The air was incredibly fresh and almost instantly his nasal passages filled with the heady scent of crushed conifer needles as he ran along the natural, quiet carpet. It was one of his ‘special moments’ and something which he always looked forward to.
He set himself a pace and began to breathe deeply as he zigzagged through the trees, each one towering above him, their boughs allowing shafts of sunlight to penetrate through the canopy and onto the forest floor.
Strands of light cascaded through the vegetation, illuminating fern fronds and revealing a curtain of dust particles. The path stretched for almost a mile, and today he was the only occupant. As he started to feel the resistance of a gentle incline, he acknowledged his senses isolating themselves once more. His nose was now alive with the scent of the forest, his eyes squinting to avoid the piercing rays and his ears embracing the ever-changing sounds, the most notable of which was the distant pounding of waves upon a shore.
Moments later and at the top of a larger mound, he reached his favourite part of the run. Exiting the forest, he found himself once more on an incredibly beautiful beach. It was one of his favourites, in a country quite literally full of dramatic, superlative-rich, pristine shores.
He breathed in the ozone-laden air, as salt particles hit his face and occasional specks of seawater cooled his already burning skin. Looking out to sea, he observed an ever-present, distant, hazy chain of small islands and nodded his approval to no one in particular before continuing his run. He felt at peace. He always did when he reached this place.
As the surface changed again, the miniscule grains of silica bit into the rubber surface of his shoes and now all that he could hear was the sound of his feet hitting the ground, his breathing, the powerful swoosh of the inbound waves, that and the distant call of a flock of variable oystercatchers, busy foraging for food on the immediate shoreline, scampering back and forth to avoid the waves.
He turned right and began to head towards a curve in the bay where a small area of cliffs met the sea.
Cursing himself for not placing them in beforehand, he fumbled in his red short pockets and removed a pair of Sennheiser earphones. Preferring not to stop, he continued to run, placing the smooth rubber pieces into his ears and switching on the device strapped to his left arm. His pace had slowed, ever so slightly, but enough to annoy him; his overt anger would have probably been amusing to onlookers as he chastised himself.
Not even the oystercatchers were interested.
It was one of the myriad reasons he chose to live here.
He soon found his speed increasing as a random musical track burst into his head, filling his ears with sound, drowning out nature’s own symphony and alerting the senses, importantly increasing his desire to run as fast as he could.
Rebel Yell had always been one of his ‘power tracks’ and this morning was no different. He was sprinting now, as fast as he possibly could. As he rounded the curve in the shoreline, he noticed another inhabitant; he was not alone.
About two hundred metres in front of him stood a darker-skinned male, taller than him and very powerfully built.
His physical activity had created a film of sweat on his body, which only sought to emphasise his impressive physique. The right side of his body was clearly marked with a striking tattoo that ran from his right shoulder, beyond his hip and onto his calf. It was a tribal tattoo, borne out of the South Pacific and etched onto his body in the old-fashioned, exquisitely painful way with a hammer and a piece of tusk. It had taken many months of commitment and recovery until it took up pride of place, a mixture of cultural and personal design.
In his hand was a rake and at his feet a number of canvass sacks. His activities were no more sinister than collecting the overnight bounty that nature had provided – sea weed. The male was harvesting the plant material, probably for his garden, but possibly to eat, to feed his family or even to sell. Who knew?
As he reached the male he slowed slightly, inhaling vast lungs of air but not stopping. He raised his right hand up and was met by the stronger palm of the harvester. Their palms clashed in a classic high five and in seconds they were both alone again; The Harvester and The Runner, the only occupants on a beach many miles long.
The only other visitor to its familiar abrasive surface had been a few resident seabirds and the insistent pounding of the Pacific Ocean.
It was a genuinely great day to be alive and to breathe in the ozone, stand, close one’s eyes and listen to the brutal persistence of the ocean.
He reached the end of the beach. Stopping, he dropped his head and shoulders and started his post-run regime. Stretching his arms high above his head, he gulped in huge amounts of fresh air then shook out his limbs. Exhausted but filled with endorphins, he pulled his T-shirt over his head, revealing what for him was considered a reasonable body, a figure that showed evidence of regular exposure to the sun.
He stopped, took another deep breath, flipped off his beloved running shoes and music player and then ran full-on into the surf.
The immediate sensation changed. Now he was really alive; highly oxygenated air bubbles fought for superiority around and above his head as wave after wave pounded over the top of him. Sounds were suppressed now, but he was still incredibly aware of his surroundings. He surfaced after a few minutes, like a cormorant hunting its prey.
He looked around and saw a much larger wave. Its deep blue core was full of raw power, the tops were arctic white and disintegrating in the wind, their ever-present, rumbling noise was immense. He took a deep breath and plunged headfirst into the foaming arc.
Being alone in an ocean so potent and yet serenely beautiful had its own allure. He could easily get into difficulty and no one anywhere would be able to save him.
Bursting through the wave, he launched himself shorewards on the next, skilfully surfing into the beach where he lay for a few moments, each subsequent wave battering him, surrounding him and eagerly tugging him back into the sea. His face lay on the sand, somehow allowing his eyes to macro-focus onto the microscopic composition of the beach. Once again, he realised why he did this every morning.
