Drake Sisters 05 - Safe Harbor

done. He'd do the job, but it would haunt him. Jackson wasn't going to let that happen.
    "The girls will be waiting in case we need them. Already they've got the fog thick and still, so we'll have plenty of cover going in," Jonas said. He stepped aside to allow Jackson to enter the boat with Gray and the rest of his team.
    Gray barely looked up from studying the yacht's layout for the millionth time. "Our information says Tarasov's got fifteen men aboard the yacht and no civilians. All of his men are armed and will cut you down without thought. These four are the most dangerous. Don't get close to them for any reason. Don't try to cuff them. Don't try to disarm them. They know more ways to kill a man than you could possibly imagine.
    Contain them and wait for my team to apprehend. This is our target." Gray passed around photographs.
    Jonas found himself staring at Boris Tarasov. The man was short and stocky, with a shock of gray hair and bushy eyebrows. He had heavy features and mean, bullish eyes.
    The second picture was of the captain. He was taller with an athletic build, a very handsome man.
    "That's Karl Tarasov, Petr's son. He's been the number one hit man for his family for years. He's ruthless and bloody and doesn't mind killing women and children," Gray continued. "No one has ever come up against him and lived. He'll do anything to protect his uncle."
    "If we don't arrest them, Jonas, you and the Drakes are never going to be safe."
    That was a blatant lie and it twisted Jonas's gut into knots. Gray knew as long as any of the Tarasovs were alive, Hannah would never be safe. Never . And that meant they had no choice but to see to it that each of them were executed. He sighed and rubbed his temples where the beginning of a headache was throbbing. He thought he was long out of that business.
    "How do they let someone like that into the country?" Jonas asked, disgusted.
    "We didn't know he was anywhere near the area," Gray said, "not until you brought us the information about the yacht. Our last information was that he left the country after Petr was arrested. You're absolutely certain of your informant?"
    Jonas wasn't going to give up Ilya Prakenskii, not to Gray. Duncan was ambitious, and if he arrested Prakenskii or Tarasov or even Nikitin, his political career would be made.
    Whatever Prakenskii was, he'd saved Hannah's life and Jonas wouldn't betray him.
    "Yeah, I'm sure."
    "The other two I'm really interested in are known for their extreme violence. Yegor and Viktor Gadiyan are brothers. Yegor was married to Boris and Petr's sister, Irina.
    She died some years ago, but the Gadiyan brothers continued to work for Boris."

    "Great family business."
    "It was Yegor and Viktor who tried to kill Sergei Nikitin some years ago. The other Russian families stepped in when Nikitin brought in Ilya Prakenskii as his bodyguard.
    I don't think any of the families wanted to chance having Prakenskii come after them."
    Jonas studiously avoided looking at Jackson. "It's funny how these men have such badass reputations, but no cop in Europe or here can pin a thing on them."
    "This cop is going to," Gray said. "We can't waste any more time. The fog being so thick is a huge asset but it can't last. We've got to move now."

    THE men were grim-faced and silent as they approached the yacht, moving through the rippling water, their boats climbing waves and slapping down with enough force to shake their teeth, yet there was absolutely no sound. Jonas knew the Drake sisters were controlling the air around them, but he wondered what Duncan's men were thinking. It was eerie to move over the choppy surface surrounded as they were by dense gray fog. Within the fog bank, darker colors swirled and moved, but the heavy mist layers were thick and still, stubbornly holding position for several miles in either direction around where the yacht lay stationary. Waves slapped the sides of the ship while men patrolled the deck, peering through the fog in an effort to see.
    It was imperative that Jonas and Jackson reach Tarasov first. If Gray did, he would do everything to keep the mobster alive. It had taken effort and a lot of persuasion to get Gray to agree to allow Jonas and Jackson to slip aboard first. Fortunately, they'd always held that position when they'd worked for Gray, so in the end, he'd agreed it was best for them to do what they knew.
    Jonas and Jackson slipped into the cold water, some distance from the yacht, pushing their waterproof