Deadman’s Track

by Sarah Barrie

  ‘You killed all these people for a ring?’ Riley asked. ‘Pax, what’s wrong with you?’

  ‘That’s a twelve million dollar ring, sweetheart. The boss would like it back.’

  ‘It’s not, it’s—twelve million?’ Riley gasped.

  Tess’s mind was spinning. Well, it wasn’t Aaron. The stupid thought struck her as she attempted to process what was going on. The man in front of them had murdered everyone for Riley’s ring. Did this have something to do with Jared’s case? Was this the guy who’d sent Jared those pictures?

  ‘Now!’ Pax shouted when Riley continued to stare, shocked into immobility.

  ‘Okay. Okay.’ Riley shuffled around in the water, braced herself against the current and let go of the rope to pull the ring from her finger.

  All the guy wanted was the ring. The initial relief he might take it and leave didn’t last more than a few seconds as more questions formed in Tess’s mind. Why not bail them up earlier and demand it? Why kill everyone off one by one, leaving them until last?

  ‘Right, pass it along,’ Pax ordered.

  If he really thought he needed to get the others out of the way before taking back the ring, why not just shoot them? Why put them through what he’d put them through, like some kind of sick game? She looked at his face. He had cold, empty eyes, his finger twitching on the trigger of the gun.

  ‘Tess.’ Jai was attempting to give her the ring.

  Was a man who did all those unspeakable things really just going to let them go? Sick panic clawed at Tess. Why would he? He wasn’t going to stop until they were all dead. But what could she do? She stared at the gun and her mind went blank, just as it had in Tank’s shop. This time, Jared wasn’t here to step between her and a bullet. This time, she had to do something. She had to think. She opened her free hand to take the ring, but fumbled as it touched her palm, almost dropped it. Her heart stopped until she managed to wrap her hand around the ring. If it fell in the river there’d be no finding it.

  If it fell in the river there’d be no finding it. All Pax cared about was the ring. An idea came to her. It was a desperate one, and defying this guy terrified her, but what other choice was left?

  ‘Pass it up to me,’ Pax said.

  Tess nodded but spoke to Riley and Jai before moving. ‘Back up, you two.’

  ‘Give it to me!’ Pax ordered, leaning over the edge of the water.

  ‘In a minute.’

  ‘Ya want to end up as debris too, bitch?’ Pax spat. ‘Just fuck me around.’

  Tess held the ring out over the water with a trembling hand as she used the rope to help her move back. ‘I couldn’t care less about the ring,’ she said, voice unsteady. ‘It’s yours. But I’ll be leaving it on the other side. You follow us in, or shoot at them or me, and I’ll drop it in this very fast flowing, very dark river. It could end up anywhere. You’ll never find it.’

  ‘Ya stupid cow!’ Pax snarled. ‘Ya want to live, you’ll give me that fucking ring!’

  ‘I might have believed that if you hadn’t already killed our friends. You want this ring, you stay there until we’re across. Then you’ll get it.’

  Pax’s gaze moved to Jai and Riley, returned to her. ‘Off you go then,’ he said. ‘I’ll catch up with ya later. Hurry up, I’m coming. And if ya do drop that ring, I’ll shoot ya before ya reach the other side.’

  He had her. She hadn’t thought this through. She glanced across the river. Jai and Riley were nearly at the bank, but it was going to be a sprint to try and get far enough away from Pax before he could fire. Impossible for her. Her rope hand brushed the hiking pole sticking out of the top of her pack. It wasn’t much of a weapon but …

  Pax stepped over some debris and sank to his knee, taking his eyes off her for a second, maybe two, to look where to put his foot next. She used those seconds to slide the pole from her pack, smacking it as hard as she could against the fingers holding the gun. It connected with a loud crack.

  ‘Fuck!’ Pax’s hand convulsed and the gun fell from his grasp with a splash.

  Her heart leapt wildly in her chest. This was it. ‘Go!’ she ordered the others. As she dragged herself the rest of the way through the water, she expected to be caught or shot at any second. When she wasn’t, she ran with them.