He’d battled his ocean nemesis and won once more.
Legend had it that the Seventh Wave was always the most powerful. As long as he acknowledged this, he would always be safe.
Having replaced his shoes and put his T-shirt and music player back on, he began a slow jog back to his home. Traffic had started to increase as local folk commenced their short and enviable commute to work. A few drivers waved as he ran, he didn’t know them but this was a beach community so everyone waved. It was how it was, apparently.
On the last phase of his return run, he began to think about the girl he had spent the last week with; the last night with.
It was a long story but in essence and all too heavily clichéd he had picked her up at a bar. Historically, this was completely out of character and yet it seemed right. Clearly, she saw something in him – not just that on the face of it he was reasonably well off and lived in a great waterfront home.
At forty, even if he said it himself, he was in great shape, both physically and mentally. Tanned, but not overly so, his five-foot eleven frame was lean and muscular in the right places, it was often said that his legs were somewhat out of proportion to his upper body but impressive nonetheless.
He had thinning mousy brown hair, his temples were greying now, or as he liked to refer to them – tinted with titanium. The colour combination of tanned skin and greying hair allowed his most natural feature to shine – he had fiercely blue eyes; eyes that captured many a girl’s heart. It was often said that just blinking as he spoke added a certain something.
He had a strong sense of right and wrong and a wicked sense of humour – but above all he had a past and in many ways it controlled and haunted him. His only way to suppress the voices was to live a life that combined relaxation with work – he’d finally added the word ‘consultant’ onto his LinkedIn profile and to date it had done him no ha
rm; none whatsoever. Worst case it had allowed him to live on the Pacific Coast of New Zealand where he would spend all summer, only occasionally leaving for Europe in the southern hemisphere winter and then, only if he felt like it.
He arrived back on the driveway of Spindrift – his summer home. Whilst it only had two bedrooms it was more than comfortable with a timber construction, Birchwood interior walls and ceilings, a log burner, a kitchen with stainless steel appliances and bench tops, two bathrooms and his favourite acquisition, an outdoor shower.
The gardens were minimal, planted with palms and succulents and Kikuyu grass. If nothing else, it meant his garden maintenance bill was also minimal. A large black sail fluttered in the breeze, attached to the front wall of the property and then onto two wooden pillars. It provided much-needed shade from the fiercely hot New Zealand sun.
At the back of the property lay another small garden and his pièce de résistance, a boat mooring. The mooring was a necessary, if not expensive, extra when he bought the home a few years before. His was the only vacant one, the rest of the adjoining properties all having impressive ocean-going yachts and motor cruisers tied up in the modern canal complex.
He vowed that one day he would fill the vacant area with a sleek black powerboat – although, truth be told, he wasn’t quite sure why or when he would ever use it and more importantly what it might be called. He pondered for an hour once as he sat on his own private jetty and tossed pebbles into the water, captivated by the symmetry of the ripples.
Parked on his driveway was his actual vice. An equally sleek, equally black vehicle; it wasn’t his first choice, that would have been a Porsche 911 or perhaps the new Cayman – against the advice of his more hirsute male friends he had ended up buying a 2010 model Obsidian Black Audi TT – the 3.2 V6 quattro version. Much to the delight of those same friends – the few that he had – who all referred to it as ‘the hairdresser’s car’.
As was always the case, once they were placed firmly in the heated passenger seats and exposed to the 280bhp that the four-wheel-drive system managed to deliver seamlessly to the road, their minds changed. As the exhaust system wailed off the cliff edges with the car darting and weaving through the Kamai Ranges most passengers conceded that it was indeed a very agreeable car.
And he enjoyed it, he enjoyed it immensely, and besides it put the fingers firmly up at ‘her’ which made it somehow even more bittersweet.
And so, it was the car that attracted the girl – the girl who came into his life that Thursday evening in the eastern coastal town of Whitianga. Whether she made a habit of it or not didn’t really matter. She had spotted his car when it pulled up outside the bar.
He parked, plipped the alarm and walked into The Oceanside. He wore a striking blue shirt that did nothing to hide the equally blue eyes that discreetly and professionally scanned the room. She was immediately besotted.
Quite how she found herself in this Pacific venue was a mystery to many, but not to her. She knew exactly why she was there.
Many months before – before she had commenced her intricately planned journey from Europe, across South East Asia and into the South Pacific, she had read the letter once more, for the last time in fact, before burning it and disposing of the ashes on a long walk through the city. She had contemplated burning the ashes too. In a country that trained people to be suspicious it was an almost laughably normal activity and as far removed from paranoia as chalk, from cheese.
The letter was simple, not that of a loving relative. It lacked any form of code and was written in plain ‘English’ but at best, ambiguous.
Do this, recover this item, go to this place, find this man. Do not trust anyone else. Do not ask questions. Use your instinct. If that fails you – walk away, burn the papers and head for a new country, seek asylum. You can never return.
