To Catch A Storm

by Warren Slingsby

  “Cheers!” Janet said chinking her glass against Alva’s. “So what makes you say you’re a car woman Alva?”

  “Oh, I just really enjoy cars. And driving. I have an open top BMW with a big engine and I love it.” She said, her eyes growing wide.

  “Ooh, that sounds lovely. What type?” Janet asked genuinely interested.

  “It’s a Z4 with a 3.0 engine. What about you?”

  “Well I have a Porsche 911 cabriolet in powder blue metallic at the moment, but I did drive my last boyfriend’s white Lamborghini for a while which was really good fun.”

  “A Lambo, I’m surprised he would let you drive that. Sorry, that sounded rude. I just meant that it’s an expensive toy to lend out. Most of the guys I go out with are idiots and think women can’t drive. They look so shocked when I downshift into second and throw the back end out on a corner.” she said laughing to herself.

  “Well, he didn’t have a choice really!” Janet said clinking glasses with Alva once more. “Shall we try the next boat along? We can give them all the benefit of our presence.” she said with a mock posh girl voice.

  Alva grabbed Janet’s hand and the two of them teetered off with their high heels to tackle the narrow gangplank that joined the two vessels. They had a glass of champagne on the first yacht and a Mojito on the second. Once or twice, they gracefully filtered out advances from inadequate suitors before ending up back on the Still Waters. Usually too old, too unfashionable or too uncool.

  “Ready to dance now?” Alva suggested hopefully.

  “Oh yes! Bring it on.”

  They joined another twenty or so who were dancing on the rear deck of the Still Waters and the other two adjoined yachts. The three boats seeming to bob up and down in time with the music. The almost full moon providing brilliance to light up the party. The music was loud, the bass deep, the alcohol ran freely as did the cocaine and ketamine in the bathrooms. This is how the super rich partied when they grew bored of being roped into VIP areas and rooftop terraces. A private party where excess was welcomed. Where everyone was rich and no one had anything to prove. Where the music could be incredibly loud and no one would come to complain about it.

  “Who’s the DJ?” Janet asked Alva.

  “I have no idea but I love this track!” The sonic heartbeat boomed through the girls and off across the dark waters surrounding them.

  “I can’t see my friend anywhere.” Alva said looking a little bemused. “Good job I found you, otherwise I might have jumped overboard. Don’t leave me anywhere okay? I don’t want to end up in some rich idiot’s cabin. Not yet at least!” She winked at Janet.

  Nicolay walked from the bar to the seating area making eye contact with Janet. He grinned at her. He was still with the large man from earlier who he had been discussing mining with. She gave him a friendly but brief smile.

  “Who’s that?” asked Alva. “I saw that little flirtation.”

  “I have no idea.” Janet said shaking her head, knowing full well exactly who it was and in far too much detail.

  “Well he’s got your number I think.”

  “I think we need to find some younger men to dance with us and fetch our drinks.” Janet replied with little actual interest in speaking to any men this evening.

  An hour later, they were sitting on the front of the boat alone. High heels were just not designed to be danced in all through the night. Alva offered Janet a cigarette, which she accepted and took a light.

  “Oh it’s nice to rest my feet. I may have to remove these shoes for the rest of the night, otherwise, I might cripple myself.”

  “With you on that.” said Alva.

  “I just borrowed these from a friend, so they don’t fit all that well.”

  They chatted about where they were staying, how long for and who with. Janet made most of her back story up on the spot, but felt she was pretty convincing. Alva was supposed to be flying back to Malmo earlier that night but had canceled after her friend begged her to stay another night and come to this party.

  “I’m so glad I met you. I don’t really know how I ended up at this...” she paused “yacht party, but I wouldn’t be enjoying it if I’d not met you.”

  “Ladies. I see you’ve come to find a quieter part of my yacht. It’s a little hectic back there isn’t it?” he offered a wide smile, “I’m Nicolay by the way.”

