The Siren's Sting Read online

  The gardens were dry and rocky—the odd one with the luxury of a lush lawn—but most making full use of the hardy plants, the natural vegetation that gave the island its distinct perfume. Even now, if on a winter’s day somewhere far away Stevie caught a whiff of cistus, or curry bush, or myrtle, she was instantly transported, with goose bumps, to the island. She had been coming almost every summer since she was a year old—thirty years already—and the place was set in her bones.

  Six men patrolled the grounds of Brown’s Villa Goliath at regular intervals, dressed in green T-shirts with Giardiniere—gardener— stencilled across the shoulders. But they carried radios on their belts and Stevie was sure, from the breadth of their shoulders and their fiercely short hair, that they were a lot more than groundsmen.

  The land was ringed by a low, dry-stone wall—very much like those of the surrounding villas—but a hedge of oleanders obscured the view and surveillance cameras, planted at twenty-metre intervals, suggested that the owner of the Villa Goliath was more nervous than most.

  Brown was at a peace summit in Scandinavia, but he had lent Krok and his family the villa. From what Rice had told her, Krok did business with Brown on a regular basis—weapons, mercenaries, ammunition, transport logistics—but the loan of Brown’s private summer palace equalled a lot of business indeed.

  It was quite impossible to get close to the place without compromising oneself and so Stevie had to be content with watching from a distance. There were security men everywhere—Brown’s dressed in the green gardeners’ T-shirts, Krok’s men all in black.

  Vaughan Krok wouldn’t have been the first of Brown’s guests to bring their own security, and no doubt the accommodation of his men had been easy, but there seemed to be a lot of them.

  Stevie’s mission—could she call it that and not sound ridiculous?— was to find out to what extent the threat to Krok and his family was real and immediate. What were his existing security measures like? Were they good enough? Appropriate? Apparently his wife had her doubts, afraid her husband was using the spectre of violence to keep her imprisoned (her words, according to Rice; not Stevie’s). She had yet to meet the woman—that pleasure awaited her tomorrow.

  But for now, all was quiet. The occupants of the villa appeared to be resting after their lunch. She hadn’t been able to see their faces clearly—they had been mostly obscured by a pergola—but she had spotted what looked like scampi, and a bottle of local rosato. It was unlikely they would stir until the cool of dusk. Through the binoculars, she followed the paving stones as they meandered through the lush gardens—hibiscus, palm, oleander—towards the small private beach. Six wooden sun lounges stood in a neat row, all empty; a large sign, vietato in poisonous red, warned off the curious.

  A small boy in a red and white striped T-shirt was playing with pebbles at the water’s edge. He had a dark mop of hair, and looked to be about six years old. It would have to be Emile Krok, only child of Clémence and Vaughan. He seemed a little forlorn—as much as anyone could tell a thing like that through binoculars, from a boat. He was walking slowly up and down the beach, his ankles in the water, now crouching down, probably to examine some treasure.

  A shadow flickered on the outer edge of the binocular’s circle of vision. Stevie turned to follow it and saw a hulking man dressed all in black, with black army boots and a black cap. He was standing at ease with a sub-machine gun resting casually in his hands. He towered over the child, a dump truck watching a sand crab.

  The bodyguard.

  Stevie saw the man glance at his watch then say something to the boy, who dropped whatever he held in his hand and obediently stepped out of the water. She kept watching until the two mismatched figures disappeared up the garden path.

  The wind was picking up. Stevie knelt at the bow of the dinghy and began hauling on the anchor chain, her arms working hard to drag it up from the depths. Then she pull-started the fifteen-horsepower engine, ancient but utterly reliable, and motored slowly in to the tiny stone jetty below her grandmother’s house.

  The water in the old garden hose was still warm from the sun as she hosed off the salt of the day. The stones on the path beneath her feet radiated heat and she felt at peace for the first time in a long while. This business with the Kroks was not going to crack her stillness— she wouldn’t let it. It had taken her almost six months to find some inner quiet after all the blood of Russia and she wasn’t going to let it go now.

