The Vanishing

by Gabrielle Lord

  Phoenix leaned forwards. ‘There it is again!’

  She grabbed Phoenix’s arm. ‘This is the place! Anika is here!’

  Phoenix picked up a heavy monkey wrench and Jazz found a pair of boltcutters that she thought would make a good club. Armed with these, they tiptoed across to the corner where the noise came from. They discovered a small door set into the wall. Closer they crept until they could see that the door was closed with two shiny, new heavy-duty bolt slide locks.

  Jazz felt excitement stirring, helping her forget her fear and exhaustion.

  Phoenix said in a low voice, ‘We know Sinclair isn’t in there—not with those locks in place on the door. But if he shows up, we’ve got to be ready to take him down. I’ll hit him first and if that doesn’t work, you’re my backup. OK?’

  Jazz nodded. ‘OK. But I kind of wish Simon had come inside with us now.’

  ‘Me too,’ Phoenix admitted.

  Jazz gripped the boltcutters tightly, holding her breath, as Phoenix opened the first bolt lock and then the second.

  <01:35>

  Carefully, silently, Jazz turned the handle and swung the door open. Inside was a tiny bathroom, just a toilet and sink, that seemed to be given over to storing cleaners’ supplies. There were mops and buckets stacked against the maze of plumbing pipes. Amongst them, eyes full of fear, crouched Anika.

  ‘Anika!’ Jazz said as softly as she could.

  The fear changed to tears of joy.

  ‘Anika! You’re alive!’ said Jazz, darting over to her.

  ‘Jazz? It’s really you!’ cried Anika. Then she saw who Jazz was with. ‘Phoenix? Phoenix Lyons? What are you doing here?’ Phoenix grinned and shrugged.

  ‘We’ll fill you in later,’ said Jazz to Anika. ‘Let’s get you out of here first.’

  ‘I’ll need some help with that,’ Anika said as she raised her arm to show them a long heavy chain padlocked around her.

  Jazz opened the beak of the boltcutters wide and slowly cut through the chain.

  Finally, Anika staggered to her feet. ‘I thought no-one would ever find me!’ she cried, throwing her arms around Jazz and Phoenix, who in turn threw his arms around the pair of them in a group hug. ‘Thank you, thank you! You saved me! I never thought anyone would come!’

  ‘Now, let’s get you out of here,’ said Jazz.

  They started hurrying across the garage floor, eyes peeled for any sight of Sinclair.

  ‘Have you seen who kidnapped me? Do you know who it is?’ Anika asked. ‘They’re wearing some weird suit. I’ve never seen their face.’

  ‘Anika, you’re not going to believe this. The kidnapper is Neil Sinclair!’ Seeing the blank look on Anika’s face, Jazz went on as they neared the entrance to the long corridor. ‘The LT in your journal, her maiden name was Linda Taylor. She was married to Neil Sinclair and he’s the one who murdered her!’

  ‘What?!’ said Anika. ‘But how—’

  ‘Sorry to interrupt, but can we save the debrief for when we’re out of here?’ Phoenix said. ‘Come on!’

  Jazz grabbed hold of Anika’s hand tightly, leading her to the corridor. Almost immediately the sound of footsteps stopped them in their tracks.

  ‘Someone’s coming!’ Anika whispered.

  Phoenix froze, listening.

  An icy fear ran through Jazz’s body. ‘Quick! It must be Sinclair! He’s coming this way!’

  ‘Get ready to take him down! Remember what I said, Jazz. I’ll whack him as soon as he comes through the door. You’re my backup!’

  Jazz tightened her grip on the boltcutters and the three of them pressed themselves against the wall next to the doorway to the corridor, Jazz and Anika on one side, Phoenix on the other with the monkey wrench raised high. A stout man with a bald head appeared in the doorway. Sinclair! Phoenix raised the monkey wrench and brought it down hard, catching Sinclair on the shoulder. He sprawled forwards, yelling in pain and surprise. Jazz and Anika fell on top of him, pinning him to the floor.

  ‘I’ll give you another whack,’ Jazz threatened, waving the boltcutters around, ‘if you dare move!’

  Stunned, Sinclair stopped struggling. ‘What do you want?’ he roared. ‘If it’s money, there’s none here! Hey! You’re the criminals who broke into my house!’

