Midnight - Hardcover

McCulloch, Amy

 
9780593315521: Midnight
Hardcover
ISBN 10: 0593315529 ISBN 13: 9780593315521
Verlag: Doubleday, 2024

Inhaltsangabe

In this pulse-pounding thriller, a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Antarctica—to camp beneath the legendary midnight sun—becomes a desperate battle for survival against a killer determined to follow their prey to the ends of the earth.

"Midnight is a clever mystery, a twisting page-turner, and a blistering adventure." —Chris Whitaker, New York Times bestselling author of We Begin at the End

THE SUN NEVER SETS AND THIS KILLER NEVER SLEEPS

In the frigid summers of the Antarctic continent, the sun never sets, and Olivia Campbell has long dreamed of spending a sunlit night in this beautiful, remote place. So when her boyfriend—a high-powered art dealer with a taste for the finer things in life—decides to stage an ostentatious, career-making auction aboard a luxury cruise liner to Antarctica, Olivia can hardly believe her luck. That is, until the ship sets sail and her boyfriend is nowhere to be found, and she is left to manage both the auction and her own creeping fear of the open ocean entirely alone. And as though that weren't enough, the first bodies turn up soon after. 

It seems like a terrible accident. This is the Drake Passage, after all, one of the most notorious bodies of water on the planet, and there are always risks in such extreme conditions. But as the situation deteriorates, it soon becomes clear that there is real danger on board—and that the closest help is hundreds of miles away. With tensions rising and temperatures plummeting, Olivia wonders whether she's booked a fabulous adventure . . . or a one-way ticket to her own destruction.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

AMY McCULLOCH is the author of Breathless and Midnight, as well as eight novels for children and young adults, including the internationally bestselling YA novel The Magpie Society: One for Sorrow. She is the youngest Canadian woman to climb Manaslu in Nepal—the world’s eighth-highest mountain. She has also summited the highest mountain in the Americas, Aconcagua, participated in the Marathon des Sables in the Sahara Desert, and visited all seven continents. She lives outside of London.

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Prologue


I watch as he scampers down the gangway, his fists clenched by his side. He avoids catching the eye of the distracted officer at the door to the ship, racing past the long line of passengers waiting to check in for their voyage of a lifetime.

He looks so small through my binoculars. A tiny slip of a man. I wait, but the woman doesn’t come after him. No matter. I had planned for that. Besides, this way is easier.

I’ve been watching them, waiting, biding my time. Every moment con­firms what I already knew: these two deserve everything that’s coming at them.

I look down at my phone, opening the message thread from a few min­utes ago.

WE NEED TO TALK.

Not possible, he’d replied.

BE AT THE HOTEL IN FIFTEEN MINUTES OR ELSE THE VIDEO GOES LIVE.

He was too smart to ignore me. Especially with the screenshot I’d attached to the message. That would have made his blood run cold.

I set down the binoculars. Now I’m certain he’s on his way, I have a few minutes to prepare the next stage of the plan. I take out the box with the syringe, making certain it’s primed and ready. My bags are packed, waiting by the door for my getaway.

The hotel staff will give him a message, sending him to the room next to mine, so I double- check the adjoining door is unlocked and slightly ajar.

I’ve already set up a laptop on the table in that room, facing away from the entrance.

I wait until I hear him enter. Then I call.

He answers on the first ring, so angry he’s practically spitting. “I gave you what you wanted. You said you would stop this.”

“It’s not enough. Meet my demand, or else what’s on that laptop goes live.”

“I told you. It’s not going to happen. The ship sets sail in an hour. You’ve got your money. You can’t just keep asking for more. Now it’s time to leave us alone.”

“I don’t think so. Why don’t you turn it on and see for yourself the damage I can do?”

I wait for him to sit down at the desk. But it’s a ploy. If there was proof, I wouldn’t have to do this. Instead, while he’s distracted, I step through into the room.

“What the fuck?” I hear him mutter as he double- clicks on the video file and nothing plays.

My footstep lands heavy on the hotel carpet, and the creak is enough to reveal me. He leaps to standing.

But it’s too late. In the next second, I’m on him, plunging the needle into his neck. He barely has the opportunity to struggle. I’m too fast; it’s too unexpected. And the drugs I’ve chosen work quickly.