  “Nice to meet you Nicolay.” Alva replied.

  “Yes, nice to meet you Nicolay.” Janet chimed in. “It’s a lovely yacht you have. Stunning.”

  “Oh, thank you. It’s nice of you to say. Most of the people I bring on here take it all for granted. They don’t realise how hard you have to work to buy something like this.” There was a bitterness in his tone and then he seemed to snap himself back. “What is it that you two do for a living?”

  They chattered for a while at the gently bobbing bow of the yacht. The sun was heading for the horizon and darkness was retreating across the sky filling in the pinpricks where the stars had been.

  . . .

  “What the hell is going on here?” Charlie asked himself. He stared at the back of the stranger’s head as the stranger watched the yacht that Janet was on bobbing gently in the moonlight a mile or so out at sea. He had the benefit of a pair of binoculars which really annoyed Charlie. Charlie was the one who was supposed to be tailing her and here was this guy who turns up late to the party and so much better prepped. He could probably see what was actually going on on the boat. All Charlie could see was a cluster of lights bobbing very slightly about. When the yacht Janet is / was on left the Port, the stranger had ran pretty much at full tilt for near on three miles to keep his eye on the yacht. Heading east with the yacht, he’d ran across beaches, through gardens, scaled walls and fences and hill sides to stay in touch. Charlie had also run just about keeping in touch with him. The yacht had gone out and headed down the coast for twenty minutes before dropping anchor. Then other yachts had come out of nowhere to join it and now, Charlie couldn’t be 100% sure, but he thought they were having a party out there in the middle of the Mediterranean. Depending upon the direction of the breeze, he kept getting wafts of dance music from one or more of the boats.

  He should probably text Carl to let him know the situation with the stranger but he wanted to see if there were any clues as to who he was first. Perhaps Carl might have some clues but he was worried that it would appear that he had lost control of the situation. The fact of the matter was that he totally had lost control of what was going on. He lost that the moment that stranger walked up Janet’s road in Barcelona.

  Charlie put his hands on his head and turned around. He was breathing deeply with stress although he didn’t realise it. He still didn’t understand how the stranger was here in Nice. Did he follow me while I was following Janet he wondered? That would have been tricky. He didn’t appear to have a car when he’d spotted him on Janet’s street. Plus, it was tricky as hell keeping up with her. Surely there couldn’t have been a third car keeping up with him. Could there? The stranger was now sat on his backpack on a rock overlooking the sea; seemingly transfixed by the goings on out at sea. Charlie hung back out of view of the stranger but close enough so he could keep his eye on him and the yacht. He had a feeling that the yacht wouldn’t be coming back anytime soon. If at all.

  Earlier in the evening, he’d had several angry and annoyed texts from Carl asking what the hell was going on? Charlie had asked him and Dan to sit tight for now. They didn’t trust him seemingly from their texts and this culminated in several calls from Carl which Charlie had to drop as it wasn’t appropriate to answer them whilst he was trying to keep a handle on events as they unfolded in Nice. His last text simply said

  I’ll call you later. Nothing to worry about,

  but Janet is in transit and I’m keeping close

  to her. She is unaware that I am tailing her.

  “Fat, ungrateful tit.” Charlie muttered and hit the lock button. He had no idea
how tired Charlie was with all this work. It was bloody exhausting. He’d hardly slept for days it felt like. And now he’d missed another night of sleep.

