Kidnap (The Billionaire Series) (15 page)

Tom and Lela watched as a trail of small carts snaked along the
road from the airport to the school and back again. All students, without
exception, gazed in awe as they stepped out off the carts into The Academy.
From the reception area, the
back-drop
was
breathtaking
. The crystal waters of the ocean lapped the
pristine
beaches which
blended into the school’s
manicured lawns. It really was a stunning sight, the school was, as one student
commented, like something out of a
high class
holiday
brochure. It was hard to believe they were at school at all.

Over the next six hours, their block filled up quickly as its new
inhabitants arrived. Tom and Lela recognised most of their neighbours as they
arrived. There weren’t many rich or powerful children they hadn’t met at some
time. There were only five students who were unknown to them. One was from
Russia and named Oleg. His father had become one of the top 100 wealthiest
people in just two years. Two were from
China,
their
fathers had made billions from the recent economic boom in China.
Mia,
was the daughter of a wealthy Chinese recluse and Chen
was the son of a high profile socialite from Hong Kong.
Thabo,
was the son of the President of Botswana, one of the most economically stable
African countries.
And finally,
Mingmei
,
the daughter of a technology mogul from Taiwan.
 

As Lela had the corner
room which
also
happened to be the best room in their year block, her room became the ad-hoc
meeting area and before long, twenty-two students had gravitated towards it and
taken up residence. Tom calculated that they were short of two residents for
their block and as he made his way to the door, the 23
^rd
and 24
^th
residents walked in. Tom couldn’t believe it, two of his very best friends had
just arrived, Ahmad and the UK PM’s son Tristan, both of whom he had not seen
since his birthday and the attempted kidnapping.

“Are you both in this block?” he asked hopefully.

“Yep, we’re your new neighbours,” replied Tristan excitedly.

“Fantastic, that’s so cool?” he turned to Lela. “Look Lela, Trist
and Ahmad are in our block.”

Lela walked over to join them. Ahmad began to smile inanely.

“For God’s sake Ahmad you’re almost as bad as Trist, calm down,”
whispered Tom.

“After what she did that night there is no other woman for me,”
he whispered back.

Tom couldn’t reply
,
Lela arrived to
greet them.

“Hi guys,” she said giving them each a huge hug, much to their
delight.

“I’m so glad you’re both here, it’s going to be
soooo
cool,” said Tom. “I wasn’t sure if you would both get
invites, I knew Trist would but…”

Tristan interrupted him and saved Tom’s embarrassment, “I already
asked…”

“Only less subtly” interjected Ahmad. “I’m actually a Prince and
my father the UK Ambassador, is second in line to the throne.”

“You kept that quiet Your Highness
”
said
Lela curtsying.

“And that’s exactly why, it’s just Ahmad, please,” he said,
blushing.

“Is that a royal command, Your Highness?” joked Tom.

“Very funny, please, enough.”

“OK, OK,” said Tom, “We’re only joking.”

Tristan excused himself. He’d spotted some girls in the room.

“Sorry guys but I see some new talent – see
ya’s
.”

They were used to him
,
he was girl mad
. In fact, neither Tom nor Ahmad could
remember a conversation with Tristan, in the last year, which hadn’t made
reference to one girl or another.

Tom spent the rest of the evening catching up with his old
friends and getting to know the new ones. Had their respective parents been in
attendance, it would have been a very impressive party indeed. In total, the
wealth in the room would have exceeded $250 billion, with Tom’s father making
up the largest portion. They would have had the most powerful armies in the
world at their fingertips particularly with the son of the US Joint Chiefs of
Staff and the daughter of the head of NATO. There were five children whose
parents were the elected heads of their nations and numerous members of
royalty. Technologically, they would have control of almost every major
electronic corporation in the world. All in all, they (or rather their parents)
were a pretty powerful bunch.
 

Of course, the assembling of these particular students had not
been accidental. Careful planning had ensured that those who were most
vulnerable to terrorist threats were concentrated in one small area. All the
students in Tom and Lela’s block and the six blocks next to them had been
deliberately placed there. There was one ‘special security’ block per year.
Between them, they housed the children of the world’s most influential and
powerful families. That part of the planning had been top secret and other than
the Headmaster and the Board of Governors, only the Special Forces Base
Commander was aware of the heightened security he was expected to impose on
those seven blocks.

Tom and Lela played host to their neighbours all evening. They
eventually said goodnight to the last of their guests at around midnight. It
appeared that there were no set rules for bedtime.

“So what do you think?” Tom asked Lela.

“Very, very cool. You?”

“Unbelievably awesome!”

“They’re all so nice, especially Mia. We’ve got so much in
common.”

“I know
,
they’re all great. Chen was
nice, really laid back and I can’t believe Tristan and Ahmad are here, that’s
just brilliant!”

“Anyway, I’m exhausted, I think we should get to bed. I’ve got a
funny feeling that tomorrow is going to be a very busy day,” said Lela,
yawning.

Tom took the hint and made his way to his room. Before going to
sleep, he decided to read his briefing pack which informed him that lessons
would start each morning at 8.00 a.m., Monday to Friday. There would be a
mid-morning break at 10.00 a.m. and lunch was between 12.15 p.m. and 1.30 p.m
..
The afternoon session would end at 4.30 p.m
..
Saturday consisted of a half day sports session which
started at 10.00 a.m. and finished at 2.00 p.m
..
Sunday was a free day of leisure but Tom had a funny feeling that probably
meant homework. The briefing pack went into detail about restaurant times,
extra curricular activities and the facilities available. There was also a copy
of the ‘School
Rules’ which
seemed surprisingly
brief:
 

“
All students
should behave as would be expected of young ladies and gentleman of their
standing. Failure to do so at any time will result in instant expulsion
.”

