Nine Lives (Sam Archer 1)

  *

  Four thousand miles away, a man woke up from a deep, deep sleep.

  As he opened his eyes, a dazzling glare from above momentarily blinded him. Throwing his arm up to shield his small, reptilian eyes, he tried to focus. Where the hell am I? He could feel a familiar rocking and swaying from the ground beneath his obese bulk. He realised the glare was coming from the sun.

  Then he smiled. He was on a yacht. His yacht. He must have dozed off.

  He went to climb to his feet.

  But he couldn’t.

  Confused, he pushed his upper body upright, looking past his immense gut.

  His socks and shoes were gone. Someone had looped his feet through a cinderblock. He looked through the gaps.

  Three pairs of handcuffs had been fastened the other side.

  And for the first time in over twenty five years, Henry was scared.

  He started pushing himself forwards, trying to reach past his belly and frantically scrabbling at the metal.

  ‘That won’t do any good,’ said a familiar voice, behind him. ‘You of all people should know that.’

  He twisted his head, sweating and in disbelief.

  It was Faris. He was in a white shirt and khaki shorts, sipping on a drink, sunglasses over his eyes.

  ‘Undo these cuffs,’ the fat man ordered.

  His lieutenant looked down at him and smiled.

  ‘Faris, undo these cuffs.’

  ‘My name’s not Faris,’ the man said. ‘It’s Special Agent Cruz. I work for the DEA.’

  Henry blinked, his fatty torso soaking his suit with sweat. Faris’s accent had changed. He now sounded like an American.

  Cruz smiled as he saw the fat man register this. He continued.

  ‘You never had a clue, did you? See, first of all, I knew you would try to kill me when we got back to Riyadh. I saw it in those puffy little eyes of yours. So I sedated you on the plane. You don’t remember? I got out of my seat to use the bathroom and pulled the autojet from behind you. You’re a big boy, so I gave you a double dose. You’ve been out for two days.’

  Henry blinked.

  He had a distant memory of sitting in his seat. A prick in his neck, like someone pinched him. The next thing he knew, he was waking up here.

  ‘You piece of shit,’ Henry screamed. ‘Undo the cuffs.’

  Cruz smiled, sipping the cocktail.

  ‘See, I spoke with the British government. We realised how you’d known about our surveillance at the airfield. Your daughter had managed to infiltrate one of their counter-terrorist teams. She’d gotten talking with a guy from the DEA and you couldn’t believe your luck, could you? You knew all about our surveillance at the airfield. You sent the two meathead assholes to take them out.’

  Henry didn’t reply.

  ‘The two agents you had your goons murder at the airfield, they were friends of mine. And you thought you were in the clear. But I was standing right behind you. I watched everything. Little did your stupid little brain realise there was an American DEA agent standing right beside you.’

  Cruz sipped his drink again and checked the watch on his wrist.

  ‘Right about now your compound has almost been emptied. Every person who’s ever been on your payroll is going into custody. See, I worked hard and gained your trust. You had to tell me about all your hides and stash houses so I could pay people off, didn’t you? My agency is now seizing all of it. Every dime. We’ve done the math already. It looks like it’s going to be close to half a billion dollars.’

  He whistled.

  ‘Oh, and I’ve forgotten to tell you. Seeing as I was a member of your crew for so long, our case was so complete that police are moving on the Albanians and the New Yorkers. It’s probably a good thing you’re out here on the water. There’ll be eight or nine figures on your head after this.’

  Henry was sweating.

  ‘Bullshit,’ he said, unconvincingly. ‘You’re full of shit.’

  ‘Oh, and two more things. Your daughter failed at the stadium. A DEA agent shot and killed her before she could blow the nerve gas. Everyone there is safe, and she’s dead. And Dominick failed too. You sent him to kill my boss, didn’t you? That was part of the deal, him getting off and all, right? Your daughter told you all about Special Agent Crawford, and the strength of his case, so you sent Dominick to kill him and erase the problem. He was close. Real close. He had a knife to Agent Crawford’s neck, apparently. But a British cop shot him in the head.’

  Silence.

