by Zoe Sharp
We set up camp in a sheltered area behind a rocky outcrop, working quickly to unload the Jeep and put up our tents. Or rather, Maria put up the tents, which seemed to involve emptying them out of their bags and letting go of them, whereupon they sprang to full-size shape like a magician’s stage prop. I, meanwhile, gathered a dozen large stones into a rough circle to make a fire pit.
My attempts to re-engage Maria in conversation were largely unsuccessful.
‘You are supposed to be listening to yourself,’ she told me stiffly. ‘I am not here.’
I shrugged, climbing onto the nearest rock, which stood about four metres high, its surface abraded smooth by wind and time. The compound had disappeared from view, with nothing but scrub and distant mountains, as far as the eye could see.
‘How far does the cult land stretch?’ I called down to Maria.
She stared up, shading her eyes with one hand. ‘We are not a cult,’ she said, sounding defensive.
‘O…K,’ I agreed. ‘How far does Fourth Day’s land stretch?’
‘I don’t know – many miles,’ she said. ‘Thousands of acres. Randall’s been buying it up for years, I think.’ Her voice was steady now. When I slithered down the rock, though, she was still frowning. ‘It’s important, Charlie,’ she said. ‘We’re not some bunch of religious wackos. We’re a community, one that is strong because we stay together and we learn from one another. Haven’t you realised that by now?’
I touched a finger to the lingering bruise around my eye. ‘Oh, I don’t think you’re a bunch of religious wackos, Maria,’ I said. ‘As for learning from each other, I’ve been wondering about that. I’ve been wondering where a schoolteacher like Thomas Witney learnt all about martial arts and the uses of psychoactive drugs. Did Bane teach him that?’
‘Randall?’ Maria repeated, her voice catching. ‘Of course not! Whatever Thomas learned was to protect us. He—’ She broke off abruptly, aware she’d said more than she’d been intending to. More than she should.
‘Protect you from what?’ I persisted, but she backed away, both hands up as if to warn me off. I took a step after her. ‘Maria—’
‘From trouble. From outsiders!’ She glared at me, eyes very bright. ‘From people like you!’
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
It was dark. I lay on top of the rock that sheltered our little camp, staring up at the stars again. The rock was curved on top, and I was just over the crown of it, so the campfire didn’t interfere with my night vision. All I could see of it was a reflected orange glow and the occasional dying ember floating upwards on the rising air. It was pleasant enough not to need a jacket, and mine was rolled, pillowing my head.
Idly, I picked out the curve of the Plough above me, the bright W of Cassiopeia overlaying the misty swirl of the Milky Way. And between them, as if signposted, the Pole Star.
I’d climbed up there after Maria had zipped herself pointedly into her tent for the night, and I’d lain long enough to see the star map rotate slightly in the heavens, as it would do regardless of my existence or anyone else’s. Lying on my back on a still-warm rock in the middle of nowhere, I was overwhelmed by my own insignificance.
Perhaps that was what Bane had in mind.
My thoughts returned to Maria, apparently asleep in her tent. She had not spoken much after her outburst. I’d tried to draw her out again, but we’d moved warily around each other within the confines of the camp, cooking and eating and squaring away with minimal communication.
Afterwards, she’d walked out into the golden sunset with just a brusque order to stay put. I ignored her, of course, following at a careful distance. Eventually, Maria halted, looked around guiltily, and pulled a small cellphone from her pocket. I’d edged close enough to hear her opening words.
‘Ann? It’s Maria. Yes, I know I’m not supposed to… Look, I just wanted to check Billy went to bed OK… You know how he can be sometimes…’ Her voice trailed off, as if all out of excuses.
Slowly, carefully, I’d backed away. By the time she’d returned, I was sitting near the fire, staring into the flames. So, Maria had brought a cellphone with her, which sounded like it was against the rules, just so she could check on her son. She’d learnt to love him. Would I have done the same?
And then, in the darkness, I heard a quiet crackle of noise below me. I lifted my head, trying to focus on the sound. There were all kinds of large wild animals out here, I knew, from coyotes to bobcats to black bears. I didn’t know much about their habits, but I didn’t fancy becoming light supper for any of them.
