Andrew Gross 3-Book Thriller Collection 1: The Dark Tide, Don’t Look Twice, Relentless. Andrew Gross

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СКАЧАТЬ Wherever it was they were heading. Another dot on the map. With a bank. A rare-stone dealer. What did it matter?

      “Right, I’ll be along in a moment,” he called back.

      Treading water, he looked at the idyllic cove one last time.

      Why had he come here? The memories only hurt him. The happy voices and recollections only filled him with regret and shame. He prayed she had found a new life, someone new to love her. And Sam and Alex … That was the only hope open to him now. We could spend the rest of our lives here, he had told her once.

      The rest of our lives.

      Charles Friedman swam toward the anchored boat, its name painted on the stern in gold script. The only attachment he allowed himself, the only reminder.

       Emberglow.

PART THREE

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

      Twice a week, Tuesday and Thursday, Ronald Torbor generally took his lunch at home. Those days Mr. Carty, the senior bank manager, covered his desk from one to three.

      As assistant manager of the First Caribbean Bank on the isle of Nevis, Ronald lived in a comfortable three-bedroom stone house just off the airport road, large enough to fit his own family—his wife, Edith, along with Alya and Peter and Ezra, and his wife’s mother, too. At the bank, people came to him to open accounts, apply for loans—the position came, to the view of his fellow locals, with a certain air of importance. He also took pleasure in catering to the needs of some of the island’s wealthier clientele. Though he had grown up kicking around a soccer ball on dirt fields, Ronald now liked golf on the weekends over on St. Kitts. And when the general manager, who was soon to be transferred, went back home, Ronald felt sure he had a good chance of becoming the bank’s first local-born manager.

      That Tuesday, Edith had prepared him his favorite—stewed chicken in a green curry sauce. It was May. Not much going on at the office. Once the tourist season died, Nevis was basically a sleepy little isle. These kinds of days, other than waving to Mr. Carty that he was back, he felt there was no urgency to hurry back to his desk.

      At the table, Ronald glanced over the paper: the results from the Caribbean cricket championships being held in Jamaica. His six-year-old, Ezra, was home from school. After lunch, Edith was taking him to the doctor. The boy had what they called Asperger’s syndrome, a mild form of autism. And on Nevis, despite the rush of new money and developers, the care wasn’t very good.

      “After work you can come watch Peter play soccer,” said Edith, seated in the chair next to Ezra. The boy was playing with a toy truck, making noise.

      “Yes, Edith.” Ronald sighed, enjoying his peace. He focused on the box score. Matson, for Barbados, wrong-foots Anguilla for six!

      “And you can bring me back some fresh-baked roti from Mrs. Williams, if you please.” Her bakery was directly across from the bank, best on the island. “You know the kind I like, onion and—”

      “Yes, mum,” Ronald muttered again.

      “And don’t be ‘mumming’ me in front of your boy like I’m some kind of schoolmarm, Ronald.”

      Ronald looked up from the paper and flashed Ezra a wink.

      The six-year-old started to laugh.

      Outside, they heard the sound of gravel crunching, as a car drove up the road to their house.

      “That is probably Mr. P.,” Edith said. Paul Williams, her cousin. “I said he could come by about a loan.”

      “Jeez, Edith,” Ronald groaned, “couldn’t you have him just come by the bank?”

      But it wasn’t Mr. P. It was two white men, who got out of the Jeep and stepped up to the front door. One was short and stocky, with wraparound sunglasses and a thick mustache. The other was taller, wearing a light sport jacket with a colorful beach shirt underneath with a baseball cap.

      Ronald shrugged. “Who’s this?”

      “I don’t know.” Edith opened the door.

      “Afternoon, ma’am.” The mustached man politely took off his hat. His eyes drifted past her. “Mind if we speak to your husband? I can see he’s at home.”

      Ronald stood up. He’d never seen them before. “What’s this about?”

      “Banking business,” the man said, stepping around Ronald’s wife and into the house.

      “Banking hours are closed—for lunch.” Ronald tried not to seem unfriendly. “I’ll be back down there at three.”

      “No.” The mustached man lifted his glasses and smiled. “I’m afraid the bank is open, Mr. Torbor. Right here.”

      The man shut the door. “Just look at these as extra hours.”

      A shudder of fear rippled through Ronald’s body. Edith met his gaze as if to find out what was going on, then moved back around to the table, next to her son.

      The mustached man nodded to Ronald. “Sit down.”

      Ronald did, the man flipping a chair around and pulling it up to him, smiling strangely. “We’re really sorry to interrupt your lunch, Mr. Torbor. You can get back to it, though, once you tell us what we need.”

      “What you need …?”

      “That’s right, Mr. Torbor.” The man reached into his jacket and removed a folded sheet. “This is the number of a private account at your bank. It should be familiar. A sizable amount of money was wired into it several months back, from Tortola, the Barclays bank there.”

      Ronald stared at the number. His eyes grew wide. The numbers were from his bank, First Caribbean. The taller man had pulled up a chair next to Ezra, winking and making mugging faces at the boy, which made him laugh. Ronald glanced fearfully toward Edith. What the hell are they doing here?

      “This particular account is no longer active, Mr. Torbor,” the man with the mustache acknowledged. “The funds are no longer in your bank. But what we want to know, and what you’re going to help us find out, Mr. Torbor, if you hope to ever get back to your lunch and this happy little life of yours, is precisely where the funds were wired—once they left here. And also under what name.”

      Perspiration was starting to soak through Ronald’s newly pressed white shirt. “You must know I can’t give out that kind of information. That’s all private. Covered by banking regulations—”

      “Private.” The mustached man nodded, glancing toward his partner.

      “Regulations.” The man in the beach shirt sighed. “Always a bitch. We sort of anticipated that.”

      With a sudden motion, he reached over and jerked Ezra up out of his chair. Surprised, the child whimpered. The man put him on his lap. Edith tried to stop him, but he just elbowed her, knocking her to the floor.

      “Ezra!” СКАЧАТЬ