Read Online Deadly Impact--A Richard Mariner nautical adventure by Peter Tonkin - Free Book Online

Italian, ‘who suggested that we should test the security of
Sayonara
by sending a team of men aboard her. A little test by which I planned to assure myself of the soundness of my investment. A plan that now, however, may have gone awry.’
    â€˜No, no, Francisco,’ huffed Tristan importantly, rejoining the conversation. ‘It’s all fine. Robin says the team went aboard in Rat Island Pass yesterday. It’s all going like clockwork. Just like I planned.’
    â€˜That’s where Richard is,’ Robin added, her grey eyes probing the deep brown ones opposite. ‘He’s leading the security response team – the A Team – himself. They should have gone aboard about an hour ago if everything’s running to time. And with Richard it usually does.’
    â€˜I
see
,’ said Lazzaro, leaning back suddenly.
    Robin too saw. More than she was supposed to see, perhaps. Something that Tristan did not – and would never have understood if he had done so. She saw a gleam in the depths of those dark Italian eyes, before those long, dark lashes came down like a visor. Tristan Folgate-Lothbury might think everything was going like clockwork, mused Robin as Mario arrived with the menus, but Francisco Alberto Lazzaro clearly thought otherwise. And if he was the new power in the Folgate-Lothbury syndicate now that
Signora
Folgate-Lothbury and her fortune had departed, it looked to her as though Tristan had better start watching his back. For the charming
Signor
Lazzaro looked as though he was up to something …
    It was a generally accepted fact that some sections of Heritage Mariner were open and functioning on a twenty-four-hour basis. Crewfinders never closed, for instance. Captains, owners and agents could call their number at any time, night or day, from anywhere in the world – any port or any ocean – certain of a speedy reply and of a crew member of any rank or skill available to them and arriving onboard within twenty-four hours. Another section of the massive company that never slept was London Centre – the commercial intelligence section. It would be working at full stretch even in the early hours.
    All the way back east from Mayfair, Robin’s mind whirled over what she had said, heard, seen and deduced during the conversation over dinner. Such had been her gathering concern that she had consumed only one glass of the divine Prosecco – with the
Cape Sante
scallops that had formed her Antipasti. Then she had joined Lazzaro with the San Pellegrino to accompany the
Taglio di Vitello
which had formed her main meal. Now, as she digested her heavenly wood-roasted veal chop, she found she had a good deal on her mind – and much of it worrying. Especially, she thought, checking the time on the screen of her doggedly silent cellphone, in the absence of any contact from Richard, who must have been on board
Sayonara
for well over an hour now.
    â€˜No,’ said Robin to the taxi driver, therefore, as he slowed at the corner of Cornhill and Bishopsgate. ‘Not here at Heritage House. Can you take me on into Leadenhall and down to the corner of Creechurch?’
    Five minutes later, she had paid him off and was walking up towards the glass door that fronted the London Centre. The foyer was bright and an ex-army security man crossed smartly to the main entrance as she keyed in her security code, swinging it open for her and coming to attention as she entered. ‘Thank you, Sergeant Stone,’ she said. ‘Is Mr Toomey in?’
    Patrick Toomey met Robin at the lift door and ushered her down to the office as though she were visiting royalty. He was a big man, blue-eyed, red-haired and liberally freckled, as broadly Irish as his name. He was noted for his cheery bonhomie, his ready wit and a laugh that could fill a large room to the echo. He should have been the proprietor of one of London’s Celtic pubs. He was actually an ex-spy, special forces