Gannon was to his right so Shepherd crabbed towards him, feeling the air pressure shift under his body. More of the troopers joined them and Gannon turned slowly, checking numbers until he was satisfied that everyone was in free fall.

They reached twenty-six thousand feet above sea level and the automatic opening devices kicked in. Shepherd felt a tug at his shoulders as his canopy deployed, then his arms snapped in and his legs went down as the chute filled with air and slowed his descent. He reached up for the toggles that controlled his direction and pulled the left one, heading after Gannon, then checked his jet-black canopy. It was fine, totally rectangular, no tangled lines. In the distance, the engines of the Nimrod were a dull roar.

Shepherd tilted his head down and looked at the chest-mounted liquid crystal display screen of his GPS system. It showed his position and, some forty miles to the south, a red dot that represented the tanker.

He looked over his shoulder. Behind him, he could see the rest of the troopers, their canopies unfurled. He did a quick count. So far so good.

The harness was biting into his groin and Shepherd kicked out with his legs, moving the webbing. He took a deep breath of oxygen and let it out slowly.

‘You okay, Alpha Two?’ Gannon’s voice crackled in Shepherd’s earpiece.

‘No problems,’ said Shepherd.

‘Just sit back and enjoy the ride,’ said Gannon.

Carpenter hated ships. He hated the cramped rooms, the constant motion, the never-ending distant throb of massive engines. Bonnie had been nagging him for years to take her on a luxury cruise, but he’d steadfastly refused. There was a certain irony in the fact that the safest place for him had turned out to be a tanker prowling around the Atlantic.

His place there had been arranged by Carlos Rodriguez, a Colombian with whom Carpenter had dealt for more than a decade. The Rodriguez cartel had links to the Colombian government and was one of the country’s biggest and most successful cocaine and heroin dealers. The tanker had been Rodriguez’s idea, a floating warehouse that went into port twice a year for maintenance, and only when it was empty. It was a quarter of a mile long with facilities for two dozen men. Drugs were flown out from South America and dropped into the sea where they were picked up by small speedboats sent out from the tanker, then taken aboard and kept in compartments at the bottom of the hold. In the event of a raid, the compartments could be emptied, sending the drugs to the bottom of the ocean, far out of reach.