  She slipped on an old Pucci kaftan in swirling aquamarines, the cotton worn thin with age, and began climbing the steps to the roof terrace. Behind her, she heard a faint tinkling and Ettore the dachshund appeared, wearing his little red collar.

  He visited Stevie every evening at sunset and stayed until his owners across the road, hoarse from calling for him, went back indoors. They had no idea where Ettore went and Stevie never told them. It was their little secret.

  ‘Buona sera, Ettore.’

  The small dog waved his long tail and looked up at Stevie with bright, intelligent eyes. They headed up to the roof together.

  If she stood on her toes, Stevie could just see the roof of the Villa Goliath. Someone had lit lanterns in the garden, and the place was dotted with soft light—not security lighting.

  The cameras would have night-vision filters; it was that sort of set-up.

  Stevie poured herself two inches of sweet vermouth from an aperitif tray she had brought up from the kitchen, added a hunk of ice, a slice of orange peel. The sun was setting over the horizon and the entire bay was bathed in pink and gold. It was impossible to think of evil, only of harmony—and of the lonely tug the perfect sunset seemed to cause in her heart.

  Did all beauty do that?

  From somewhere across the terracotta rooftops, Stevie heard the notes of a flute. Every evening at dusk, the same flute, the same tune. It sounded vaguely Middle Eastern, or perhaps Indian. Stevie did not, unfortunately, have any kind of ear for music and, much as she enjoyed singing, she was often gently—or sometimes not so gently—discouraged from doing so.

  She raised her binoculars and scanned the neighbouring houses.

  Pino Maranello in the stone bungalow behind—former professional soccer player, many beautiful daughters, many beautiful wives and girlfriends, unlikely flute player—was sitting on a rattan chair on the lawn, smoking a cigarette and reading the newspaper. He was still terribly handsome and made good use of his looks. Several women in jewel-coloured shift dresses bustled about with plates and napkins under the bamboo pergola, chattering like gay parrots.

  Stevie lowered her binoculars. ‘Buona sera,’ she called.

  Pino looked up from his paper and flashed her a grin. ‘Ciao, Stevie. La nonna sta bene?’ He always asked after Stevie’s grandmother. ‘Will we see her this summer? It’s been too long.’

  ‘Perhaps this summer. I know she misses Sardinia.’

  Pino nodded and raised both palms to the sky. Of course, everyone misses Sardinia when they are elsewhere.

  Stevie turned her binoculars to the house to her right: the Biedermeiers had obviously just arrived—still pale as butter. They were eating their dinner outside. It was early for dinner, but they were German—from the north—and had perhaps acquired this custom in the long winters. Frau Biedermeier, tall and fair, Herr Biedermeier, round and fair, two good-looking, fair-haired children— not flute players either.

  She swung to the left but the music ended there, a last graceful note hanging in the powder-blue air.

  If only all mysteries were as charming.

  Across the road, a woman was calling for Ettore—‘Ma dove sei andato?!’—the exasperation in her voice growing.

  Stevie looked down at her companion. ‘Perhaps you had better . . .’ And little Ettore was gone.

  The sun was sinking steadily into the glassy sea. Stevie’s grandmother Didi used to tell her to watch for the green spark— electricity, she called it—that you might see, if conditions were right, if you were very lucky. She remembered sitti
ng beside her father on the sun-warmed wall, just as she was doing now, and the sound of her mother’s singing voice rising from the kitchen. Days long-gone, almost as if they never were. Stevie kept her eyes focused on the sliver of planet, pale pink and disappearing fast, until—there! The green flash.

  At least some things never changed.

  5

  At the easy hour of eleven o’clock, Stevie stood at the end of the long wooden jetty at Hotel Cala di Volpe. She spotted the launch in the distance: right on time. The sun was already hot, burning through her silk kaftan—this one a wiggling Missoni print in turquoise, pink and yellow; the kind of garment a happy and high-living acquaintance would wear for lunch on a yacht in the Mediterranean. Stevie was, after all, incognito.

  She had had a brief moment of doubt on the drive over: was the turban too much? She touched the turquoise headpiece gently, making sure it was as she had arrranged it.

  Too late for second thoughts—the launch was pulling up to the jetty.

