Deadly Coast (5 page)

And she remembered her big mouth had gotten him killed.

Tough-talking, take-no-shit-from-anyone Lynda Arnett. She’d always been proud of that image, and the respect that came with it. But someone else had paid the price, and she was determined no one else would die for her pride. So each time the
Carney
’s captain used the word
storm
in their conversations, she’d worked
good weather
into her response, signaling that all was well aboard
Luther Hurd
. And each time she’d been tempted to respond with
bad blow
—the prearranged signal to alert
Carney
she was under duress—she thought of young Gomez lying on the deck. She saw no way
Carney
could intercede without getting more of her crew killed, and she couldn’t take that chance.

She roused at the sound of several people moving through the chart room, some of the steps hesitant, like those of blind men in unfamiliar surroundings, mixed with the more confident footfalls. The sound moved away onto the bridge, and despite her situation, she took comfort in the sound of a familiar voice coming from that direction.

“Get your goddamn hands off me,” said Jim Milam.

She flinched at the sound of a blow, followed by a moan.

“Get the woman,” she heard Mukhtar say, and moments later she felt the restraints on her ankles being cut. She was hauled to her feet and half dragged onto the bridge, where Mukhtar ripped the tape from her face and stood waiting for her eyes to adjust.

Chief Engineer Jim Milam stood on the bridge, his hands bound behind his back, with what looked like a small horse collar sprouting multicolored wires around his neck, held down by straps under his armpits. The cook, the bosun, and a seaman stood beside him, similarly bound and outfitted with the strange collars.

“Take them to the top of the wheelhouse,” said Mukhtar to Diriyi, in English for Arnett’s benefit. “Bind one to the rail at each corner.” He smiled at Arnett. “That should keep them far enough apart to allow us to detonate them one by one.”

“Just a minute, Mukhtar! You said—”

“Silence,” screamed Mukhtar, as he backhanded her. Caught off guard, and with hands bound behind her, she stumbled backward and lost her balance, crashing to the deck in a heap.

Milam started toward Mukhtar, to be folded over by a rifle butt to the midsection.

“Take them up,” said Mukhtar, jerking his head toward the door to the bridge wing, and Diriyi towed the still-gasping Milam toward the door. The other two terrorists herded the three bound seamen in their wake.

Mukhtar grabbed a handful of Arnett’s short hair and hauled her to her feet.

She twisted her head and glared at him. “What’re you going to do?”

He ignored her question and dragged her to the steering stand. Holding her with one hand, he fished handcuffs from his pocket and locked one cuff around the storm rail on the steering stand. He moved behind her, and she felt his gun at the base of her skull and heard the soft click of a switchblade opening.

“I am going to cut your hands free,” Mukhtar said, pressing the gun harder to her skull. “I want you to handcuff your right hand to the steering stand. Move slowly. Try any of your tricks and your whole crew will die. Understand?”

Arnett nodded, and she felt the blade between her wrists, slicing through the plastic cable tie like butter. She wanted desperately to rub her raw wrists, but did as ordered and cuffed herself to the steering stand. She heard the slightest sigh of relief from behind her.

He was afraid of her. Despite her circumstances, the realization brought a small thrill of satisfaction and a ray of hope.

“Now,” said Mukhtar, “place steering in manual and come right to a new course of one-eight-zero degrees.”

Arnett did as ordered, without bothering to repeat the course back to him. A mile or more ahead, she could see the stern of the USS
Carney
, moving out of view to port as the bow of
Luther Hurd
swung due south.

“What are you doing?” Arnett asked.

“What I’m doing is changing our destination,” Mukhtar said. “Very soon I’ll be showing your navy friends they can do nothing about it.”

The words were hardly out of his mouth when the VHF squawked. “
Luther Hurd
,
Luther Hurd
, this is USS
Carney
. Why have you changed course? Over.”

“There they are now,” he said. “The show is about to begin.”

Chapter Five

Offices of Phoenix Shipping Ltd.
London, UK

Dugan gazed at Alex Kairouz across a conference table littered with sandwich wrappers, the debris of a working lunch.

“For Christ’s sake,” Dugan said. “It took the insurers ten days just to agree on a five-million counter on a fifteen-million ransom demand? While our ship and crew are rotting in some Somali shithole? What’s the matter with those guys?”

