Terror Stash

by Tracy Cooper-Posey

  He’d simply turn around and kill her. Problem solved.

  The adrenaline pouring through her turned to an icy nausea. She should halt this now, before she was fully committed. Except that if she did, then Caden Rawn would be on his own.

  Then the man she knew to be Ghenghis Bob got up from his computer and headed for the exit. She had maybe sixty seconds to decide what she was going to do.

  She squeezed her thudding temples with finger and thumb. “Oh Christ...” she murmured.

  Chapter Ten

  Gut instinct. She was smart. Stay smart, stay calm. Follow him.

  She dropped the history book onto the shelf and watched as he turned left outside the glass doors of the library, heading for the covered walk that led across the public park to the bandstand on the other side. Across the road from the bandstand was the river.

  As soon as he’d disappeared, she took a couple of steps towards the end of the stacks, then stopped. What if someone was watching to see if anyone took off after him? What if he was at the end of the park, watching the library to see who came out after him? What was she supposed to do now?

  She had to leave the library. That would look innocent enough. So she slipped out the glass doors and spotted a Good Samaritans bin at the end of the porch. She made for it and went through the contents, while watching the walkway.

  Bob was almost halfway across the park, now. He didn’t glance back. Did that mean other people were watching his back for him? Or was he just supremely confident? Or innocent?

  She picked up a pair of battered runners and quickly stepped out of her pumps and tried them on. Close enough. She tied them up and to salve her conscience, threw the leather pumps into the bin. They were almost brand new. Someone would appreciate them.

  There was an oversized dark green high school sweatshirt towards the bottom. With no more hesitation, she threw her suit jacket into the bin. She threaded her head and arm through the shoulder strap of her purse and put the sweatshirt on over the top of it. She pulled the strap around so the purse was resting against the small of her back. She couldn’t afford to abandon her purse and this left her hands free and gave her freedom of movement.

  She glanced up again. Bob was at the bandstand, now. She held her breath. Which direction would he take?

  He turned around and came straight back towards the library.

  She didn’t think her adrenaline could spike anymore this day than it had already, but the surge that shot through her as he headed back made her feel almost dizzy. She clutched the side of the bin, realizing how close she’d come to blowing it from the start. He’d done a dummy run to the bandstand and doubled-back. If anyone did the same thing, it would be a sure tip-off they were following him. Christ, she’d even seen this in the movies. Why hadn’t she thought of it now?

  She had to start thinking like a terrorist.

  Montana realized with another jolt that she’d just got her proof. Innocent tourists did not do dummy runs to smoke out anyone following them. There was still an outside chance he was not Ghenghis Bob, but whoever he was, he was not a law-abiding citizen of any country.

  Her instincts had been right.

  She started searching through the bin in earnest as he came closer. Now she had the scungy sweatshirt and ragged runners on, he’d look at her and figure she really was a destitute scavenging for anything of value. While her head was below the top of the high-sided bin, she ripped the pins and combs from her hair and tousled it, trying to make it look as unkempt as her sweatshirt. At the last second, she remembered to wipe her lipstick off. The rest of her makeup was light enough and after a day of sweating and worrying, it was mostly gone.

  She saw a pair of black jeans at the very back corner and hung over the side of the bin to reach them, as Ghenghis Bob strolled past her, out onto the parking area. She kept her head averted and below the level of the bin. There was a good chance he’d remember her face from the Pink Galah, if he saw it.

  She held up the jeans for inspection. They were pretty much whole, although the hems were frayed. The tag said they were size ten. She translated the Australian sizing to US size eight. Good enough. She carefully folded them over her arm and the movements of shaking them out, holding them up and folding them allowed her to glance naturally towards the parking area. Bob had moved past all the cars now. He wasn’t driving.

  She strolled out into the car park herself. Was there anything in her car that she needed or should grab? She didn’t own weapons and wasn’t sure having them would be a good idea. If Ghenghis Bob did confront her, there was a chance she could talk her way out of it. She’d seen him at the pub and admired him and hey, wasn’t that fight something else? When she saw him in the library, she’d hung around trying to figure out how she could strike up a conversation.... If he found any sort of weapon on her at all, that story would fall apart.

  She kept going past her car, keeping well back from Bob, trying to look like a casual stroller. Here in town, it would be easy enough. Lots of people used their feet here.

  As she walked, she tried to anticipate where he was going. There were only a few more streets and buildings in this direction, then the land turned into bush. But one of the buildings on the way was the hospital, where the last two survivors of the fight were located.

  Was that why he was in town? Mail and to finish off the job he’d started? Why else would anyone like him risk exposure? Well, no sane person would expect to trip over international criminals here in Margaret River, but if he thought it prudent to double back on himself, then he’d be cautious in other ways, including staying out of sight when his work didn’t require the risk.

  As soon as Montana was sure he was heading for the hospital, she reached under her sweatshirt and delved blindly inside her purse for her cell phone. She stepped behind a tree, in case Bob looked over his shoulder. It wouldn’t do to let him see a ragged bum talking into a cell phone.