But when I looked down, the predator who crept towards our campsite was far more dangerous – human.
The figure of a man passed so close below me, I could have reached down and touched the top of his head. In the weak moonlight, I made out night vision goggles covering his eyes, covert clothing.
I flattened against the warm stone until he’d passed, then rolled silently onto my stomach and low-crawled to the crown of the rock on my elbows and toes, moving one limb at a time, body suspended to reduce any possible scrape of sound.
As he neared our damped-down campfire, the intruder lifted the NV goggles up onto his forehead. He turned a slow circle, checking, keeping his awareness open, and I got my first look at his face.
It wasn’t really a surprise to recognise John Nu. I’d already subconsciously placed the size and the shape of him. And you don’t forget the way a man moves. Still, I waited. Had Bane sent him to check on us?
I waited longer than I should have to find out, letting him advance, soft-footed, into the camp, careful not to silhouette himself between the tents and the fire. He stopped again, cocked his head to listen for sign of occupation.
From inside Maria’s tent, I heard a faint rustle as she shifted in her sleep. Nu heard it, too. He paused as if to confirm it, or to steel himself. I wasn’t sure which.
Then he reached for something at his side and started to bring his right arm up. In the dancing flames’ reflection, the outline of the gun was starkly familiar.
Scrabbling for compression, I launched myself off the top of the rock and landed heavy on his back, just as he took up the tension on the trigger. Reacting rather than acting, I was a fraction slow.
His arm lurched, hand tightening reflexively. The brutal sound of the gun discharging catapulted away into the distant darkness, hard and hot and bright. The shot went high, punching a small, seemingly trivial hole through the fabric of the tent above where Maria lay sleeping.
The momentum of my attack took Nu down to his knees. I wedged my right forearm into the nape of his neck and looped my left around his throat, felt his muscles bunch to counter.
If I’d hoped to win myself a second or so to complete the lock, Nu disappointed me. He instantly whipped the gun back and pulled the trigger twice more in quick succession, no panic, no hesitation. I jerked my head sideways instinctively, the hearing in one ear exploding into numbness by the proximity of the blasts. The pressure wave flattened my hair, particles from the cordite stinging the side of my head, vision buzzing. Shit!
Dazed, I fell backwards, landing with a whump in the sandy soil. Nu spun, crouched, swinging the gun round as he came. I pivoted onto my hip and kicked his left knee out from under him, aiming low under the patella and driving the kneecap up and back with the sole of my foot.
Nu grunted, but kept the gun up as he went down. I shifted and sprang, landing sprawled along the length of him, driving my own knee into his solar plexus, bringing the other up hard into his groin. Air gushed out of him in a fast hiss as he curled around the blows. And as his head came into range, I slammed my elbow round into his temple, knew it was a solid connection by the way his head snapped to the side.
Still Nu hadn’t let go of the gun. I asked myself, afterwards, if it would have made a difference if he had. He was more or less out of it, certainly groggy, but a dogged survival instinct had him still struggling to aim.
I lurched to my feet and lashed out towards his hea
d, my booted foot cracking hard against his jaw. He splayed backwards, the gun finally spilling from nerveless fingers. His skull bounced off the ground with a dull, wet thump.
Balance gone, I staggered over and snatched up the gun, recognising it as a SIG that was almost undoubtedly my own. I shoved the gun into the leg pocket of my trousers, almost falling.
The ringing in my ears wouldn’t clear. It had become high-pitched, erratic, and I realised that Maria was out of her tent, in a skinny top and shorts, eyes wild, and she was screaming on and on, eyes fixed on Nu’s body.
The rise and fall of his ribcage told me he was still breathing, if shallowly. But the earth around his head was turning slowly dark, and that was very bad news.
‘Maria!’ She jerked, and I realised I was shouting. ‘We need a medic. Where’s your phone?’
She was starting to shiver now and didn’t respond, didn’t take her eyes off him. I tottered across and grabbed her arms, gave her a shake.
‘Is he dead?’ Her face was white, eyes huge. ‘Is he dead?’
