Ivory (27 page)

‘What's to stop the South Africans from just burning the ivory in situ, in order to avoid worrying about transporting and storing it?'

Chan nodded. ‘The politicians want to stage a media event in Johannesburg. They want to show the world that the cull is not about stockpiling ivory in the event that the CITES regulations are relaxed further, but rather purely about environmental management and conservation.'

Alex knew that CITES – the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species – had achieved some success in stabilising elephant numbers on the continent by severely restricting the worldwide ivory trade. Auctions of legitimately harvested ivory – such as tusks taken from animals that had died of natural causes – were very rare and strictly monitored. It would be in Chan's interest, Alex realised, to try and ensure that the legal trade was further curtailed, or stopped indefinitely, as this would push up the price of illegal ivory. While his mind calculated the possible value of the heist, his conscience kicked him hard in the guts. ‘This is wrong, Chan.'

The Chinese man laughed. ‘Excuse me, but where exactly does
hijacking a ship and keeping my men imprisoned fall in your definition of wrong versus right?'

Alex lowered his voice. ‘Your men are criminals – like me. Those elephants are defenceless.'

‘I do not pretend to agree with your naive view of the world, Alex, but I respect a man who sticks to his principles. Think this through, though, before you make your decision. What would the world think of the South African government if, having finally secured a tenuous agreement to resume culling for a limited trial, it was unable to protect all that ivory?'

Alex pushed his plate away and poured himself another glass of wine. ‘They'd end up with egg on their face, and the cull would be regarded as a failure. Criminals – you, chiefly – would be regarded as the main beneficiaries of the slaughter of two hundred animals.'

Chan grinned. ‘Chiefly. The man who swipes that ivory, from under the noses of the people who are planning on destroying it, and gets it to the
Peng Cheng
would also be richly rewarded.'

Alex could see the headlines. The government would be backfooted into explaining how it had lost the tusks. After the fallout one of two things would happen – either there would be no more culling or, next time, the ivory taken from the slain elephants would be burned on the spot, as it should have been first time around. The initial crime would benefit Chan and the middlemen and consumers down the line, but never again would such a large quantity of ivory fall into the wrong hands. Alex felt a surge of excitement, a tingling rush like a shot of adrenaline.

Stealing ivory so that rich Japanese businessmen would have carved seals and figurines was wrong, but so too was killing two hundred magnificent beasts that might one day take up residence across the border from Kruger if they were given a few more years' grace.

And there was the challenge.

To steal four tonnes of anything from the middle of the African bush and move it – somehow – across Mozambique and onto a ship was bigger than any job he'd ever attempted.

‘How much?' Alex asked.

Chan smiled. ‘Again, that wonderful directness. I will not insult you with a charade of negotiating. I have read of your work off the coast of Mozambique and I am impressed. I need a man who can mount a military operation, on land and sea – and air if you think it necessary. Am I right in thinking that you are that man, Alex?'

‘How much?'

‘One million US dollars, in cash or transferred to the bank account of your naming. Half up front – which will also secure the return of the
Peng Cheng
and her crew to me – and half on completion.'

‘Expenses in addition,' Alex said. That was non-negotiable, as he already anticipated them to be high.

Alex did some quick mental arithmetic. He and Novak had been discussing the value of the ivory they'd found on the
Peng Cheng
and the South African had recalled that the prices fetched for ivory at the last legal auction were around the one hundred and fifty US dollar mark per kilo. Chan was offering him a substantial amount more than the legitimate value of the tusks.

‘You're working out the value of the ivory, yes?' Chan said, reading his mind. ‘If I am right – and I'm sure I am – there won't be any more legal trading in ivory for a long time if we are successful. I'll be able to name my own price for ivory on the black market. This is a long-term investment by me, Alex, and I know the allure of the magic-million price tag. Tell me, would you have said yes to less than a million dollars?'

Alex shook his head.

‘So?'

‘You've just bought your ship back, Valiant.'

