Raymond Benson: High Time To Kill

Raymond Benson

HIGH TIME TO KILL

1999

James Bond fights for his life on the icy slopes of the Himalayas as he faces a terrifying new criminal society in a race to retrieve missing military secrets.

ONE

HOLIDAYS ARE HELL

THE BARRACUDA SURPRISED them by opening its jaws to an angle of ninety degrees, revealing the sharp rows of teeth that were capable of tearing out chunks of flesh in an instant. It closed its snarling mouth just as quickly, leaving a half-inch gap.

Had it yawned?

It was easily a twenty-pound fish. One of the most dangerous predators in the sea, the barracuda is an eating machine that rivals the ferocity of a shark. This one swam lazily along beside them, watching. It was curious about the two strange larger fish that had invaded its habitat.

James Bond had never cared for barracudas. He’d rather be in a pit full of snakes than in proximity to one of them. It wasn’t that he was afraid of them but merely that he found them mean, vicious, and unpredictable creatures. There was no such thing as a barracuda in a good mood. He had to be on his guard without showing fear, for the fish could sense apprehension and often acted on it.

Bond looked over at his companion. She was handling it well, watching the long, slender fish with fascination rather than trepidation.

He motioned for her to swim on, and she nodded. They decided to ignore the barracuda, which proved to be the best tactic. It lost interest after a few minutes and swam away into the misty blue.

Bond had always likened the undersea world to an alien landscape. It was silent and surreal, yet it was full of life. Some sea flowers shot down holes in the seabed as the two humans moved over them. A small octopus, or “pus-feller” (as Ramsey, his Jamaican housekeeper, called it), was propelling itself along the orange-and-brown-colored reef. Patches of sea grass hid the domains of the night-crawling lobsters and crabs.

They swam toward the beach, eventually reaching a spot where they could stand. Bond pulled off the face mask and snorkel. Helena Marksbury emerged from the water and stood beside him. She removed her own mask and snorkel and laughed.

“I do believe that fish wanted to take part of us home as a souvenir,” she said.

“It wasn’t interested in me,” Bond said. “It was staring at you. Do you usually have that kind of effect on barracuda?”

“I attract all the meat eaters, James,” she said with an inviting smile.

March in the Bahamas was quite pleasant at eighty degrees Fahrenheit. The hot summer was just around the corner, and Bond had decided to take a week’s leave before then. It was the perfect time of year to be in the Caribbean. He had originally planned to spend the holiday at Shamelady, his private home on the north shore of Jamaica, but changed his mind when Helena Marksbury said that she had never been to Nassau. Bond offered to show her the islands.

“Where did everyone go?” she asked, looking around at the empty beach. Earlier, there had been a few other snorkelers and sunbathers in the area. Now it was deserted.

It was just after noon. Helena looked around for some shade and sat in the sand next to a large rock that provided some shelter from the fiercely bright sun. She knew she had to be careful not to get too much of it, as she had a light complexion and burned easily. Nevertheless, she had worn the skimpiest bikini she could find. She was most likely the only person who might notice a flaw—that her left breast drooped slightly lower than her right—but Helena knew that she had a good body, and didn’t mind showing it off. It just proved that nobody was perfect.

They were on the southwest side of New Providence Island, the most populous of all the Bahamas. Luckily, Bond had found a villa at Coral Harbour, somewhat removed from the hustle and bustle of metropolitan Nassau, which is the center of commerce, government, and transportation, on the northern side of the island. Here they were surrounded by beautiful beaches and reefs, country clubs and exclusive restaurants.

“What am I supposed to wear tonight?” she asked him as he sat down beside her in the sand.

“Helena, I shouldn’t have to tell you how to dress,” he said. “You look marvelous in anything.”

They had a dinner invitation at the home of the former Governor of the Bahamas, a man Bond had known for many years. They had become friends after a dinner party at which the Governor had presented Bond with a theory concerning love, betrayal, and cruelty between marriage partners. Calling it the “quantum of solace,” the Governor believed that the amount of comfort on which love and friendship is based could be measured. Unless there is a certain degree of humanity existing between two people, he maintained, there can be no love. It was an adage Bond had accepted as a universal truth.

The Governor had long since retired but had remained in Nassau with his wife. Bond had made it a point to stop in and see him every time he went through the Bahamas, which wasn’t very often. When Bond went to the Caribbean, it was usually to his beloved Shamelady in Jamaica.

Helena reclined and looked at Bond with her bewitching, almond-shaped green eyes. She was beautiful—wet or dry—and could easily have been a fashion model. Unfortunately, she was Bond’s personal assistant at SIS, where they both worked. So far they had kept their affair a secret. They both knew that if they carried on much longer, someone at the office would find out. Not that there was anything particularly wrong with it, but office romances in this day and age were frowned upon. Bond justified it to himself because there had been a precedent. Several years ago he had been romantically involved with another personal assistant, Mary Goodnight. How could he forget their time together in Jamaica during the Scaramanga case?

Helena was different from Mary Goodnight. A thoroughly modern woman of thirty-three, Helena Marksbury had none of Ms. Goodnight’s charming yet scatterbrained personality. She was a serious girl, with weighty ideas about politics and current events. She loved poetry, Shakespeare, and fine food and drink. She appreciated and understood the work Bond did and considered her own job just as important in the scheme of things at SIS. She also possessed a stubborn moral conscience that had taken Bond several months to penetrate before she agreed to see him socially.

It had begun in the courtyard in the back of Sir Miles Messervy’s house, Quarterdeck, near Great Windsor Park. The occasion was a dinner party held there a year earlier, and the mutual physical attraction between Bond and Helena had become too much for them to ignore. They had gone for a walk outside and ended up kissing behind the house in the rain. Now, after three months of false starts and two months of cautious experimentation, Bond and Helena were dating. While they both acknowledged that their jobs came first, they enjoyed each other’s company enough to keep it going casually. Bond felt comfortable with Helena’s level of commitment, and the sex was outstanding. He saw no reason to rock the boat.

There was no mistaking the invitation in her eyes, so Bond settled next to her wet body and kissed her. She wrapped one slinky leg around his thighs and pulled him closer.

“Do you think we’re all alone?” she whispered.

“I hope so,” he replied, “but I don’t really care at this point, do you?” He slipped the straps off her shoulders as she tugged at his bathing trunks.

“Not at all, darling,” she said breathlessly. She helped him remove her bikini, and then his strong, knowing hands were all over her. She arched her back and responded with soft moans of pleasure.

“Take me now, James,” she said softly in his ear. “Here.”