No Man's Land - A Russell Carter Thriller (2 page)

4

Carter sat up on his board and savored the fresh salty smell and tang of the ocean.

Waiting for them to take the initiative was out of the question. And if he struck first, he needed to go all out. Half-measures would get him killed.

He stretched his arms over his head and rotated his shoulders and neck, wondering what weapons might be concealed under their wetsuits.

Something to keep an eye on.

He slid off his board into the choppy water, detached the leg-rope from his right ankle and unhooked the other end from the tail of his board.

His movements galvanized the Indonesian closest to him into action, and he stroked furiously along the channel toward Carter.

Carter didn’t waste a second.

He climbed back onto his board and lay prone, secured the leg-rope under his chest to keep it close and began paddling away from the approaching stranger at a forty-five-degree angle. He aimed his board for a position well inside the pack, where he figured a smaller but still solid wave would break. The other surfers kept their focus out to sea watching for the next wave, oblivious to anything else.

Carter reached his targeted take-off point just before the incoming wave hit.

The lip curled and a wall of steep water reared up.

He whipped his board around, pointed the nose at a slanting angle toward the wave’s face and powered his board forward.

His board came to life. He grabbed the ends of the leg-rope in either hand and jumped to his feet, bending his knees to keep his center of gravity low, and accelerated across the near-vertical face.

A quick backward glance told him he’d left the guy paddling toward him well behind, but one of his friends was now stroking at a frantic pace in an effort to cut Carter off.

He was just yards away when Carter shifted his weight on the sticky waxed deck of his board, lining its nose up with the man’s forehead.

The startled Indonesian stopped paddling, sat up on his board and reached behind his back.

Too late.

Carter jammed down on his back foot, thrusting the speeding board forward.

At the same instant he threw himself off the back of the wave into the arms of the ocean. The board flew through the air toward its target.

A second later Carter’s head breached the surface.

Just in time to see the Indonesian collapsing forward onto his board, blood streaming from a head wound.

The flying board had found its mark. He was out cold.

Carter switched his attention to the first guy, who was once again paddling straight for him.

Carter held his position in the water, still holding the leg-rope. There wasn’t time to grab his board.

The Indonesian stopped and sat up four yards away. He reached into the back of his wetsuit.

Carter knew what was coming.

He took a deep breath, stuck the leg-rope between his teeth, dived underwater and swam under the assailant’s board.

When he was half a body length behind the tail, he popped his head out of the water.

The Indonesian faced away from him, holding a fishing knife in his right hand and peering into the water from side to side, trying to figure out where Carter was.

Carter kicked hard to propel himself upward out of the water and stretched his arms high in the air.

The guy started to turn his head.

Again, too late.

Carter looped the plastic-covered leash around his neck, yanked back and dragged him off his board, tightening the leg-rope like a hangman’s noose.

The startled surfer tried to grab the rope with his left hand, while his right hand whipped the knife back and forth.

Carter pulled the rope even tighter with his left hand and smashed his right elbow against the base of the Indonesian’s skull.

The strike was designed to pinch a nerve in his neck and paralyze the right side of his body. The knife dropped from his now limp hand and slid into the water.

Carter let go of his leg-rope, lifted the unconscious guy back onto his board and turned toward shore, leaving him floating there.

The final Indonesian was fifteen yards away and paddling toward him with an eight-inch dagger clenched between his teeth.

Carter recognized the distinctive pistol-grip hilt and wavy blade of a Javanese kris, an ancient weapon favored by practitioners of pencak silat, the Indonesian martial art.

Carter swam toward his board, climbed onto it and faced his attacker.

The Indonesian stopped paddling two body lengths from him and straddled his board.

He took the dagger out of his mouth, pulled it back behind his ear and yelled, “Allah akbar!”
God is great!

5

A split second before the kris left the Indonesian’s hand, Carter slid off the tail of his board into the water. He grabbed the sides and held the fiberglass deck in front of him as a shield.

The dagger slammed into the board with a thud, slicing straight through its middle but holding firm at the hilt, the point of the blade stopping two inches from Carter’s face.

Carter rolled the board over and pulled the kris from the deck. The traditional blade was both weapon and holy object, believed to have a spiritual presence. Some blades bestowed good luck. Others bad. For its current owner, it was going to be all bad.

Carter flung the dagger at his assailant’s right shoulder.

The kris penetrated the man’s pectoral muscle, throwing him back on his board, screaming.