Having left home two years earlier she had travelled across Europe and into Asia, as planned, all the better to create a time-stamped journey, one that could later be easily verified, stopping as many other travellers did to take in the usual singles sites such as Phuket and Bali.
She’d met plenty of people en route to the Antipodes – even slept with a few men. She was single, so why not? She’d avoided the perilous pitfalls of modern travel – drugs, smuggling and alcohol-fuelled sex. And now here she was in a bar on a Thursday evening and thinking of a way to approach the male without appearing too – forward.
What little information she had received, and raw instinct had put her here, near to this place, with an item, safely secreted and now, she hoped before her was the man. Somehow via a process of varying degrees and skill and luck, she had arrived.
But something changed the moment she looked at him.
Figuring that you only live once she walked up to him as he sat on a bar stool. He’d just had a remarkably boring tonic water and lime delivered. He became aware of her approaching, glancing at her via the bar mirror. She was almost perfect; taller than average, slim, lightly tanned, green eyes; she wore a simple summer dress, but she wore it elegantly and most importantly, she was a redhead.
‘My God she is beautiful’ he found himself thinking in the time it took her to transition from her sofa to the bar.
“And she’s coming towards the bar. She’s alone; this can only mean one thing.”
She stopped at his side, tried hard not to look, and then turned towards him.
He turned to meet her gaze.
“Look, love, I’m flattered, but I probably can’t afford you, so thanks, but no thanks.”
Her look was instantaneous, and the slap that she delivered to his face was even swifter. Christ, it hurt.
“How dare you? How could you? Why did you?”
He quickly slipped into professional mode.
“OK, so three questions, which would Madame like answering first?”
“Forget it, you are too old for me anyway and as you say I am too much girl for you, plenty more fish in the ocean.” Her head bowed before she made a move toward the door.
At that exact moment something triggered in his mind, her voice, importantly her accent told him that she wasn’t from the area, the country or even the region. He had three seconds to analyse everything: Late twenties, incredibly attractive, slim, confident, probably eastern European. No, definitely eastern Euro and most likely Russian – or Bulgarian. But why now? Why here? Why him?
He smiled, having just asked himself three questions too. She looked around as she opened the door and headed along the street. In her mind, she had never been so insulted.
He watched her strut along the quiet road, her hair tussled by a sea breeze and her dress, simple, white and yet very attractive, soon clinging to her body.
“Shit, what a mistake. Go and find her, at least apologise,” offered Big Stan the bar manager, “She’s stunning bro’, I will if you won’t!”
He knew in that moment that she was far too good for Stanley Foster, the muscular and egotistical weekend rugby warrior that he was, so he realigned his glass with an existing condensation mark on the bar, winked at the barman and walked outside.
She was gone.
A moment later the indicators flashed on the Audi, and he was inside starting it up. The V6 came to life, and the red and white dials on the dashboard indicated that all was well. Engaging Sport he pushed the accelerator, all four Bridgestone tyres bit into the road surface and launched the coupe down the street.
She had to be somewhere.
Turning down the first road, he found it to be empty. Gunning the throttle, he reached the intersection, looked left and then right. In his past life he always took right if in doubt, so did just that. The car whipped through the six-speed gearbox and in a licence-threatening moment he was well over the local speed limit. Turning right again, he found himself on the waterfront where one of the local fishing boats was returning from a few days at sea, surrounded by desperate gulls, the promise of a free meal proving to be too tempting to ignore.
He flew by
the boat ramp and just as he indicated to turn right; he spotted her, sat on a bench, staring across the river mouth. He pulled over, abandoned the car and began to walk towards her.
His internal dialogue was a confused mish-mash of words and feelings, but like her he felt that you only live once, so decided to exorcise a few demons and in doing so apologise and hopefully allow her to have some dignity.
He walked quietly towards her, sat on the right-hand side of the bench and placed his hand out in a gesture that indicated that he wished to shake hers. She lifted her head, and he noticed that her green eyes were now even more opaline, surrounded by myriad reddened blood vessels.
For reasons unknown to her, she took the hand. He squeezed ever so gently and she returned the same pressure. He smiled, again she reciprocated.
“I’m not entirely sure where to start, so my mother always told me that apologising is a good place. I’m sorry. I was out of order back there. I have lived a life that has made me somewhat cynical and therefore…” He blew air through his teeth, “therefore the chances of a woman quite as attractive as you approaching a man like me in a bar and only wanting to be sociable seemed about as likely as you winning the Bulgarian lottery.”
He paused expecting her to interject, but she just nodded, clearly waiting for him to finish.
“Again, I’m sorry. I fully appreciate that you may wish to tell me to ‘Q hodi se ebi, be!’ and should you choose that course I will do the gentlemanly thing and retire.”
She tried to control it, but her laughter came quickly.
“Where you learn Bulgarian?”
“Now that’s a long story, but it started around the early 2000s – if you allow me to buy you a meal I can explain and then perhaps we can start again?”
“I would be most honoured, sir. And for the record, I must tell you, I’m much too expensive for a man who can only afford Audi TT.”
Seventh (The Seventh Wave Trilogy Book 1) Page 5