Sui Lee teased my nipples until they hardened. She made me moan and I knew then that I hated her for making me think of how wonderfully sensual Michael’s touch was.
I felt Sui Lee’s lips move down my stomach and settle between my legs.
“Open your eyes,” she ordered. “I want you to see everything I do to you.”
I opened my eyes and stared at her in defiance. She held my gaze as she moved her tongue between my thighs. I tried to imagine she was Michael between my legs as I heard her delighted laughter.
She stretched out her arms up through my legs and groped my breasts.
I knew then what I had to do to survive.
“Closer,” I groaned. “Deeper.”
Sui Lee slid her arms out from between my legs and held my hips as she moved her face closer against my pussy. I waited for the moment the thrill of her conquest began to seize her. She closed her eyes it seemed to savor her delight.
I moaned and rubbed myself against her lips, encouraging her to go deeper. She seemed delighted.
That was exactly when I made my move.
I violently clamped my thighs tight against her head and moved them quickly down her to her neck. With all my strength I began to crush her.
After a few seconds she seemed to realize what I was intending. Her hands reached out for her gun.
As her fingers touched the gun I lifted up my legs and twisted her head away from the gun, forcing her body to follow. I slammed her head into the far post of the bed.
Her hands reached up and beat at my chest, but I slammed her head once again into the post. A violent cracking sound vibrated through my thighs.
She got her fingers around her gun and as I slammed her head once more against the post, she squeezed the trigger. A shot rang out and tore a hole into the canopy over the bed.
Her gun hand pivoted towards my head. I knew I only had a second before she squeezed off another round. I summoned all my strength and slammed her into the post.
Sui Lee’s gun hand flopped onto the bed. Her eyes rolled back into her head. I relaxed my aching thighs, but kept her head up.
I looked around and saw the knife teetering on the edge of the bed. I let Sui Lee slip down between my thighs and slump to the carpet. I reached out with my feet and cupped them around the knife. I raised my knees to my chest and leaned back.
I twisted my hips and raised my legs so the tip of the blade sliced the bonds of the silk between my wrist and the wooden post.
Half a minute later, the frayed silk fell away and my hand was free. I reached down for the gun and placed the end of the barrel a few inches from the handcuffs. I turned my head away and squeezed the trigger.
A loud shot echoed around the room and my other hand was free.
Exhausted, I slumped to the carpet and sat next to Sui Lee. I felt for a pulse. Nothing.
She was dead.
I felt remorse launch bile into my mouth. I swallowed hard. I knew I had no choice, but that didn’t make killing her right.
I stared at my shredded clothes and decided to dress in Sui Lee’s suit. I felt something in the jacket pocket. I reached inside and found her cell phone. On the screen a digital countdown ticked away.
It read: Detonation in 1:59:07
“Shit!” I shouted. “There’s a bomb on board?”
I glanced over to the body of Sui Lee. “You psychotic bitch, you really intended to go out with a bang.”
I had less than two hours to find the bomb.
FORTY SEVEN
Alice’s Journal
Under the countdown was a green button marked: Deactivate.
But next to the deactivate button was a space to input a six digit pin code.
It could take me two weeks to figure out the deactivation code.
I knew I had to get help.
I tried to call out from Sui Lee’s cell phone. It automatically locked me out.
I ran to the bridge and found the two way radio. It was smashed. I searched the bodies of the crew for a working cell phone. She’d thought of that as well. Must have dumped all the cells over board.
From the Global Positioning Satellite maps in the bridge I discovered I was fifty five miles from the mainland.
With less than two hours I might just make it back to the mainland in time for the bomb to detonate and destroy Kimberley harbor.
I found my position on the G.P.S. monitor. It presented a digital map of the coastline. By trial and error I selected the autopilot facility. With my finger moving across the screen I drew a line extending from my position to the Kimberley harbor. I hit the engine start button.
Nothing.
I hit it again.
Again, nothing.
“Sui Lee,” I shouted, “I hate you.”
I realized even if I knew how to operate this yacht it would take me a couple of hours to sail this floating bomb into Kimberley Falls harbor and endanger every boat in the vicinity. I needed another option.
At the back of my mind I contemplated the idea of a bomb being hidden aboard was just a hoax. I began to search every cabin and the entire yacht. After hour and a half of turning rooms upside down I gave up.
No, my only chance now lay in getting off the boat and somehow swimming to land.
I glanced overboard and scanned the ocean. Sui Lee must have thrown a dead crew member overboard because circling a cloud of blood a few hundred meters from the yacht were the unmistakable tall angular fins of two dozen great white sharks.
“What next, Alice?” I shouted at myself. “Come on, think!”
I looked up at the sky. Nothing but the first rays of dawn and a few vapor trails some thirty five thousand feet above.
I searched for a flare gun and found one on the bridge. I took three spare flares. I loaded the gun and aimed it at the sky. I squeezed the trigger and watched as an orange flare launched into the sky.
I stuffed the flares into the jacket and carrying the flare gun I went to the back of the boat to see if there was a lifeboat. I found nothing. I went below and found a couple of Jet Skis attached to a low platform.
