Deep Water

  Isla Whitcroft is a journalist who writes for national newspapers including the Daily Mail, the Mail on Sunday and The Times. She lives in Northamptonshire with her husband and three children.

  To my mother Eileen Whitcroft (nee Arkless).

  A remarkable woman who gave me endless love and freedom and surrounded me with books.

  First published in Great Britain in 2011

  by Piccadilly Press Ltd,

  5 Castle Road, London NW1 8PR

  www.piccadillypress.co.uk

  Text copyright © Isla Whitcroft, 2011

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

  The right of Isla Whitcroft to be identified as Author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN: 978 1 84812 155 3 (paperback)

  eISBN: 978 1 84812 202 4

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

  Cover design by Simon Davis

  Cover illustration by Sue Hellard

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  PROLOGUE

  It was sundown at the turtle sanctuary. The newly lit campfire was giving off a green, smoky haze and several of the younger volunteers were bustling around, preparing supper or securing tents for the night ahead. Someone was strumming songs on a guitar, the gentle sound blending perfectly with the lilac light of the fading Australian sun. Two teenage girls, bronzed from weeks by the ocean, sat quietly chatting. Food and then bed – it would be an early start the next day, as it always was at Snapper Bay.

  No one noticed as the white-haired boy crept away from the group, and made his way onto the soft sand of the beach that had been both his home and his work place for the last two months.

  The boy, just eighteen, had things on his mind, things he needed to work through and decisions to make, and there was no one at the camp he could confide in. Not yet anyway. It made him feel lonely, scared even, and so he would do what he always did when he was craving peace of mind. He would go swimming, immersing himself in the warm waters of the Pacific Ocean to wash away his fears and clear the nervous chatter from his brain.

  He knew the dangers, of course. Everyone at the sanctuary had been told the rules the day they arrived and number one was ‘No swimming alone and certainly not after dark’. He remembered Jacob, their Swedish leader, speaking in loud and impeccable English: ‘Swimming at night is a high-risk activity. Sharks feed at night, jellyfish are impossible to spot, and you can’t see the rip tides which can take you out to sea in seconds. Needless to say, if you get into trouble, it is much harder to find you than in daylight.’

  But he didn’t care. Not tonight. Tonight there seemed to be more dangers on land than at sea. As he reached the water’s edge, the boy unrolled the lycra body suit he had been carrying under his arm. Much as he wanted to swim in just his trunks, he knew that he needed protection from the ever-present and often lethal jellyfish, which spent the summer months in this beautiful part of the world.

  He edged into his suit, pulled on his swim shoes and stood at the water’s edge, feeling his body relaxing at the first gentle touches of the water, so different from the icy northern seas he had braved as a child. He entered the sea in slow motion, causing no ripples, no sound.

  He paused as he reached waist height in the water and turned round to look at the camp. The fires were burning brightly now, standing out against the gloom, and he could no longer see faces, only silhouettes of the people sitting close to the heat. A few lanterns attached to the tents glowed steadily; there was no breeze tonight. He heard laughter and winced, his blue eyes filling with sadness. Everyone else at the camp was so happy, so upbeat, so up for a laugh. Why was he the one who had to carry such a burden?

  He watched for a few seconds and then turned back to the sea and struck out in the direction of the towering islands that lay just a few kilometres offshore. His strokes were regular and economical. Like all strong swimmers he hardly made a sound as he powered through the water. One hundred metres passed, then two, then three hundred metres, and he was almost ready to turn back to shore when he felt a strong nudge against his left leg. Surprised rather than panicked, the boy’s first thought was that he had swum into one of the hundreds of submerged sandbanks that littered the bay, and caught out many an unwary sailor. But as he put his right leg down to check, it seemed that there was nothing below him, only water.

  Perhaps he had imagined the nudge, but even so, he now began to regret his bravado, his stupidity at ignoring the shark warnings.

  He looked around him and at first could see nothing. He paused, instinctively keeping quiet as his heart hammered inside his chest. Then he saw the small fishing boat, its prow facing away from him. He almost laughed out loud with relief. Of course, he had swum into its anchor rope.

  He was tempted to climb onto the boat, to lie back and watch the clouds scudding across the moon. But he knew he should really swim back to the beach, and so he trod water for a few minutes, waiting while his heart stopped racing and his breathing returned to normal.

  He was just about to turn for home when he felt something strike his right leg, the blow pulling him under the water. He opened his eyes. There was no denying the shape darting away from him – this time it really was a shark. And it was coming right back towards him.

  He lashed out, somehow finding the strength to kick the shark in the gills, making it turn away again as he pushed back up to the surface. The boat was now lit up and closer to him, the two men on board silhouetted against a lamp swinging from the cabin hatch. Relief washed over him – he was saved.

  He wanted to call out, to scream for help, but his voice was frozen, paralysed with fear, and the only sound that came out was a desperate whimper. The men looked up from their task. They were dropping something into the water – something so big that it needed both of them to lift it. They didn’t seem surprised to see the boy in the water, but nor was there any sense of urgency in their movements. Even in the midst of his terror the boy was puzzled. Surely now they could see him they would rush to his aid?

