Crash Course by Derek Fee (pdf to ebook reader .txt) 📕

to the buoy at Faraglioni first then he would trail the Penhalion boat to the line. And there was no way he wanted to follow Kane and the Penhalion bitch home. He held his line, inching all the while towards Kane’s boat. Sooner or later one of them would chicken out otherwise there would be a lot of debris floating around in the water.

Kane held his line as Barrett swayed towards him. He took a quick glance at his throttleman. Morweena’s face was taut, her mouth was tight, and her eyes were staring. She was scared out of her wits but her hand never wavered from the throttle. There were only two boat widths between them as they raced over the last few hundred yards to the buoy. The slightest change in the wind or the appearance of a freak wave and they would be into each other. Kane had forgotten everything outside of his desire to get his boat to the buoy first. He could hear the roar of the two sets of engines in his ears but he was blind to the danger.

Barrett’s heart was pounding. Kane had countered his move by moving towards him. What was the bastard trying to do? Get them all killed? The distance between the two boats had fallen below two boat lengths and the buoy loomed ahead. Barrett glanced to the side and saw the look of terror on his throttleman’s face. His courage failed and he pulled away from the Penhalion boat.

Morweena sensed rather than saw the breaking of Barrett’s resolve and opened the throttle to maximum. They leapt over the final hundred metres, forcing Barrett to go steadily wider as the buoy approached. As they reached the buoy, she pulled back the throttle and Kane swept around in a tight curve causing the hull to heel over and toss a huge stream of water into the air. Barrett missed the turn and careened on towards the port of Capri before adjusting and completing the turn.

“Whoa!” the shout of relief filled the cockpit. David and Tom had yelled into the mikes at the same moment.

“I don’t believe that I saw what I just saw,” David’s voice was weak.

Kane and Morweena were pointed at the finish line. The race wasn’t over yet and there were still two boats ahead. Morweena gave them maximum throttle as they raced towards the gap between the island of Capri and the mainland.

Hakonen’s Finnspeed and Angelino’s Benneton were neck and neck as they passed the first outcrop of the mainland with Kane only eight hundred metres behind. The three boats bucked over the waves as their crews pushed them to the limit.

Kane was closing the gap but they were running out of time and ocean.

“Come on,” David's voice was cracking. “One last effort.”

The gap between Benneton and the Penhalion boat had closed to only six hundred metres but the race was nearly over. The headland which hid Sorrento was barely visible through the streams of spray which lashed the windscreen.

“Give it everything,” Kane said through clenched teeth.

Morweena opened the throttle as much as she dared and they powered forward once more, bouncing off the waves like a shuttlecock in a badminton game. Kane managed to close the gap but there was still two hundred metres between the boats as Benneton crossed the finish line in second place. Harry Hakonen had won, with the Penhalion boat a worthy third.

Morweena immediately eased off the throttle and slumped forward in her seat. The boat gave one last leap through the air before gradually dropping speed.

Not bloody good enough, Kane thought, as he piloted the boat through the flotilla which dotted the entrance to the Piccolo Porto. He reached his hand across and stroked Morweena’s back. She was certainly one courageous lady. She remained slumped, physically and mentally exhausted.

The boats around them were sounding the klaxons and shouts of ‘Forza’ resounded on all sides. The spectators were going crazy and most of their attention was centred not on the crew of the winning boat but on Kane and Morweena. Adrenaline poured around Kane’s body. He wanted to shout and scream. This was living with a capital L. He eased the boat into the Piccolo Porto and a huge roar came from the crowd lining the wall of the jetty.

I could get used to this, he thought and waved back to the crowd.

Morweena lifted her head and smiled. “My God but that was some bloody race,” she said softly. “I’ve never been so scared in all my life. You and Barrett going head-to-head only two hundred metres from the buoy. Don’t you ever do that to me again!” She pulled off her helmet and shook out her hair. The tautness had disappeared from her face. She put her hand on the throttle and dropped the speed to a crawl.

“You were pretty cool out there,” Kane said.

“I wasn’t cool, I was petrified. But I wasn’t half as scared of dying as I was of answering to you and Dad if I’d throttled back.” She eased herself forward and winced at the pain in her back. “I need a massage and a lovely long bubble bath to ease away most of the bruises this monster gave me.”

Tom and David were waiting along with Doc, Reg and Bill at their slot on the wooden marina.

“You bloody stupid reckless bastard!” Reg stepped in front of David before he reached Kane. “That’s my daughter in that boat and you could have bloody killed her. Don’t you have any sense in that thick skull of yours?”

“Doing my job as best I could, boss.” Kane stood his ground.

“But not at the cost of a life, you silly bugger.” David watched Morweena climb unharmed out of the cockpit. “If you want to kill yourself, go ahead. But leave my daughter out of it.”

“Take it easy, David, you’ll have a heart attack.” Tom held his arm. “Nobody’s hurt. Everybody’s safe and you’ve come third in your first race. There’s no need