“Are you sure you’re not putting on weight?” she asked, but he could tell from the tone it was a half-hearted attempt to lighten the mood. “Just looks a little doughy down there.”
“I just keep thinking about all the ways I could have done things differently and then they would still be alive and maybe even Rich would be okay.”
“Blaming yourself for Ryan and Maria is stupid,” she said quietly. “But blaming yourself for the attack on this island is downright idiotic. What the hell could you have done differently to stop it? We don’t even know who did it.”
“We know they were Americans.”
“Alex thinks they might have been American, Joe. A big difference.”
“It’s something to go on.”
“If you say so.”
He paused a moment, watching the surf crash on the beach. “How’s Camacho these days?”
“If you must know we’re getting along.”
“Is the great Cairo Sloane finally settling down?”
“I wouldn’t go that far, darling. Let’s just say I can see a future for myself that doesn’t involve…”
“Boozing, smoking and fighting?”
“I was going to say a future that doesn’t involve being lonely, if you must know.”
“I’m pleased for you, Cairo. You know I am.”
“And what about the great Josiah Hawke?” she asked mischievously.
“What do you mean?”
“Are we looking at a Mrs Lea Hawke one day?”
Her words made him pause for a moment. He had never heard Lea described like that before — with his own name. He had never put the names together in his own mind before and it sounded strange. It brought back memories of his first wife and their wedding day.
“Well, if you must know, I was…”
He stopped talking when the sun flashed on the door to reveal Lea and Lexi as they emerged from the ruined compound. Reaper was a step behind. They both watched them step outside and walk over to the garden.
Scarlet lit a cigarette. “You can tell me later darling.”
“That was weird,” said Lea, sitting back down beside Hawke.
“What was weird?” Scarlet said, blowing a cloud of smoke into a mosquito and sending it into a rapid u-turn.
“The phone call I just had. It was someone named Magnus Lund.”
“Shit,” Scarlet said. “That is weird.”
Lea rolled her eyes and sighed. “If you’ll let me finish, then I can properly explain the weirdness. Mr Lund was calling me from on board a jet over the Atlantic.”
“Not even vaguely weird yet,” Scarlet said, dragging on her cigarette and pulling her hat down over her face to block the sun.
“He’s on board a flight from Copenhagen to Miami, where he wants us to meet with him about something he described as urgent.”
“Do we even know who this bloke is?” Hawke said.
“We do,” Lea said with a broad smile, “because he just told me. Apparently, now Rich is in hospital, Magnus Lund is the leader of the Consortium that owns this island.”
CHAPTER THREE
“I thought this place was supposed to be sunny?” Hawke said as he opened up the umbrella he’d bought in the airport. People were bustling all around them as they made their way along Brickell Avenue until they reached the address Lund had given them.
They crossed the lobby and took the elevator to the top floor. When the doors slid silently open they revealed a hardwood corridor bereft of decoration. They stepped out of the elevator and walked toward the only door, and Lea tapped gently on the panelled wood.
“Enter.”
They walked into a large light-filled space and took in the opulence. It was postmodern in style, and expensively decorated with abstract art and sculpture, and on the floor was an enormous ushak rug. Behind the desk, a man in a sober suit but no neck tie flipped his laptop screen down and looked up at them. His face was lean and he wore a pair of frameless glasses.
“Good day — please take a seat.”
They exchanged a glance and did as he asked, each taking a comfortable leather seat opposite his big desk.
“I’m Magnus Lund. Would you like coffee?” he asked.
“Not for me,” Scarlet said, peering around the room for a drinks cabinet.
“I don’t mind if I do,” said Hawke, trying to get the measure of the man.
Lea smiled at him. “I’d love one, thanks.”
Lund spoke in Danish into the intercom on his desk and then returned his attention to the five ECHO members sitting opposite him.
“Out with it then,” Hawke said.
Lund stared back at him, expressionless. “Out with what?”
“Who are you?” Lea said.
“I already told you, my name is Lund.”
“Yeah, we got that part,” Hawke said. “I meant, who are the Eden Consortium?”
“Of course you did,” Lund said, smiling. “The Eden Consortium was established by Sir Richard to provide funding to run the fun and games you have down in the Caribbean.”
“Fun and games?” Hawke said. “We’ve lost some good people.”
“My apologies — a poor choice of words on my part. I mean to say only that we are a small group of international backers with a similar worldview. After the attack on the island and the hospitalization of Sir Richard we convened at once and I have asked you here to express our sympathies.”
“That’s very kind of you,” Hawke said sarcastically. “But what’s the real reason we’re here?”
Lund gave Hawke a thoughtful look and leaned forward closer to the desk. He rested his elbows on the desktop and then steepled his fingers. “I see you are an astute observer of human nature so let me get right down to it. Sir Richard is in a coma, but that doesn’t mean we’re off the job. A few hours ago a museum in Colombia was raided by three masked men.”
“Sounds like trouble,” Scarlet said, lighting a cigarette before the sentence had even left her mouth.
“Yes, but what sort of trouble?” Reaper asked.
Lund leaned back into his chair, his face draining of what little color it had. “You might recall a galleon that the Colombians discovered off their coast last year?”
Hawke nodded. “The San José?”
Lund nodded.
“I remember that,” Scarlet said. “They just brought a shit load of treasure up out of it and carted it off to a museum in Cartagena.”
“Gripping stuff,” Hawke said.
“But where’s the trouble?” said Lea.
“As I said, the museum just got raided by a group of highly professional men.”
Hawke sat up in his chair and looked at him sharply. “Treasure hunters?”
“They weren’t looking for ice creams, Joe,” Scarlet said with a sigh.
“We don’t know who they were,” Lund said coolly.
“You know, I’m not sure if I can bring myself to give a shit about any of this,” Lea said in response. “Not any more.”
Lund looked at her sharply but it was Hawke who answered. “We owe it to Maria, Ryan and Rich to give a shit,” he said firmly. “And that’s exactly what we’re going to do. What I want to know now is — who raided that museum and why?”
Reaper shifted in his chair and gave a grunt of dissatisfaction. “And what did they take?”
“That’s easy,” Lund said. “It’s not public knowledge but I have my contacts. They stole only one item.”
This captured everyone’s attention, even Scarlet’s, and now they were all fixing their eyes on the sombre Dane.