Crocodile Tears by Anthony Horowitz Page B

were in the air with the black, frozen waters of Loch Arkaig far below.
    For half a second the car hung in the air.
    Then it pitched forward and plunged down.

5
    DEATH AND CHAMPAGNE
    IT WAS LIKE DRIVING deliberately into a black wall. They couldn’t stop. There was nothing they could do. The last thing Alex saw was Edward Pleasure clutching the steering wheel as if he had been electrified, his arms rigid, his eyes staring. Outside, the world had turned upside down. The headlights were bouncing off the surface of the loch, which hurtled toward them, filling the front window.
    They hit the water. The actual impact was brutal, whipping them forward and backward at the same time. Alex realized that there must have been a thin coating of ice stretching across the lake—he heard it and felt it splinter. It was like smashing through a mirror into another dimension. The car didn’t float, even for a second. Carried on by its own velocity, it plunged into the darkness, huge tentacles of water reaching out and drawing it in. The real world of Scotland and castles and New Year was wiped out as if it had never existed, to be replaced by . . . nothing. All the lights in the car had gone out. It was as if steel shutters had fallen on the other side of the windows. Alex would never have believed that darkness could be so total.
    Something was pressing against him, smothering him. For a moment he panicked, punching out with his fists, trying to get whatever it was off him. He couldn’t breathe. What was this huge thing pushing him back into his seat? Where had it come from? He forced himself to think straight, to fight against the sense of blind terror.
    The air bag. That was all. It must have been activated at the moment of impact.
    Air. He was going to need it. They were still sinking beneath the surface, getting deeper and deeper. He couldn’t see anything, but he could feel the pressure in his ears. There was no letup. It was getting worse and worse. How deep was the loch? Some of these Scottish lakes continued down for hundreds of feet. They would keep going until they reached the bottom, and that was where they would die. What had seconds before been a $35,000 luxury car had become a steel coffin.
    There was a soft thud and a shudder as the tires came into contact with mud. Alex was aware of a ton of blackness weighing down on him. They weren’t moving anymore. That was something to be grateful for. But how far down had they gone? More to the point, how long did they have? The car wouldn’t be able to keep the water out for more than a few minutes. It was even now splashing down onto his feet, presumably coming through the air vents on either side of the satellite navigation system. The water was freezing cold, numbing the flesh at first touch. Already it was over his ankles. It was as if his legs were being taken away from him, one inch at a time.
    “Dad?” It was Sabina’s voice, coming from the backseat. She sounded a mile away.
    “Are you okay, Sabina?” Alex asked.
    “Yes. I think so. What about Dad?”
    Edward Pleasure hadn’t spoken since they had left the road. Alex reached out over the air bag and felt the worst. The journalist was resting against the steering wheel . . . unconscious, injured, perhaps even dead. It was impossible to say. Alex couldn’t see anything. He drew his hand back and held it in front of his own face, so close that it was brushing against his nose. He couldn’t see it. It was impossible to breathe normally. His heart was racing, trapped inside him, just as he was trapped in this car. He couldn’t deny it. He was terrified.
    He swallowed hard and somehow managed to speak. “Your dad’s unconscious,” he said.
    “What happened?” He could hear the tears in Sabina’s voice. Like him, she was struggling for control.
    “I don’t know.”
    “What do we do?”
    It should have been silent here at the bottom of Loch Arkaig, yet Alex was aware of noise all around him. The engine was