by Alex Palmer
Grace felt her gun against her ribcage, glad it was there. Did you hear that, Clive? I’m walking into a meeting with two very dangerous people. You’d better be there.
They turned into Cowan Water. The steep waterside hills of Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park closed in on them. Then the lights of the tiny suburb were in view. Situated on the banks of Cowan Creek and surrounded by bush in the heart of the national park, it was an isolated, if beautiful, place. From here, the lights of Sydney were a pale glow in the night sky. Soon the boat slid quietly up to a mooring place. There was a dinghy moored nearby. They got into it and Sara rowed them to the private jetty of a three-storeyed house, the last in the short line of buildings on the water’s edge.
There was a light shining dully over a door not far from the jetty; otherwise the house was in darkness. Before they went inside, Sara turned and looked around at the water, the hills surrounding them, and the sky.
‘What are you doing?’ Grace said. ‘Saying goodbye to Cottage Days? We’re not coming back here then.’
‘Just keep quiet,’ Sara hissed, an edge of tears in her voice. ‘Sound carries.’
She let them both in, switching on the lights to a spacious rumpus room. The décor, from the ’70s, looked old and kitsch. Under other circumstances, the house would have had a comfortable, holiday feel, the kind of place where you could kick your shoes off. There was no sign of Griffin.
‘Is this where you were bringing Narelle?’
‘Check that room over there.’
Grace walked up to a door with a lock on the outside. She looked back over her shoulder but Sara hadn’t moved.
‘Don’t worry,’ she said. ‘I’m not coming after you.’
It was a small room with one window, too small to get out of and too high to reach. The walls were brick, the door solid wood. Once you were locked in here, there would be no way out until someone opened the door.
‘What was going to happen to her in there?’
‘You were going to shoot her.’
‘I was?’ Grace said.
‘I was going to strip her and then I was going to watch. She was going to cry and beg for mercy and I’d say, too bad, Elliot doesn’t love you any more. But she’s already dead. We don’t have to do that.’
‘Where’s the gun?’
‘It’s the one you’re carrying. You are carrying one, aren’t you?’
‘Why me?’
‘Proving yourself to Joel. Oh, he thinks you’re genuine and I’m beginning to think you are too. But that’s what you were going to do to prove it.’
No, I would have had to arrest you and take you in. The operation would have been aborted. Grace shut the door and once again felt the security of her gun against her ribs.
‘There’s no Narelle. What are we doing here now?’ she asked.
‘Just wait.’
Sara took a mobile out of a drawer, turned it on, sent a quick message, then turned the phone off again and put it in her pocket.
‘All right. We’re moving on. You’re finally going to get what you came for.’ She held up a set of car keys. ‘The garage is two levels up. Let’s go.’
‘This is your parents’ house, isn’t it?’
‘It’s basically mine,’ she replied with a shrug. ‘We’ve had it for years but they never come here. I’m the only one who’s ever used it.’
‘You came here to go sailing. When you were a kid. This is where you learned to sail.’
‘So what?’ Sara replied, a little puzzled. ‘Why do you want to know?’
‘It was before you met Joel. Before you found out about all those things he taught you. You came here and you were happy.’
Before you let him turn you into a murderer.
‘What are you talking about? What are you getting at?’
Sara’s tall and slender figure was shaking. She stared at Grace, almost crying.
‘Nothing.’
‘Then stop talking rubbish and let’s go.’
‘Where to?’
‘Mona Vale Road. We have to hurry. We’re late.’
The car was a Mazda Grace hadn’t seen before. ‘Where’s your black Porsche?’ she asked.
‘Do you want to ride? Or do you want to walk?’
‘Why drive some cheap little blue Mazda when you can drive a Porsche?’
To her surprise, this comment, which was only intended to tell her listeners which car to look out for, had clearly hurt Sara’s feelings.
‘It’ll be good enough to get you where you’re going,’ she said, a crack in her voice. ‘That’s all that matters.’
