Revenge of the Tide (31 page)

He aimed a kick at Malcolm’s back and Malcolm arched away from him, groaning, an animal sound.

‘Don’t do that!’ I said. I crouched down, touching his head, trying to see where the blood was coming from.

His eyes opened, panic in them. He whispered, ‘Sorry…’

‘It’s okay,’ I said. And added, pointlessly, ‘Don’t worry.’

‘And Dylan,’ Fitz said. ‘Nice to see you, mate. Spain not quite to your liking, was it?’

Dylan didn’t answer immediately, just kept his bulk between Nicks and me, his back to the door. ‘You shouldn’t be here, Fitz. Wherever you think your leak is, it’s not here.’

Fitz laughed then and Nicks did too, both of them, like a couple of school bullies. ‘I know exactly where my leak is, Dylan, old boy. You think I’m here for her? You seem to think I’m thick or something. Do you?’

He got to his feet, then and came towards Dylan, who stood his ground. He wouldn’t try anything, surely? Dylan was at least a foot taller, and twice as wide.

‘I’m here for
you
,’ Fitz said. His voice was almost gentle, but as he said it he dug his index finger into Dylan’s ribs.

‘What’s he doing here?’ Dylan asked, his voice still casual, casting a single glance over to the galley.

‘I’m looking after my interests, mate, same as you are,’ said Leon.

Dylan snorted. ‘What interests?’

‘We had a deal going,’ Fitz said, ‘before you went and fucked it all up for us.’

Where was Josie? Maybe they didn’t know about her. Maybe she was safe, shopping somewhere. On the floor, Malcolm let out another groan, longer this time, louder.

‘I
said
, shut the fuck up!’ Fitz said, kicking Malcolm in the shoulder.

‘Dylan’s just here to see me, no other reason,’ I said.

‘I know that, love,’ Fitz said, looking at me properly for the first time. ‘He’s been a bit distracted lately, haven’t you, mate? Can’t keep your mind on the job? Funny, that. And you disappear off to the wilds of – where are we? – Kent, and, what a surprise, there’s Dylan all ready to keep an eye on you. Touching, I call it.’

‘Must be love,’ Nicks said. And they laughed.

‘Look,’ I said, my patience wearing thin, ‘I’m getting sick of all this. Whatever it is you want, just take it and get off my boat. Leave us alone. Leave us all alone.’

‘We’ve got things to sort out first. Right, Dylan?’

Dylan turned to look at me then and for a second I saw the old Dylan, the guy who used to watch me dance with a face like a rock, not giving anything away with his expression but somehow saying a lot more with his eyes.

‘You need to go,’ he said to me quietly. ‘Take Malcolm with you, and go.’

‘I don’t think so, sunshine,’ Fitz said.

‘Let her go,’ Dylan said. ‘You don’t need her here. You’ve got what you came for.’

‘Not yet.’

Like a petulant child demanding attention, Malcolm let out another cry, a sob, moving his legs.

I didn’t know what I had been expecting. I was alert, aware that this confrontation was not going to be easy or straightforward, but I wasn’t at all ready for what came next.

‘Will you fucking shut up, you annoying little shit?’

Fitz pulled a gun out of the waistband of his jeans and aimed it at Malcolm. I saw the gun a second before he fired it. The noise of it was deafening in the small space and I jumped back without even realising it, just as Malcolm’s body jerked on the floor. Blood started seeping from a wound in his shoulder. He cried out, just once, and then he was silent and still.

Both my hands clasped over my mouth with the shock of it. Struggling to breathe. And then it all got much, much worse. Fitz was pointing the gun directly at Dylan’s head. I screamed, started shouting, ‘No! No, no!’ and Markus took me by the arm and pulled me towards the bedroom.

Dylan took a step towards me and for the first time I saw real fear in his eyes. ‘No!’ he said.

And then Leon Arnold stood and blocked my line of vision as both of them took me into my bedroom and shut the door. Markus turned on the light and I wriggled free of his grip and lunged for the door.

‘Now, now,’ Arnold said, putting himself in my way. ‘You don’t want to watch him do it, do you, Viva?’