Chan beamed. ‘Keep it at your island hideout. Oh, yes, don't look so surprised. I know more about you than you think, Alex. Set Wu free and have him call me. I'd be obliged to you if you could accommodate the captain and his crew until you give him his orders – where and when you need him to collect the ivory.'

Alex nodded. Ivory – white gold – had made Europeans rich in Africa in centuries gone by. It might just save his dream, and he wouldn't have to kill a single elephant.

J
ane woke, slightly hungover and very confused, scrambling with her hands to escape a prison of pure cotton sheets and fluffy pillows.

She sat upright and blinked. For a second she had no idea where she was. The room was dark, though a chink of light peeping around the edge of the heavy curtains told her it was daylight. The air-conditioner hummed.

She'd been dreaming of the Norman church in the village where her parents lived, walking down the aisle in an ivory dress with a lace bodice. George was waiting for her, his back to her, but when he'd turned it was Alex's face she saw. She shivered.

The bed was empty, just an indentation in the mattress beside her and the smell of his aftershave on the pillow. And on her.

She put a hand over her eyes. ‘Oh, God,' she said aloud.

Right at that moment, Jane wanted to be back in her old room, in her parents' cottage, with a mum who'd tell her everything would be fine, and a father who'd bring her tea in bed. She wished she'd never met George Penfold or Alexandre Tremain.

She remembered George's proposal and groaned.

‘George, you're already married,' she'd said to him, once the shock had passed.

‘She's agreed to a divorce, Jane. I spoke to her on the telephone as soon as I learned you were safe. It was hard, of course, but it'll be an amicable split, I'm sure.'

‘It's all so soon, George. I'm flattered, honestly, but please, I need some time to think.'

He'd told her how much he had worried about her when she was missing, and how he'd come to the realisation that he needed her in his life. She had been touched and had felt the tears start to well behind her eyes. It had been a very long time since she'd felt needed by anyone.

He'd told her he understood her need for time, and then dragged the upright chair from the suite's desk into the bathroom and sat and poured them both some more champagne. She'd gone over what had happened to her on the island and in Mozambique – making no reference to what had happened between her and Alex, of course – as she'd finished cleaning herself and then shaved her legs with a pink disposable razor.

When she had finished washing, George had just sat there, sipping his wine, as she'd stood. The soapy water slithered down her body as she reached across to the rail for a towel.

For a moment she wondered if his stillness and silence were signs of pouting, as if he were offended by her lack of commitment. But then she noticed his dark eyes, the only part of him showing any sign of life just then, moving from her face, to her breasts, to her lower belly.

‘It's started to grow back,' he said, looking at her.

She blushed, then felt a pang of annoyance. After the second time they'd slept together he'd told her he'd like it if she were bare for him. She'd gone to a beautician for a full wax. It had been painful, but the anticipation of getting it done for him, and of waiting for and receiving his approval, had been incredibly erotic. She'd read in women's magazines about people playing games of domination and submission in the bedroom and the whole idea had never really appealed to her, until she'd become intimate with George. What she liked about their liaisons was the different feelings and experiences he helped her discover.

But expecting her to maintain some bizarre standard of personal
grooming while she'd been away for weeks at sea and then imprisoned on an island in the Indian Ocean was just too much. She started to speak, but he raised a finger to his lips.

‘Stay there,' he said, and her anger was replaced with a different emotion.

Slowly, he rolled first one, then the other of his shirt sleeves to the elbows. He still wore his silk tie and suit pants and shoes. He leaned across her, the back of his hand lightly brushing one thigh, and she felt the goose bumps instantly rise on her bare flesh. George took a bar of translucent red soap, dipped it in the water and rubbed it into a lather in his left hand. With his right he took the razor she'd used on her legs and sluiced it in the bath.

Jane took a breath and held it as his fingers touched her, slowly, firmly rubbing the suds into the soft folds of her skin.

‘Move your feet further apart,' he commanded.

She placed her palms either side of her, against the cool, pure white tiles to brace herself as she slid her feet carefully wider on the slippery bottom of the tub. She didn't want to fall, and the effort of standing still added to the intense feelings of arousal his touch was producing in her.

