The Number 8

by Joel Arcanjo

  “I’m not talking about the summit.”

  Dante was dripping everywhere now. He wanted to call someone and tell them what he knew, but he still had no proof. The article he was reading focused on the bus driver who had vowed to get justice for his son. For ten years he had fought the legal system and tried to get the verdict overturned but failed. But the article also detailed that two weeks after the jury ruled against the family, his wife had taken her own life. So the crime had not only taken his son’s life, but also his wife’s. Dante understood why he had fought so hard.

  But five years had gone by since the last news article had been published on the bus driver, whose real name was Simon Napier. He had supposedly disappeared into thin air. But it was now clear to Dante that Simon Napier had been planning this spree. Dante had only spoken to him twice and he had told Dante that he had been driving this route for a few years. To have planned these murders so intricately, knowing where the best places were to kill his targets and make them look like accidents, would have taken years of preparation. It was a genius plan really.

  Dante scrolled down, he wanted to see if there was anything else he needed to know. His eyes came to rest on a photograph. It was maybe ten years old. Five years after the trial and five years before Simon Napier went off the grid. It was a picture of his whole family, or what was left of it. His wife was dead by this point, but he had children. He had two daughters. They were around the same age and like their father, they looked distraught.

  Dante had had an inkling about the bus driver. Finding out it was him merely confirmed his theory. But this picture changed everything. His body was not ready for it. His palms started to sweat, his heartbeat went through the roof and his first instinct was to reach for his phone.

  Annie and Becki were Simon Napier’s daughters.

  Chapter 45

  “What do you mean?” Asmir asked her, “We’re going to the summit. Right?”

  “I am, but you’re not,” Becki said, turning to face him, her face entirely changed now.

  “Where the hell am I going then?” Asmir asked, a little frightened now.

  “Oh. You are so naive…” she laughed before pulling the emergency stop lever.

  The cable car squeaked to halt, flinging Asmir to the floor. The car trembled and swung on the cord, but Becki remained standing having braced herself early.

  “What…what the hell?!” Asmir spluttered, his mouth filled with blood from the fall.

  “Ah, damn, I was hoping this would go down without you bleeding. Are you happy? I’m going to have to clean that up now,” she said calmly, pointing at the droplets of Asmir’s blood on the floor of the cable car.

  He looked at her, stunned into silence.

  “This is a shame really, I started to enjoy your company. This was meant to have been ended a while ago, but my sister…”

  “At the lodge…you wanted me to get swept down the river.”

  “That was the plan, but big sis had to get in the way. She wanted to do it right, she wanted it to happen here.”

  “Sis…Sister?” Asmir gasped.

  “Oh, that’s what you’re surprised about? Funny, I thought you’d be more interested in why you’re about to die, but hey, I’ll indulge you. Yes, Annie is my sister.”

  She grabbed what looked like a crowbar out of her handbag and began to pry open the doors to the cable car.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Asmir blurted out.

  “Oh this? Don’t you worry, it’ll be over soon,” she said flapping her free hand at him.

  “People are going to see this, Becki. You’re crazy.”

  She paused what she was doing and looked him right in the eyes. A cold gaze of fury and hatred.

  “Look around you, Asmir Nankin, there’s no one to see anything. The car behind us is empty and so is the one in front. Why do you think we picked this spot? This exact spot is shielded from the eyes in Queenstown. No one can see any of this.”

  “And what are they going to think about you pulling the emergency brake?”

  “You’ve got that wrong too. You pulled the emergency brake and jumped out when you found out that your best friend had died in a tragic accident.”

  “Dante? What… Why are you doing this?”

  “Finally we get down to brass tacks! It took you long enough. Truth is, you didn’t do anything…”

  Asmir interrupted her, “So why are you doing this to me?”

  “Let me finish… You didn’t do anything but your Dad did everything! Your Dad was the lawyer that defended the two kids who killed my brother and caused my mother to commit suicide. He is the reason that they got off scot free. They killed him, he knew it and he still defended them,” she said, tears streaming down her face now.

  “I have nothing to do with that. I’m not responsible for the actions of my Dad.”

  “No, but he is responsible for his own and he must pay. My brother deserves justice! An eye for an eye. He took away what we cared about most and now we’re taking away what he cares about most.”

  “Well, you’re failing there,” Asmir puffed desperately, in a plea to change her mind. “If you wanted to take away what he cared about most, you should’ve taken away his money and his career.”

  “We were going to kill him, but, why kill a dying man? Yes, we know. Your father is going to die, but not before he loses you! As for the rest of it, well, it’s too late to change our plans now. Get up, it’s time,” she said, with the crowbar held up threateningly.

  Asmir got to his feet slowly, his mouth still bleeding and he spat on the ground, if only to spite Becki. She grabbed his arm and forced him closer to the open door. The icy wind pelted him with rain. He was sodden in seconds. It was a very similar feeling to the bungy jump he had experienced earlier. Except, he knew he wouldn’t be caught by an elastic cord. He would plunge to his death. He didn’t think this was how he would die. He thought he would die in a blaze of glory after a particularly heavy bender, not as a human pancake on the side of a mountain.