“I’m afraid feeding them intel may actually be working against a speedy conclusion,” Alex said. “They haven’t said it in so many words, but I’m increasingly of the opinion the insurers see this as a golden opportunity to drive the ransom as low as possible, with a possible knock-on effect on future ransom demands.”

“Then we need to explain to the insurers that our intel is a perishable commodity,” Dugan said. “I’m sure there’s a limit to Jesse’s patience.”

“And mine,” Anna added. “Given the nature of my involvement, I’m not keen to see this drag out either. I’ll drop some veiled threats to the insurers that Her Majesty’s Government would like this concluded expeditiously.”

Alex sighed. “Well, there’s nothing more we can do now. The counter has been made. We just have to hope it isn’t so low that it’s angered the buggers and hardened their position. I’m anxious to hear from Ward on that point.”

Dugan’s cell phone vibrated on the table, and he glanced at the caller ID. “Speak of the devil,” he said.

“Jesse,” said Dugan. “We were just talking about you. Any word—”

“We? Are you with Alex and Anna?” Ward asked.

“Yeah, they’re right here.”

“Best put me on speaker,” Ward said. “They’ll want to hear this. And check your email.”

Dugan activated the speaker function, placed his phone in the middle of the table, then pulled his laptop over and opened his email. “Go ahead, Jesse,” he said. “You’re on speaker and I’m opening my email. I see one message from you with an attachment. Looks like a video clip.”

“That’s it,” Ward said. “Yesterday an American flag ship, M/T
Luther Hurd
, carrying a full cargo of jet fuel for Diego Garcia was hijacked off the Horn of Africa. There were—”

“As in the Panama
Luther Hurd
, the Hanley new build?” asked Dugan.

“The same,” Ward said.

“But how could that happen?” Alex asked. “Surely, given the cargo and destination, there was a security presence.”

They heard Ward’s sigh through the speaker. “It’s easier to show you than tell you,” Ward said. “Play the video clip. But be warned, it’s tough to watch.”

Anna and Alex moved around the conference table beside Dugan, as he opened the video. They saw an aerial view of a ship in the distance, taken from an aircraft. The ship loomed larger as the camera closed on it, and then the camera circled the ship, making it obvious it was footage taken from a helicopter.

The ship was underway, but no one was visible on deck or on the bridge wings. However, there were four men on the flying bridge, standing by the handrails at each corner of the wheelhouse. The camera zoomed in to show the men bound to the handrails, each with a strange collar around his neck. As the camera panned over them, the men stared up at it, their terror obvious.

“Wh … what are those collars?” asked Alex.

A light began blinking on one of the collars, and the man wearing it screamed and tugged at the restraints binding him to the handrail, attracting the attention of the cameraman, who zoomed in closer still. There was a flash and the man’s head disappeared, to reappear tumbling through the air. It landed on the main deck below, as the headless body collapsed to sit on the deck, torso held upright by wrists bound to the top handrail. The three other men looked dazed, the closest covered with his shipmate’s blood, then all began to scream and tug at their bonds. The cameraman held focus on the ship, but the ship began to fade into the distance as the chopper beat a hasty retreat.

Dugan stared at the screen, blood drained from his face, the pencil he’d been twiddling snapped in half. Anna suppressed a strangled sob, and Alex sat wordless, moving his mouth as if trying to speak but not producing a sound. Dugan spoke first.

“The bastards,” he said through clenched teeth.

Ward’s voice came from the speaker. “That was filmed by a chopper from
Luther Hurd
’s escort, the USS
Carney
. The hijackers didn’t even issue a warning until they’d killed the first guy to prove they meant business. Only then did they contact
Carney
on the VHF and order the immediate withdrawal of the chopper. The chopper withdrew, of course, and the hijackers informed
Carney
they would execute a crewman every thirty seconds if
Carney
violated a buffer zone of five nautical miles.”

“If
Luther Hurd
had an escort, how the hell did the pirates get on in the first place? And wasn’t there a security force onboard as well?” Dugan asked.

“There was supposed to be a private security team onboard,” Ward said. “But since the revolution last year, the Egyptians haven’t been very accommodating. Last week they began to enforce a ‘no security team, no weapons’ ban on merchant ships in Egyptian waters. My guess is that wasn’t a coincidence, and it left the ship wide-open for the hijackers to stow away at Suez.”

“What’s the navy doing now?” Dugan asked.