As he sags to the floor, I search his pockets for anything I might need. I drag his body into the second room, the one I’ve booked for the next week. Then, I make sure the “Do Not Disturb” sign is still on the outer knob, shut the door and start walking. I expect he won’t be found for some time.

I’ll be long gone by then.

After all, I have a boat to catch.


Chapter One

TWENTY- FOUR HOURS EARLIER


Huge, snowcapped mountains rise up behind the town, their jag­ged peaks piercing the bright blue sky. The Martial range cradled the southernmost town in the world— Ushuaia— and, with it, the gateway to Antarctica.

An icy breeze swirled around her body as Olivia stared out at the slate- gray sea. Half a dozen yachts were moored in the harbor and birds splashed in the surf, fighting over a silvery fish nabbed from beneath the surface. The waves were calm, lapping gently against the stone walls of the dock. For the moment there was no sign of the ferocious, stormy weather that this part of the world was notorious for.

She knew some people found comfort by being near water. Not her. For her, the sight of the water brought up a fear that caught in her throat, threatening to choke her.

She gripped the metal railing, took a breath and focused on the large ship docked in the port. The MS Vigil. Tomorrow, it would take her across one of the world’s most perilous bodies of water— the Drake Passage— to the final continent. The ship was a converted icebreaker from Norway, designed to chop through icy waters and sail through polar storms with ease. She’d read up on the specifications for the ship and its captain’s impeccable safety record. She knew she had nothing to worry about.

But the fear remained.

Movement on the dock caught her eye. Two men strolled down the gangplank from the Vigil. When she was sure one of them was her boyfriend, Aaron, she waved, glad of the distraction. Her palms stung as she let go of the cold iron.

She wasn’t sure if he’d seen. If he had, he didn’t acknowledge her. About halfway toward her, they stopped, speaking with their heads close. They shook hands before they parted, and Olivia watched as the second man stalked off in the opposite direction. She didn’t recognize him from the meeting that morning, but that wasn’t a surprise— she’d been introduced to so many people, and his face was covered by the fur- trimmed hood of his parka. He could have been anyone.

Olivia frowned, but then Aaron turned to her. His cheeks were flushed from being blasted by the freezing air, his normally per­fectly set curly brown hair disheveled in the wind. He gave her a wide smile.

“Feeling better, Livi?” he asked once he’d made it through the security gates separating the dock from the park. He kissed her firmly before she could answer.

No, she wanted to say. I’m not ready. I’ll wait for you here, safe, on land. But she swallowed down her anxiety. She knew this was a make- or- break moment for them— in their relationship and their business. He’d put his trust in her again, even after how badly she’d messed up on the night of his big auction.

Still, he wasn’t fooled. “Once we’re underway, I know you’ll love it. The ship is incredible— it feels like a floating boutique hotel. You won’t even know you’re on the water.”

“Is everything ready?” she asked, looping her arm through his as they meandered back toward their hotel.

“Still a few last- minute details.”

Aaron had been on board overseeing the installation of a special showcase of work by his star artist— Kostas Yennin. Aaron had represented Yennin’s work for years, steadily building his profile but never truly breaking him out in a big way on the art circuit. It was only after tragedy struck, resulting in Yennin’s untimely death, that his star had had a meteoric rise— his pieces selling at auction for millions of pounds, demand from galleries and museums skyrocketing, even his social media following grow­ing exponentially. But Aaron wanted to be careful. He’d seen so many gifted artists make a big splash but then fail to transition to blue- chip status— that top echelon of artists whose paintings consistently increased in value.

He wanted to create a lasting legacy for Yennin’s art, and that required finding a way to make him stand out from the pack. Since Yennin’s paintings had all been inspired by the beauty of the polar regions, Aaron had negotiated a deal to match artist with adventure. His work would be displayed exclusively aboard the MS Vigil and the passengers would have the unique opportu­nity to attend a high- end art...

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Verlag
Doubleday
Erscheinungsdatum
2024
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0593315529
ISBN 13 
9780593315521
Einband
Gebundene Ausgabe
Anzahl der Seiten
323
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