by David Blake
STORM FORCE
David Blake
www.david-blake.com
Proofread by Jay G Arscott
Special thanks to Kath Middleton, Ann Studd, John Harrison, Anna Burke, Emma Porter, Emma Stubbs and Jan Edge
Published by Black Oak Publishing Ltd in Great Britain, 2021
Disclaimer:
These are works of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Copyright © David Blake 2021
The right of David Blake to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998. All rights reserved. This eBook is for your enjoyment only. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.
CONTENTS:
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
Chapter Twenty Two
Chapter Twenty Three
Chapter Twenty Four
Chapter Twenty Five
Chapter Twenty Six
Chapter Twenty Seven
Chapter Twenty Eight
Chapter Twenty Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty One
Chapter Thirty Two
Chapter Thirty Three
Chapter Thirty Four
Chapter Thirty Five
Chapter Thirty Six
Chapter Thirty Seven
Chapter Thirty Eight
Chapter Thirty Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty One
Chapter Forty Two
Chapter Forty Three
Chapter Forty Four
Chapter Forty Five
Chapter Forty Six
Chapter Forty Seven
Chapter Forty Eight
Chapter Forty Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty One
Chapter Fifty Two
Chapter Fifty Three
Chapter Fifty Four
Chapter Fifty Five
Chapter Fifty Six
Chapter Fifty Seven
Chapter Fifty Eight
Chapter Fifty Nine
Chapter Sixty
Chapter Sixty One
Chapter Sixty Two
Chapter Sixty Three
Chapter Sixty Four
Chapter Sixty Five
Chapter Sixty Six
Chapter Sixty Seven
Chapter Sixty Eight
Chapter Sixty Nine
Epilogue
“For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.”
James 3:16
PROLOGUE
Saturday, 21st August
THE OPULENT MOTOR yacht’s grandiose cockpit pitched and rolled over the ocean’s waves, sweeping gently underneath its bulbous white hull. Spread out over a dark folding teak table lay the body of a beautiful young woman, her translucent blue eyes staring up at a blanket of stars, her unblemished skin glowing in the light from a steadily rising moon.
Around her stood three middle aged men, their mouths hanging open, their own bodies as naked as the girl lying before them.
‘What are we going t-to d-do now?’ stuttered the fattest of the three, his small piggy eyes blinking fast as they remained fixed on the girl’s.
‘You mean, what are you going to do?’ replied the older man standing to his side, his body thin, loose folds of skin hanging down from its sides.
‘Don’t try and make out that this was my fault,’ the fat one replied, turning to stare up at his skinny balding friend. ‘You’re the one who was choking her!’
‘But it wasn’t me who slipped the LSD, ecstasy and cocaine into her vodka bloody tonic, all at the same time, now was it!’
‘Iain. Tubbs. Do me a favour and shut the hell up.’
The two men turned to stare over at the third man, busily stuffing a vibrant pink shirt down into a pair of faded blue designer jeans.
A sudden feeling of exposed vulnerability had the two still naked men start scrabbling frantically about for their clothes, pulling them over their sun-bronzed bodies before standing once again to stare down at the girl.
A silence as cold as the surrounding sea crept its way over the luxury yacht, leaving the only sound to be the tops of the waves, lapping gently against its gleaming white hull.
‘Is she definitely d-dead?’ came the uncertain voice of the man who was being called Tubbs, peeling his eyes off the girl to stare over at the person standing on the opposite side of the table.
‘What do you think?’
‘I don’t know, Mike. Unlike you, I’m not a doctor.’
‘Well, after the convulsions, vomit, and blood that came pouring out of her nose, she stopped breathing. She hasn’t moved since, not even enough to blink. Bearing all that in mind, I don’t think you need five years in medical school to know that she’s definitely fucking dead!’
‘Shit.’
As they’d been talking, Iain had been furtively glancing about. ‘I think the solution is obvious enough,’ he soon began, casting his eyes over at the sea, glistening in the moonlight like a carpet of slithering slugs. ‘We simply tie something around her feet and throw her over the side. Then we motor our way home and pretend none of this ever happened.’