One had a tank nearly empty. The other was half full.
The platform lowered like a freight elevator. I sat astride one Jet Ski.
To escape I had no choice but to aim it directly at the widening cloud of blood and shark fins.
I lifted up the tab on the front hood of the ski and opened up a compartment. I tossed in the flares and flare gun. I shut the lid. I checked the rear compartment. It contained a couple of small fire extinguishers and nothing else.
I fitted the safety lanyard to one wrist, pulling it tight and connected the other end behind the start button.
I made sure the forward lever was down. Finally, I checked Sui Lee’s cell phone.
I had thirty seconds until the bomb exploded. I hit the start button, eased the throttle and headed out towards the cloud of blood.
FORTY EIGHT
Alice’s Journal
Fifty feet from the yacht I felt a huge pressure on the back of my head. I was hurled from the saddle of the Jet Ski. I somersaulted over the handle bars.
I felt the safety lanyard tug at my wrist and rip away from the starter button. I hit the ocean of blood head first and submerged.
I spun around and caught sight of a grey shadow circling me. Large burning fragments of the yacht collided with the ocean and plummeted down on me like a meteor shower. I knew if I surfaced now I’d almost certainly be killed by falling debris.
I held my breath as the grey shadows circled increasingly closer. I kept turning, but couldn’t keep up. I felt a nudge from behind and the remaining air in my lungs burst out of my body.
After half a minute the rising panic burst out of me and I couldn’t wait any longer. I frantically kicked and pawed my way to the surface.
I turned around in a circle, praying my feet weren’t an invitation for the sharks to drag me under. I scanned the surface for the Jet Ski. It lay on one side. Bobbing up and down in the cloud
of blood.
I swam around to the Jet Ski’s saddle. It was alight with burning debris.
I felt something nudge my feet. Instantly I grabbed for the Jet Ski. Away from the exhaust I hooked my feet onto the side of the Jet Ski and grabbed the handle bars.
I glanced back at a pair of great white fins cutting through the waves. They headed towards me from opposite directions.
“A girl likes to feel wanted,” I shouted, “but you guys will have to wait for lunch.”
The only way I knew to get the Jet Ski to right itself, was if I leaned back into the water.
I took a deep breath and gripping the Jet Ski tight I hurled myself back into the waves. The Jet Ski righted itself. I clambered on board as a wide jaw of serrated and blood stained teeth rose up from the ocean and bit into the burning saddle where my ass had been a moment earlier.
I kicked out at its nose. The great white dislodged itself, but I knew it would be back.
I flipped up the rear compartment and pulled out a small fire extinguisher. I pulled the pin and directed the nozzle at the flames. I depressed the plunger and sprayed the flames with foam.
The two most eager sharks returned like psychotic twins fixated on their reluctant lunch... me!
I flipped up the front compartment and retrieved the flare gun and spare flares.
I loaded the gun. I reattached the end of my safety lanyard to the starter button.
As I aimed for one shark, they both submerged and dived under the Jet Ski. I felt them shunt the Jet Ski. I fell back against the handle bars.
A shark shunted me along for some ten feet before giving up.
“You boys can’t take a hint,” I shouted. “Can you? See you around.”
I hit the starter button. Nothing happened. I hit it again. Still nothing.
Shit!
A great set of jaws broke the surface of the ocean and clamped down on the back of the Jet Ski. It kook its body violently and threw me backwards against the handle bars once again. It must have realized it couldn’t get me that way and released its jaws. As it did so I instinctively hurled the fire extinguisher into its mouth. I brought up the flare gun, aimed and fired directly between its wide open jaws.
I twisted my back to it and a second later a huge ball of fire exploded out of the shark’s jaws.
Not knowing what else to do, I hit the starter button again and felt the engine engage. I opened up the throttle and felt the welcome growling force of the Jet Ski propel me across the surface.
As I cut through the cloud of blood and circling fins, a shark leapt up at the handle bars. I had no time to anything but open up the throttle further and drive the Jet Ski straight at the brute. We collided. Hard.
The shark back flipped and fell to one side as the Jet Ski motored on. I was free for almost a minute until the Jet Ski’s engine cut right out.
With only two flares left, I was alone in the ocean, a few hundred feet away from dead center of a great white hunting ground.
FORTY NINE
Alice’s Journal
It didn’t take long for the Great White fins to turn in my direction. By now all I could think about was I’d used up all my options. My mind filled with images of Michael lying dead on the ocean floor in the bay of Kimberley Falls.
Soon I’d be joining him. It was an irony too far that we’d finally be together only in death. Out of sheer desperation I fired another flare into the sky.
I reloaded the gun with the last flare.
The wind picked up and began to toss the Jet Ski back and forth at angles I knew it couldn’t sustain for long. Soon I’d be back in the water and easy prey for the Great Whites.
It was then I noticed a spinning shadow looming over me. I glanced up at a coast guard helicopter.
“I’m dreaming,” I shouted and waved frantically as a figure leapt out of the helicopter and descended on a rope. But my real attention was taken by two competing sharks cutting through the ocean towards me.