‘Don’t tell me you’ve had to say goodbye to your car as well as everything else?’ Grace said as mockingly and mercilessly as Sara could have done.
‘Get in! We have to go!’
Sara drove in silence, staring at the road ahead, pushing the car. Her face was set; had she been walking, she would have had her head down and been powering through anything that got in her way. They climbed the steep slope up from Cowan Creek, through the national park, then too fast along the ridge out of the park to the main road. It was getting late. Grace allowed herself to think about Ellie and Harrigan. You’ll see me, she told them. Then Sara turned off Mona Vale Road into Terrey Hills.
‘What are we doing here?’ Grace asked.
‘Going where you want to go.’
‘Terrey Hills? Duffys Forest? What’s here?’
‘Wait.’
She drove deep into the heart of the rural suburb of Duffys Forest. The roads were dark and Grace couldn’t see any street signs. Finally she caught sight of one illuminated in the car lights.
‘We’re out in the sticks,’ she said. ‘The Bush Fire Brigade is just down there.’
‘But we’re not going there, are we?’ Sara replied with a razoredged smile.
There was a car a short distance in front of them along the road. Its lights were turned off. It drove for a little longer, then turned into a driveway. Grace watched a man get out and open the gate. Griffin. He cut his engine and coasted down the driveway. Sara had already turned off her car lights and followed him. When they turned into the driveway, Grace could just make out a For Sale sign out the front of the house.
‘Is this your house?’ she asked. ‘Or is it empty because it’s for sale and you’re just using it?’
‘Quiet!’
They coasted down the driveway into a garage with a light on overhead. Griffin had already pulled up in a white Toyota Camry. Sara stopped behind him. Grace recognised the numberplate: the car that had stalked Harrigan and Ellie to Kidz Corner.
‘Get out,’ Sara said.
Grace did so. She had her gun, they knew she did. Would it be enough to protect her from the two of them? This was enough. Time to bail out.
‘Why are we here?’ she asked Sara, who was standing by the open door of her car. ‘Why come here? It’s time to go.’
‘Not yet,’ Sara said.
Griffin came over. Grace stood where she could see both of them. Griffin didn’t even look at her.
‘Why are you so late?’ he asked Sara. ‘I’ve been waiting for your SMS for hours.’
‘She killed Joe Ponticelli.’
‘What?’ He turned to Grace, seeming to see her for the first time. ‘Why did you do that?’
‘Because he tried to kill me. The same way Kidd got gunned down. I ran them off the road. They got Narelle. She’s in the bush.’
‘He wasn’t after you, he couldn’t have been. Unless—’ He stopped. ‘It doesn’t matter one way or the other now. Did you get Marie’s ID?’
‘Yes.’
‘Okay. We’ve no time now. Coopes won’t be with us tonight.’
‘Oh, why not?’ Sara asked, not hiding her disappointment.
‘Who’s Coopes?’ Grace asked.
‘An old friend,’ Griffin replied dismissively. ‘He can’t be involved. There’s no time.’
‘I wanted to see him. It’s the last time,’ Sara said.
Griffin looked at her in the weak light, a friendly, apparently candid expression on his face. ‘Coopes was going to help me pay you, but we don’t have time to take you to him now. It doesn’t matter. I have money inside the house.’
‘Are we still meeting at Halfway Hut?’ Sara asked.
He stepped forward, a finger in the air, shaking it at her as if it might transform itself into a blow. ‘Don’t. You should know—no—’ He left whatever he was going to say unfinished. ‘You should leave now. Make sure the gates stay open. And whatever you do, no games till I get there. Okay? Don’t underestimate anything. It’s too dangerous.’ He spoke harshly, angrily.
‘I know what I’m doing,’ she said. ‘I’ll see you there.’
‘Wait!’ He stopped her as she turned away. ‘Give me your mobile.’
‘What if I need it?’
‘You won’t. Give it to me.’
