Blood Memory: The Complete Season One (Books 1-5) (22 page)

Terry slapped a hand on Jordan’s back. “You let me know when I can expect the first shipment of hammerhead shark.”

The first of the two armed guards climbed down onto the quay. “It’s clean, boss,” he said.

Terry extended a hand. “Happy trails.”

There was the sound of splashing on the far side of the boat. Terry’s stomach leapt with joy.

“Well, well,” the remaining guard on board Big Daddy said. “What have we got here?”

The bald guard dragged a dripping pair of ladies roughly across the deck and dumped them on the jetty. An air tank followed, the indicator reading empty. The ladies coughed and gulped for oxygen.

“Stand up,” Baldy said.

“I’m sorry, Jordan,” Anne said.

“It’s my fault,”
Jordan replied.

“Daniel,” Terry said, “take the boat away. These fellows won’t be needing it.”

“Terry, please…” Jordan said.

As the nameless boat moved away, Terry circled the women, leering at them with an appraising eye. “Fine specimens you have here, Jordan. A welcome addition to my collection.” He brushed Anne’s hair aside and kissed her at the nape of the neck, his eyes never leaving Jordan’s.
“Mmm. Lavender and lilac.” He reached around and grabbed her left breast. “Firm. The boys’ll have fun milking her, I’m sure.”

Jordan stepped forward. “Leave them out of this.”

Baldy stepped forward and slammed the rifle butt into Jordan’s stomach. He grunted and fell to his knees.

“Your negotiating rights are over,” Terry said. “You should have told me you had ladies on board. Our negotiations could have been so much more fruitful.” He turned to
Jessie. “What’s your name, darling? How old are you? Twelve? Thirteen?”

“Stay away from her!” Stan shouted.

Bushy turned his gun on Stan.

“Now, now,” Terry said, “there’s no need for violence.” He gently pushed the gun barrel so it faced Jessie. The message was clear. He returned to
Jessie. “I asked you your age, darling.”

She stared into space with no expression. Her feet jittered, and her fingers wrapped around h
er bracelet in nervous motions.

“What’s wrong with her? She got a screw loose or something?”

“She can’t talk,” Anne said.

Terry lifted the
Jessie’s face. “Pity. The men like them more when they’re noisy.”

Jordan got to his feet and watched Terry with disdain.

“The fate of humanity depends on these women,” Terry said. “I take care of their bastards who issue forth. The girls will perform their duty when they come of age – twelve seems sufficient. You know what they say, ‘old enough to bleed, old enough to breed’. And the boys will become soldiers. The future is glittering and golden. My legacy – my gift to the world – will be the future of the human race. They’ll name new cities after me.”

“Terry,” Jordan said. “Don’t do this.” There was an edge to his voice that the guards picked up on. Their guns moved ever so slightly in his direction.

“It’s nothing personal. It’s just business.”

“It’s personal to me.”

Quick as a flash, Jordan wrapped his arm around Terry’s neck and, using him as a shield, pushed him into Bushy. Jordan dashed forward, grabbed the knife in Bushy’s combat trousers, unsheathed it, rose, and sliced a gash an inch deep in the guard’s neck. As the guard fell, Jordan caught his gun, brought the butt around, and smashed Terry in the mouth. By now, Baldy was turning with his gun, but Jordan had already thrown the knife. It buried itself in the guard’s chest below the ribcage. Jordan grabbed his gun and as Baldy fell backward into the sea – clutching the knife in his body with a look of bewilderment on his face – the strap slid off him.

Terry, bleeding from the mouth, spat out the teeth Jordan had knocked loose. “You broke my teef! You broke my teef, you baftard!” He drew himself up to his full height and looked down his nose at Jordan. “Do you realife what you’ve done? Don’t you know who I am?”

All the loathing Jordan felt for Terry surged out of him in a single movement: a crack across the jaw with the butt of his gun. Terry went down as gracefully as a stubborn tree trunk.

Jordan’s chest heaved from the exertion, his breaths the only sound.
He looked up to find they were all staring at him.

“What the hell was that, Jordan?” Anne asked
, her tone both awed and afraid.

“Beats me
. Turns out I’m pretty badass,” Jordan said with a smile. “If we get through today, we can add it to the list of things we need to talk about.”

“Let’s just go,” Stan said. “Take Big Daddy and get the hell out of here.”

Jordan slung the automatic gun over his shoulder, picked up the other gun from Bushy’s fingers and tossed it to Stan. “No. We’ve got to get that other boat. It could take us weeks or months to find another one like it.”

“That’s
better than us getting killed!”

“If we run now, we’ll always be running. Do you think Terry will let us get away with what we just did to him? They’ll chase us down and kill us. Unless we go somewhere they can’t – or won’t – follow us.” He relieved Bushy of his long overcoat and put it on.

“The Indian Ocean,” Stan said.

“Yes,” Jordan said, sheathing a knife into the back of his
boot. “Or somewhere else far away.”

“We’re certainly committed now,” Stan said.

“Stan, take Baldy’s coat. Use it to conceal the gun. It took that boat about ten minutes to get to us. Daniel will pound the engine, so it won’t take him six minutes to get back and alert the guards. Then we’ll be screwed. We have to hurry.”

Jordan grabbed the unconscious Terry by the wrists and dragged him – with much effort – onto Big Daddy. Terry’s head bounced
down the few steps to the deck.

Jordan ran down the stairs of Big Daddy into the engine compartment. He bent down and crawled under the engine. There was a series of handles and other pro
tuberances. Even with the guards’ search, Jordan knew it was unlikely the guards would find it. Jordan pulled on an inconspicuous handle. A small black bag hit the floor with a solid thump. Jordan dragged it out and put it over his shoulder.