  The sky was turning into a purple and orange sheet as the sun came up to hide just under the lip of the sea. The more he thought about Janet on the yacht with God knows who, the more stressed he felt. Had some type of reverse Stockholm syndrome occurred within him? He had been the aggressor back in Edinburgh pretending to meet her by chance and then taking her trust and good nature and ripping it into tiny shreds by drugging her and delivering her to Carl. She must have been terrified and now he really regretted it. He wanted to take that back but what was done was done. He just could not imagine doing that again to anyone. Now it felt like he worried about her night and day. This was all so wrong because nothing could ever come of all this now. One thing he did know for sure was he wanted rid of Carl and Dan for good. However this played out, he needed to be rid of them. That could be tricky. A couple of million pounds meant that they weren’t going to go away in a hurry. He still wasn’t 100% sure she ever had the money. What he was certain about was how cool this woman seemed to him as he watched her from afar. An enigma. Whoever or whatever she was, she was switched on and just got on with it. She seemed to grab life by the lapels, rough it around and take what she wanted. Do what she wanted. Whenever she wanted. First, he saw her driving a Lamborghini in Glasgow. She had seemingly stolen that from Joseph. She escaped topless from six blokes in one of their cars after giving them the finger. She’d moved to Barcelona and started driving a classic Porsche. Now she’d driven to Nice for who knows what reason and broke onto a yacht that had then gone on to some weird yacht cluster party. Now how did this compare to his previous girlfriends. Not in their wildest dreams would they live their lives like this. And now he had spent all this time observing her, he wondered whether he would ever be able to go back to meeting sensible girls in dreary bars. He wanted to live his life as she did. He wanted to live his life spontaneously. Packing up and moving to new cities. Driving exotic cars. Taking road trips. Spending endless days on beaches. He wasn’t too sure he’d want to do the breaking onto yachts part. But he supposed it depended why she’d broken onto the yacht. Was there a greater prize than what she’d already taken from him and the rest of the gang? Or perhaps she was simply invited to a party on a yacht and she turned up early and decided to go onboard before her hosts arrived. That seemed unlikely, surely if that was the case, she would have awaited her host on the back of the yacht in the open area, not gone straight into the inner rooms or cabins. That would be like turning up at someone’s house and then letting yourself in and going upstairs to the bedrooms. What was she after? Was she putting herself in terrible danger? He thought there was a good chance she probably was. He decided he couldn’t just sit there all day, he would need to do something. He didn’t know what, but sitting and watching from a distance it was not. The stranger looked like he was happy to wait it out, but it wasn’t sitting well with Charlie. He set off back toward Nice.

  . . .

  It was now 10:30 am. Janet was returning from the loo and looked around the rear deck. The party had petered out. The majority of the party goers had returned to the two yachts they had arrived on and were either in cabins or internal rooms sleeping or more likely with the amount of cocaine consumed, having bad sex. One or two people were sleeping across seats on the decks and on the right hand boat, a young man and woman sat at the very low back deck with their feet dipped in the water and their eyes locked on one another. She returned to Alva and Nicolay. He was charming, humble (for a billionaire) and funny. Not at all as she had guessed he would be. He exuded a style that men his age simply didn’t have. It was difficult to describe it. Effortlessly relaxed, yet smart. As though he’d been dressed by Tom Ford before the party and still looked absolutely pristine even at this time of day. Yes it was probably some stylist’s job to dress him but still she couldn’t help but feel an odd attraction.

  Someone shouted Nicolay’s name and something in Russian. He excused himself momentarily. When he came back, the other boats were sailing off. The sound of motors accompanied the initial momentum of the boats. The yacht that had been on their right was heading out to sea with three pale blue sails at half mast. It looked majestic and tranquil. The other one sailing east towards Italy. She wondered what works of stolen art were on those boats? This boat contained a stolen Rembrandt; so perhaps a yacht was the perfect hiding place. It made total sense. With a house, there was always a chance, someone could get in or that an authority figure could see the piece of art. But not out at sea. Who ever went on one of these yachts apart from the fortunate few? She remembered reading about a lot of other paintings that had also been stolen on the night when the Rembrandt was taken. At least another ten paintings or more including Manet, Degas, Vermeer and a second Rembrandt. Were they all just floating about out here at sea viewed only by those on the inner circles of their privileged owners? They had to be somewhere and if you could afford to buy one of them, even on the black market, they’d still cost a hell of a lot, so it’s likely they’d all be in the hands of the super rich.