  ‘Take me back then, asshole. You need me for trial,’ Henry said

  At that moment, a blond man appeared from inside the hull, dressed in a suit with a blue shirt and red tie. A band aid had been stuck to his neck.

  ‘Let me introduce Special Agent Crawford,’ Cruz said. ‘He’s the head of our team, the six men that have taken your whole business down. The man you sent Dominick to kill. I was going to take care of all this myself, but he insisted on joining me.’

  ‘I don’t give a shit. Take me back to land. You work for the government. You have to follow rules.’

  Cruz smiled. Crawford didn’t.

  ‘Well that’s the thing,’ Cruz said. ‘We have everything we need; we’re seizing everything you’ve ever owned and arresting every guy who ever worked for you.’

  Cruz sipped his drink.

  ‘But we don’t need you. It’s down as a real tragedy in the report. We confronted you on your yacht, out at sea. We planned to take you in out here, away from the public. But you decided to try and shoot your way out, so we were forced to fire back. Unfortunately, one of the bullets knocked you into the sea so we couldn’t recover your body. Shit, it’s a hell of a long way down. We’d never find you if we searched all year.’

  Henry blinked, and stayed still for a moment. Cold fear seeped into his belly.

  Then he frantically started scrabbling at the cuffs by his ankles, trying to reach over his fat gut.

  ‘It’s useless. You’re a big boy, so I used three sets.’ Cruz pulled three things from his pocket. Henry saw they were steel keys. As he sipped his drink, he threw them overboard, one at a time.

  He then drained the cocktail and placed the empty glass to one side, checking his watch.

  ‘Right. I think it’s time for you to go.’

  Henry started bucking and thrashing, screaming, as Cruz approached him, trying to break the handcuffs from the cinderblock. It was no use. His feet jangled as his chubby ankles pulled the cuffs tight against the concrete, the metal solid. He then started trying to grab something, but it was useless.

  He’d been placed in the middle of the space at the back of the yacht, nothing to grip but slippery white deck.

  Cruz approached and stood near him, staring down.

  ‘My friend Faber is down there. You drowned him two days ago. Diving teams haven’t been able to find his body yet. Try to hold your breath. You owe him an apology.’

  Behind Cruz, Henry saw Crawford walk forward, his face expressionless. The two of them moved past the drug lord, towards the edge of the water. Cruz looked down at him.

  ‘Tell Faber we said hi.’

  The two men each gripped the rail, to prevent Henry from pulling them down. They bent down.

  And pushed the cinderblock into the sea.

  The concrete hit the water with a splash and pulled the fat man down like whipcord. He slid off the deck, scrabbling for something to hold, but the polished deck didn’t provide any grip.

  He screamed like a stuck pig as it pulled him into the water, vanishing under the surface.

  And all of a sudden, it was silent.

  Peaceful and calm.

  The only sound was the lapping of the water against the side of the yacht.

  Cruz stood still for a moment, looking down at the clear blue water and the beige round shape becoming smaller and smaller as it disappeared into the depths.

  It’s over.

  He’s gone.

  Thoughts and m
emories flashed into his mind, like someone flicking through a series of photographs. When the DEA had needed an agent to go undercover, the other four guys hadn’t even considered it for a moment. So Cruz had swallowed his fear and stepped up. He knew they needed him. He’d been in for over a year. He’d been forced to do some terrible things, things that would stay with him the rest of his life.

  But to protect the flock, you need to catch the wolf.

  And the wolf was finally gone.

  Cruz turned back to Crawford who was standing, watching him. He nodded and smiled at his agent, the man who’d been known as Faris for the last thirteen months.

  ‘You OK?’

  Cruz didn’t respond. He just smiled.

  ‘Ready to have your life back?’

  Cruz nodded. ‘I can’t wait, sir.’

  ‘Let’s get back to the bay,’ Crawford said. ‘We’ll be on the next flight to DC, First Class. I called ahead. Your wife and son will meet you at Dulles.’

  Cruz felt a lump in his throat, and readjusted his sunglasses. Crawford smiled and moved back into the hull of the yacht. Twisting the key, he fired the engine.

  He took the wheel in his hands gently, as the motor pushed the sleek vessel forward.

  And the sun shimmered across the calm, still water as they headed back to the harbour.

  THE END