‘No,’ I said, ignoring the voice in my head that told me I’d fractured his skull. ‘But he will be if we don’t get him to a hospital. Listen to me, Maria! Where’s your phone?’
I took the flicker of her eyes as permission to scramble into her tent, quickly locating last night’s clothes. I dug in the pockets until my hand closed over the shape of the phone in the gloom. Above me, there were two holes in the canvas walls, on opposite sides, where the round had penetrated and continued on, harmlessly, into the night.
I backed out of the tent again, stabbed my thumb on the power button for the phone and cursed its seemingly interminable start-up routine.
‘He’s shot,’ Maria murmured. When I glanced across, she still hadn’t taken her eyes away from Nu.
‘Nobody’s been shot. He missed,’ I snapped. Aware of a tickle at the side of my neck, I dabbed a hand to it. My fingers came away greasy with blood, muttered, ‘Not by much, but he missed.’
‘He’s shot,’ Maria repeated, mumbling. ‘I saw the blood. I saw him fall. I saw…’
Her voice drifted off and I realised from the shock-bound stare that whatever she was seeing, it wasn’t here and now.
‘Who, Maria?’ I asked, more gently now, although part of me already knew the answer. ‘Who did you see?’
Her head turned in my direction, but her streaming eyes were a long way from me. ‘Liam,’ she said.
CHAPTER FORTY
‘When Maria and Liam left here five years ago, they joined Debacle together,’ Randall Bane said. ‘She didn’t tell me what she planned to do.’
‘Would you have tried to talk her out of it?’ I asked dryly. ‘I thought you encouraged everyone to find their own path?’
‘I do.’ For a moment his eyes were very dark and very difficult to read. ‘But Debacle was Liam’s choice, not Maria’s. She went only to be with him.’
‘I see.’
‘Do you?’ There was a hint of bitterness in his voice that I’d never heard there before. ‘Afterwards…she was never quite the same again.’
‘She witnessed his death, didn’t she?’ I said. ‘That would be enough to break anybody.’
‘Perhaps.’ He glanced at me again, fathomless and brooding. ‘It would not have broken you.’
I was sitting on the folded-down tailgate of a big Ford crew cab pickup truck, which had brought Bane out to the campsite, together with Yancy and a couple of the other security men.
They’d found me keeping a watch over the still-unconscious Nu. Maria had closed down into shock by the time they arrived. I’d wrapped her in blankets and stayed close, but she hadn’t spoken again, just sat silently rocking herself into a protective trance.
Nu hadn’t moved. I’d checked his airway and his pulse, which was a steady tremble in his veins. There was a protruding rock beneath his skull and he’d landed on it hard enough to break the skin, and the bone beneath. The fluid coming from his ears – not a good sign – told me he was beyond my medical abilities, so I’d left him where he’d fallen.
About an hour after my 911 call, I’d heard the first approaching vehicle and assumed it must be the paramedics, but stayed put. Our fire was the only light showing out here, so they didn’t need additional guidance from me. I left the SIG in my leg pocket, albeit with the flap open.
It was my gun. Not just the same make and model, but my personal weapon. I didn’t need to check the serial number. I’d know it anywhere. The one I’d buried on the way into Fourth Day and had last seen on the desk in Bane’s study. I could hazard a pretty good guess at Nu’s plan. Shoot Maria first, then suicide me and leave the SIG in my own dead hand.
What I didn’t know was why.
But when the vehicle engine finally stopped and I heard doors slam, it was Bane who strode into the camp, followed by Yancy and the others, fanning out, M16s ready.
Bane faltered, taking in Maria’s almost catatonic state and Nu’s immobile body. Yancy shouldered his weapon and bent over Nu.
‘I thought this was supposed to be quality alone-time,’ I said, aware my voice was still too loud and there was a vicious throbbing in my ears. ‘It’s turning into quite a party.’
‘One of the patrols heard gunshots,’ Bane dismissed, face satanic in the firelight. ‘What happened here?’
I nodded towards Nu. ‘Your boy there decided to use us for target practice.’
Yancy twisted. ‘He’s alive,’ he said, eyes flicking over me. ‘Hurt bad, though.’