Tom couldn’t work out whether this was a good thing or a bad
thing. It was surprisingly concise.

The briefing pack also informed him that he didn’t need the vast
array of alarm
clocks which
his mother had packed for
him. Tom did not wake easily and no single alarm clock could ever wake him.
This had worried his mother and so Tom was equipped with four alarm
clocks which
, after rigorous testing and experimentation,
had proved to be effective. The first alarm was subtle, tugging at his subconscious.
The next was slightly louder with a gentle tone to slowly penetrate his
consciousness. The next was louder and would persevere to the point of full
alertness. The next could wake the dead and terrorised anyone nearby. Tom’s
father said that anyone who remembered the war would run to their bomb shelter
if they heard “that bloody thing” go off. Tom hated the final alarm, it really
was brutal and that was the point. After hearing it twice, his brain forced him
to wake-up by the third alarm to avoid the last one going off. His mother had
cracked it.

However, after all the experimentation, it would all be
redundant. The school operated its own alarm system to ensure the students were
woken up at 7.00 a.m. Tom was relieved and didn’t bother setting his
complicated series of clocks and went straight to sleep.

***

Ling made contact with Reaper. She had worried that she may find
it difficult to maintain the charade of her new role but, to her surprise, she
found it very easy. Nobody had suspected a thing. She booted up the small
mobile device and sent off her encrypted report. This was going to be the
easiest $1 million she had ever made.

***

The twins, on the other hand, were concerned. Although they had
spent three weeks preparing the area for surveillance, they had hoped that
their targets would not pick one of the seven super secure blocks. Their hopes
were shattered and their vantage points severely restricted due to the presence
of extra
security which
was surprisingly covert. The
twins stumbled across a number of hidden and occupied security
look-outs
on their search for vantage points, pleading
ignorance as they made their apologies. Whoever was in charge of security was
not only affording this area of the school substantially more protection than the
rest, but they did not want anybody to know about it.

The twins tapped into the base’s surveillance camera network and
were able to call up individual cameras on every square inch of the island.
Although these covered their
blind-spots
, including
the back entrance to their targets’ block, this did not quell their concerns.
Cameras were all well and good but were no substitute for human eyes. They
filed their report, moved into position and began their surveillance of the
building.

***

Reaper was ecstatic. His secure mobile mail retrieval system was
pinging every few minutes as sit-reps (situation reports) flooded in. The
one which excited him most
was the note from Ling. She had
infiltrated the school beautifully and had spent the evening with the targets.
The Ling angle was perfect. Had he thought of it earlier, he could have saved
time haggling with greedy soldiers and just used Ling. He then reminded
himself, however, that it was always good to have a
fall-back
plan.

In less than four weeks, the action phase would begin. The
feedback from each of the camps was excellent. The terrorists had been provided
with photographs of the targets and told various false stories about them to
incite their bigoted and fanatical hatred. This tactic had worked predictably
well, perhaps too well. Reaper’s Team Leaders informed him that such was the
terrorists’ hatred for the
children,
it was going to
take a monumental effort to stop them from shooting the children on sight.

Chapter 2
8

“Tom!” Lela shouted, banging on his door.

“Tom! Wake up! It’s 10.30!”

“What, what …what is it… what’s going on, 10.30… it can’t be.
”
Tom stumbled out of bed and opened the door.

Lela laughed.

“You really are useless in the morning!”

“I take it you were joking about it being 10.30, we start school
at 8?”

“No, I’m not joking but didn’t you read the briefing paper?”

“Yes I did, cover to cover, before going to sleep, actually.”

“And the welcome note from the Headmaster?”

“No, didn’t bother with that usual guff, you know ‘Hi. I am glad
you’re here...hope your flight was OK...look forward to meeting you all soon’
blah, blah, blah.”

“Well, actually, it wasn’t. It said that as students and teachers
were still arriving, school wouldn’t start until Tuesday. We’ve got the whole
day off to do whatever we want!”

“Excellent!! So what are you still doing here and why am I not
still sleeping?”

Sleep was sacrosanct to Tom and Lela knew that.

“Simple. A few of the guys are going to explore the island and I
thought you’d want to come.”

“Who’s going?”

“Tristan, Ahmad,
Mingmei
, Mia and
Chen.”

“OK, give me ten minutes,” he said as he disappeared into the
bathroom and got into the shower.

“Hi guys,” said Tom to the waiting group, five minutes later.

“Right, let’s go, I’m starving,” said Tristan as he led the way
to the restaurant, everybody reliving their first night at school. Lela seemed
to have made friends very easily with
Mingmei
, Mia
and Chen. Tom presumed that this affinity was connected to their shared
oriental
blood lines
.
 

Tom was interrupted from his thoughts by
Tristan
.

“Hey, you should see the babe in the block next to us. She is so
fit!”

“Which block?” asked
Tom.

“The one to the left as you come out the front of our building.”

“That would be the fifth years’ block, she must be seventeen!” he
said raising his eyes, would Tristan never give up?

“So?”

“You are thirteen and your voice hasn’t fully broken,” said Tom
scathingly.

“She won’t be interested,” added Ahmad slightly more tactfully.

“How do you know?” asked Tristan indignantly.

“Oh, forget it.”

Tom and Ahmad were exasperated, as usual, with Tristan’s attempts
at womanising and illusions of grandeur. They had never seen him with a girl
and as far as they could gather, he blushed every time one came close. He would
tell them stories of girls he had met in London but failed miserably to prove
it.