‘Agreed,’ Mike replied. ‘One-hundred percent!’
A sudden giant beam of light swept over the boat.
Panicking, they all ducked their heads.
‘What the hell was that?’ demanded Tubbs, his bottom lip trembling.
Mike slowly lifted his head to peer out over the side towards where Norfolk’s coastline lay. When the exact same light swept over them again, he stood up to stare down at his two cowering friends. ‘It’s the bloody lighthouse, for fuck’s sake. Now, get up and help me find something to tie around her ankles.’
As the light arced around again, the remaining two lifted themselves cautiously to their feet, gazing over to where Happisburgh Lighthouse stood, its distinctive bands of red and white stark against Norfolk’s starlit sky.
Without waiting for them, Mike threw open the nearest lazarette bench seat, delving down into its contents. ‘We just need an anchor, or something, and a length of rope to attach it to.’
Tubbs looked back at the body. ‘Are you sure we should be doing this?’
‘I suppose you’d prefer to take her body straight to the police, making sure
to tell them exactly what we’d been doing to her, just before she happened to overdose on the various illegal drugs that one of us decided to slip into her drink?’
‘But…we didn’t kill her. At least, not on purpose, we didn’t.’
‘It may not be murder, but I can’t see it being classed as anything other than manslaughter. Then there’s the question of where we got the cocaine, LSD and ecstasy from. So unless you want to spend the next twenty-odd years being gang-raped by your overly affectionate homosexual prison mates, I suggest you help me find some bloody rope!’
A few frantic minutes passed as they all searched the depths of the cockpit’s lockers, until eventually Tubbs pulled out a tangled clump of blue frayed nylon, attached to which was a long length of rusty old chain.
‘Will this do?’ he asked, holding it up for the others to see.
‘Looks like it’ll have to,’ Mike replied, snatching the rope out of his hands to begin tying it around the girl’s thin delicate ankles.
After checking the knot, he skirted around the table to take hold of her arms. ‘I’m not doing this on my own,’ he stated, shooting a glance at his fellow co-conspirators, neither of whom were doing anything more productive than staring vacantly at the girl’s angelic stone-like face.
‘Are we absolutely sure about this?’ Iain questioned, a flicker of doubt catching at the corners of his eyes. ‘The moment we throw her over, there’ll be no turning back.’
‘It was your bloody idea,’ Mike scoffed. ‘Anyway, the moment we do, she’ll be fish food, so I don’t see how it matters. Even if her body was to wash up on a beach somewhere, I doubt there would be anything left of her to identify. Certainly nothing to indicate that any of us had been within a hundred miles of her. Now, if one of you can throw the chain over, the rest should follow.’
His two more reluctant friends glanced nervously around at each other.
‘I’ll do the chain,’ Iain eventually mumbled. ‘You can grab her ankles.’
Tubbs shuddered, the fat on his face wobbling like chilled jellied eel. ‘I’m not touching her.’
‘That’s hilarious, Tubbs, really it is, especially given the fact that you couldn’t stop yourself about half an hour ago.’
‘That was b-before – b-before she was…’ Tubbs’ began, his trembling voice trailing away as his eyes drifted over the length of her body.
‘For fuck’s sake,’ lamented Iain. ‘I’ll take her feet. I assume you’ll be able to manage the chain?’
‘Of course I can manage the chain,’ Tubbs grumbled, stooping down to gather the heavy cast iron links into his brown chubby arms.
Through short shallow breaths, he hauled it slowly over to the boat’s side. There he stopped to look over at Mike, still holding onto the girl’s arms. ‘What do I do now?’
‘What d’you think you do? Throw it over!’
Seeing him swing his arms back, Mike suddenly shouted, ‘Not all at once!’
‘What!’ Tubbs exclaimed, hurling the entire length of chain over the side for it to instantly vanish into the cold uninviting sea beneath.
The three men watched in stunned silence as the rope attached to its end caught at the girl’s ankles, whipping her body around to drag it across the table, straight over the side; the back of her head cracking against the hard fibreglass edge before it too disappeared.