Carter swam up to him, grabbed his dreadlocked hair, pulled his head back and struck him behind the neck with a closed fist.

Knocking him out and shutting him up.

Religious fanatics
, Carter thought. After living in the sleepy surf town of Lennox for a year, he thought he’d left this madness behind.

He laid the third surfer on his board and wrapped the man’s leg-rope around him to secure his unconscious body. He did the same for the other two, glad they were still breathing.

Not because he thought the world would be better off with these three guys still in it. On the contrary. But dead bodies generated official investigations, creating a potential hassle he could do without.

Hopefully they’d come to and make it to shore. If not, too bad. He’d be long gone and would have to take his chances with the law. It wasn’t like anyone would be filing an official complaint.

He paddled to shore and left the water by riding a surge onto the rocks. He stood with his board tucked under his arm and scanned the break. None of the surfers at the line-up were paying the slightest attention to anything beyond the next wave.

He shifted his focus to the grassy headland that rose out of the ocean like a lioness guarding her domain. A lone figure stood just on the edge of the parking lot, watching him, and he felt a pulse of adrenalin.

Though he hadn’t seen her for over a year and had tried to make a relationship work with another woman, not a day went by that Erina wasn’t in his thoughts.

She was a far tougher opponent than the three fanatics put together. And considering the morning’s events, he knew she hadn’t turned up to wish him a merry Christmas.

6

Carter followed the dirt track up the gentle sloping hill toward her, carrying his badly dinged surfboard under his right arm. The coarse gravel pressed into the hardened soles of his bare feet. He noted a slight quickening of his heart rate.

Erina Wing leaned against the hood of her black four-wheel drive, dressed in a white T-shirt, tight-fitting black jeans and sneakers. At thirty-two, she possessed the lithe body and grace of an Olympic gymnast.

A discreet black bag lay on the ground behind her. It looked like any normal sports bag, but instead of the usual make-up, deodorant and a towel, she’d be packing a handgun, poison darts and throwing knives.

He reached the edge of the parking lot and stopped. Behind him a powerful wave crashed against the rocks.

Erina touched the peak of her red San Francisco 49ers baseball cap and gave him an enigmatic smile.

The familiarity of her fine features stirred a host of memories. Part of him longed to hug her. Another wanted to turn and run.

He placed his board on the grass a couple of yards in front of her and said nothing. Any decisions he made now could have significant long-term implications and Erina wouldn’t necessarily have his best interests at heart.

She removed her baseball cap and placed it on the hood, revealing jet-black hair tied in a loose ponytail. Fine wisps blew over her face in the gentle breeze. The rising sun created a luminous sheen across her head like a halo.

A dark angel.

She motioned her head toward the surf. “Glad to see you didn’t need me out there.”

“I get by okay on my own.”

He waited for her to make a move, trying to read from her body language what she wanted. Like him, Erina buried her true emotions deep, giving nothing away.

She took a couple of steps toward him. “I know that attack probably took you by surprise, Carter, but as you can see, we’ve got a problem.”

“We?” he asked. “What’s it got to do with me?” His words came out harsher than he intended.

“It involves all of the order and then some. We need your help.”

Though her tone was light, he could tell she was serious.

“Erina, it’s not the first time some fundamentalist wack job has tried to kill one of us.”

“This is different.”

“No, Erina. It’s always the same.”

“This is the first time they’ve come to Australia. Why do you think that is?”

“I’ll leave that for you guys to figure out.”

He looked down at his board as if expecting it to offer him some answers. The sooner he brought the conversation to an end and got out of there, the better. Now that everyone seemed to know where he lived, he needed to grab his stuff, make a swift exit and set up a new life somewhere else.

He knew how to disappear without leaving a trace.

The only thing keeping him at Lennox was the surf. All his friends from his early teens had long gone. Maybe Margaret River in Western Australia would be worth a shot. It was out of the way and he knew the surf ripped as good as Lennox.

He bent down to pick up his board.

“Thomas wants to fill you in on the details himself,” Erina said.

He stood up and left his board where it was. “Thomas is here?”

She nodded. “I’ll take you to him.”

“Why didn’t he come himself?”

“I offered to pick you up. I wanted to see you first.”

“I’ve got other plans for today.”

“What, another surf?”

“Maybe.”

She slipped her hands into the front pockets of her jeans and took a step toward him. “Don’t you care about anything beyond the next wave?”

He looked into her dark brown eyes. She didn’t blink.