She handed it over, smiled angrily at Grace, then got into her car and drove up the driveway out of sight. Grace felt the chill of the smile. Then she asked herself: they’re an item, lovers supposedly. Why didn’t they kiss? Do they touch? Does he always talk to her like that?
‘What’s going on?’ she asked. ‘How do I get out of here?’
‘I drive you. Don’t worry.’ He stopped, listening. ‘Did you hear a car?’
‘Sara?’
‘No. After her.’
Grace listened but heard nothing.
‘There’s no one there,’ she said, with a touch of despair.
Where are you, Clive? You must have heard the pull-out signal. Are you here at all? You can find me. I’m wearing my wire.
‘Is that Marie’s ID?’ Griffin was asking.
‘Yes.’
‘Give it to me.’
She did, having no choice.
‘What about the passport and the tape?’
She handed them over. She watched him open the Camry’s door and put all these things in the glovebox, along with Sara’s mobile.
‘We’re taking all that with us, are we?’ she asked.
‘Come inside,’ he replied, ignoring what she’d said. ‘I have some things I have to get before we leave.’
She followed him but stayed back. If she took out her gun, she’d have to use it; probably to kill. Kill or wound. Wounds that incapacitated often did so permanently and sometimes killed. If she only had herself to rely on, she would have no choice. They reached the back door where he turned on an outside light.
‘Is this your house?’ she asked.
‘I should have inherited it,’ he replied. ‘But in the end I had to buy it.’
‘Why did you want this particular house?’
‘Not your business,’ he said.
He unlocked the door, switched on the inside light, and they walked into an old-fashioned kitchen. There were jerry cans of petrol on the table.
‘What are they doing here?’ she asked.
‘I’m cleaning this house away. But first I have some things to get.’
‘You’re going to burn this place down?’
‘Not me. Some people will do it for me later on tonight. By then we’ll all be long gone.’
‘The house is for sale.’
‘It’s already been sold by private treaty. I have the money. I have another house for sale. As soon as I sell that, it’ll go up as well.’
‘Why?’
‘Because that’s what I’ve done all my life. Clean away shit. Turn it into something useful instead. When this goes up in flames, that’ll be the last of it wiped out. I’ll have got what I wanted from it. It’ll be money in the bank instead.’
Still keeping a distance behind him, she followed him while he switched on the lights first in a dining room and then the hallway. They passed a bedroom. Grace looked at the disordered sheets. She had a perception of bodies wrestling with brutal movements. You couldn’t tell whether it was love or a beating. A small pile of women’s clothes, including underwear, had been placed on the end of the unmade bed. She glanced at them, then jerked her head back. Who were they waiting for? Not Sara.
‘Why didn’t you wait for us inside the house?’ she asked. ‘Then you could have got what you wanted and we could just have got in the car and gone.’
‘People might have seen the lights and realised someone was here. Only do what you have to do when you have to do it. I don’t want anyone knowing I’m here.’
He walked past a bathroom to a door at the end of the hallway. He pushed it open onto a small white-tiled room. This one smelled of bleach and the wooden floor was stained.
‘Let’s not waste any time,’ Grace said. ‘It’s time to go.’
‘I won’t be long,’ Griffin replied.
He knelt, levered up a floorboard and reached down into the cavity below. Grace stepped back and took out her gun.
‘They’re gone.’ He sat up straight on his knees. ‘That’s not possible.’
‘What’s missing?’ she asked.
‘Everything. I put them there just two days ago.’
‘Put what there?’
‘My business records. Money. I have to have those records. I can’t leave without them.’
He stood up and turned around on this last question, saw her gun and stared.
‘Lie down on the floor,’ she said. ‘If you try to do anything else, I’ll kill you.’
He shook his head. His friendly expression was back. ‘You’re not the type to kill. I can tell.’