  ‘You’re the criminal!’ Jazz roared. ‘You’re a kidnapper! A murderer!’

  ‘What are you talking about? What are you doing here? I’ll call the police!’

  ‘We’ve already done that for you,’ sneered Phoenix. ‘Come on, Sinclair, we know that you murdered your wife! This is the end for you!’ Phoenix threw himself down and sat on Sinclair’s back with Jazz and Anika keeping the man’s shoulders and arms pinned to the floor.

  ‘Get off me, you little thugs! I don’t know what you’re talking about. My wife died after a long illness! How dare you say that I murdered her?’

  ‘A long illness that you created!’ Jazz said. ‘We’ve read the journal. You had to get your hands on the jewellery box because that’s where Linda had left the evidence of you poisoning her! But you didn’t know that we’d already helped ourselves to a sample!’

  ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about!’ Sinclair screamed.

  ‘Oh yeah?’ said Phoenix. ‘What are you doing here so late at night?’

  ‘Something set off the alarm; I got an alert at home.’

  ‘Don’t try to play innocent with us. We know all about the toxin. We even have the proof now. Linda passed it to us from beyond the grave,’ Jazz said.

  ‘Toxin? Linda? Proof? You’re out of your minds!’ Sinclair raged.

  ‘You’re the crazy one who climbed into my room in the middle of the night and kidnapped me!’ cried Anika. ‘And now I’m hearing you were the one who killed the woman in the journal. With poison! I’ve been chained up in a tiny room by a murderer for two days!’

  ‘Kidnapper? Chained? Murderer? You kids are nuts,’ yelled the struggling man. ‘You’ve been watching too much television. Let me go!’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Jazz. ‘The only place you’re going is jail.’

  A sound in the corridor made them all look up. Even Sinclair stopped struggling. Jazz, Phoenix and Anika went still, exchanging looks of terror.

  Some thing had appeared in the doorway.

  <00:59>

  ‘What the—?’ Phoenix’s startled voice broke the silence.

  Filling the doorway was a figure in a white suit, looking like a spaceman landed from Mars. In the darkened lab the hood covering its head was a blank mask.

  This couldn’t be happening—but it was!

  This was the figure that had fled from Monash Park when the hostage exchange went wrong. But it was even more terrifying. In the figure’s right hand was a gun. And it was pointed straight at them!

  ‘Marvellous!’ hissed the voice behind the mask. ‘All my problems in one place. Now I can deal with you all at once.’

  For a split second, no-one moved . . .

  Then came an explosion of action.

  Phoenix, using the fighting skills that Simon had taught him, charged full tilt.

  ‘Oof!’ came a gasp as his opponent staggered backwards.

  Jazz stood up and swung the boltcutters, bashing the arm holding the gun as hard as she could with the heavy tool. The gun flew out of the rubbery hand that had grasped it as the figure toppled forwards.

  Neil Sinclair got to his feet, knocking Anika aside, and jumped on top of the suited figure as it fell face-first to the ground. ‘Who are you?’ he roared.

  Phoenix reached for the mask and yanked it off.

  Sinclair gaped in shock and let go as the person rolled on to their back. Peering up at them was a woman’s pale face. She had brown eyes and strands of curly dark hair sticking out around her head.

  Neil blinked. ‘Karen?’

  ‘Karen?’ repeated Jazz. ‘As in Karen Taylor, Linda’s helpful sister?’

  Phoenix, Anika and Jazz gazed at the woman lying on the floor, whos
e face crumpled with rage and frustration. ‘Let me go!’ she yelled. The menace had left her voice now that it was no longer modulated through the breathing apparatus in the oversized hood of the lab suit.

  ‘Not until you explain yourself!’ Sinclair demanded. He rose slowly to his feet, and rubbed at his shoulder where Phoenix had landed the blow with the monkey wrench.

  ‘Could someone please tell me . . . what is going on?’ Sinclair was roaring no more, a look of pure bewilderment coming over his face as he stared down at his sister-in-law.

  ‘It’s all a mistake. You have to trust me,’ Karen blurted.

  ‘I’m not so sure about that. It was surprising enough when you turned up at the house “on holiday” the other day, Karen, but now, showing up here, with a gun? And who are these kids?’