  CHAPTER

  43

  ‘There are way too many dead bodies associated with this guy! Where the hell is he?’ Indy marched through the doors of the police station just ahead of Jared. ‘I hope everyone’s ready for this meeting because I need boots on the ground in the Southwest National Park now.’ Indy was fuming but under it, she was as bone-deep scared as Jared was for Tess and her hiking group. He caught up enough to open the meeting room door for her, but stayed silent. Along with the dead Mr Booth from caravan forty-one, they’d discovered receipts and sales tags in Orvist’s van for camping equipment, nonperishable foods and a pair of Nikon Monarch binoculars.

  Inside the meeting room, cops were mingling, some sitting in small groups with coffees, others staring at the board of photos and evidence, deep in conversation or silent and thoughtful. They all quietened and took seats or stood behind their colleagues as Jared and Indy entered.

  ‘Thanks for being so prompt,’ Indy said. ‘Where’s Emily?’

  As she spoke, Emily rushed in behind them. She smiled apologetically as she caught her breath. ‘I’m sorry, but Kit from National Parks just called. She and another ranger went out earlier to recover the boat Tess found on the lagoon.’

  Jared’s stomach clenched. He was waiting for bad news. Emily’s face gave it away. ‘And?’ he asked.

  ‘They found a backpack in the boat, so they did a search. They found a body.’

  There was a moment when he didn’t want to ask, didn’t want to know who it belonged to. But the colour had drained from Indy’s face. She didn’t ask either.

  ‘Who?’ he finally said.

  ‘The body belongs to a male, probably early twenties.’ Emily showed them an image on her phone of a victim that had been in the water.

  ‘It’s Brock Hodgkins,’ Jared said, recognising him.

  ‘Poor kid.’ Indy sat, rubbing her eyes. ‘Murdered?’

  ‘Kit said it looks like a drowning, but the victim has bruising to his upper torso that could suggest a struggle of some kind. They want to know what to do. They’re … worried about animals disturbing the body.’

  ‘Ask them to cover him if they can, but don’t intrude on the scene any more than necessary,’ Indy said.

  ‘Will do.’

  ‘And do we know if anyone has located the couple he started back with?’

  ‘I’ll find out,’ Emily said, and disappeared again.

  Indy stared at Jared for a moment, though he thought it might have been more through than at, as though she were preparing herself for battle. Then she straightened, her face all business.

  ‘Right,’ she said sharply and pushed back to her feet. ‘Paxton Orvist. The sick bastard knows where Tess and her hiking group are, has the survival training to exist in the national park, kills for the hell of it and is after a ring Riley Finlay has on her finger. We now have a dead hiker and I’m going to assume there’s a strong likelihood his death is the result of Orvist’s work. Finally, Tess believes Hodgkins went home and we have no way of warning her or her remaining group what they’re up against. We need to get out there and attack this area from every possible angle. First priority is bringing Tess and the others back safely, but we don’t want Orvist slipping through our fingers out there, either.’

  ‘We’re not going to be able to fly out there tonight,’ Roberts said. ‘It’s already too late. We can’t search until first light, anyway. But I’ve begun coordinating with Search and Rescue on the best way to tackle this. We don’t want civilians on the ground but the chopper pilots will take groups of us out and drop us at strategic locations along the track and the surrounding areas. Other teams can go in by boat. Aaron and Craig are on their way in to talk to us.’
/>   Though Jared grated at the mention of Aaron’s name, now wasn’t the time for grudges. Hell, if the guy helped save Tess’s life, he’d happily shake his hand.

  ‘Okay,’ Indy said. ‘Let’s make this happen.’

  ‘Are you okay?’ he asked her as the preparation began in earnest.

  She nodded. ‘Yeah. But … God, Jared, I feel sick. If this bastard—’

  ‘We’ll get them,’ he replied as confidently as he could manage over his own churning dread. ‘We’ll find Tess and the others, and we’ll get Orvist. I’m on the first chopper out there tomorrow and I’m not coming back until we do.’

  CHAPTER

  44

  Jai crouched low in the trees with Tess and Riley and waited, watching. Darkness was falling quickly and the rain was doing its best to soak them through their raincoats. It was freezing, and he noted Tess was shivering badly, no doubt colder than he and Riley put together as a result of her earlier fall in the river. Sitting so still, too afraid to leave their hiding spot, wasn’t good for keeping warm, either.

  For as long as he lived he’d never forgive himself for this. If he survived.

