Blood Island

By Dick Morris

Guests arriving at a luxurious hotel in the Adriatic find their vacations turn into nightmares...

When Paul Mander and his new girlfriend arrive at Adrihotels' Brioni Island complex, they cannot believe their luck. The island is beautiful, the hotel is luxurious, the service leaves nothing to be desired, and the cuisine is top class. Paul had swapped this holiday for one in the West Indies with a friend who had won this holiday in a competition he couldn't remember entering. Now Paul thinks he got the better of the bargain. Gradually, however, he finds that things are not what they seem, and finally, and belatedly, he realises he has made a big mistake...                        

About 28000 words

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dick Morris
• Release date: Jun 20, 2012
• ISBN: 9781507041604

Dick Morris

Dick Morris served as Bill Clinton's political consultant for twenty years. A regular political commentator on Fox News, he is the author of ten New York Times bestsellers (all with Eileen McGann) and one Washington Post bestseller.

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Blood Island

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Blood Island

A novel by Dick Morris

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Copyright 2012 Dick Morris

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used, reproduced, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law, or in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, please contact:

www.indiopolis.com

Published by: dick morris – carla bowman - books

Other books by Dick Morris:

Pelican - Escape or Die*

Dark Harbor*

The Investigators*

The Black Hats*

The Killers*

The Last Supper*

The Curse*

The Castle*

The Ruin*

The Weather Station*

Three Horror Stories*

Cursed Slaughtered Hunted*

*Also available as paperbacks

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This is a work of fiction and the characters and locations are imaginary. Any resemblance to persons living or dead or actual establishments is purely coincidental.

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"I’m going to crush that mother-fucker, Ford. That’s what I’m going to do!"

Jack G. Harding shouted above the noise of the helicopter as it approached the island of Sveti Marko. His wife, who sat beside him, only half-listened. She had heard Harding speak like this so many times before. Harding was on a high, as he always was whenever he was about to pull off a major deal. Now, he, the President of Titan Corporation, intended to pull off the biggest takeover of his career. He aimed to launch a bid for a company belonging to an operator with a reputation as fearsome as his own. The company, Ford Oil Holdings, belonging to George T. Ford, was almost as big as Titan.

He thinks he’s tough, Harding went on, largely to himself, "but now he’s going to go the way of all the other mother-fuckers who’ve gotten in my way. First, I’m going to kick his lungs out, and then I’m going to crush him. Just like I did with that other mother-fucker, Edberg."

Brandon Edberg had been president of Greengate Corporation, the last firm that Harding had taken over. Edberg's great-grandfather had created Greengate, and Edberg had been the last of the family line. Harding had taken a liking to the company, figuring that it would make a nice addition to his other automotive holdings, and had launched a hostile bid for Greengate. Edberg - whom Harding had tended to refer to as that little Swedish ass-hole - had fought back valiantly. But his comparatively small corporation had been no match for the massive Titan. Edberg’s lawyers had tried to persuade Harding to call off his takeover bid by revealing to him, during one of their meetings, that the old man had terminal cancer and that, quite obviously, it would be only a matter of time, perhaps twelve months, before Greengate came up for grabs. They had asked him to let the old man die happy in the knowledge that he, the last of the Edberg family, had retained control of Greengate until his death. But Harding had refused. If I see a drowning man, he’d snapped, I shove a hosepipe in his mouth. The takeover had been completed and Edberg had flown to a clinic someplace in Switzerland. A couple of weeks ago, news had come through that he had died at the age of eighty-one. 

For a few moments, Harding was silent, for they were passing over the island now, and turning to approach the landing pad, and he found himself inspecting the place. This was the first time he had been to Croatia, and the first time he had ever seen the Brioni Islands. He hadn’t even heard of them until a few days ago. Leticia had read up on them and now Harding recalled some of the things she had mentioned. They had once been a personal possession of President Tito, the former communist ruler of Yugoslavia, who had had a summer palace on them. After the break-up of the Yugoslav republic, they’d been acquired by the Croatian state. They were covered with holm oak forest and numerous plant species, maquis, and were the home of a good number of bird species, and raptors. Now, this particular island had been turned into a luxury hotel resort by a Swiss concern.

Harding had been in Geneva doing a deal when he had got a call from a vice-president of Ford Oil, Bill Barret, who had said he’d fallen out with George T. Ford and who had offered to help Harding gain control of the company. Barret, who had said he intended to spend a few days vacationing in the Brioni Islands, had suggested that Harding join him there. He would be bringing photocopies of Ford Oil’s most confidential financial documents, he’d said, documents that would reveal to Harding the company’s vital weaknesses. It had been an offer that Harding had not been able to refuse. Before he had heard from Barret, Harding had been thinking that, for the first time in his life, he might, just, this time, be attempting the impossible. With a vice-president of Ford Oil on side, however, he knew that success was as good as assured. He had flown immediately to the Croatian town of Pula in his private jet. There, the resort’s private helicopter had picked him up.

We’re going to land, Mister Harding, Mike Butler said from the front of the copter. Butler, Harding’s personal bodyguard, sat beside the pilot. A tough, six-feet-three, crop-haired former marine, Butler went everywhere with Harding.

Right! Harding spoke absentmindedly, for he had noticed three guys standing by the side of the helicopter landing-pad. They were, he guessed, hotel staff. Two of them, youngish guys, wore white jackets and black trousers. These were, he supposed, waiters or stewards. The third guy, who was taller, thinner, older and paler than the others, wore a blue jacket, blue tie, white shirt, and black trousers. He, Harding guessed, was some sort of supervisor. Harding found himself staring at this guy’s face. He thought that he might, just, have seen him someplace before...

The copter jolted as it hit the concrete and Harding turned his attention to unbuckling his seat belt. Within seconds, the rotor had come to a stop, and the three guys who had been waiting by the side of the pad came forward and opened the copter’s doors. The full warmth of an Adriatic early summer afternoon hit the occupants of the helicopter as they did so. One of the two shorter guys helped Mrs Harding down, whilst the other removed the passengers’ luggage. The tall pale guy approached Harding, smiled pleasantly, and introduced himself as David Gates.

Good afternoon, Mister Harding, he said. May I welcome you to Adrihotel’s Brioni Island complex? We hope you will enjoy your stay, Sir!

Harding just nodded. He had caught sight of a bright red birthmark on the side of Gates’s face. 

If you will follow me, Sir.

Gates led the way up a white concrete path, and the new arrivals followed. Harding walked with his wife, Mike Butler followed, and the two stewards brought up the rear. Butler stared thoughtfully at his boss’s back as they progressed, thinking that Jack Harding appeared to be unstoppable in life. Harding was a big man, almost as tall as Butler himself, and now much heavier for he was quite obviously overweight. At sixty-six, though, and now white-haired, he still seemed to be extremely fit, keeping up schedules that would exhaust a younger man. And, he seemed to have kept those schedules for the whole of his working life from the day he had started working for his father at the family’s small automobile repair business in Philadelphia to the day when he had become a billionaire. Fifty-two years of non-stop business activity had given him interests in the media, leisure, oil prospecting, service, and automotive industries; homes in New York, San Francisco, Las Vegas, London, Provence, and Geneva; a sports fishing boat - which he never seemed to have time to use - an art collection which, likewise, he never seemed to have the time to enjoy, and a Learjet, which was one of the few possessions