  Nicolay suggested that that they could take some comfier seats at the rear deck now that the other boats had left. He made coffee for the three of them and effortlessly pulled together a buffet breakfast of granola, chopped bananas, honey and yoghurt. He grabbed a very well stocked fruit bowl from another table and brought it over.

  “We can at least have a healthy breakfast after all the bad things we put in our bodies last night.” and he winked at Janet. He winked a lot she noticed. It put her very much at ease. Much more so than she should have been to say that she shouldn’t really be here in the first place. She had blagged her way into this position, she was not here because she knew anyone. Not really at least. She kind of knew Alva and now she kind of knew Nicolay. Both would be short lived friendships she thought. Especially if they knew why she was on board.

  “What plans do you have today ladies?” He asked the pair of them. “You’re both more than welcome to stay aboard, but equally I can get you back to Nice if you wish?”

  “Well I was supposed to fly back home to Sweden. Malmo. But I stayed to keep my friend company, but I seem to have lost her somewhere along the way. So I currently don’t have any plans.” She looked expectantly toward Janet.

  Janet pulled an expression that said ‘thinking’ for literally a second, then blurted out. “Don’t have any plans. Staying on board would be good.” she paused, then added, “If I could freshen up.” She wasn’t thinking about sunbathing. She was thinking about Nicolay and her attraction. She smiled at the chatter but felt annoyed on the inside with herself. With her shallowness. Her predictable-ness. She couldn’t even just enjoy this for what it was. A day on a beautiful yacht in an amazing setting.

  “We have everything you could possibly need to shower, sunbathe… freshen up. You are my guest now, you can do as you please. What is mine is yours.” He spread his arms out to show he meant everything on the boat.

  “Lovely, thanks.” said Alva.

  “Very sweet of you.” added Janet whilst thinking slyly that she intended to take him at his word. Although, how she was actually going to take such a big painting off this yacht was yet to be figured out. Could she take it out of the frame and roll it? Could you roll a Rembrandt? Probably not, it would be canvas stretched on a wooden frame. She would need something large enough to put it in like a suitcase. Would that be big enough? She couldn't remember now that she was away from it whether it was huge or tiny. All she could see was Rembrandt’s calm face staring out. Staring out of the painting at her. At Janet. ‘Get me out of this Janet. Free me from this place.’

  “I’m going to grab a shower if that’s ok?” said Janet.

  “Of course, it’s okay. As I said I want you to make yourself at home. There is a guest bathroom straight down.” Nicolay said motioning through to the living area to the corridor beyond. “Third doo
r on the left. There should be everything you need in there. If there isn’t, let me know what you need.”

  Half an hour later, feeling refreshed and wide awake now, even with no sleep whatsoever. She opened the door to the bathroom and looked back down the corridor to the back deck. She could see the two of them sat at the table still chatting and laughing. Across the gangway from her was the study door. The door was askew. She had another look to make sure they were still chatting and flew across the narrow corridor and into the study. She still hadn’t figured out what her plan of action was. She just wanted another look at the painting. See how big it was. See how it was attached to the wall. She pulled on the book that unlatched the book shelf and manoeuvred it all back to allow a gap into the inner study. It was big. In fact it was huge. It was way too big for her to do anything with. It probably weighed a ton too. She held onto the sides of the picture and lifted it slightly. It moved up the wall remarkably easily. She had thought the frame might be gold but it wasn’t. It must be wood with gold leaf. She lifted it a little further and felt it unhook from the wall. She would certainly be able to carry it, but it was just so big. She tried to hook it back to the wall but now couldn’t find the hook.

  “So he was right, you are up to no good.”

  She jumped back from the wall. She was literally caught red handed. The painting in her hands. She stood there holding the painting in front of her. She placed it down on the floor and leaned it slightly against the wall. Her heart was popping out from her chest.

  “Have you seen this?” Janet asked Alva in a whispered tone. “This is a stolen Rembrandt you know?”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “You know?” Janet asked incredulously. “How do you know?”