‘George, can't we –'

‘Quiet,' he'd ordered.

Jane stretched now, raising her hands past her head as she yawned in the bed. She remembered the first touch of the blade and the scraping noise it made as she dared not breathe. She lowered a hand beneath the plump duvet and felt the smoothness. Her own touch produced a repeat of the throb that had seemed to resonate through her body last night as he'd held her, in his fingers, and shaved her bare.

After he'd finished she'd turned the tables on him.

She'd stepped from the tub, placing a wet foot either side of him and forcing his legs together so she could straddle him. She noted the quick grimace as suds and water soaked the expensive pressed fabric of his trousers, but also the hardness beneath the material.

His mouth opened, hungrily, to hers as she placed her hands on
his shoulders and pushed him back into the chair. She broke the kiss, amused at how quickly his cool had vanished. He looked imploringly up into her eyes.

‘Please,' she said.

He swallowed, licked his lips and repeated the word, as she knew he would.

She reached down between them, rocking back a little in his lap so she could undo the zipper. When he reached for her she grabbed him around the wrist and forced his hand back by his side. The memory of how slick he'd been, the slippery fluid welling from him, made her touch herself again now, in the bed.

Jane had freed him and run her hand up and down the thick shaft just twice, before standing slightly and then lowering herself down on him.

She revelled for a few pleasurable minutes in the memory of him inside her, the sense of fullness and completion. She craved that intimacy, more than she'd remembered. But now, as had happened last night, another face invaded her mind as her breathing quickened. Despite her best efforts to blank it out, she saw Alex's face.

It was no dream, though, what had happened after George had climaxed inside her. She'd stayed there, in his lap, as he'd wrapped his arms around her. As she'd laid her head on his shoulder, spent, he had whispered to her again, ‘Will you marry me, Jane?'

And she, feeling terribly guilty that this man, who would give up his family for her, had been supplanted in her mind by a criminal, who had been using her to find something that did not belong to him, had said, ‘Yes.'

 

‘I love you. See you at midday.' George Penfold smiled to himself as he folded his mobile phone closed.

‘Who's that, the little woman?' Mitch Reardon asked.

‘None of your business. Tell me again why I'm taking time out of my busy schedule to see you?'

Reardon laughed, and the waitress at the Primi Piatti coffee shop in Melrose Arch was so taken aback by the ferocity of the outburst that she hovered several metres away from the table the men sat at.

Piet van Zyl waved her over. ‘I'll have another espresso.'

Penfold waved his hand over his latte to signify he wanted nothing, but Mitch said, ‘Cognac, neat,' and winked at the girl. Johannesburg was full of blondes. ‘You want to go on losing valuable cargo, and you don't want your stuff back, then just get up and leave now. But don't forget to leave enough money for the bill, and a nice fat tip for the babe in black and white.'

Mitch had already said as much to Penfold's henchman, Van Zyl, over the phone before the meeting.

Van Zyl looked military. Probably an ex-Recce Commando, like Mark Novak, Mitch thought. He'd said to Mitch, ‘Tell me something I don't already know', and Mitch had been pleased to hear the pause at the other end when he'd replied that he could give the names and the location of all of the men who'd hijacked the
Penfold Son
.

‘Well, go on, what do you have to tell me – or sell me?' Penfold said.

‘Now we're talking. I know who raided your ship and where they live.'

Penfold smiled, took a sip of his coffee and reached into the inside breast pocket of his suit jacket. ‘I know you do, Mister Reardon. Because you're one of them.'

He laid the photograph on the white laminate table. Mitch saw it was a printout of a digital shot. He recalled the moment in an instant. All of them wore their black T-shirts with the skull and crossbones insignia. It had been taken with Lisa's camera. They'd all been drunk – the night after hijacking the freighter full of booze and widescreen televisions – and not even tight-ass Alex had prohibited Novak's wife from giving the camera to one of the Vilanculos prostitutes to take a picture of them all.