  He slowly began to swim towards them, desperately trying not to think what would happen if the shark returned. After what seemed like hours, one of the men threw him a rope with a buoyancy aid attached. He grabbed it, and felt the utter relief of being towed through the water and yanked onto the boat, where he lay like a helpless child, as his blood seeped slowly out into a warm pool around him. He gazed up at his rescuers, who were staring down at him. Their faces bore no shred of concern, no pity at his plight.

  ‘Please,’ he began in a low voice. He tried to gesture towards the shore but he was feeling light-headed now, confused. ‘Take me to my friends.’

  The taller of the two men squatted down and inspected his leg. ‘It’s only a graze,’ he said roughly. He threw a towel onto the boy’s leg. ‘Press on the wound. You’ll be OK.’ The man stood up and spoke angrily,
almost to himself. ‘Now what? How are we going to clean up this mess?’

  ‘We should have left him in the water.’ The smaller man was speaking now. ‘The sharks would have finished him off in no time.’

  The boy looked from one man to another. The pain was subsiding now, his body releasing endorphins that were taking the edge off his agony, leaving room instead for a gnawing, gut-wrenching feeling of fear. Something was wrong. Badly wrong.

  ‘Thank you for saving me,’ the boy said, desperately trying to placate the two men. ‘Now, please, can you just take me back to shore? My friends will be concerned for me.’

  The first man laughed. It was an empty, angry sound and gave no comfort to the boy. ‘Your friends are the least of your worries,’ he said. He put out a huge hand and jerked the boy effortlessly to his feet, then nodded towards the small opening through which a set of stairs led to the bowels of the boat.

  ‘Down below, now.’

  The boy was about to argue, to protest, to take his chances and scream for help. His friends would surely hear him from the shore. But before he could muster the energy, he felt a hard, sharp object pushed painfully against his neck.

  ‘I’d do as my friend says, if I were you.’ The short man was talking again, quietly but with a menace that cut through the night air like his knife. ‘It’s either that or taking a night swim with the sharks. With both hands tied behind your back.’

  CHAPTER 1

  The pile of clothes on the bed was growing larger by the minute, the duvet cover slowly but surely disappearing under a pile of cashmere jumpers, jeans, woolly socks and snuggly snoods in a range of bright colours.

  Cate Carlisle sighed as her glance moved from the overloaded bed to the one disappointingly small suitcase that was somehow supposed to hold everything she needed for her week away. It was the same dilemma every year. Skiing needed so much stuff, not just to wear on the slope but also in the evenings off-piste. And everything was so large and bulky. How was she ever going to get it all packed? If she wasn’t careful she would end up having to wear four layers of clothes on the plane and she wouldn’t be able to move along the aisle, let alone sit down in her seat. The thought made her giggle and, cheered up, she picked up the first pair of jeans – her prized pair of Miss Sixties – and started folding them.

  ‘Cate, aren’t you packed yet?’ said a voice from the doorway. ‘Honestly, mine was done ages ago.’ Her brother Arthur bounded into the room, made for the bed and then, seeing the mayhem, changed his mind and plonked himself onto her dressing-table stool instead.

  ‘It’s all right for you,’ grumbled Cate. ‘You’re a boy. All you need is a couple of pairs of jeans and a few tatty jumpers and you’re done. You don’t care what you look like.’

  Arthur grinned at his sister. ‘Well, more fool you,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Why are you worrying about your image anyway, when your boyfriend isn’t even going to be there? In fact, shouldn’t you be in purdah or something in case you turn the head of another man?’

  ‘Very funny,’ said Cate, laughing despite herself. ‘But actually Michel isn’t really my boyfriend any more. After the summer he and I agreed that it wasn’t sensible to carry on a relationship, what with him living in the South of France and me back at school in London. We’re just going to take it as it comes and maybe meet up again in the spring. We’re just good friends.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ said Arthur. ‘I believe you, Sis, millions wouldn’t.’ He turned to the mirror, pushed his dark, floppy hair behind his ears and deepened his voice. ‘Je t’aime, ma cherie. Je t’aime. Mwah, mwah.’

  A ski glove whizzed past his ear and skidded over Cate’s precious collection of Bobbi Brown make-up, a present from Monique, her dad’s girlfriend. ‘Right, Arthur, that’s it,’ said Cate, waving the other glove at him and pretending to be angry. ‘Out of my room.’

  Arthur raised his hands in mock surrender and made for the door. ‘OK, OK! But seriously, Sis, you can’t leave your packing much longer. Our flight to Geneva leaves early in the morning. I’ve already got my GPS tracking system working out the best way to avoid the rush hour traffic and I’ve hacked into air traffic control to see if there are any expected overnight flight delays. There aren’t, by the way.’

  Just for good measure, Cate threw the other ski glove after her departing brother, laughing inwardly at how his obsession for all things technical could slip into just about every conversation they had.