By the time he returned to the deck
, Anne and Stan had laid the dead guards on Big Daddy’s deck beside Terry.

The deck was sprayed with blood. Jordan reached over the side and tossed up some water. Anne took off her jumper and began mopping up the stains. It took about thirty seconds, and though the blood had already run into the grain of the wood, giving it the appearance of angry capillaries, it was at
least a little less noticeable.

Jordan cast Big Daddy off and leaned his weight against it, pushing it out to sea.
He nodded to the others. “Let’s go.”

They crept through the corridors following Jordan’s lead.
The building creaked and groaned and clunked, with each swaying motion of the sea, causing them to pause and peer around each corner and listen for anyone that might be coming. The corridors snaked in jagged lines, shifting from splintered wooden boards one minute, to shiny moulded carbon fibre the next.

Jordan stopped at another corner and listened. His expression turned ashen. “Somebody’s coming.
”

“Shall we go back?” Stan asked.

“There’s no time.”

“There’s a door here,” Anne said.

“Try it.”

The doorknob rattled. “It’s locked.”

They could all hear the voices now. They were indistinct and fast approaching. Jordan reached up into Anne’s hair and pulled out a pin. He knelt down in front of the door, inserted the pin into the lock and began jiggling it round.

“I didn’t know you could pick locks,” Stan said.

“Neither did I.”

“Hurry, Jordan,” Anne said. “Hurry!”

One of the voices said, “Man City, now there was a team.”

“You’re joking! They could never hold up to Chelsea’s attacking power!”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

Stan turned to Jordan.
“Hurry!”

The men were going to stumble on
to them at any moment. Jordan kept fiddling with the lock.

“Of course, Man City benefitted from having the best manager ever.”

“Did Mourinho manage Man City too?”

“No, you daft ninny. He was always over-hyped anyway.”

The men’s boots thudded loudly on the mesh decking, then turned restrained as they stepped onto the oak deck.

There was a soft
click. Jordan grabbed the doorknob, twisted it and pushed the door open. They slipped inside. Jordan closed the door silently behind them. The voices grew louder, then dwindled away as they passed down the corridor.

They smiled at each other.
Then their noses crinkled when they caught the smell of excrement and body odour. They covered their mouths with their hands and T-shirts.

“What is that smell?” Anne said. She peered into the darkness around them, but the miner’s lantern hanging on the wall in the corner shed only the faintest orb of orange light.

“Hey,” a frail voice said. “Who are you?”

Jordan spun, gun raised, and aimed at a point in the darkness.

“You’re not one of them, are you?” the voice asked.

Jordan shifted position and aime
d at the voice’s origin.

“One of who?” Anne asked the darkness.

“One of them… those men.” The voice had a slightly lilted accent.

“We haven’t got time for this,” Jordan said.

“Take me with you,” the voice said. “Please.”

“Who are you?” Anne asked.

“An innocent. I was betrayed by the man who was supposed to never betray me. He brought me and left me here.”

“We have to go
,” Jordan said. “We can’t trust anybody here.”

“On your right, there is a light switch,” the voice said. “See me and decide for yourselves if I am dangerous or not.”

Anne reached for the switch, pulling her hand back in hesitation only once, before pressing it. A harsh red light swallowed the room and for a moment it looked like they were in the belly of some giant beast. A dozen cages lined the walls. Inside each lay a woman. Most sported cuts and bruises to the face and forearms, as if in an attempt to defend themselves, and had ugly-looking needle puncture scars in the crook of their arms.

Only one woman stood, her hands wrapped around the bars of her cage. Anne could see why she wanted them to see her. She was only a few years younger than herself and had dark skin that could have at one time been beautiful. There were black lumps of congealed bl
ood at the corners of her mouth.

“You…” Jordan said, recognising her. “You served us during the negotiation.”

The woman nodded.

“I’m sorry but we have to go.”

The woman in the cage dropped to her knees. “No, wait. Please. Let me out.”

“We don't have time to rescue everyone.
”

“I am no junkie!” the woman said, pulling up her sleeves. “Look! See? No holes!”

“We can’t help you.”

The woman
turned to Anne. She raised her hands, palms up, toward her. “Please…”

“Jordan…” Anne said.

“She’ll slow us down.”

“We can’t just leave her here, Jordan. What if it was
Jessie in there? Or me?”

“The keys. They are over there.” The woman gestured to a corner. “It takes one second.”

“I’m sorry,” Jordan said, moving for the door and ushering the others through it.

The woman’s expression turned serious. “Take me, or I scream.”

Jordan pulled up short. “You scream, I’ll shoot.”

“You shoot, they come.” She stared defiantly from her cage.

Jordan looked from the woman to Anne, and then back again. “Do you know the way to the docks?”

“Yes!” the woman said, seriousness discarded instantly. She bounced on the balls of her feet. “I know it! I know it!”

Jordan turned. “Stan, get the key.”

The woman squealed with delight, pointing frantically to a corner. “Over there! Over there!”

“What about the others?” Anne said. The other women lay unconscious on their cell room floors in their own faeces. None stirred as Anne banged on the cages and shouted, “Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!”

“Anne!” Jordan hissed. “You’ll alert everyone!
”

“Why don’t they wake up?”

“Look at them. They’re doped up to the eyeballs.”

“Why?”

“It keeps them sedate, under control. They’ll do anything for a fix.
Anything.
There’s nothing else we can do.” Jordan raised his gun and let it drift toward the prisoners. “Except, maybe put them out of their misery.”

Anne stepped in front of the gun. “No! Someone might still rescue them. In fact…” She beamed a mischievous smile. “I suppose we can help them out in that regard…”