  Tess lifted a hand and, following her gaze he spotted movement: a slow, silent stalking. Pax. And he’d found his gun. Would it even work? Jai wondered desperately. He put a warning hand on Riley, hoped his expression read Don’t move. Don’t breathe.

  Pax continued past them, stopping every few metres, waiting for what seemed like an eternity, before moving off again.

  They kept still for another ten minutes, none of them trusting Pax not to double back, to be waiting just out of sight. Then, limbs cramping painfully from inactivity and cold, Jai slowly stood to peer into the fading light. Tess and Riley rose beside him.

  ‘We need to get back to the rainforest on the other side of the Ironbound Range,’ Tess said, her voice barely audible. ‘And we need to do it in the dark. There’s no cover up there.’

  Jai couldn’t bear keeping still, waiting to be found. He’d rather move. ‘Okay.’

  ‘Can’t we just stay here?’ Riley whispered, eyes desperate. ‘Or keep going towards Melaleuca?’

  Tess shook her head. ‘We’re sitting ducks—there’s not enough forest here to hide in indefinitely and there’s too much open ground between here and Melaleuca. Besides, he’ll be expecting us to do that.’

  ‘It was scary enough in the daytime, Tess,’ Riley whispered desperately. ‘I can’t do it in the dark. It’s too high, too windy. If we fall, we’re dead.’

  Jai was thinking something similar, but pushed the fear back to something manageable. He knew it was their only choice. He put a hand on Riley’s shoulder and squeezed. ‘We have to.’

  ‘Keep a look out,’ Tess ordered, and with the next gust of wind that rattled the trees hard enough to make some noise, she unzipped her pack. He watched as she quietly shoved food into her pockets, then emptied the contents of her pack onto the ground. ‘Give me your sleeping bags and any ready-to-eat food you have,’ she said. ‘Hurry, but be quiet.’

  They loaded up one pack, secured it. ‘Now what?’ he asked.

  ‘As soon as it’s full dark, we walk. Even in almost complete darkness the path stands out from the ground around it, and once we hit the boardwalk, we can use it to guide us. The rest, you’re just going to have to trust me.’

  ‘I do,’ he said and looked at Riley.

  Riley hesitated, then nodded. ‘Yeah. Okay.’

  *

  Jai’s legs were jelly, his feet stung viciously from blisters and his head pounded from stress and long periods of heavy concentration as they seemed to trudge forever. He was out of water, too, but he didn’t want to bring that up. It had been tough, slow going and they’d been walking or crawling for what felt like the entire night. He shifted the pack and felt a cold chill where it unstuck from his back. He’d been taking turns with Tess to carry it. Riley simply couldn’t anymore. They’d had to talk her over a lot of the worst of the terrain, places that had scared him witless. But he was pretty sure they were on the last of the dips across the top of the ranges. He tried not to think too much about how much further Tess intended on taking them, putting one painful foot in front of the other, until she suddenly stopped.

  ‘We’re heading back down into the forest,’ she whispered. ‘I’m going to need to risk turning on the torch. Keep your eyes and ears open, okay?’

  They crept under the canopy of the trees and slipped and slid by torchlight just a few metres. To their right, a huge fallen tree lay just off the track and Tess headed for it. ‘We’ll get behind this thing. Going too far into this sort of terrain in the dark would be suicidal.’

  ‘What we just did was suicidal,’ Riley said. ‘I think I almost died twice.’

  ‘Hey, at least it stopped raining,’ Jai said. ‘Are you sure this is good enough?’ he asked Tess as he slid over the tree to the far side.

  ‘We can’t risk injury going further. I don’t think we’ll be visible from the track.’

  ‘I feel sick,’ Riley said, awkwardly scurrying over the tree. ‘Sorry, not trying to complain, just saying I don’t think I can go any further anyway.’

  ‘We can’t set up a tent, but we’ll make up a rough shelter and try and get some rest. Make sure you eat something.’

  He was standing close enough to feel the tremors emanating from Tess. ‘You’re shaking. Are you still wet from the fall?’

  ‘I’ll be okay. We’re all cold, right?’

  He wasn’t going to argue. His ears were aching from the wind on the range and he couldn’t feel his face or fingers. But he helped rig up a makeshift shelter from a tent fly and was grateful for the relative comfort of his sleeping bag.