  Two years younger than sixteen-year-old Cate, Arthur was a computer whizz, gifted beyond his years and his talents had been essential at getting Cate out of a particularly tight hole during her adventures in the summer. Having taken a holiday job on a yacht moored in Antibes in the South of France, Cate had been caught up in a vile scheme involving endangered animals. To save them she’d been recruited by a shadowy security organisation, the International Maritime Investigation Agency – IMIA – and had witnessed murder, beatings and very nearly lost her own life.

  All these tumultuous events had happened at the beginning of the summer but then there had been weeks of fun, sunshine and camraderie as Cate worked on the yacht and partied with local boy Michel and his friends. While her family had found out the truth, Cate had promised IMIA that she would keep her adventures secret and she had – she hadn’t even confided in Michel. As summer had drawn to a close, she had said her reluctant goodbyes to her newfound friends, and, even more sadly, to her summer romance with Michel and returned to London, school, and – worst of all – the start of her A-level courses.

  She was still in touch with many of the people she’d met. Cate and Nancy Kyle, the supermodel who owned the boat that Cate had worked on, texted each other regularly. One of Cate’s jobs in the summer had been to look after Nancy’s five adopted children and she made sure she still spoke to them on the phone every couple of weeks, enjoying hearing their news and listening to their adventures as the children of one of the most famous women in the world. She even still received the odd cryptic text from Marcus, an officer with the IMIA who had recruited Cate to help on the case, and of course she and Michel tried to talk at least once a week, sometimes for hours at a time.

  Cate smiled to herself. It had been a mad summer, but boy it had been exciting. It had been a real effort to keep her vow of silence when she went back to school in September, but gradually, as the weeks passed, it almost seemed as if the adventures had happened to someone else, like something she’d seen in a film.

  And now it was nearly Christmas and Michel was in a remote part of Australia where internet connection was sporadic at best. He was with his cousin Noah, a professional eco-warrior who flitted around the world as the fancy took him, his chaotic lifestyle funded totally by his doting and very rich mother. One day Noah might be leading a protest march against global warning, the next he would turn up on the nightly news as part of a group trying to board a Japanese whaling boat.

  But he was passionate and committed, and so, when Noah had decided that his latest project would be to work on a turtle conservation project on the north-east coast of Australia, Michel decided that it would be interesting to join him before going to university in Paris. ‘I get to save turtles and escape the European winter,’ he said to Cate when they were discussing the trip. ‘How cool is that?’

  Looking out through the bedroom window of her West London home, Cate could see fairy lights twinkling in houses up and down the quiet street and a sprinkling of snow lay on top of the cars parked outside the Georgian terraces. She sighed happily. She loved this time of year: the run up to Christmas with all the parties with her school mates, shopping in Sloane Square, spending hours in Selfridges with her best friend Louisa, admiring the amazing seasonal displays and then scooting off for hot chocolate and ice-skating at Somerset House overlooking the Thames. Now that she had broken up from school, she and Arthur were off for their annual skiing holiday with their father, a United Nations diplomat, and his long-time girlfriend Monique, a linguist who worked as a transla
tor. Cate had skied since she was a toddler and was addicted to the feeling of freedom that it gave her. That, she grinned to herself, and the amazingly calorific lunches on the mountainside. She could hardly wait.

  Lost in excited anticipation of the week ahead, Cate didn’t at first register that her phone was ringing and by the time she managed to locate it under a pair of pyjamas she thought the caller might have rung off.

  ‘Cate? Cate, it’s me.’

  Immediately her heart began to race. ‘Michel,’ she said. ‘It’s great to hear from you.’

  ‘I’m so glad I got through. Cate, I have to ask you something, and I need to know the answer right away. I know you’re about to go skiing but this brilliant opportunity has come up.’

  He paused for a second and Cate held her breath. What on earth was he talking about?

  ‘The thing is, Noah’s mum was going to fly out and see him for Christmas but her new boyfriend wants to whisk her off to Gstaad and so there’s a first class return ticket going begging. Fully transferable. Shame to waste it.’

  It took a few seconds before his words sank in. Then Cate gasped. She could hardly believe what she was hearing. ‘Michel, are you saying that you want me to come out to see you? In Australia? This Christmas?’

  ‘Why not, cherie? I’ve told you how amazing it is here. You’ll finally get a chance to see the huge beaches and amazing forests and the wildlife. It’s so different from Europe. And you’ll love the guys I’m working with – they all really believe in what they are doing. We’re doing some great work too – we must have rescued dozens of turtles already.’

  Michel paused, and continued almost shyly. ‘I’d really love to see you. Actually, I really wish you were out here with me now.’

  Cate still wasn’t used to the way in which, compared to the boys she knew in London, Michel spoke his mind and revealed his feelings with complete honesty, and she felt herself blushing.

  ‘There’s been a bit of an incident here and it’s kind of shaken us all.’ His voice changed, he sounded tense and strained. ‘This boy, Rafe, well, he’s gone missing. Overnight really. One minute he was there and the next morning he was gone, without leaving a message or even saying goodbye. His tent was empty, cleared out. Just like that.’