Free The Abigail Affair by Timothy Frost

the Italian chef, Bernadetto.
    Then there was the assistant engineer, Timmins, a tiny man with big, thick spectacles and a worried look about him who seemed to spend his time with his head in machine compartments. Toby couldn’t remember the man’s first name. He had christened him “Grease Monkey” for the time being.
    The final crewmember on board was the senior deckhand, a tall, thin-faced Eastern European with spookily long and bony fingers who spoke poor English. Toby had not caught his name, which had been full of Z’s and S’s, and had privately nicknamed him “Ski-Pants,” which is what the name had sounded like.
    What a useless lot. His only possible ally was Julia Simons. She had let Toby bum a cigarette and counted as the nearest thing to a friend he had. But she had told him to stay out of trouble. Could he persuade her to help him?
    Possibly.
    As he lay there in his little cabin, still humiliated from his recapture, Toby had tried to weigh up his options. He could carry on, do his job, and hope he got no more abuse. At the next port he would leave—in the daytime, when no one could challenge him.
    Or he could try to find out what had happened to the girl, raise the alarm somehow, and get the authorities alerted to Krigov. At the next port, police would then be waiting on the dock to take the man in. They would find the body, arrest Krigov, and Toby would get his name in the paper and perhaps on local TV too. And he would have done “the right thing”—something on which his family was very keen. Plus, he felt for the Russian girl. Her life had been cheaply taken, he was now certain. And she had begged him for help, to no avail.
    There were obvious attractions to the first course of action—carry on and keep calm—and obvious drawbacks to the second—get evidence and raise the alarm.
    Everyone wanted him to keep a low profile and just do his job. Why not comply? He was only twenty-two, for God’s sake. Why should he be the one worrying about a Russian hooker? For all he knew, she was fine.
    Toby reached out to the bedside table for his mobile phone to look at the calendar.
    Immediately, and with a fresh pang of loss, he remembered it had been confiscated and smashed.
    What date was it? Even this simple fact caused him some brainwork. He had flown from London Gatwick at sparrow’s fart on 27th December. That was yesterday, though it seemed weeks ago. So the new day now dawning was 28th December.
    Three days to New Year’s Eve.
    Surely the yacht would be heading to wherever they held the best New Year’s Eve parties. Antilla, maybe. St Bart’s or Antigua, even more likely.
    Toby grappled with the problem as he tossed and turned, and found a plan starting to form in his tortured head.
    He was going to have the best of all worlds. He would do his duty with impeccable style and grace. As soon as he was off watch, he would seek out Julia and sound her out. If she seemed on his side, the two of them would investigate the girl’s disappearance and alert the authorities. If she seemed distant and uncooperative, he would keep mum and investigate it himself. If caught, he would come up with some plausible bullshit. After all, he was new on the ship and they could expect him to get lost.
    Reaching this conclusion had further exhausted him and he had started to doze off at last. A second later, seemingly, there was a rap on the door. It opened immediately and Julia poked her head in. “Come on , Toby. You gotta keep moving. Chef has been up for hours and you’ve done nothing but sleep since you got on board. Out of bed! Now!”

Chapter 7
     
    “Hugh Grant, more coffee! You are in a dream world!” Walther’s sharp, educated voice pulled Toby back from his reveries to the present with a jolt.
    The coffee pot by his elbow on the sideboard had finished its stuff. He snatched it up.
    He poured for all of them except Krigov, who shooed him away with a dismissive wave of the hand. Toby retreated to his bar