I tried to push past him to get to the door. And then he hit me, casually, across the face. It hadn’t looked as though he’d put much force behind it but even so my feet left the floor and I ended up in a heap against the berth. I pulled myself up into a sitting position, my head spinning. From the saloon I heard a yell – Dylan’s voice or Malcolm’s? A noise of such pain and accompanied by a crash, as though something heavy had fallen –

‘Dylan!’ I shouted, as loud and hard as I could, sobbing at the end of the word as Markus came for me and dragged me to my feet before smashing his fist into the side of my head.

I heard Leon Arnold laugh as I fell to the floor, and then ringing in my ears, and blood in my mouth, and for a moment I passed out.

I was being dragged up, off the floor. I gasped and coughed, pulling with weak fingers at the hands that gripped under my arms. Then I was thrown back on to something soft – my bed? I opened my eyes. Everything was a confusing whirl and the emotions behind it all were alien – and then, my pounding heart, and the realisation that I was in my bedroom with these two men, and the door was shut. And out there, in the saloon, noises – shouting…

‘Dylan,’ I said.

‘Never mind him,’ said Markus. ‘He is a dead man.’

I think it was the first time I’d heard him say anything. He had an accent, from somewhere in Eastern Europe. The words and the way he said them chilled me to the core.

‘Let me go,’ I said, ‘please let me go.’ My own voice sounded odd, dulled above the ringing and surging in my ears. I touched a hand to my jaw; the side of my face was throbbing.

Leon Arnold was looking through my clothes. He had opened the drawers and was pulling out bits of underwear. I tried to get up off the bed but Markus pushed me back with a single hand.

‘What are you doing?’ I said, my voice high and panicky. ‘Leave that alone, it’s mine.’

At the back of my drawers, he had found something that stopped him. ‘What about this, Markus? What do you reckon?’

From the tip of his finger, a sequinned thong dangled. I’d even forgotten it was there – the last few bits of skimpy underwear from my dancing days.

I felt sick at the sight of it.

‘Put that back,’ I said, trying to make my voice stronger, more in control.

He seemed to notice me then, and came over to the bed. ‘Are you going to be difficult, Viva?’

‘Get the fuck off my boat, you disgusting little man,’ I said.

He laughed. ‘That’s a yes, then.’

He pushed me back and before I could move or struggle he’d put one forearm across my throat, leaning over so close to my face that I could feel his breath on me. I clawed at his arm, scratching him with my pathetically short nails, kicking with my legs. And then, someone holding my legs. While I fought and bucked, I felt someone – it must have been Markus, although all I could see was Arnold – undoing my jeans.

I thought about Jim. I wanted him to come and save us, so badly. I wanted him to be here and take these horrible men away. I thought about him until I could almost hear sirens, too far away, fading and getting closer and fading away.

I tried to speak, tried to say no. But I couldn’t breathe, or speak. When he relieved the pressure on my throat I heaved in air, coughed, gasped.

Arnold sat companionably next to me on the bed while Markus pulled my jeans down. I kicked him as hard as I could, aiming for where I thought his face would be.

That was a mistake. Arnold pushed me back again, this time spreading his hand across my throat, squeezing with his fingers.

‘Viva,’ he said, ‘if you carry on fighting, you’re going to get hurt. Do you understand?’

Panic was rising inside me. I nodded, my eyes wide. He let go of my throat and as I gasped and sucked air in, I heard the unmistakable sound of the engine starting. Abruptly Arnold got up off the bed and left the room.

It gave me such a shock that I half-sat up. The whole boat rattled and shook. I could hear the water churning at the stern, and the splashing of the water against the hull. The keys were still in the pocket of my jeans. They must have bypassed the ignition somehow. What were they doing?

Markus was sitting on the edge of the bed, looking towards the door.

In that moment I could have tried to fight back – choked him, maybe, hit him with something – but there was nothing within reach. My hands were shaking and there was no fight left in me. No fight. Only fear.

I shrank away from him to the corner of the bed, hugging my knees. Trying to disappear.

There was a shout from the saloon, something I didn’t quite catch. Markus went to the door and looked out down the corridor – was he talking to somebody? Then he shut the door behind him and stood facing me with his back to the door. Guarding it.

I moved slowly to the edge of the bed. My jeans were on the floor. I reached down for them, expecting at any minute he would stop me, shout at me, hit me even. I stretched out my arm for them and pulled my jeans towards me slowly, as though he would only notice quick movements, as though he was some kind of wild animal I was trying not to disturb.