  Crystal Wong’s desk number was programmed as a one-touch. Montana depressed the six key and mentally begged Crystal to pick up fast.

  “State department; Crystal Wong speaking.”

  “Crystal, it’s Montana. I can’t stop to explain anything, but I need—”

  “Ohmigod, Montana!” Her voice came out in a squeaky rush. “Mr. Nelson is totally pissed at you! I told him you had a medical appointment, but he didn’t believe me! You did, didn’t you? Have an appointment, I mean?”

  “Crystal, I really need you to listen to me—”

  “Did you?” If anything Crystal’s voice got even higher. She was trying to be discreet, but her shock and distress were coming off her in waves and in the high pitch of her whispers.

  “It doesn’t matter anymore, anyway, Crystal. I can’t explain now. I need you to phone the Margaret River police station and tell them to get some men to the hospital. Now.”

  “Montana, I can’t!” Crystal wailed. “You know we can’t interact with local authorities—not people at my level. I’m just a clerk!!”

  “Shh! It’s all right. It’s okay. Do you have the electronic phone book up on your computer?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Give me the number for the police station here. Not the public one, the staff desk. I’ll call them.”

  Crystal was good at her job. It took her twenty seconds and she rattled off the number. Montana bit her lip, memorizing it. “Thanks, I’m hanging up now before I forget. I’ll get back to you.”

  “But—”

  She clicked off and dialed the number Crystal had given her. It was answered straight away. “Staffing.”

  “Is Constable Scarborough there?”

  “It’s Steve, Montana. What’s up?”

  “I don’t have time to explain and you don’t have time to ask questions. You’ll have to trust me. Get some uniformed men over to the hospital right now. Have them at all the entrance doors, have them visible.”

  “Wait.”

  There was silence for thirty seconds. She edged around the tree
, looking for Ghenghis Bob. He was nearly out of sight, now, but his direction was unmistakable for he was thirty yards away from the community hospital annex. On the other side of the annex was a covered car park for doctors, then the hospital itself. There was nowhere else he could be heading. The hospital was right on the edge of town.

  Steve said into her ear, “Can you tell me what’s happening?”

  “You don’t have time, Steve. You’ve got about two minutes, tops, to get someone at those doors.”

  “They’re already there. There’s been uniformed police in and out of the building for the last three days and we have radios.”

  “Just like that? Without verifying I’m me and not someone pretending to be me?”

  “Your accent is stronger on the phone. No way anyone could fake it.”

  “Yeah, I guess you don’t run across Americans with the direct staff number every day.”

  “Not the American accent,” Steve said gently. “The one underneath it. Very faint, but definitely there.”

  Montana had heard and seen a great many shocking things the last few days, but this one completely floored her, because even as she was casting around for the words to dispute him, she knew she would never find them. The truth was, she just didn’t know.

  “So now you get to tell me why I just did what I did,” Steve added.

  She glanced around the tree again. Bob had disappeared. He’d be sneaking up on the hospital center now, but the uniformed police at the doors would discourage him. She hoped. Everything Bob had done so far had been sneaky and underhand. He wouldn’t be ready to face police openly.

  “You’ll just have to trust me for a while longer, Steve. I promise I’ll give you a full explanation later, when I have time.” She disconnected the call and the phone immediately rang again. Crystal, this time. She grimaced and turned the power off. She couldn’t have the phone chiming now.

  She moved around the tree, towards the hospital once more. If she was right, then Bob was casing the center, looking for a way into the building to deal with the two survivors of the fight. The police would deter him and he would be forced to move off again.

  She intended to follow him for the next week if she had to, to find out where he went when he disappeared from public view. Once she had that location, then she could present verified facts to the police, to Nelson, to anyone who would be interested to know that Ghenghis Bob was alive and well and living in Western Australia, along with a place where they could find him again. It would help take the heat off Caden Rawn, too.

  She crept forward again, heading for the annex. The building was twice as big as a double-car garage and single storied. A roofed verandah ran around all four sides of the building. The annex dated back to colonial days when Australia was just a handy place to park criminals and misfits. Some administrator or British official would have lived in the annex, perhaps even the first generation of Australian officials in the early twentieth century. The preserved and well-maintained building was now a community health center that played host to a wide range of clinics. She wouldn’t look out of place walking around the verandah, so she stepped up onto the varnished beams and edged around the corner.

  The short end of the hospital was facing her and a long expanse of lawn between. No doors.

  No sign of Bob.

  She moved cautiously up to the next corner of the building, scanning the way ahead with every step.

  Between the annex and the doctors’ carport lay a twelve-foot-wide perennial border, with square flags laid corner to corner to make a shortcut through the flowers for busy doctors.

  She paused right at the corner of the building, afraid to step out into the open. The expanse of lawn lay all around the hospital, with virtually no garden beds or trees. The project managers had wisely sunk all their money into the building itself and the fixture and fittings within.