As the figure winched down to only about ten feet above me, I felt the Jet Ski flip over. I fell backwards into the path of my ravenous suitors.
A wave crashed down on me and forced me under. Through a cloud of millions of tiny bubbles a pair of wide jaws engulfed me.
I aimed the flare gun and squeezed the trigger. A huge orange bubble exploded out of the wide barrel. I felt something tug me upwards.
I lashed out my arms, hitting at it blindly. My attacker dragged me up to the surface and a second later I realized I was dangling a few feet above the waves. This didn’t stop the sharks.
Another leapt out of the ocean about fifteen feet above the waves. I hurled the flare gun at its nose. At the peak of its arcing flight, the shark brushed my feet. It seemed to hang in the air for an eon before falling back to the ocean.
I glanced up at the coast guard diver who had his arms around me. The winch man hauled us both into the helicopter. I gripped the floor of the helicopter and kissed it.
Before I could thank anyone I vomited so hard my eyes filled with tears. I felt a silver foil blanket being wrapped around my shoulders. Then eventually I recognized a familiar face of a woman smiling at me.
“Robyn?”
She said something, but over the sound of the rotor blades I couldn’t hear.
The winch man placed a pair of headphones over my ears and suddenly I could hear Robyn.
“I can’t believe you found me,” I screamed.
“We were searching for Abu Saeed’s yacht,” Robyn said. “Then you made it easy for us.”
“I did?”
“Everyone could see the explosion a hundred miles away.”
“Robyn, what happened to Michael?”
She swallowed hard. “It’s a long story.”
“Is he...” I couldn’t bring myself to say the words.
Robyn glanced across to the co-pilot. He removed his black sun visor of his helmet and smiled.
It took me a moment to recognize him. When I did I staggered backwards out of the open door. He leapt forward and grabbed me tight.
“I thought I’d lost you forever,” Michael said. “I’m never letting you go, again.”
I wept into Michael’s chest as I punched him over and over.
“Don’t you ever,” I cried.
I explained how Alistair Cameron Mohammad saved me and how Sui Lee killed him and his crew.
He held me in silence. I wanted us to stay like this forever. But the look on Robyn’s face said she had something important to discuss.
“What is it, Robyn?” I asked.
She shrugged. “It can wait. I don’t want to spoil the moment.”
I pulled away from Michael. “Go ahead,” I said.
She sighed. “Michael’s plan to rescue you involved a smoke rocket attack,” she said.
“It almost worked,” I said.
“Unfortunately,” Robyn said, “it worked too well.”
“What do you mean?”
“Either by accident or Barret’s design, the laboratory ship caught fire and was destroyed.”
“So that’s why Alistair thought you had died, Michael.”
He nodded. “I almost did,” he said. “Had to leap overboard. Only just made it to safety.”
“The thing is,” Robyn said. “And this is why I think Barret may have designed a self-destruction mechanism upon intrusion. All evidence of Barret’s activities were completely eradicated. The virus. The formula. Everything.”
“That’s good isn’t it?” I asked.
“It is,” Michael said. “It means Barret can’t possibly hope to carry on his plans.”
“I’m sensing a ‘but’,” I said.
“The F.B.I. are unhappy about being excluded from the rescue attempt,” Robyn said. “They have nothing to show for their investigative efforts. They want someone to blame. With Barret missing presumed dead that only gives them one option...”
Michael held my face. “Alice, I’m a fugitive with no way of proving my innocence.”
Alice’s Journal
We arrived at the coast guard base at Kimberley Falls. I was taken to the hospital on base and thoroughly checked over by doctors before being released.
After a few hours of tests a female doctor approached me.
“Ms. Angelo,” she said.
“Call me Alice.”
“Alice, we have preliminary blood test results for you.”
“And?”
“And...” she said, “Congratulations. I hope.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, Alice, that you’re pregnant.”
“Sorry, what did you say?”
“It’s very early days, Alice. Would you like to discuss your options?”
I shook my head. “I, um... how early?”
“A week, maybe two.”
Then it was Michael’s child I was carrying.
“After your ordeal I hope it’s good news, Alice,” the doctor said. “Or at least can fit in with your plans.”
I wasn’t sure of either. A million questions flooded through my mind. Would Michael want to be a father? Hell, did I want to be a mother? A few weeks ago I wanted nothing more than a life of independence that hard work and graduation from a great degree course would promise me. But now what do I want?
“Thank you, doctor,” I said and left.
Michael met me in the hospital lobby.
“Everything OK?”
“Sure,” I said a little too quickly. His eyes narrowed, but he let it slide.
“We need to talk, Alice,” he said.
We certainly do.
A limousine was waiting outside. “Can I give you a ride back to your apartment?” he asked.
Lost in thought, I nodded.
In the limousine, he hit a button that raised the blackened partition glass between us and the driver.
“I know it’s probably not the best time for this,” he said. “But when I thought I’d lost you, even before that...”
“What is it Michael?” I said.
He reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out a tiny blue velvet box. He flipped back the lid, revealing a beautiful ring with the biggest diamond I’d ever seen.
Sorority Secrets (Campus Love and Murder Sorority Eyes Romance Book 2) Page 14