  ‘These little meddlers are trying to come between us! They’re trying to spoil everything!’ cried Karen. ‘Don’t listen to them!’

  ‘I’m afraid you do need to listen to us, Mr Sinclair,’ said Jazz.

  ‘Karen used thallium to poison your wife,’ said Phoenix.

  The woman raised herself to a sitting position.

  ‘They’re lying! Monstrous lies, Neil!’ she screamed. ‘They’re troublemakers. I came here to help you deal with them!’

  ‘Thallium?’ Sinclair said, his eyes wide. ‘Thallium?’

  ‘It’s all lies!’ Karen screeched, sounding unhinged.

  ‘You’re a scientist,’ said Phoenix to Sinclair. ‘You must know it’s the perfect poison. You know it fits with your wife’s symptoms. Think about it.’

  Neil Sinclair stared at his sister-in-law, the bewilderment on his face turning to deep shock as he worked through what Jazz and Phoenix had told him.

  Sinclair’s face went white as the realisation hit him. ‘You murdered Linda?’ His eyes blazed with rage towards Karen.

  ‘It’s a lie!’ she said desperately.

  ‘You did! That’s why we could never work out what was wrong with her. You killed my beautiful wife!’

  He grabbed the gun from the floor, aiming at a spot on Karen’s forehead. His hands were shaking but his voice was steady. ‘Tell me the truth, Karen.’

  Karen slumped back down to the floor, hands crossed in front of her face. ‘Don’t shoot me! I’ll tell you! I’ll tell you everything!’ She raised herself to her feet. Neil’s aim didn’t waver. Karen’s voice was calm now as she began to speak.

  ‘You know the boy’s right, Neil, thallium is the perfect poison. It started with those care packages I used to send Linda—trace amounts injected into Cherry De Lix chocolates. I knew I had to be there to make sure she was dosed up enough so that the end would come. That’s why I came to stay with you. But then Linda started to suspect something. Maybe she’d learned something about poisons, spending all those years around pathologists. She told me she had evidence hidden away somewhere. So I upped the dosage. She died before she could do anything with it. I looked but never located the evidence, so I thought maybe she’d made it up. Anyway, the secret died with her. Until this one—’ Karen turned her narrowed eyes at Anika, ‘—found that journal. I didn’t know Linda had written everything down.’

  ‘Journal? What journal?’ Sinclair’s voice was barely a whisper.

  ‘I found it in my room, behind an antique mirror,’ explained Anika. ‘A journal written by a woman who had lived in that very room twenty years earlier. She suspected her husband of murdering her.’

  ‘Me?’ Now Sinclair’s voice rose in a shrill cry. ‘She suspected me? Karen, how could you do this? Why did you do this? She was your own sister!’

  ‘I did it for you, Neil!’

  ‘For me?’ Neil looked horrified.

  ‘Yes. So I could be with you. You should have married me! I was the clever one. I was much prettier than Linda. I understood about your work. I was the obvious choice. I did what I had to do, and then I waited for you.’

  The two adults seemed oblivious now to the three teenagers who stood by, watching them, agog.

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Neil whimpered.

  ‘I could hear it in your voice, when we used to talk while Linda was sick. You sounded so sad, frustrated. I’d tell you about all the fun things I was doing and I’d hear you becoming so wistful. I was trying to tell you—that wonderful life you’d been having with Linda could still happen, could happen with me, when we were finally together.’

  ‘Us, together?’ Sinclair looked at Karen with a face of pure disgust. ‘Is . . . is that why you kept calling me after she died? I was grieving.’

  Karen’s calm voice suddenly rose to a shriek again. ‘You still didn’t turn to me. Instead you just sold up and disappeared! You didn’t even tell me where you were.’

  ‘You were pressuring me,’ Neil said. ‘I didn’t want you around once Linda died.’

  ‘But you were free!’

  ‘You “freed” me from Linda? By murdering her? I couldn’t love anyone other than Linda, certainly not her murderer! How did you think you could get away with such a thing?’

  ‘I have! For twenty years!’ shrieked Karen. ‘And I didn’t just come here for a holiday, Cornelius,’ spat Karen. ‘I had to take care of this kid who was threatening to spill everything all over the internet.’

  ‘How did you find my blog?’ asked Anika.