‘Yeah, well, he had it coming.’ Still unsteady, I got to my feet, vibrating with tiredness as the adrenaline hangover kicked in. The blood had dried on my neck and was starting to itch. ‘I can understand you wanting rid of me, Bane, but what the hell has Maria done to you?’
Bane didn’t answer immediately. I saw his gaze range round the campsite, taking it all in. He spotted the bullet hole in Maria’s tent, so either he was sharp, or he’d devised the plan and was just checking how far Nu had managed to get before being so unexpectedly thwarted.
‘Maria is an innocent,’ he said at last. ‘I have no idea why John would try to harm her, as you say.’
‘Well, think harder.’
Bane fell silent. Eventually, he glanced at Yancy. ‘Tyrone, please take Maria out of here.’
‘She stays.’ I held up the cellphone I’d taken from Maria. ‘I’ve already called this in. Trying to cover up for her will only make it worse when the cops interview Nu…if he ever comes round, of course. He landed with quite a crack.’
Yancy’s eyes flicked over Nu. ‘I knew this Brit bastard was up to something,’ he muttered.
Bane silenced him with a single look. ‘What happened?’ he asked again, something subdued about him.
‘A convenient opportunity for you,’ I said. ‘Or an engineered one – I’m not sure which. A chance to get rid of two liabilities at the same time.’
‘And in what way, exactly, might you both be considered liabilities?’
‘Well, I’ve seen things I really shouldn’t have done,’ I said, glancing at Yancy, who’d straightened and moved closer. I deliberately ignored him, skimmed my eyes over Maria’s huddled figure instead. ‘And her because people are closing in on you, Bane. Heavy people, and she’s just too delicate to hold the line. What are you afraid she might tell them about you?’
‘Not everyone is as resilient as you are, Charlie,’ he said, evasive, ‘but if you think I’d sanction something like this, you are gravely mistaken. I have always tried to protect Maria.’
‘I saw her run from you, scared, days before we took Witney,’ I said flatly. ‘Now you send the pair of us out here, prepped as sacrificial lambs. Nu was even using my gun, just to make it look good.’ I fished the SIG out of my pocket and displayed it loosely, partly to show it to him, and partly to disguise the fact that I was reaching for it at all.
‘Bastard,’ Yancy repeated. He swung round and glared at the supine figure, shifting his weight so that for a
moment I thought he meant to put the boot in.
As for Bane, something flashed through his face, emphasized by the light from the fire. Anger and sorrow. Suddenly, I realised this was as much a shock to him as it had been to me. Whatever Nu had been up to, he’d done it without Bane’s blessing. And possibly without Yancy’s knowledge.
And that…changed things.
‘I sent Maria out here as your guide because I thought she could learn something from you, not the other way around,’ Bane admitted. ‘I hoped she would absorb something of that resilience I mentioned. Something of your strength.’
‘Why?’
Those eyes pierced me again. ‘Because I spend my life trying to help people, but my biggest regret has always been that I seem unable to help the one person who means most to me – my own daughter.’
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
The police and paramedics arrived at the same time, and from then on the activity became frenetic. I let the uniforms take away my SIG with gloved hands, dropping it into an evidence bag. This was getting to be a habit.
The paramedics quickly decided to airlift Nu to the nearest trauma centre. They wanted to take Maria in as well, but I pointed out that transporting the victim to the same hospital as the man who’d tried to kill her might not be good for her state of mind. Bane intervened. I don’t know what he said to them, but eventually they entrusted a sedated Maria to his care. He left with her, in the big pickup, shortly afterwards.
The female paramedic who checked me over told me I’d been lucky, and that my hearing should recover in a day or two. It wasn’t the first time I’d experienced gunshots at close proximity, but the muffled whine was starting to annoy. I hedged when she asked careful questions about my residual black eye.
By the time the air ambulance helicopter lifted off with Nu on board, the sky was lightening towards another mild day.
Yancy appeared at my elbow. ‘I’m gonna drive you back to the compound in the Jeep,’ he told me. ‘There’s a Detective Gardner waiting on you there.’