But he still wasn’t looking at me. It was as though I had ceased to exist for him, as though he was there to guard the room and anything in it.

The sobbing started again when I was dressed. I curled into a ball in the corner, my back to the door, my body shaking with it.

I was still curled up like this when Arnold came back. ‘Get up,’ he said.

I didn’t move and he grabbed my arm, digging his fingers in and dragging me backwards over the bed. I yelped in pain and fear, gripping the waistband of my jeans, horrified at the thought of being undressed again. But he needed me for something else now.

‘Get up on deck. Fitz wants you to drive the boat.’

Drive the boat?

I stumbled through to the saloon. The boat was swaying and rocking in a way I’d never felt before. The tide was rising, but not quickly enough – every few moments I felt a jolt and a scrape when the hull brushed against the riverbed.

There were two bodies on the floor. Malcolm’s and Dylan’s. Standing over them, Fitz: the gun he was holding aimed at Dylan’s head.

My hand covered my mouth in horror. Holding back a scream. I had no words left for him.

The whole scene was alien to me. My boat, my beautiful boat, was a strange place now with these people here, with these events taking place inside it.

Then I realised something. If Fitz was still pointing the gun at Dylan, that meant he was alive. And in that moment I heard him make a noise. His head was covered in blood, as though they’d kicked him over and over. He was lying awkwardly, half on his back, his legs sprawled wide. And his foot moved. Very well, then. He was alive. And then I saw Malcolm’s hand, lifted and moving in a vague, graceful wave before falling on to his chest.

‘Get up there,’ Fitz said, jerking his head up to the wheelhouse. ‘Get up there and I might not kill your fucking shit of a boyfriend. Yet.’

As I hauled myself up the steps, I could hear the sirens. Nicks was waiting for me at the top of the steps. He had his hands on the wheel but it was jerking out of his grip, as first the tide took it and then the silt, the rudder catching against the bottom. The engine roared and rumbled and I could hardly hear myself think.

‘You,’ he yelled, ‘steer this thing. Get us to deeper water. Right?’

‘You need Malcolm,’ I shouted back. ‘I’ve never done it before.’

‘Who?’

‘Malcolm. The guy he shot. Down there. He knows the river.’

The
Revenge
was adrift, maybe fifteen metres from the pontoon. I could see blue flashing lights, coming towards us down the hill. The marina was in darkness.

The boat jolted again, harder this time, enough to make Nicks lose his footing.

‘I said you need Malcolm!’ I yelled at him.

He stuck his head through the door to the cabin and shouted something at Fitz. And then, a few moments later, Malcolm was being shoved up through the doorway. Conscious, bloody, but still it was Malcolm. He looked at me, squinting and frowning as though he had no idea what was going on.

‘Are you okay?’ I said, trying to get him to focus on me.

‘Yeah, yeah…’ he said.

‘You need to steer,’ I said, putting his hand on the wheel.

He looked blank. Nicks was in the doorway to the cabin, talking to Fitz. I got close to Malcolm, close enough to smell the sweat and the blood and the fear.

‘You need to steer. Right?’

Finally he got it. He gripped the wheel and turned it gently, and the
Revenge
started to move away from the pontoon again. Blue lights now, flashing outside the gate to the marina. One car pulled into the car park, then a second.

The
Revenge of the Tide
eased off the mud and rocked into the flow of the river. Malcolm steered the boat round, back towards the Strood bank. Nicks stepped back as Fitz came up the steps and into the wheelhouse. I moved out of the way. He had blood on his hands, blood down the front of his jeans. The gun was still in his hand. The boat was roaring out into the midstream now, away from the bank and the police officers who were gathering on the pontoon, torches shining over us, flashing into the wheelhouse.

‘Where do you want to go?’ Malcolm shouted at them.

Fitz was slapping Nicks on the shoulder as though they’d done something smart, outwitted the gavvers, escaping from under their very noses. ‘I dunno, mate. Just keep driving for now, right?’

Malcolm was turning the wheel slowly, bringing his hands back to the two o’clock position each time. And Fitz and Nicks had to move to the stern to keep watching the pontoon. I wondered what Malcolm was playing at. The
Revenge
was heading straight for the other bank now.

Fitz was laughing, cupping his hand to his ear as the officers on the pontoon shouted things that none of us could hear. Nicks was next to him, almost leaning over the edge.