Where the Dead Go

by Sarah Bailey

  Saturday, 16 April

  11.23 pm

  I grip the wheel so hard my hands hurt.

  Theories fly around my head, matching the mad dance of the trees.

  What the hell is Lane doing at the Clarks’?

  Meg’s warnings are like a chant in my brain. Did she really see something? I remember what Janet said about Meg retracting her statement all those years ago, and something suddenly clicks. They paid for my sins. Could she have been talking about Sally?

  Up ahead, de Luca’s car hurtles into the pub car park. She darts across the asphalt in the drizzle, sliding inside my car just as Grange calls me.

  ‘Elsha’s here at her friend’s place,’ he says, sounding like he’s been hyperventilating.

  ‘Okay, great. Stay there until you hear from me. If Lane calls her, call me.’

  ‘What’s going on—?’ he says as I hang up.

  De Luca and I don’t speak. I press on the accelerator and launch the car back onto the road, racing toward the Clarks’ house.

  ‘The kid left the phone on at the house after the emergency call. Lane has totally lost it, yelling and screaming at Daniel Clark.’ De Luca gazes out into the darkness. ‘I just can’t believe it.’

  ‘How long until back-up arrives?’ I say.

  ‘They said thirty to forty minutes.’

  ‘We’ll have to go in without them.’

  She nods. ‘I know.’

  The rain becomes a sheet of silver as we hit the dirt road. The sky lights up then plummets us back into darkness, the wind pulling the car from my control.

  Out of the corner of my eye I see a movement, and I swerve just in time to avoid the crush of a falling tree.

  The back wheels slide out and we slam hard to the right. Holding on to the steering wheel, I feel the air leave my body as I throw my weight to the left. The night sucks us in like a whirlpool. I can’t see anything except for the two white discs of the headlights.

  All sound evaporates. De Luca is pressed back against the seat, her chin almost touching her chest, eyes bulging. One hand is pressed to the dash while the other clutches her phone. She leans toward me; her lips are moving but I can’t hear a thing.

  The absolute silence shifts into a soft but urgent sting before exploding into a horrific blaring.

  My forehead is on the horn and the sound stabs my eardrums.

  ‘Oh!’ I exclaim, reeling back to stop it. Silence again. ‘Are you okay?’

  She nods. ‘Are you?’

  ‘I’m okay.’

  ‘You did well to avoid that.’ She looks at me in astonishment as if only just realising we didn’t hit the tree. Even in the dim light I can see that her irises have completely succumbed to her pupils.

  I nod, taking in the carnage around us: the carcass of the tree, the road turning to water. I right the car and keep going. She gestures to the upcoming turn-off, and the car shakes wildly again as I veer into the shallow court and switch off my headlights.

  Something shines against the dark matt of the bush. Lane’s squad car is parked outside Jacqui Cobb’s house.

  As I step into the rain, my legs buckle and I steady myself against the car. We press our doors shut and approach the house. I notice de Luca check her gun and I do the same, praying like hell we’re not going to need them.

  Branches brush the edges of the house; the sharp scratching creates an angry symphony.

  I plug my earphones into my phone and push in the right bud, then wrap the cord around my ear and fix it in place. ‘Call me and I’ll stay on the line.’

  Panic flashes across de Luca’s face. ‘We’re separating?’

  ‘Yes. I’m going to go in first.’ I set my jaw. ‘You’re on standby if things escalate. I don’t want Lane to feel ambushed—I’m hoping we can talk him down.’ The wind surges again, my hair flying skyward. I frantically pull it into an elastic; it’s dripping wet. ‘You go around that way. See if the side door is open. Keep your phone on and enter if you need to.’

  She nods sharply and disappears into the darkness. I step onto the broken tiles and place my hand on the doorknob, pausing to listen.

  Nothing. Maybe the faint murmur of voices, but I can’t be sure.

  I twist my hand. It’s open.

  ‘I’m going in,’ I say, for de Luca’s benefit.

  A gust of wind masks a tiny creak as I ease the door shut behind me.

  My hand flies to my throat when I come face to face with a shadowy version of myself: the bathroom door is open and I’m looking straight into a mirror.

  ‘Inside,’ I murmur.