  ‘I’ve had a search alert set up for “Deepwater”, just to keep an eye on what was happening in the neighbourhood. Remember that ghost story you wrote set in that “spooky old mansion”? The one talking about spying on the house next door? You stupid girl, you gave me the idea!’

  Anika’s eyes widened in horror.

  ‘That’s right, this is all your fault. You’re the one who wrote the story, found the journal and decided to blog it all! I knew you had to be stopped.’ Karen looked at Anika with pure venom in her eyes.

  ‘So hang on, this is all because I blogged that journal?’ said Anika. She shivered.

  Karen ignored Anika and turned her evil gaze to Neil. ‘And you. I knew I’d be able to borrow your car, find a lab suit, even wear your workboots. Getting into Anika’s house was easy—I knew all about the old laundry chute. It all went perfectly, until these kids got involved and ruined everything!’

  Neil Sinclair loosened his hold on the gun and it slid to the floor.

  Karen’s rage now boiled over. ‘I even came back to give you a second chance and you still rejected me!’ she screamed, standing up and starting to walk menacingly towards Neil.

  ‘You’re not going anywhere,’ said Jazz as Phoenix pushed the struggling woman back down while Jazz quickly tied the laces of the Hardywear boots together. Now, if Karen Taylor tried to run, she’d fall flat on her face.

  Just then, Simon ran in yelling, ‘The cops are almost here!’

  ‘I can hear the sirens!’ Phoenix agreed.

  But it was too late. Karen, seeing her plans falling apart, had taken advantage of the momentary distraction provided by Simon’s arrival, and had torn the boots off and was already halfway down the corridor, grabbing the gun on the way. She ran out the door.

  ‘After her!’ Phoenix yelled. ‘Quick! She’s getting away!’

  Everyone raced after Karen. Phoenix and Simon were the fastest. They reached the door first and flung it open, then sprinted outside. As they got out into the cold night air, they saw Karen pelting through the car park. They chased her but in no time she was at the road. They saw her risk a quick look back at her pursuers. Simon and Phoenix were gaining on her, with Anika, Jazz and Neil behind them. Karen turned back around and suddenly swerved to the side of the road— where Simon’s ute was parked.

  ‘Stop! Don’t you dare!’ yelled Simon. He turned to Phoenix and said, ‘She’s stealing my car! And I’ve gone and made it easy for her—I left the keys in there. She’s really going to pay for this.’

  The engine throbbed as it started and the ute sped off. Simon kept running after it, yelling in desperation. The car headed into a bend in the road so fas
t that it teetered briefly on two wheels. There was no way he’d catch it. Simon stopped in the middle of the road.

  ‘Come on,’ panted Neil, as everyone caught up with Simon. ‘Quickly, let’s go get my car. We can’t let her get away.’

  ‘No, you go. I’m going to stay here and wait for the cops,’ said Simon, tugging his ginger hair in anger. ‘She’s not going to get away with this.’

  Phoenix awkwardly patted his coach on the back, and then quickly followed Neil as he led everyone else back towards the lab building, then around to the side where his car was parked. They all piled into his green SUV.

  Sinclair took off so fast that the back door swung wide open. Jazz precariously leaned out, grabbed the handle and slammed the door shut.

  Sinclair accelerated, pushing them all against their seats. They tore out of the car park, turning with a squeal onto the main road.

  ‘I always knew there was something wrong with Karen,’ said Sinclair, his eyes never leaving the road. ‘She was so . . . well, self-centred doesn’t cover it.’

  ‘Narcissist,’ said Jazz.

  ‘What?’ he said sharply, snapping his head to glance at her before returning his intent gaze to the ute in front of them.

  ‘That’s what she called Anika on her blog. It’s someone with an exaggerated idea of their own importance and achievements.’

  Neil Sinclair nodded grimly. ‘That sounds about right.’

  ‘Narcissists often project their issues on to others. She was the one putting those nasty comments on your blog, Anika, both to discredit you and to try to scare you off. You were getting too close to the truth. She wanted to make it look like you were just showing off, when really you were solving an important crime.’

  Anika reached across and gave Jazz’s hand a squeeze. Jazz smiled in return, knowing their fight about the journal was over.

  ‘It’s also why she was going on about being prettier and smarter than—’ Jazz faltered for a moment, before finishing, ‘—than your wife.’