  From the back of the hospital building to the back fences of the row of houses along the next block, the view was completely open. She watched a car cross the open space at the end of the block, slowing for the intersection that the hospital hid from her view.

  Then she saw Bob and her heart thudded hard. He was standing very still, close to the back fences of the houses behind the center. As he was wearing dark brown trousers and a black tee-shirt, he blended in with the dark wood they used for fencing here. He didn’t sway in a sudden gust of hot afternoon air and that drew her gaze.

  He was staring up at the second-floor windows of the hospital. He had a full beard and thick black hair. Both were well trimmed. He was an unusually tall man—over six feet—and quite slender for his height. There was nothing particular about him that would make him stand out in a crowd until you got closer to him and discovered that the steady, mesmerizing stare was partly made so because one of his eyes was green, the other blue.

  The mesmerizing stare Montana could personally attest to. She had watched him watching last night at the Pink Galah. But she hadn’t been close enough to examine his eyes. She had only noticed the difference in the online images and it was listed on the known-facts sheet. Seeing his eyes would be the last piece of confirmation she needed, but it would not be possible to check today. She couldn’t afford let him see her face.

  His predatory stare was in action right now. He was gazing up at something on the second floor of the center. She looked up at the windows herself, but she was at too acute an angle to see anything but the sun bouncing off the glass. If she were at the other end of the verandah, she might.

  Rather than moving to her left, down to the other end of the verandah, she backed away until Bob was not in sight. She hurried around the annex’s verandah, her feet thudding on the old wood, coming to the other end of the verandah by circling the entire building. She edged to the corner and checked Bob’s location first.

  He hadn’t moved.

  She looked up at the windows again and this time her view was better. As she looked up, she saw a man in a hospital gown at the third window along. He turned away from the window. She hadn’t seen him long enough, but she had a feeling he was one of the five men who had attacked Rawn.

  Bob did not move from his post, even though the man had turned away.

  A few seconds later he was back at the window. In the window to the right, a second man appeared, looking down at Bob.

  “What the hell...?” Montana looked from the windows to Bob and back again. Nothing was happening. They weren’t signaling to each other, mouthing words, or showing any emotion at all that she could see. They were just standing there, staring at each other.

  After more than a minute of steady staring, Bob at last made a move. He brought his fingertips to his chin, his lips and his forehead, then bowed from the waist.

  The two men in the window nodded their heads. Once.

  Then they turned and walked away.

  Bob, too, turned and headed for the road at the end of the hospital. He did not attempt to approach the back entrance. He didn’t look over his shoulder to where Montana was standing clutching the corner of the annex building, her mouth hanging open.

  When he rounded the corner of the hospital and disappeared, she finally roused herself. She crossed the flowerbed and the grassed-over lot, breaking into a slow jog to make up for her dislodged attention. At the corner of the hospital, she dropped into a crouch and peered around carefully.

  Ghenghis Bob was crossing the narrow tarmac of the road, moving swiftly. As she watched, he reached the gravel shoulder and slowly stepped down the sharp, short bank on the other side of the road. Crickets chirped a protest at his interruption as he pushed into the low undergrowth between the tall gum trees. So still was the afternoon, the snap of twigs and the sweep of wattle across his trouser legs as he pushed deeper inside came to her as clearly as if she had been there with him.

  She looked down at her suit trousers. They would offer no protection at all. With a quick glance over her shoulder for observers, she shucked off the last piece of Armani. The oversized sw
eatshirt preserved most of her dignity as she thrust her legs into the black jeans and yanked them up around her waist, jumping to get them up quicker. Then she took one last glance around the corner and saw that Bob was still cutting through the bush like a ship through water. She had to stay on him.

  She hurried across the road, which was still empty of cars, and half-slid, half-lunged down the short embankment, breaking twigs and sticks and rattling gravel down with her. At the bottom, she stayed crouched, listening. Had Bob heard the noise over the sound of his own passage?

  She could still hear the echoing crack and pop of twigs and undergrowth, although he was too far away for her to hear the brush of growth against his clothes this time.

  Reassured, she rose to her feet and followed him.

  The next two and a half hours were an education to her. She was not trained in bush craft, although she had spent more than her share of weekends out camping in the bush like thousands of Australians did every weekend of the year except for deep winter, which lasted about three nanoseconds here.

  But she had never had to walk through bush she didn’t know while trying to move as silently as possible.

  She quickly learned that silence just wasn’t possible. There was no spongy cushion of leaf litter to muffle her steps. Gum trees constantly shed paper-dry leaves, bark and twigs, all year round, and the dried gum nuts they dropped after they had flowered and shed their spore tended to go off like mini firecrackers when stepped on just right. It was like trying to walk on uncooked instant noodles and not make a sound.

  She spent more time watching where she put her feet than she did watching where Bob was heading.

  Then she noticed that the ground underneath the wattle bushes was almost completely bare of leaf litter. Normally, she didn’t like to rub up against them because they let off an astringent scent that got on her clothes and the spindly, needle-like leaves on them would slap at her as she passed. But she wasn’t in ‘normal’ now.