His heart quickened again.

Arguing with her was pointless, but he tried anyway. “You know as well as I do that there are no winners in this kind of situation,” he said. “Only losers. The harder we retaliate, the more they hate us. If we ignore them, they’ll eventually go away.”

“You’re not hearing me, Carter.”

All she cared about was getting him to do what she and Thomas wanted.

He looked over his shoulder.

The three guys were drifting out to sea, slumped over their boards.

Two of them were out for the long count, but the guy with the dreadlocks was starting to come to.

He needed to make a decision. Either go with Erina, meet with Thomas and be put through the emotional wringer once again, or just walk away.

Out the back of the break, an anonymous surfer took off on a screamer.

“Look at me, Carter.”

He turned his head and met her steely gaze.

“We’re your family. You need to think about what kind of man you want to be.”

It was as much a threat as a plea, and deep down he recognized the truth of what she said. The order was the closest thing he had to a family, and he had to admit he’d struggled to live in the world without them.

Thomas would play on that.

But it wasn’t going to happen. Not today.

He picked up his board. It felt light in his hands.

“So what’s your answer?” she asked.

“I’m sorry, Erina,” he said, softening his tone. “I’d like to help. But I can’t.”

He kept his focus on her, pushing down the emotion welling in his chest. He needed to make her see he was serious so she would leave him alone.

After a few moments she raised her hands and smiled, revealing the single dimple in her left cheek.

“Okay,” she said. “You do what you need to do. I’ll respect your decision.”

Carter’s shoulders relaxed. “Thank you.”

“Thomas said if you wouldn’t come back willingly, you’d be no use to us.”

“Thomas is a wise man.”

She extended her hand and he took it in his own. The familiar calluses from countless hours of martial-arts training, including up to a hundred chin-ups a day to maintain her upper-body strength, rubbed against his palm.

“We can do better than that,” she said.

She dropped his hand and held out her arms.

Without thinking, and still holding his board, he stepped into her embrace and felt her arms wrap around him.

He drank in the freshness of her hair and the warmth of her body. They fitted together like the last two pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.

Against his better judgement, he allowed his whole body to relax. He closed his eyes and for a fleeting moment felt like he’d come home.

Then a sharp shiver ran down his spine, breaking the potent spell.

A warning.

He started to pull back.

Too late.

He felt the sharp prick of a needle at the back of his neck.

Numbness spread down his shoulder and arm.

“Fuck you, Erina.”

He wanted to say more, but no words came out.

His muscles went slack. He heard the board drop onto the gravel.

There was a moment of great peace.

A sensation of falling.

She gently guided him to the ground, and his world faded to black.

7

Carter drifted back into consciousness sitting in the front seat of Erina’s four-wheel drive, speeding down a narrow tree-lined road.

The first thing he noticed was that his hands were cuffed and resting in his lap. He was still in his board shorts, and his naked back and legs sweated against the leather seats.

Every muscle ached. His stomach was queasy, his skin clammy and his bone-dry mouth tasted of zinc. She must have used scopolamine hydrobromide. In low doses it put the subject to sleep for under an hour and had no long-term effects.

He glanced out the tinted window and recognized the rolling hills behind the picturesque town of Mullumbimby, twenty-odd miles north-west of Lennox. The aptly named Mount Warning, usually one of his favorite local landmarks, stood tall and remote in the hazy distance, its head lost in the clouds, removed from life below.

He moved his tongue, trying to work up some spit.

“You okay?” Erina asked.

He could barely form the word. “Fantastic.”

“I’m really sorry about this,” she said gently. “But avoiding Thomas wasn’t an option today.”

“So it seems.”

“You never should’ve left without saying goodbye.”

Carter stayed silent and refrained from looking at her. He wasn’t going there.

Erina was an elite member of the Order of the White Pole, a private black ops organization based in South-East Asia. He’d been a member too, for over twenty years. The only way he’d managed to escape was to walk away without any explanation or argument and stay away.

“If you still refuse to join us after hearing him out,” she said, “no one will try to stop you.”

He’d heard that one before.

“I promise,” she said, using her free left hand to lift a small plastic bottle with a straw to his lips.

He drank the warm milky antidote and flexed and relaxed his legs to get his blood flowing.

He wasn’t thrilled with what she’d done, but blaming her was pointless. Thomas was not only her leader but also her father. And whatever feelings she might have once had for Carter were now long buried. For Erina, the ends always justified the means, and she wouldn’t allow sentiment to cloud her actions.