  The Hercules was moored off the coast, visible only as a white dot from the jetty. Stevie knew it had been built by an ultra-discreet German firm that had been designing since the warships of World War I. There had been much talk and speculation in mega-yachting circles over the project—know only by its code 999—but the shipbuilders and everyone else associated with the project had remained tight-lipped.

  Almost no one knew who the owner was, nor how it was possible that project 999 bore such an uncanny resemblance to the latest $100 billion US naval project, codenamed DD(X), a super-fast, compact warship designed for littoral defence, perfect for shallow water and small waterways. It was designed to chase smaller attack vessels and submarines and it was armed with three kinds of torpedoes and missiles.

  Stevie had seen pictures of the DD(X), a sleek, pointed ship with a single turret far back on the length of the ship, all hard-angled blades. Even so, she was still not prepared for the sight of the Hercules: the giant head of an albatross, six storeys high. The bow was three storeys high and sharp as a needle, drawing back to a towering living space, then cutting away, straight into the sea. The Hercules was at once extraordinary, hideous and quite breathtaking; an ultra-modern warship in gleaming white.

  It was cold in the port shadow of the beast and Stevie was glad to hop aboard and step back into the sunlight.

  ‘Get those fenders down properly, you morons, before you dent her.’ A man’s voice, deep and pebbly. Stevie looked up towards the upper deck: the figure of a man, stocky, large arms, silhouetted by the sun.

  Krok.

  Stevie lightly drew breath and assumed her persona. She waved, hand high above her head, gold bangles tinkling, and let out the universal cry of the swanning society swan:

  ‘Yoohoo!’

  The man slowly turned his head. ‘Clem!’ he barked.

  Clémence Krok possessed all the charm her husband lacked. She was a beauty in her early forties and as polished as diamonds, which she seemed to have a fondness for. Lithe and tanned and perfectly blonde, she wore white linen pants and a turquoise and orange bolero jacket made largely of feathers. As Clémence went to kiss Stevie, palms raised in studied delight, wonderful smile flashing, Stevie decided she was glad she had worn the turban after all.

  ‘Oh, it was at the Serpentine party, Vaughan,’ Clémence was saying. ‘We promised to meet up if we ever found ourselves in the same patch of sun. And here we are.’ She kissed Stevie on both cheeks.

  Krok stared at Stevie. ‘And here you are.’ He wore a salmon-coloured polo shirt, but was not quite tanned enough to pull it off.

  Stevie affected airiness, giving a small laugh as she inwardly cursed David Rice.

  A crew member appeared, immaculate in white: ‘Lunch is served.’

  Clémence rose. ‘We lunch early, Stevie. My husband likes to get up with the sun, says it keeps him ahead of the competition.’ She put her perfectly manicured hand on Krok’s arm.

  Did he stiffen?

  Clémence carefully removed her hand and smiled widely. Both Vaughan and his wife wore sunglasses, so it was hard to tell what their souls were up to.

  Were there no other guests on this mega-yacht? Where was Emile, their son?

  Stevie knew better than to ask pointed questions, especially around a man like Krok. She simply slipped her eyes into soft focus and gazed lazily about her, following Krok and Clémence forward.

  There seemed to be very few windows, not unusual in a warship, but certainly uncommon in a pleasure craft. Perhaps the Hercules used other technology to show guests the view. Stevie noticed a small insignia on one of the small portholes as they passed: bulletproof glass.

  ‘What a wonderfully original design. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.’

  Krok looked back sharply. ‘Nothing like it in the whole world. Made by Schorr and Hess. Cost me two hundred and seventy million US.’

  Stevie nodded with what she hoped was suitable awe.

  ‘One hundred and eighteen metres long, fourteen guest cabins, forty-six staff.’ Krok telegraphed the statistics, his hundred-yard stare scanning the sea. He turned his head and barked into the open doorway, ‘Long Island iced tea!’ A well-built crew member appeared almost instantly with a long glass on a silver tray.

  ‘Don’t you worry about pirates?’ Stevie asked in a hushed tone, her eyes suitably wide. Her own experience aboard the Oriana was still fresh in her mind, and she also wanted to learn more about this most extraordinary vessel. Krok was only too glad to oblige.