“What can they do?” Ward said. “After the hijackers decapitated the crewman, the
Carney
pulled back and shadowed the
Luther Hurd
at the specified five-mile distance. We’re dispatching more ships to the area, as are the UK and several NATO allies. Based on her current course, it looks like she’s headed for Harardheere, where your own
Phoenix Lynx
is being held.”

“Bloody hell,” Anna said, now recovered. “Does it get any worse?”

“Unfortunately, it does,” Ward said. “The hijackers must have had a camera of their own mounted to film the decapitation. It’s starting to show up on several radical Islamic websites.”

“Radical Islamic websites?” Dugan said. “Aren’t we dealing with pirates?”

“I was coming to that,” Ward said. “Al-Shabaab, the al-Qaeda affiliate, has taken credit. They’ve issued a statement via al-Jazeera, refusing any monetary ransom, and a list of terrorists they insist be freed. The list includes the names of over a hundred dangerous terrorists held in a dozen countries. The logistics alone of dealing with that many jurisdictions make it an impossible demand on its face, even if anyone was inclined to free terrorists. They claim they’ll kill all the hostages and blow up the ship if their demands aren’t met.”

Dugan buried his face in his hands, then looked up. “OK. We understand, Jesse. Where do we stand?”

“I’m scrambling to get in front of this new situation, which leaves you without help, I’m afraid. I need to focus all my resources on al-Shabaab.”

“Understood,” Dugan said. “But could you try to get the pirates’ reaction to the five-million-dollar counter before you pull out?”

There was a prolonged pause. “I don’t think you understand, Tom. This is a game changer,” Ward said.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that Somali piracy just became unambiguously linked to terrorist activity, and the US, the UK, and many other countries have a clear policy of refusing to negotiate with terrorists. That includes allowing ransoms to be paid by US or UK citizens or companies.”

“But they’re different groups,” Dugan said.

“Not to the general public,” Ward said. “Public perception drives politics, and politicians make policy. Homeland Security is notifying US ship owners and insurers as we speak. Anna can check on her end, but I’ll be very surprised if the Brits aren’t doing something similar. It’s always been a gray area, and rightly or wrongly, this pushed it over the line.”

“Agent Ward,” Alex asked, “are these public pronouncements or private notices to the owners and insurers? At any given time, the pirates hold over a dozen ships and several hundred crewmen, all the subject of negotiations. There’s no telling what impact such a public pronouncement would have on the safety of the hostages, but I suspect the pirates will murder a few just to test the governments’ resolve.”

“That’s been considered,” Ward said. “For the moment, the notifications are verbal and no statements will be issued. Owners and insurers are free to continue talks, but no money can change hands. At least, that’s what US owners are being told. But it’s moot for us. The only US ship being held is the
Luther Hurd
, and Hanley’s not talking to anyone, except calling me every thirty minutes to scream in my ear.”

“So what you’re saying is that we’re screwed and there’s not a damn thing we can do about it. Does that about cover it?” Dugan asked.

“Look, Tom. I’m sorry about—”

“We understand,” Anna said. “But unless you’ve something else, we should ring off and check things from our end before someone lets the cat out of the bag.”

“No. That’s it,” Ward said, and they said their goodbyes.

Anna looked at Alex. “I’ll ring MI5 HQ if you’ll contact the insurers.”

Alex nodded, reaching for his phone, and Dugan stood to pace in front of the windows. He was not reassured by the bits of overheard conversation. Anna finished first, and Dugan sat down again, as they both waited for Alex to hang up. When he did, he didn’t look pleased. He motioned for Anna to go first.

“Right,” she said. “Long story short, HQ basically confirmed what Ward told us. Ransoms are prohibited and they’re in the process of notifying owners and insurers. We’re on the list to be notified, but they’re starting with the major insurers first. No public announcement and no prohibition against talking to the pirates, but no money can change hands. What’d you find out, Alex?”

“Much the same. Our insurers intend to drag out negotiations as long as possible. From what they said, it seems all the major insurers are taking the same approach. I suppose no one wants to worsen an already horrible situation.” Alex sighed. “In retrospect, I suppose our low-ball offer puts us ahead of the game. We can’t have the buggers agreeing to a ransom we can’t pay.”

“How much time do you think we have before the pirates figure things out and it starts to get ugly?” Dugan asked.

“God alone knows,” Alex said.