  I hear a male voice, sharp and high, and follow it up the passage. Another voice. A thick line of light runs under the lounge-room door; it’s slightly open.

  I press my hand to the door and push it gently, widening the gap by a few centimetres.

  Lane stands a few metres from me, facing the other way. From the angle of his arm I can tell he is holding a gun. An odd sense of calm covers me. It’s all come down to this.

  Peering into the room, I see the twins on the couch on the other side of the room, their terrified eyes blinking in the dim light. Dot is standing in front of them, shoulders squared, chest heaving. The TV blares in the corner of the room, an oblivious game-show host leaning toward the camera and winking exaggeratedly.

  Outside, the wind scratches to be let in.

  ‘I’m not leaving till you admit what you did.’ Lane’s voice is a low growl.

  I widen the gap a bit more and look around his bulk to see Daniel standing in front of a cluttered coffee table. His chin is set in an arrogant tilt, but I can see a pulse in his neck and the tautness in his calves.

  ‘I need you to confess,’ says Lane flatly. ‘You’ve wasted our time from the start.’

  ‘You’re mad,’ spits Daniel.

  ‘I’m not going down for this. I need you to come forward, Daniel.’

  He snarls, ‘I told you to get out.’

  Lane shuffles in an odd little semi-circle, turning the gun on Dot and the kids. ‘You killed Rick,’ he says to Daniel, ‘because you found out he did something to Abbey.’

  Dot whimpers; her gaze darts from the gun to her sons. ‘Please.’

  Daniel is glowering. ‘Don’t you dare threaten my wife. Get out of here or I’ll fucking kill you!’

  Lane thrusts his free hand into his hair. ‘No way. Not until you tell me what happened!’

  ‘Get the fuck out of my house!’ Daniel roars.

  On the couch, one of the boys begins to cry. Lane’s head jerks toward the sound and he grunts, holding his hands on either side of his face as if in pain. The gun points to the ceiling. Wind rushes into the crevasses of the house; false echoes bounce from the walls.

  Lane steadies himself and points the gun back at Dot. ‘Tell me what you did or I shoot her!’

  I step forward, my gun trained on Lane. When Dot sees me, hope washes over her expression. Daniel sees me too, but his face remains blank.

  ‘Kai,’ I say firmly.

  He spins around. All traces of boyish charm are gone. ‘I didn’t hurt her! Or Rick. You have to believe me.’

  ‘I’m not saying you did.’ I take another step. ‘But we need to talk about this properly. Not here.’

  He has the rabid energy of a junkie. The glow from the TV catches in the black of his pupils, and my heart skips a beat. He is capable of anything right now.

  ‘I know how it looks,’ he says. ‘I know you found the bike, but I didn’t see her after she left the station, I swear!’

  I picture him hustling the bike into the storage shed, Abbey racing off into the darkness. The bush was warm and still that night, nothing like the raging beast it is now.

  It’s hard to control my anger. ‘Okay, Kai, I believe you. But this is between us—we don’t need anyone here to be involved. How about you come with me and we can talk it through?’ I inch closer.

  ‘No! I know how it works. I don’t have an alibi. Shit will get pinned on me and I’
ll be screwed.’

  The boys blink. Dot bleats a tiny sob.

  ‘Kai, you know a confession can’t work like this.’ I gesture to the room. ‘We need to do it properly or it will be worth nothing.’

  ‘He must have done something to her,’ Lane chokes out, ‘when I went to the party.’ He brushes tears from his eyes with the sleeve of his jacket. ‘He must have been waiting for her at home, or Rick was. Or that backpacker. But none of it was me, I swear.’

  On the TV, the audience begins to clap and cheer.

  ‘Did you see Abbey after she left the station?’

  Lane’s movements are jerky and he won’t look at me. The eye of the gun is fixed firmly on me. ‘She ran off, like I said, and I went to meet Tommy. But then I came here later, and . . .’ He shakes his head.

  ‘Why did you come here that night, Kai?’

  ‘Because! I was worried about her. Abbey . . . she was angry at me. I just wanted to make sure she was okay.’

  No, I think, disgusted, you were just terrified Abbey was going to say something about what you’d been doing to her.