  “I’d rather not push you, so…go ahead,” Becki whispered in his ear.

  Asmir stood for a moment, unable to believe that he was being forced to jump out of a cable car willingly.

  Then, two things happened which changed everything. A strong gust of wind shook the cable car and unbalanced Becki, who hadn’t been holding onto the rails. Then, Asmir’s phone, which he had left on the seat behind Becki, burst into life. It buzzed loudly on the seat and startled her. It was enough. Asmir swung around, grabbed for the crowbar and pulled hard. His momentum swung him back inside and into safety. But the cable car, with the combination of wind and sudden movement, began to see-saw from side to side dangerously. Asmir hadn’t managed to pry the weapon from her hand completely, she was fighting back. But Asmir was on the inside now, Becki was the one with her back to the open door. He waited until she had a firm grip on the crowbar and then, he let go. Becki stumbled backwards, unable to regain balance. She grabbed for the rail, but missed. Just like that, she was gone. The cable car righted itself and stopped swinging. It was over.

  The phone was still buzzing on the seat.

  He took a deep breath and spat some more blood onto the floor. It was Dante calling.

  He answered, “D, you just saved my life.”

  Chapter 46

  “Becki is Ben’s daughter and so is Annie. They’re sisters. Get away from her!” Dante shouted down the phone, prompting Asmir to pull his hand away from his ear.

  “She’s dead, D,” Asmir replied, still out of breath.

  Dante was silent.

  “She tried to kill me. She took me up to the cable cars, pulled the emergency brake and forced the doors open. If it hadn’t been for your call, it would be me down there, not her.”

  “You need to come back here, right now!” Dante shouted again.

  Asmir agreed. “I’m coming.”

  The cable cars took ten minutes to start up again, another five minutes to the summit where
he got off and got on the car behind him. Asmir knew that the operators would check the emergency brake in each car and he didn’t want to be in the one where it had been tampered with. There were no CCTV cameras in any of the cars and only one at each end of the cable. They would see him get out of the car at the top, but they wouldn’t check the tape until he was long gone, so he was in the clear.

  It took twenty minutes to get down. From there, he ran through the rain to the hostel. It wouldn’t be long before somebody found Becki. She had fallen over the most secluded area, which was obviously her plan for him. So it would take them at least one day to find her. It was getting dark now and no one would be looking for her. There wasn’t a chance in hell that Annie would report her sister missing yet.

  He got to the entrance of the hostel and slowed everything down. His mouth was still bleeding so he made sure to close it tight. He wiped himself off and walked in like he would have if it were any other day.

  He spotted Dante at a computer in the corner but as soon as their eyes met, Dante got up and gestured towards the stairs. It was way too public to talk in there.

  They walked side by side up to the privacy of their room. The moment they closed the door, Dante took charge of the situation. He explained everything to Asmir. The bus driver and his daughters. His son, Viktor and Marco. But what they didn’t know was how it had all happened.

  “Az, do you realize that for the first time this trip, we have the advantage?” Dante said.

  “Becki said that you were meant to be dead, drowned and it would look like an accident. So I’m guessing that Annie is gonna come find you and ask you to take a walk with her. She’s going to try and get you to go swimming. Then, she’ll kill you. Probably by hitting you over the head with a rock or something, hard enough to knock you out, but not hard enough to kill you. She’ll leave you in the water and it’ll look like you fell, hit your head on a rock and drowned.”

  “Sounds about the size of it. But we have the upper hand now. Here’s what I want you to do…”

  Then Dante laid out his plan. It was risky, but if it worked, it would pay off big.

  They had just finished talking when there was a knock at the door.

  Dante turned to Asmir and pointed to the bathroom and added, “She thinks her sister killed you.”

  Asmir obeyed. He hid in the bathroom with the door opened just a crack so he could listen.

  Dante waited a few seconds, then opened the door.

  As predicted Annie asked him to take a walk with her, then a swim. It wasn’t long before her mood changed from flirty and playful to dark and determined.

  “Time to go back, I think,” Dante said, trying to get her to take the bait. They were in a secluded part of the lake with nothing around except trees.

  “I can’t let you go, Dante. You had to be so smart didn’t you? You and your little friend poking your nose around. Wondered why you haven’t seen him? Probably because he’s dead,” she spat, a darkness in her eyes he hadn’t seen before.

  She continued, unprompted, “Who do you think drugged you? We did, me and my sister, Becki. We had to find out what you knew. You were asking us too many questions and we needed to see if you suspected us, but you didn’t. You thought it was Marco,” she cackled. “Like he would have the guts to pull this off.”

  “I saw you kill Viktor you know,” Dante said through gritted teeth. He was up to his waist in the water, while she was stood on the bank. He was feeling very vulnerable.

  “You’re wrong, you didn’t see me, you saw my Dad. You know, the bus driver? That was the brilliance of this plan really. For one of the deaths the other two would not have had the opportunity. In the caves, my sister and I were in the second group with you, but Dad was in the first group. He’d been through those caves so many times he knew every exit and every corner he could hide so he could strike fast and be gone before anyone saw him.”