  ‘There’s a powerful water cannon on board—can sink a boat at a hundred metres. If they get closer than that—which I doubt— we’ve got a sonic gun that’d shatter the eardrums of every pirate in an attack vessel.’ He fixed Stevie with a rather mad stare. ‘And there’s a high-speed escape boat. But we won’t need that. My crew can defend themselves just fine.’ He said this with a smirk and Stevie had no doubt, looking at the massive arms of the tray carrier, that they could do just that, and more.

  They sat down in the shade on the foredeck, a huge white expanse of prow stretching before them, tapering to a sharp point.

  Wave-piercing technology, thought Stevie. No wonder she goes so fast.

  Could you still refer to a warship named Hercules as ‘she’?

  Stevie smiled and patted the white leather upholstery. ‘Well, it’s certainly lovely and roomy.’

  Clémence directed the staff with soft clicks of her fingers— ‘Champagne over there, prawns here, finger bowls there, there and there, lemons . . .’

  Another very muscular crewman emerged with a huge platter of oysters and laid them on the table near Stevie. As he turned, Stevie noticed the white leather holster hanging almost invisibly from the white belt on his shorts. From it emerged the handle of a white pistol.

  A ceramic gun? Was that possible?

  She smiled a little harder. Clémence sipped a flute of champagne and turned to Stevie. ‘We’ve been in the Med for a month already. I feel like it’s been forever. Does London still exist? How is the weather?’

  ‘Actually I flew in from Turin. It’s been months since I’ve been in England.’

  Always keep your lies as close to the truth as possible.

  ‘So you don’t live there. For some reason . . .’ Clémence had not done her homework.

  Stevie jumped in. ‘Oh, I spend a lot of time there, but I was visiting friends in Turin. I actually live in Zurich. My grandmother is there. I find the town a perfect antidote to modern life—with all the conveniences.’

  ‘We always stay at the Baur au Lac when—’ Krok’s mobile phone interrupted, ringing with Wagner’s ‘Ride of the Valkyries’.

  How appropriate.

  Clémence stopped mid-sentence.

  Krok grunted a few words and hung up, turned his attention back to the table. ‘So, Stevie, you decorative or useful?’ he barked without looking up. He shoved a prawn head into his mouth and sucked noisily, tossed it onto a pile with all the others.

  Stevie dip
ped her fingertips in the finger bowl. ‘Oh, neither, I’m afraid. I get by being in the right place at the right time, I suppose.’

  ‘Married?’

  ‘No. Not married.’

  ‘Ever been?’

  ‘No. Never been.’

  ‘So you’re down here in these parts husband hunting.’ He plunged a hairy hand into the finger bowl and squeezed the lemon quarter to a messy pulp. ‘Rich pickings?’

  Stevie blushed despite her cover. She hoped it could be blamed on sunburn.

  ‘Not really my scene,’ she laughed, hoping she sounded convincing. ‘I’m quite happy to have myself all to myself.’

  ‘That’s what they all say. Won’t admit to wanting a rich husband, but show them a man with money and their legs go up like the sails on a windmill.’

  Stevie took a rather large sip of the (extremely good) champagne and swallowed.

  One must not rise. No. However, one was beginning to find it a struggle to rein in one’s tongue.

  ‘What a wonderful image.’ She smiled. ‘Aren’t you clever, Mr Krok?’

  ‘Oh, call him Vaughan, Stevie, darling. Don’t be too intimidated by the ruffian.’

  But Stevie could see that Krok was secretly pleased. So she had done well.

  She now knew that Krok was a man who liked to goad people for sport, to press until he got a reaction. He was also vulnerable to flattery. This was useful information; Stevie only hoped her self-control would last.

  Fortunately Vaughan Krok seemed to have a short attention span. He stood up before Clémence had even finished eating, shoved his chair back and shouted at one of the crew.

  A clay pigeon pull had been set up on the aft deck. Krok broke his twelve bore, over and under shotgun and thrust in two cartridges.

  ‘Pull.’

  A black disc went flying high across the back of the yacht. Krok pulverised it with a single shot.