  ‘And how were you going to check that she was okay?’

  ‘I was just going to look in on her, you know.’

  ‘How?’ I press. ‘Were you going to call her?’

  His shoulders sink in defeat. He knows I know. ‘There’s a tree outside her room. She never closes the blind to the window.’

  Daniel stiffens.

  ‘And was she there?’ I say softly.

  ‘No. I don’t know if he came out looking for her or if he lost it when she got home or what. Or maybe Rick hurt her and that’s why he killed him.’ Lane’s face crumples again. ‘I don’t know what happened—but he does,’ he says, gesturing wildly at Daniel. ‘He needs to stop fucking us around.’

  Jacqui Cobb’s high-pitched voice worms into my ear. A car stopped at the end of the street at some point. I got up to go to the loo and heard it, just idling. It only had its parkers on, which I thought was weird.

  Lane, parking the squad car at the end of the street.

  ‘Okay, okay,’ I say quietly, still hoping I can calm him down enough to cuff him and get him out of here unharmed. ‘Why was Abbey angry with you, Kai?’

  His face folds up like a piece of paper. ‘I guess I let her down. She wouldn’t come with me after that, she wouldn’t let me take her home. She ran off. And then you killed her!’ He stabs the gun clumsily toward Daniel. ‘The next morning I could tell you knew what happened to her. You knew! What did you do to her?’ Lane retches, mopping at his mouth. He’s out of control, muscles pulsing in his face and veins jutting from his neck, but the anguish in his voice seems real.

  ‘Kai,’ I say as calmly as possible, ‘you know we need to go. Why don’t you come with me?’

  ‘I’m not leaving until he comes clean.’ He looks at me pleadingly. ‘Don’t you get it? I’m fucked otherwise.’

  In spite of myself I feel a tug of empathy. He seems so lost. I can’t work out if he’s a sociopath or simply desperate.

  ‘I didn’t bloody touch Abbey or her piece-of-shit boyfriend!’ says Daniel.

  ‘You’re lying.’ Lane narrows his eyes and firms his grip on the gun.

  Daniel’s face contorts in rage; he still seems completely unperturbed by the gun. ‘She was my daughter! I told you, Rick did something to her and I wanted to beat the living shit out of him for it, but someone got to him before I had the chance. I have no idea who it was.’ The words hiss from his teeth.

  Chris and Wayne are statues on the couch. Dot’s eyes slide briefly to the other side of the room. I can’t see around the dividing wall, but I can picture the small dining room that leads to the staircase and the bedrooms upstairs. I hope de Luca has managed to get into the house.

  ‘What did you do?’ Lane yells.

  ‘Get out,’ sneers Daniel. ‘You’re a complete joke of a cop. You’re a bloody rock spider and I hope they put you away.’

  Lane stumbles back, edging along the wall toward the door, his right arm still outstretched, the gun still trained on Daniel. His fingers tighten and he adjusts his aim.

  ‘No, Kai, don’t!’ I scream.

  A door slams somewhere deep in the house and the walls shake.

  Lane throws one final mad look around the room, the gun swirling in a wild arc, before he slips into the dimness of the dining room and disappears.

  Currents of electricity burn through me as I point my gun to the space where Lane was standing a second ago. ‘Everyone stay here,’ I yell. ‘Don’t move!’

  As I pass the dining table, the house shudders with another almighty crash, followed by a gunshot. And a scream.

  Saturday, 16 April

  11.59 pm

  I hurl myself into the hallway. I don’t breathe as my eyes adjust to the darkness.

  A horrible moan fills the long passage.

  My heart presses into my throat, and I rush forward just as a spray of bullets rattles above me. I drop to the ground, balanced on my hands and feet.

  Not gunfire but rain, smacking against the tin roof at the front of the house. All I can see is a square of light at the end of the blackness as I scramble to my feet again, pitching myself toward it. A gruesome montage plays in my mind’s eye: scenes from the past week: the possum’s gaping throat, Rick’s bloody skull, Abbey’s blacked out face in the photographs. My brain attempts to whir into overdrive but the rain is making it impossible to hear anything, impossible to think. Is that crying? Talking? Is someone calling for help? Are there two voices? Please let there be two voices. I point my gun forward and step through the doorway.