‘I said, not all at once, you brainless moron!’
‘You said throw it over the side, so I threw it over the side.’
Mike shook his head with a bemused sigh. ‘Anyway, it’s done now,’ he eventually continued, nudging himself around the table to a set of steps that led up to the flybridge above. ‘I suggest we start heading back.’
‘Are you sure she’s gone?’ questioned Iain, barging past Tubbs to peer down over the side.
‘As long as the rope holds,’ came Mike’s apathetic response, disappearing up through a hole in the cockpit’s roof.
‘And if it doesn’t?’
Hearing the motor yacht’s engine rumble into life, they glanced up to see his head appear over a gleaming stainless steel railing.
‘Then, as I said, she’ll either be carried out to sea, or washed up on a beach somewhere, but not before being feasted upon by about a billion fish.’
The two remaining men turned to stare silently out over the vast undulating ocean.
Feeling the yacht begin motoring away, Iain was about to join Mike up on the flybridge, when something caught at the edge of his eye. Stopping where he was, he spun his head around to stare out once again.
‘Did you see that?’ he asked, turning briefly to look at Tubbs.
‘See what?’
‘I thought I saw…’ He stopped mid-sentence, casting his eyes back out over the ocean’s gently rolling waves.
‘Are you going to tell me or not?’
Iain shook his head. ‘It doesn’t matter. For a minute there I thought – I thought I saw the girl, swimming away. Just my imagination, I suppose.’
CHAPTER ONE
Friday, 27th August
JOHN TANNER WAS feeling unusually nervous as he turned his polished and recently fixed jet-black Jaguar XJS into Christine Halliday’s modest circular drive, and not only because he’d come to pick her up for what was to be their first official date. He’d only just had his car back from the garage having been forced to spend a small fortune getting it through its MOT. If it happened to break down now, or if anything important fell off, like the exhaust for example, he’d be left with little choice but to sell it. The garage’s hefty and somewhat extortionate bill left him living off not one, but two credit cards, neither of which had all that much actual credit left. And as he wasn’t due to be paid until the end of the month, the first time he had in almost two years, he simply couldn’t afford for anything else to go wrong.
Climbing out, he closed the driver’s side door as gently as he could to take an admiring step back. He’d always appreciated the lines of the XJS, ever since he’d seen one of his wealthier school friends being picked up in one, some thirty-odd years before. It was one of the aspirational vehicles of its day. It was also the first car he’d seen that he found himself desperate to own. The association with his childhood was one of the reasons why he’d bought it. It reminded him of simpler times, when everything was possible, and all he had to worry about was finishing his homework on time; that and if any of the girls in his class fancied him, of course.
‘Nice car!’ exclaimed a voice, echoing out from the modest house ahead.
Glancing up, he saw Christine beaming a warm smile over at him.
‘Really?’ he asked, an anxious frown sending waves rippling over his forehead. He’d always known his car was an unusual choice. It was for that reason he was never quite sure what people’s reaction would be.
‘Of course!’ she replied, with apparent sincerity. ‘I mean, what’s not to like?’
Tanner shrugged. ‘Some people think it’s…well, a little eighties.’
‘And what’s wrong with that? Some of my best memories are from the eighties.’
‘They’re not exactly known for their reliability, either.’
‘It’s a classic car. They wouldn’t be as much fun if they didn’t keep breaking down all the time.’
‘I suppose,’ Tanner shrugged, his mind taking him back to the numerous occasions when it had, and how much he’d had to fork out each and every time. ‘Anyway,’ he continued, turning to take her in. ‘You look stunning!’
‘Oh, please,’ she replied, glancing down at her worn jeans and scuffed boots.
‘OK, that might have been a slight exaggeration, but in my defence, this is the first time I’ve seen you wearing anything other than your life jacket, that and your rather threadbare blue uniform.’
‘It’s not quite the first time you have, but I’ll take it anyway. Thank you!’
Skirting around to the other side of the car, he eased the door open for her.
‘So, the rumours are true,’
she mused, casting her eyes up into his thin, sun-bronzed face. ‘You are a gentleman.’