‘I’m counting to three. One, two—’
She would have fired at him if someone hadn’t taken hold of her from behind. She fired anyway but the bullet went wild, burying itself in the door frame. The man who was pushing her to the floor was too strong for her. He twisted her gun out of her hand, almost breaking her wrist. Then he ripped her phone out of the pocket of her jacket. All she could see were Griffin’s feet, the open cavity and the stained wooden floor.
‘You wouldn’t have killed me,’ Griffin said.
Yes, I would have.
‘Give me that,’ he said to whoever was holding her. ‘It’s a powerful gun. Standard Orion issue, I suppose. Better than mine. Yes, I’ll use this. You can stand up.’
She did, and looked at who was behind her. A man she didn’t know, probably a Ponticelli goon. Griffin was holding her gun. The man who’d tackled her had his own.
‘Where was he?’ Grace asked.
‘He’s been waiting here for hours. In the dark. I always take precautions.’
‘What do you want to do?’ the muscle man asked Griffin.
‘Someone came here and took some things I own,’ Griffin said to Grace. ‘Computers. Portable hard drives. Do you know where they are?’
‘I’ve never heard about any of those things before. Don’t you have backup records somewhere else?’
‘I’d have to go and get them, which complicates things. You and I have somewhere else to be and we’re already late.’ He looked past her to the man holding her. ‘Who’s been here? Do you know?’
‘I don’t know. I didn’t get here till late this arvo. I just dumped the petrol on the table and waited.’
Griffin looked around the white-tiled room, searching for something invisible.
‘Would Sara do this? She can be so bitchy when she’s angry with me—’ He stopped. ‘Something like this happened at my other house in Blackheath. Is someone stalking me or is—’ Again he stopped.
‘Doesn’t Sara want to leave with you?’ Grace asked.
‘We both want the same things. We always have,’ he said with the strange and apparently candid look.
He stood there silent in the hallway, thinking.
‘Mate,’ the muscle man said, ‘she drew a gun on you. I reckon she’d have used it. You say she’s from Orion. She’s got to be wired.’ ‘Are you?’ Griffin asked.
Grace’s wire, a sophisticated piece of miniature wireless technology, was neatly twisted in the underwiring of
her bra and finished in the decoration set in lace between the cups.
‘I came here to get paid,’ she said. ‘That’s all. Then you double-crossed me. That’s why I drew my gun. Your money’s gone. Maybe it was never there in the first place. It’s time to go. Let’s just do that. Forget all this.’
‘It’ll be in her clothes.’ The muscle man giggled. ‘We can get her to take them off.’
To Grace’s surprise, a look of powerful distaste crossed Griffin’s face.
‘I’ve already got some clothes I want her to wear,’ he said. ‘Sara bought them the other day. They’re in the bedroom.’
Soon he was back, offering her the compact bundle. ‘Put these on. You can dress the way I want now. With your hair out.’
‘What for?’
‘It’s the way I want to remember you. I told you, you have beautiful hair.’
You’re sick. Don’t say it. Don’t make him lash out.
‘I’m not changing in front of this ape.’
‘You can change in there.’ Griffin nodded to the white-tiled room. Then he was staring at her with a total lack of expression. ‘If you won’t change, I’ll kill you now. Your brains will be all over those tiles. I don’t want to have to do that but I will. It’s up to you. I’ll be waiting in the kitchen.’
‘Get going,’ the ape said, pushing her inside. ‘Take everything off and give it to me.’
‘Get out,’ she said.
He grinned and pulled the door not quite closed. She felt his eye on the crack. There was nothing she could do. Shaking, she changed, keeping her back to the door. The dress was blue, waisted, coming to the knee, a glittering little-girl thing. Nothing like her taste. At least the clothes were new and clean. He had chosen her size well; he’d looked her over carefully every time they’d met, the way lovers do, not murderers. It was an odd look, as if he’d tried to make her a child.
She’d just finished when the door opened and the ape was there. He motioned to her to come out. When she did, he tossed her own clothes back inside the room and shut the door. Her wire was sensitive, but left in that room it wasn’t going to pick up anything.