On assignment her motto was
Get the job done or die trying
. That’s what made her a dangerous opponent when you crossed her and a great ally when working on the same side – something he could no longer do.

He was mostly angry with himself. He should’ve been more alert. Getting close to Erina in any sense was way too dangerous.

“How’s it going with that woman you left us for?” she asked. “Jessica, wasn’t it?”

“You know my leaving had nothing to do with her.”

She glanced at him sideways, as if she knew what had happened to him the night before, why he’d gone on such a bender.

“It’s over,” he continued. “She said she’d met laptop computers with more emotion.”

Erina giggled like a young girl, reminding him how sweet and lighthearted she could be. “She obviously doesn’t understand you.”

He looked out the window at the trees rushing by and said, “I wouldn’t have thought I was that complicated.”

She accelerated out of a tight corner. “You need to find a woman who knows how to handle you.”

Carter looked across at her. “What, like you do?”

An impish grin spread across her face. “I never said that.”

He almost cracked a smile. “No one would ever accuse you of letting your finer emotions get in the way.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

She held the bottle to his lips again and he took another long sip. The reason the relationship with Jessica had never worked was that his heart was never in it. He hated himself for hurting her. But he couldn’t shake his feelings for Erina and wasn’t about to tell either woman that.

He stretched his shoulders back and shook his head. The antidote was starting to kick in.

—

Erina turned right off the deserted bitumen road, slowed down and continued along a flat dirt track covered by overhanging foliage, which became thicker and denser the further they moved in.

The four-wheel drive bumped through the shadowy green tunnel for about a hundred and fifty yards until the thick vegetation opened up, revealing a lawn the size of a football field. The track led to a traditional country homestead, complete with sloping red-tile roof, brick chimney and wraparound verandah. Carter spotted several makeshift sensors and security cameras placed strategically around the grounds.

The wooden house stood in front of a hilly ridge that ran along the back of the property. A black four-wheel drive was parked to the left of the house under one of the half-dozen tall gum trees spread around the lawn area. The set-up guaranteed privacy, but Carter reckoned the place would be vulnerable to a well-organized attack. He wondered what had prompted the order to set up a temporary headquarters here.

Thomas would have his reasons.

The tires crunched to a halt on the loose gravel.

Carter looked deep into the shade of the covered verandah. His pulse quickened as he recognized the familiar silhouette.

Thomas Wing stepped out of the shadows.

He walked down the stairs toward them and stopped. Standing just under six foot tall, Thomas wore a black cotton shirt, loose pants and sandals. The early-morning sunlight reflected off his bald head.

His features were distinctly Asian; he took after his Chinese mother, rather than his American father. He was sixty-eight, but could’ve easily passed for fifty.

Erina stepped out of the vehicle, walked round the front and opened Carter’s door.

He breathed in the smell of moist grass. A kookaburra laughed as if amused by Carter’s predicament.

Thomas moved toward him, calm and unhurried, stopping a yard from the open door.

His unlined face looked paler and gaunter than Carter remembered. Thomas’s dark eyes examined him as though probing directly into his soul.

Carter wanted to look away but forced himself to maintain eye contact. Thomas and Erina were the only two people in the world who could throw him off balance with their eyes.

Thomas broke off his gaze, placed his hands in the prayer position and bowed his head.

“My heartfelt apologies,” he said. “Desperation forced our hand.”

“You always said the ends never justify the means.”

“I did what I thought necessary given the circumstances.”

The hint of an ironic smile softened Thomas’s face. He nodded at Erina, who unlocked Carter’s handcuffs.

Carter stepped into the sunlight, kicked his legs out and shook his arms, wrists and shoulders.

Erina got back into her car, turned on the ignition and opened the window.

“Where are you going?” Carter asked.

“Unlike some people, I’ve got a job to do.”

“So the package has been delivered and you move on to the next assignment. Don’t you ever clock off?”

“Life’s too short. I’ll be seeing you, Carter.”

“Don’t count on it.”

She smiled at him and the tinted window slid up, hiding her from view.

The car rolled down the drive and gathered speed. He watched it disappear under the canopy of trees, feeling a curious mix of relief and disappointment.

Carter turned back to Thomas, who stood with his arms folded. A knowing smile broke the smooth lines of the older man’s face.

“What?” Carter asked.

Thomas said nothing, just turned and walked toward the house.

Carter waited a moment and then followed.