This action book story is about a wily Kremlin plot to ship a boatload of high-tech Russian and German arms to Argentina, and, in this way, spark the second Falkland War. The MI6's tardy attempts to derail the deal are wrecked by the German intelligence. While the British military are at their wits' end, two honest and uncompromising brothers, Englishmen from Holland, take the lead. After a series of dramatic, funny, seemingly impossible events, the arms ship finally deviates from its course and beaches on a rugged shore - little more than eight thousand miles away from its goal.
Excerpt:
“Shoot, dummy, they’re closing in on us!” John yelled, pushing the heavy boat off the crumbling embankment.
“But... how?” Carl staggered at the stern, trying to keep his balance, fumbling with a heavy gun in his shaking hands. “The trigger's stuck!”
Time was too precious to squander on words, so John dashed to the helm and pressed the starter. Two large motors at the rear churned and growled, revving loudly and creating a little eddy. Shuddering to life, the sleek boat almost sent Carl—and his gun—down into the water. From the opposite canal bank, where at least five black motorcycles now crouched, a muffled shot whizzed through the air, sounding like a plastic bag burst. Another one followed. A round hole appeared in the middle of the boat’s low windshield, encircled by a crown of shattered, chipped glass.
John felt that time was running out.
“Get down! They’ll shoot you in th' noodle!” Not waiting for a reaction, he pulled his brother down by the jacket. Carl, in his brown tweed suit, thumped onto the wet bottom of the vessel. He was still fumbling with the gun in search of the safety switch.
“Ching-ching-ching-ching!” The assault pistol suddenly woke up. John’s eyes widened, and Carl’s jaw dropped. Four bullets, able to pierce a half-inch thick steel rail, buzzed through the moist air, across the canal.
“It won’t stop!” shrieked Carl. He released the trigger, and the salvo halted.
Suddenly there came a loud explosion-like sound from the opposite bank as the last of the four little steel-headed monsters ricocheted off a scaffolding pipe and knocked the nozzle off of a high-pressure paint hose. The creamy liquid burst forth through a waving, writhing rubber snake. The hose worked itself high into the air, covering everything and everyone yards around with a profuse layer of white. It blinded the leather-clad, helmeted shooter and covered the bikers’ shiny black hogs with a greasy, thick pomade.
John couldn’t watch the metamorphosis that turned Bandidos into angels. After all, he was steering a hot-blooded, skipping speed-boat for the first time in his life.
... It all began just a couple of weeks ago, with one innocent phone call that came during an ordinary Monday lunch break. The slim mobile buzzed imploringly. “Zzzz! Bzzzz-bzzzz! Zummm! Zummm!” It twittered in his side pocket as though trying to skip out onto the unvarnished wooden table.
“Yep?” John answered the call, even though it was during his sacred lunch break. “Oh, hi, Carl! Hello! Haven’t heard from you for years! How’s life? How’s the wife?”
The voice on the other side chuckled. Carl, his older brother, called him every week or so. They had always been friends, and surely not the types who shunned one another.
But for John, whose job was to lure new bank clients with a gentle trickle of kind words, then stun them with a waterfall of convincing words, and finally hypnotize them by the glowing sincerity of his expressive blue eyes, all in order to sell them risky papers they mostly didn’t need, such superlatives were daily bread.
After a full morning of speaking in three languages, composing cunning emails, and reviewing dull faxes, John was hungry. Cramming the flat mobile against his ear, he gazed with a craving eye at the two hard-earned pieces of rye bread with tomato and cheese on the plywood tray. Still, he’d never cut a talk short with his brother over something as trivial as eating.
He filled his mouth with words instead. “Can we perhaps meet – what 'perhaps', oldie? Always! What? This Wednesday afternoon? Of course! That is ... um, maybe, and- what’s the emergency that brings you to call me today, might I ask?”
The less wordy person on the other side chuckled again.