  “I saw him.”

  “Yeah, that’s why you have to die. You were never on our list, but, things happen and plans change.”

  “And Marco? You switched out his shoes, didn’t you? It made him slip and slide which made him slipping off the cliff more believable. Right? And let me see if I have this right too. Your Dad picked up the body at the bottom, removed the shoes and put it back in the river, only a little further down.”

  She gave him a sarcastic slow clap. “Very good. But you missed someone. Mel. You remember her, don’t you? Dad had to get rid of that nosy bitch. She caught the three of us talking behind the bus. We were pretty sure she had no idea what we were to each other, but she was a loose end and we really don’t like loose ends.”

  “At the lodge… I heard someone talking and then it stopped. That was your Dad killing Mel?” Dante felt a little sick. He hadn’t seen that coming.

  “I had to call the receptionist and pretend to be a relative of hers that was in hospital. That was a drag. Never liked acting. Had to pretend to like you too and listen to all your boring stories. I guess this is a kind of payback,” she said looking at the rock in her hand. She started to advance, but Dante needed to stall.

  “How did you manage to get all three of your targets on one bus? The chances of that are next to none.”

  She stopped and indulged him. “That was all Dad. He found each of their email addresses and got them all to enter a competition for two tickets to this bus trip. Of course, they won and humans don’t like to turn down anything that’s free, especially when it’s an all expenses paid trip to New Zealand. That part was easy. You can convince someone to do anything if you find the right pressure points and push.”

  “Why make all the deaths look like accidents?”

  “I would’ve thought that was obvious. We don’t want to get caught. But I guess it’s also sort of poetic. Because each person that we’ve killed has someone that loved them, even if it’s that brute James. But they’re never going to have any closure. You wanna know why? Knowing that your loved one died in an accident will never bring you closure. Humans need someone or something to blame and what can they blame for an accident? God, maybe? But I left him behind a long time ago… No, I blame Viktor and Marco for the death of my brother and mother and now they’re dead because of me and my family. That’s how to find closure!”

  “Has it all been worth it?” Dante asked her.

  “Every single second of studying this route, coming up with Plan A, B, C, Z, it was all worth it and I would do it again in a heartbeat. My sister will tell you the same. Right now she’s up on the cable cars getting rid of your best friend. His vile father represented Marco and Viktor back then. He took away our justice and we’re taking away his son.”

  “There are some things you can’t plan for, Annie.”

  This threw her off. She became flustered and agitated.

  “Dad told us that we will always have a back-up plan. There will always be a plan,” she said, her eyes intense.

  “What if I told you that Becki had tried to kill Asmir, but instead, she was the one that fell to her death,” Dante said, his demeanor now that of someone who was cool, calm and collected.

  “You’re…you’re lying. She’s too well drilled to get that wrong. We’ve been through it maybe fifty times.”

  “Like I said, plans change,” he said starting to walk towards her calmly. “Az, it’s time,” he shouted.

  Asmir and ten armed policeman emerged from the trees.

  “They’ve got everything, Annie. Time to give it up,” Dante said.

  She looked at Asmir, her eyes filling with tears. Panic and pain etched on her face as it dawned on her.

  “Becki…” she muttered to herself.

  She looked down. It seemed like she was staring at her reflection in the water. Her hands were trembling, but she was still holding the rock.

  Then, she started to sprint at Dante screaming, “Jassspppppeeerrrrrr!”

  But she got about three steps before the officers fired on her. She was shot five times in the back. By the
time she hit the water, Annie Napier was dead.

  Chapter 47

  Dante and Asmir got out of the police station at teno’clock that night. They had been giving their statements for two hours. The police wanted everything nicely tied up in a bow. Dante didn’t understand it. They had heard a full confession from Annie and then some. She had admitted that her sister had tried to kill Asmir which made his actions self-defense. She had detailed ever single area of their plan and yet they had to stay in that dingy interrogation room that smelled like stale coffee for over two hours. But, after all that, they were free to go.

  They hadn’t caught Simon Napier yet, but they would. This island wasn’t big enough for him to hide from the police for too long.

  “I’m sorry,” Asmir said as they made their way back to the hostel.

  “For what?”

  “A lot of things actually, but mainly for not telling you that the tickets were free or that I won them in a competition.”

  Dante chuckled. “Why is that important?”

  “Makes me seem cheap. I’m not cheap, D.”

  “Mate, I know you’re not cheap. You just changed our flights to tomorrow. I don’t even want to guess at how much that cost.”

  “Well, just so you know…”

  “I do.”He didn’t.

  “This trip was a disaster and I’m sorry for that too,” Asmir said, his face showing that his words were genuine.

  “Not completely. It did what it was intended to. Right? Get my mind off all the bad stuff that was happening at home. It did that for sure. Just a shame that I swapped all that stuff for a murderous bus driver and his daughters.”

  “When do we leave here?”

  “9:40. Changed our flights so that we’re leaving from here. Have to be there a couple of hours earlier, so we’re looking at waking up at 6:30. Sorry mate.”

  “It’s fine, I just want to get home now. But first, I need a drink.”

  “Agreed.”