The Siren's Sting

She was not an action woman: she could not run very fast; she favoured ballet slippers over combat boots, she never swore and still suffered from nightmares; she did not enjoy confrontation of any kind. She was reluctant to face risk, and it was a quality that made her very good at her job. Her art lay in her ability to pass unnoticed, to slip in and out of the cracks of life, to be quietly invisible.

Aboard a luxury yacht as the minder to one of the world's most renowned, influential, and temperamental opera stars, Stevie Duveen manages to thwart a pirate attack off the coast of Somalia. She soon realises, however, that the attack is merely one salvo in a ruthless campaign of terror. Shipping lines, insurance companies, and international interests panic as the waters are muddied with hijacked vessels, exorbitant ransom demands, and blood.
On the orders of her adored boss and mentor, Stevie flies to Sardinia's idyllic Costa Smeralda to recuperate from her injuries. Soon, however, a favour for her mentor plunges her back undercover, and underwater. The job seems simple enough--a threat assessment on the young son of Vaughan and Clemence Krok--but it becomes clear that Krok runs the world's most powerful mercenary army.
Posing as just another jet-setting party girl, Stevie cruises aboard the mega-yacht Hercules, surrounded by arms dealers, aristocrats, billionaires, and divas. Her story swings from the sun-kissed marinas of the Mediterranean to diva season in Venice, through the oil fields of Azerbaijan, and on to the billionaires' playgrounds of Europe. Stevie uncovers more questions than answers, questions that lead her deeper underwater: Is the Kroks' son really in danger? How is Krok connected to the pirate scourge? And why is someone trying to kill her?
At her best in discreet and dangerous realms, Stevie must fight to save everything she holds dear as she finds herself at the heart of a deadly double game.