In Rides Trouble (Black Knights Inc. #2)(10)
“Aw, shucks,” she feigned dejection, “and I was so looking forward to it.” Eve shoved a pointy elbow into her rib cage.
Sharif tilted his head and smiled. Unlike Ghedi, his teeth were large and even and brilliantly white against the darkness of his face. “You have a very insolent tongue, Miss Reichert. What is that expression you Americans love so much? Ah, yes, you had better make sure it is not writing checks your ass cannot cash. Such a wonderfully colorful turn of phrase, don’t you think?”
“I think I’d feel a lot better if we kept my tongue and my ass out of the conversation completely.”
Another sharp elbow crashed into Becky’s side, and she turned to glare at her friend. The look Eve gave her clearly stated the woman was seriously questioning her intelligence. And yepper, when she swung her attention back to Sharif, his dark scowl pretty much telegraphed his intention to kill her, slowly, if ever the opportunity arose.
“I have little patience with mouthy women,” he growled, his musky smelling cologne sticking in her nose until she wanted to puke. “Breaking every little bone in your body would gratify me greatly, not to mention the fact that your diminished health would likely only expedite your ransom. So you see, it’s a win-win situation for me. It would behoove you to remember that.”
She could almost hear Billy in her head, S squared, Becky. S squared. Which was his way of telling her to sit down and shut up.
With difficulty, she clamped her lips together and satisfied herself by glowering.
Sharif turned his back on her and informed Ghedi of their course change, while two other members of the crew captained the extra skiffs back to the safety of the Somali coast.
Which is how she now found herself stuck on her own catamaran about to become a pirate …
The crew onboard the BP Hamilton hadn’t a clue they were being attacked until the first volley of bullets burst across the hull.
This was a nightmare. A really, really scary one where Becky held on for dear life to the Serendipity’s rail as the pirates threw down the throttle on the catamaran’s two big outboard engines until they were blasting across the choppy seas, hurtling like an uneven cannon shot toward the Hamilton as waves crashed over the railing.
Four red flares suddenly streaked from the tanker’s bridge, turning the bright sky above the football field-sized ship an angry orange. The people on board were no longer under the mistaken impression the Serendipity was a simple pleasure cruiser.
Was the spray of bullets your first clue? Becky thought sardonically, using her free hand to grab Eve as the woman’s fingers slipped from the rail, and she started sliding across the watery deck. Becky strained to keep them both from bouncing right out of the boat.
Going overboard would be a case of falling out of the frying pan and into the fire. In this instance, the fire was thousands of miles of endless, shark-infested waters where trying to locate them would be akin to locating a needle in a haystack.
On second thought, that analogy didn’t quite cut it.
It was more like, if they managed to separate themselves from the boats and wind up adrift, locating them would be like trying to locate a protozoan in a haystack.
So yepper, it was best just to hang on and hope she could keep them both alive long enough for Frank and Billy and the rest of the boys to pull one of their Mighty Mouse maneuvers—as in, “here I come to save the day!”
She absolutely hated finding herself in a situation requiring a Mighty Mouse maneuver. It didn’t bode too well for her chances of becoming an operator…
Another set of flares soared over the Hamilton’s big deck.
Is that the best you can do? she thought with derision.
Yes, it probably was. Merchant vessels almost always went to sea unarmed.
The Somalis obviously understood that as well as she did. They didn’t slow a single knot as they fired a few more warning shots from their AKs.
She gritted her teeth and tried to use her forearm to push her salty, water-logged hair out of her eyes. Not that she necessarily wanted to see the moment when she was blown to smithereens. Every time one of those rounds pinged off the tanker’s hull, she expected a giant fireball to ensue. What kind of idiots fired at a ship carrying a ton of combustible fuel?
Somali pirates and their trusty interpreter, that’s what.
Being set adrift in the Indian Ocean was looking better and better. If she had to choose a way to die, drowning promised to be much less painful than burning. She turned to look behind them at the plume of white water kicked up by the catamaran’s outboard engines and the endless panorama of undulating waves beyond. Maybe she and Eve should just let go and—
She didn’t get any further along that train of thought because the pirates yanked back on the throttle, throwing the engines into reverse and causing both women to slide across the slick deck. Scrabbling for purchase, they managed to grab the base of the mast and each other. The Serendipity slid in sideways… oh God, we’re going to crash!… and slammed into the Hamilton’s port side about mid-ship with a bone-rattling thud!
She was amazed the Serendipity didn’t just disintegrate on impact, but the little sailboat held together.
Thank you, dear sweet Christ!
She struggled to catch her breath, watching in horrified amazement as the pirates immediately threw grappling hooks over the tanker’s railings. They swung their AKs with their improvised rope gun straps over their bony shoulders and started climbing like mountain goats.