s a thundering boom from the door, and a few pots smash on the floor. Raphael wrenches his way into the room, panting hard, and nudges against a trellis with withered grape vines.
“Come out and kiss my hand,” he calls.
Axel holds his breath. He tries to retreat farther but there’s a massive metal potting bench in his way.
“I promise I’ll give you everything!” There’s a wide-stretched, oily smile on Raphael’s face. He prowls forward, searching among the shelves and past the dead stumps of bushes. “Your brother’s liver is waiting for you. All you have to do is kiss my hand and it’ll be yours.”
Axel’s stomach lurches and, shaking violently, he leans against a metal cabinet. He’s blocked. His heart races and he hears a roaring in his head. He tries to remain silent. He searches everywhere and then discovers a hatch just five meters away, a hatch that must open onto the foredeck.
The helicopter’s engine is roaring louder.
Axel plans to crawl under the table and then run the last few steps. He peers closely. The door is held shut with just a hook. He begins to shift to one side.
He lifts his head slightly to estimate the distance. But then he freezes. In his concentration, he lost track of Raphael, who has crept up behind him. He hears Raphael’s rasping breath and smells his sweat. And he feels the cold edge of a knife against his throat. It burns where the blade touches Axel’s skin.
114
The gray-haired bodyguard slides out of the dining room silently, glides through the doors, and then runs quickly along the glass-covered section of the deck, holding his camouflaged weapon ready. The lenses of his glasses sparkle. Joona sees him sneaking up behind Niko and knows he will get Niko in a few seconds. Niko’s back is unprotected.
The bodyguard raises his automatic weapon and shifts his finger to the trigger.
Joona stands up, rigid, and places two shots into the middle of the man’s chest. The bodyguard staggers and catches the railing to keep himself from falling overboard. He looks around wildly to see Joona coming. He raises his weapon back up to shoot again.
Joona realizes that the man wears a bulletproof vest under his black jacket.
Joona has already sprung at the man and knocked his weapon before slamming his gun into the base of the man’s nose. The bodyguard’s legs collapse. He staggers back, head thudding against the railing, his sweat and snot
