The 13th Tablet

He smiled as he thought about the bright young woman he had just disposed of. ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t have been in such a hurry. Maybe she knew more than she let on.’ His doubts lingered, but only for a moment. He glanced at Natasha as she crossed her legs. She knew that look well and rose slowly from her chair. Turning around to face him she unbuttoned her top. She was not wearing any underwear. She pulled a silver clasp from her head and let her blond hair sweep over her bare shoulders and breasts. He watched her, breathing heavily as she walked around the table. He sat back in his chair and held her eye as she leant down and gripped him by his tie. She brought her face close to his, and slipped the tip of her tongue between his lips. He grabbed her from behind, trying to pull her down. She held him at a distance while she slowly slipped out of her skirt. He was overcome with desire for his deadly assassin. Leaving her thigh-length boots on, she stepped forward and straddled him. She moaned gently as she sank into his passionate embrace.

A few hours later, a man standing on a small boat in the darkness of the harbour made a phone call.

‘Master… she went on the yacht but it’s back in the harbour, and she hasn’t returned. We believe she was disposed of by Wheatley.’

‘That would be very unfortunate. Keep watching Wheatley and his men.’

Chapter 16

December 9th, 2004

Mina woke up shivering. In a daze, she looked around and thought she saw metal walls. ‘Where the hell am I?’ She tried sitting up, but she was zipped up in a sleeping bag, and covered with a pile of duvets. Her head felt like it had been pumped up with pressurised air, but it was nothing compared to the pain she felt on the left side of her face and at the base of her skull. Her whole body ached. In the dim light she could make out the figure of Jack looking at her.

‘Hi Mina.’

‘Jack? Where am I?’

‘You’re safe. Take these, and drink some water.’ She took the proffered tablets and swallowed them as told, then finished the whole glass in a bid to cool her aching throat.

‘You’re in the back of my van. Stay still. You almost died of hypothermia.’ He stroked her face and smiled at her.

‘I’m in your van? In Mosul?’ She felt nauseous, and tired beyond belief.

‘No. We’re in Tel Aviv. Sleep Mina. I’ll watch over you.’

She dropped back onto the floor of the van and fell into a deep sleep. Jack watched her and thought about the past few hours. He’d been waiting in the water for two hours by the tender while Mina was on the yacht. Powerless to prevent it, he had watched her being beaten up by Natasha and bided his time. When they put her in a sack, he knew the time to act had come. He hooked his belt to the tender and was towed along until Oberon’s men stopped, far away from the yacht. He swiftly detached himself as soon as they had slung Mina into the sea and turned the boat around to return to the yacht. He plunged after her. The water was icy cold but he was wearing a full scuba diving outfit he had rented that afternoon. He had a powerful torch but could hardly see a few feet ahead. A seasoned diver, he knew that if he did not find her in the next few moments, it would be too late. Suddenly he could make out the shape of the sack, dropping fast into the murky abyss. He reached out but missed it. He plunged further down, thrusting himself down as hard as he could, and caught it by the cord. He pulled out his knife from his ankle sheath and cut through the length of the sack, yanking Mina out and bringing her back to the surface in a few kicks. Placing his mask over her face, Jack made her breathe his oxygen, and tried to resuscitate her, but despite coughing up some water, she was still unconscious. He knew he would have to swim very quickly to the harbour, before hypothermia set in, which worried him more than anything else. He was furious for not anticipating Wheatley’s sadistic streak and how far he was prepared to go. Jack would make him pay for every bruise on her beautiful face.

‘Morning Mina,’ said Jack, offering her a warm drink, as she sat up sluggishly.

She looked at him with blank eyes, then, remembering fragments, her hands started twitching, she felt a long shiver shooting through her spine, and suddenly burst into an uncontrollable flood of tears. Jack held her in his arms. She cried for a long time while he slowly explained what had happened and how he had saved her.

She finally took a sip of coffee from the Styrofoam cup, grimacing from the pain in her jaw, and looked up at him.

‘Thank you Jack. Thanks for everything… but what were you doing there? What are you doing here?’

Jack looked down, feeling uncomfortable. ‘I’ve been following you since you left Iraq.’

‘Why?’

‘Well, I was worried about you, and obviously with a good reason. That bastard Wheatley had you thrown into the open sea, tied up in a sack. Had I not been there, we wouldn’t be talking right now.’