Prey Zone by Wilbur Smith

Author:Wilbur Smith [Smith, Wilbur]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781471412462
Publisher: Hot Key Books
Published: 2022-06-01T12:15:08.118000+00:00

13

Gerhard’s appearance caught Robyn off-balance. She’d seen the man a hundred times in the news and online, but to see him in person … it was like coming face to face with a bogeyman you’d been told about since childhood.

‘So, you didn’t believe the cover story about us faking the action down by the river.’ Gerhard shook his head sadly. ‘A pity. If you’d swallowed it, we might have let you go.’

Shrinker and Abi followed Gerhard into the room and stood behind him.

‘You really have brought extinct animals back to life, then,’ Ralph said quietly. ‘We knew Shrinker was lying.’

‘A little respect for Mr Shrinker, please,’ said Gerhard. ‘He’s a former British SAS officer who has shifted into … private security.’

‘Pays better,’ Shrinker said. ‘That’s no lie.’

‘So why are you really here – two Ballantynes and the son and heir to the VanRok Security empire?’ Gerhard wondered aloud. ‘Come to borrow a cup of sugar?’

‘We didn’t think you were even home,’ Ralph said. ‘Dad said he’d tried to get hold of you –’

‘I guess I should ring him back.’ Gerhard’s smile was as frigid as an icebox. ‘We can talk about how he can help me now. After all, I’ve kept his precious children alive after they put themselves in danger.’

Robyn decided that calm politeness was the best policy. ‘Like we’ve said all along, we only wanted to return your springbok.’

‘I’ve had that ewe picked up.’ Gerhard gave an over-the-top grin. ‘Thanks, good neighbour!’

‘And,’ Robyn went on quickly, ‘we wanted to warn you that she was nearly killed by something that got onto our land … and could’ve got on to yours.’

‘Sadly, the sarcosuchus has proved hard to recapture after chewing its way through the boundary nets in the river,’ said Gerhard. ‘I regret the incursions onto your land, but I’m sure you’d rather we at least tried to retrieve it. See? You’re a good neighbour to me, and I’m a good neighbour to you.’ He hefted Robyn’s phone in his hand. ‘And good neighbours watch out for each other. So, with your personal safety in mind, I have to say … if you’ve taken any pictures or video of some of the more dramatic moments from today’s events at the riverbank, I suggest you delete them. Now.’

‘Mr Gerhard?’ Ralph looked him right in the eye. ‘I swear to you that there are no videos or photos on that phone.’

‘He’s right,’ said Robyn, thrusting her chin out.

‘You can smash it if you like,’ Ralph went on.

Robyn glanced at him uncertainly.

‘Yeah,’ Luke said. ‘Evidence or not, it doesn’t matter if you break the handset. Auto-archive software backs up the entire camera roll to the cloud.’

‘He’s lying, sir,’ Shrinker sneered. ‘Your security sats block all signals coming out of the park.’

‘That’s only true if you have fibre-optic links all across the reserve,’ Luke said calmly. ‘And that’s not easy in a big old park, right? You must share bandwidth from third-party satellites to connect to the world outside.’

‘That’s right. But on a secure network,’ Gerhard agreed.

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