She checked her watch again and returned to the boot, pulling down the tailgate as hard as she could. As she did so, the sharp bang all but completely covered up the low, muffled whump that came from a few short kilometres offshore.
As she opened the driver’s side door, the children noticed the smoke and low-level flame on the nearby horizon. ‘What’s that?’ Ben asked, pointing.
‘Ooh, pretty!’ Amy said, giggling.
Sarah looked back over her headrest and smiled. ‘Just some early New Year fireworks, that’s all. You’re right though, Amy. It sure is pretty.’
Two twelve-kilo limpet mines would not be pretty for the men on the yacht though, she was sure of that.
But her children were safe again, and that was all that mattered.
7
It was only a short while later that Sarah found herself scanning the small departure lounge at Owen Roberts International Airport, senses alert. She was no professional when it came to counter-surveillance, but her husband had developed the natural instincts that she did possess into a passable approximation. He had taught her the basic skills of the trade, and now she was following routines that Mark had made her practise many times in the past.
To avoid detection, they might ordinarily have taken the family yacht the 400 kilometres across the Caribbean to Miami. But there was now the danger that they could be attacked at sea, because even though she had disabled one enemy vessel didn’t mean that there weren’t more.
It was therefore decided to revert to the secondary plan, and so the family had taken the island hopper from Cayman Brac to Grand Cayman, and then stayed at the airport to get a direct flight to Miami.
Sarah finished her inspection of the varied commuters, and finally turned her attention back to Ben and Amy. ‘How about some ice cream?’ she said as calmly as she could, trying to hide the adrenalized pumping of her heart, which had been working overtime since the explosion near her house.
The fact was that there were simply not that many ways to leave the Cayman Islands. Even if there was nobody watching here, it wouldn’t take a genius to figure out that they would be connecting with Miami. They were even using their real names and passports, at least for this initial part of the journey.
Sarah knew that Miami would be where the real work would start, and where their counter-surveillance would have to be operating on overtime for them to get clear of anyone waiting for them. Se only scanned the crowds at the airport out of habit, and just in case an attack was made. She thought that such an attack would be highly unlikely however, especially in such a crowded, security-conscious place such as an airport.
Besides which, Sarah had a feeling that if there had been orders to kill them, they would have already been carried out. But the yacht had only started moving when it became apparent that the Cole family was leaving. It therefore seemed that the men’s orders had been to follow, perhaps with the hope that the family would lead them to Mark.
Sarah grimaced internally. If that was their plan, then she’d have to make bloody sure that they weren’t followed in Miami, for everyone’s sake.
8
The passenger information came chattering over the secure connection onboard the private plane Albright had chartered that morning.
He scanned down the list, seeing what he needed — Mrs Sarah Cole, Ben Cole, Amy Cole, Flight 983 to Miami International; leaving in just under an hour and getting in at 1305 local time.
Albright allowed himself a satisfied smile. He had guessed right, and the small Gulfstream jet would get him to Miami a full two hours before his quarry, giving him time to liaise with Hansard’s men there, and to set up their surveillance operation.
Still smiling, Albright snapped open his small compact, the mirrored glass of which was now cracked down the middle. As he examined himself, the smile vanished. His hair was a mess, dark with sweat and salt water, and his eyes were puffy and bruised, his jaw line swollen. Cuts crisscrossed their way across his tanned face.
Most of the men from his detail were dead — only two others had lived through the devastating explosion, and they were both in intensive care. But as he stared at himself in the broken mirror, he didn’t feel lucky.
Albright had been lucky, however, the main bulkhead in the dive room protecting him from the full force of the blast. He’d managed to get out of the yacht through the immersion chamber, and had found one of the SDVs just below, blown free from its mooring under the bow by the explosion.
He had piloted the machine to shore, calling in the emergency and making straight for the airport, shrugging off the superficial injuries he had sustained. The other men were pulled from the wreckage by a rescue team just twenty minutes later, which was considerably too late for most of them.
It did not take long for Albright to figure out what had happened — he knew the effects of mines as well as anyone. He also knew that he had made a potentially fatal error — he had underestimated this woman, Sarah Cole.
As he snapped the compact shut again, disgusted by his appearance and deciding that he would take a shower and clean himself up at Miami International before anything else, he thought about Sarah, and knew for a fact that he would not let himself make the same mistake again.
9
Cole’s back touched down on the cold metal floor of the second-level parking zone, his muscles at first relaxing, before cramping up agonizingly. He had been clinging to the Toyota’s chassis for over an hour, and although he had adopted the most comfortable posture available, he had known that muscle cramps would be inevitable. And so he knew he just had to lie quietly and ride out the pain.
As his mind cleared, he considered his options. The car had been parked for the last twenty minutes, and Cole had still waited, suspended underneath the car, until all the passengers on this level had left for the comforts of the lounge above. He had only let himself slide down to the floor when he could detect no further presence in the parking area — no radios, no doors shutting, no children shouting, no drunkards singing. All was silent, and he was now free to move around the huge vessel like any other passenger.
The lure of a cold beer at one of the bars was certainly tempting, and yet he hesitated to move. Going above to the public areas would certainly be the more comfortable option, but it would not be the wisest. Although he had boarded the ferry undetected, he knew Hansard might have men stationed on all boats leaving port, including this one. Cole didn’t know whether his old boss would have had the time, or the manpower, to launch such an operation; it didn’t seem likely, but he simply could not afford to take the chance.
As his muscles eventually began to properly relax and feeling started to return to his limbs, he considered another of his options. He could access the service areas, and hide within the operational bowels of the massive ship. It would certainly give him room to stretch out, whilst keeping him away from other passengers, and possible agents. But the chances of a crew member stumbling upon him were too great, and then the options would be to either succumb to arrest, or silence the crew member, and Cole wanted to avoid that at all costs.
And so he decided on his third and final option — just stay exactly where he was, keeping himself as warm and mobile as he could, and leave for France underneath the same car he had come in on.