  ‘So,’ Tess asked once they were settled, ‘anyone want to tell me how you two happen to have a—what was it? Twelve million dollar ring?’

  ‘I wouldn’t mind an explanation,’ Riley said. Her voice was full of anger. He couldn’t see much but he knew she was glaring accusingly at him.

  ‘I don’t know!’ he said. ‘I was sure …’ Because he didn’t know how else to explain, or where to start, he told them all of it: the break-ins, the murders he was tricked into being a part of, how Tank was set up, the drop that went wrong. ‘I was so nervous, so worried about getting it done. I must have picked up the wrong box.’

  ‘Jai, what were you thinking?’ Tess asked. ‘Why didn’t you go to the police?’

  ‘I just got caught up,’ he said miserably. ‘I was trying to get out of it.’

  ‘Good job!’ Riley lifted her head to snap.

  ‘I’m sorry!’ he said, and heard the crack in his own voice. ‘I didn’t know what to do. On that—’ He took a deep breath. ‘Tess, what you did back there was awesome. Thank you. He would have killed us.’

  ‘You have to tell,’ Riley said.

  ‘I’ll go to prison for murder!’

  ‘It wasn’t murder. You might have been holding the gun but Pax shoved the guy at you and it went off accidentally,’ Riley said. ‘This is Pax’s fault.’

  ‘I don’t reckon the cops will see it that way.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Tess said. ‘Not now. All that matters for the time being is staying alive. Someone will come after us, eventually. We need to survive until they do. Get some rest. I’ll take first watch.’

  Light rain hitting her face woke Tess at first light. She sat up, frozen, almost convulsing with the tremors that racked her body. She’d somehow rolled out from under the shelter and quickly moved herself back under it.

  ‘Morning,’ Jai whispered. Riley was curled up against him, sleeping soundly.

  ‘Morning,’ Tess replied. She reached for her water bottle, but found it empty.

  ‘Mine’s all gone too,’ Jai said. ‘We should have filled up when we crossed that creek.’

  ‘Hey,’ Riley said, stretching and looking around. The thick canopy of twisted trunks revealed little about their location. ‘God, it’s freezing.’

  ‘Pa
ss me your water bottle,’ Tess said. She kicked out of her sleeping bag, rolled it up and put it back in the pack. Then she pulled on her damp shoes. ‘Yours too, Jai.’

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Back to that creek at high camp—it’s maybe half a kilometre. I won’t be long. Pack up ready to move if necessary but don’t leave this spot.’

  ‘Got it,’ Jai said, taking a muesli bar out of the pack. ‘Tess, be careful.’

  ‘Do you think there’s a chance he’s given up?’ Riley asked.

  ‘Twelve million dollars and six dead hikers,’ Tess said. ‘What do you think?’ She looked down at the ring she’d slipped onto her finger so she wouldn’t lose it. A twelve million dollar ring? Didn’t look very special to her. But it was worth killing for, so she wasn’t letting it go.

  ‘We don’t know for sure he killed Brock,’ Jai said.

  Tess pulled a face at him that she hoped told him what she thought of that. ‘If something happens, if he finds me, I’m going to scream as loud as I can to alert you. If you hear that scream, you’re on your own. You don’t come for me. You hide, you wait it out here or somewhere else where you’re not too far from open ground so when you hear the Search and Rescue teams fly over—and they will come—you can get out fast and flag them down. Okay?’

  ‘Tess …’ Riley began.

  ‘Okay?’ she asked Jai again.

  Jai hesitated, then finally nodded. ‘Yeah. Yeah, okay. For Riley. If it was just you and me out here, I wouldn’t leave. I’d come to help.’

  ‘Then we’d all die,’ she told him. ‘Stay safe.’

  ‘Be careful,’ Riley begged.

  She smiled tightly and moved quietly up the track. There was a long stretch of open ridge between her and the shelter of the light forest directly surrounding the creek. She stood just inside the tree line, listening carefully as she scanned the area for any sign of Pax. Nothing. She crept out, tense, ready at any second to duck for cover. A little further, further again. Then she raced on aching legs, ate up the ground as quickly as she could and fell down into the scrub by the creek, breathing heavily.