  It’s a spare room, dimly lit by the moonlight through the window.

  A dark puddle is spreading on the dirty cream carpet. Limbs folded into limbs. Two guns lie discarded on the floor.

  I drop to the floor and crawl forward. My knees are sticky with blood and I want to weep at the sight. Even though I gave up bargaining with a higher power a long time ago, I find myself praying as I yank a sheet from the bed and add to the pressure a sobbing Lane has applied to de Luca’s torso. It’s a desperate attempt to stop the flow of blood from her body.

  That underwater sensation returns to me. I frame de Luca’s face with my hands and feel her pulse thrumming against my fingers as I stare into her eyes, saying her name. A tiny bead of light dances across her pupils. Someone is screaming for help; it takes me a moment to realise it’s me. I push through the surface of the water and greedily pull air into my lungs.

  Daniel appears in the doorway, his face unreadable. I’m hyper-aware of the guns on the floor. We might all be dead in a minute, I think, cradling de Luca and pressing down on the wetness.

  And then Daniel is gone. Was he even there to begin with? Time shifts around us, fast then slow, and suddenly Daniel is back, armed with bandages, his jaw a hard line, hands wresting de Luca’s neck to the side as he checks her pulse. ‘You’re going to be fine,’ he says.

  Lane stands less than a metre away, his face almost as slack and bloodless as de Luca’s.

  Our eyes meet with crippling intensity. The guns seem to glow on the floor.

  I keep my eyes on Lane as I lurch to the right. He moves at the same time.

  Closing a hand around each gun, I scramble to my feet, stumbling into the wall. Breathing hard I watch Daniel hovering over de Luca. I hear the roar of an engine and reach the front door only to see the taillights of Lane’s squad car burning holes through the fuzz of rain.

  EIGHTH DAY MISSING

  Sunday, 17 April

  12.24 am

  The wind continues to thrash at the house, wild and furious.

  I am frozen in the doorway, chaos behind me, chaos before me.

  The cul-de-sac explodes with blue and red light. The hazy dots firm into thick shapes, and they dance drunkenly across the road, the lawn, my face.

  Car doors snap shut. Strangers march through the rain toward the house, armed with the energy and tools that will hopefully me
an this nightmare is over.

  ‘Gemma?’ Tran’s worried features appear in front of me.

  ‘It’s de Luca,’ I splutter, gesturing to the bedroom. ‘He shot her.’

  The ambulance officers enter the house. They talk to Daniel. They talk to de Luca.

  I’m still holding the guns. Tran and I look down at them.

  ‘Gemma?’ she asks again.

  ‘Lane’s gone. He took his car. Dot and the twins are in the lounge. They’re fine.’

  ‘Lane shot de Luca?’

  I nod. ‘I don’t even know if he knew it was her. I didn’t see it.’

  ‘Are you injured?’

  ‘No.’

  Daniel stands back as de Luca’s face is covered with a plastic mask. The ambos decide it’s too risky to move her and needles are inserted into her veins as she lies on the floor; her torso is bound like a mummy’s.

  Daniel’s face is stained with blood, his hands are slick with it.

  Tran is on the phone now; her sharp orders echo up the hallway.

  I go to the lounge. Dot has a child under each arm, her face as hard as stone.

  ‘Are you all okay?’ I ask.

  She nods.

  ‘Daniel’s fine,’ I tell her.

  Another nod.

  Tran is off the phone. She gives the twins a reassuring smile and calmly explains to Dot what is going to happen next.

  An ambulance officer enters the room. ‘We’ll get her to the hospital while she’s stable.’

  I lean on the wall and let their voices swirl around me.

  My phone vibrates with a text. I pull it from my pocket and see that the call with de Luca is still going. I yank out my earbud and end the call.

  I open the text and stumble back against the wall.

  My legs shake uncontrollably as adrenaline oozes from my pores, air evacuating my lungs.

  I stumble to the bathroom just in time to retch and vomit repeatedly into the toilet, Lane’s message slamming through me over and over.

  I swear I didn’t hurt her but I know I’ve ruined everything. Tell my parents and Elsha I’m sorry.