“Super,” he said to Dave. To Cait he said, “Go eat something.” She gave him a look of unadulterated loathing and pushed past him. He called after her, “Bundle up your washing. I’ll see it’s done.”
That made her pause, her stride faltered. “I do not need you doing my washing.”
He heard the whir of the Land Cruiser’s window as Dave rolled it up and he caught up to her. “You don’t need a lot of things. But right now, you fucking need me, so get over it.”
She broke into a run and he almost went with her, but they were within sight of the motel and the other team was pulling into the parking lot. He settled for a quick stride and could feel the prick of humiliation stinging in his face. Jesus, what was wrong with him? To yell at her like that, as though he was trying to punish her, break her down. That was not his remit. That was not his privilege. It was fucked and he hated himself for it. In the car park he signalled Dave to have eyes on Cait. He was not finished running. He took off, this time at a punishing pace.
The additional run helped. Made him feel loose-limbed and more centred. He wouldn’t let his emotions get the better of him again that way. He’d be cool. Take a leaf out of Cait’s book. She knew how to be professionally composed and there was no reason he couldn’t play that game too.
He knocked on her door at one, ready to go see the vet. Picking up Blue was a huge mistake. They’d be half way to Port Augusta by now. Not that he’d have done anything differently, there was no way he could shoot it with Cait watching, and you couldn’t leave a dog out there to starve, but now there’d be a decision to make. There was no seat on this train for a dog.
Cait came out of her room and he should’ve found the TAB and taken a bet she’d get in the back seat. It was irrationally annoying. He swallowed irritation all the way to Paul’s clinic only to discover Paul was out on an emergency call and they’d have to wait. They sat in the waiting room with a woman with a nearly bald cockatoo on her shoulder and a man with a comatose cat. Cait read a book and ignored him. He tipped his head back and rested on the wall behind him. He’d slept badly again last night. Alert to every unfamiliar noise despite the fact there was an active watch in place and Stud’s almost casual insistence they were in the clear.
Every piece of intelligence they had said Wacker was still in Perth even though the big inter-club powwow had been canned. Things were too hot and Wacker was too smart and too lawyered-up to give the cops any new reason to be all over him or his operation.
When Paul finally appeared he was apologetic but there was a cockatoo and a comatose cat in the queue before them. Another forty-five minutes later he called them into a room where Blue was lying on a blanket and attached to a drip. She thwacked her tail with more vigour than yesterday on the floor of the big cage she lay in when she saw them, but didn’t attempt to get up.
“Good new or bad news?” asked Paul.
Sean looked at Cait, down on her knees in front of the cage, stroking Blue’s head. He could do with some good news. “Give us the good, Doc.”
“She didn’t die overnight.”
Cait said, “Oh God.”
“And the bad?”
“She’s very ill. She needs intensive care and even then…” Paul started to list the things wrong with Blue and what she needed. Sean watched Cait put her forehead down on Blue’s head and whisper to the dog. Blue’s tail thumped the cage floor in a steady beat. He tuned back in as Paul was saying. “I don’t know how you want to proceed.”
“Can you fix her?” Cait said. She’d swivelled around to look up at Paul and Blue pawed her arm.
“I can make her feel a lot better, but it’s going to take time. Didn’t you guys say you needed to move on?”
“We do, Doc. We can’t hang around,” Sean said.
“Then we need to make a decision. I can treat Blue, but there’s no point if she doesn’t have people to go to.”
Cait was on her feet. “You can’t put her down.”
“I don’t like the idea either, but there’s no guarantee she’ll respond and it’s the responsible thing do to,” Paul said.
“No. She’s beautiful. You can’t put her down.”
“She is a well-behaved dog. She’s smart and she’s brave. She got herself in some trouble. Maybe trusted the wrong people. But honestly, I can’t keep treating her for free and—”
Cait cut him off. “Sean.”
He shook his head. “We don’t have room for a dog.” No room, no time, no budget.
“We do.” She turned to Paul. “You must know other vets. We could have her treated again on our way through to Sydney.”
Paul scratched his head. “That’s a possibility. I have a mate in Port Augusta, but—”
“Then we can do that. We can find her a home in Sydney.”
Sean sighed. “This is not a holiday jaunt, Cait.” There’s no ‘we’ anywhere in the equation.
Paul was shaking his head. “It’s too soon to make that call.”
They both refocused on the Doc. Cait said, “Too soon?”
“She’s too sick to go anywhere right now.”
“We have to move on.”
“No, we can wait,” she snapped.
“Cait.” He said it sharply and she jumped.
Paul shifted his weight onto his back foot, creating some distance. “Why don’t I leave you to talk about this? But I’m going to need the room. Maybe go for a walk and come back? Let me know what you decide.”
Cait left them before Sean had a chance to set a different course. There wasn’t much point talking about this further. The decision was made. They had to move on.
“As a matter of interest, how long before she could travel, Doc?”
Paul sighed. He bent down and adjusted the drip line in Blue’s front leg. “Another twenty-four hours would make a big difference. But really I’ll be impressed if she makes it through another night. You don’t have another twenty-four hours do you?”
“No.”
Paul clapped him on the shoulder. “Your wife is taking it hard.”
“Cait. Ah, right.”
“She has a good heart, you can see that. This is the part of being a vet I hate. Good luck with your decision. I’ll make it as easy as I can whatever you decide. But Sean, if you decide to take off, you need to know I will put Blue down. I don’t know if that helps your decision any, but I thought you should know.”
When he made it outside the clinic, Cait was waiting for him by the car. They were across from a park, he gestured to it and she walked ahead of him.
“You know what we have to do,” he said.
She jammed her hands on her hips. “I’m sure you’ll tell me.”
He let that barb go. “We tried.” He shrugged. “This is better than her wasting from exposure or getting run over by a road train.”
“It’s not better. It’s in no way better. Isn’t she worth fighting for?
“It’s over, Cait.”
“It’s so easy for you to say that. This is just another part you’re playing. All care, no responsibility. You get to walk away without looking back.”
He ran a hand across his head. “What are you saying?”
“You should never have tried to save her if you don’t have it in you to follow through.”
“I’m not a miracle worker. I did what I thought was for the best. I’m sorry it’s not up to your impeccable standard of care.”
“I never picked you for a quitter.”
He balled his fists. “Are you trying to make me lose it with you again?”
“No. I’m just… You can’t be half a white knight.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” He was starting to wonder if it was about Blue.
“You can’t decide to get involved then walk away when it doesn’t go your way.”
“Where do you get off telling me what I can and can’t do?”
“Where do you get off telling me?”
“In case you’ve failed to notice, you are a w
itness co-operating with the police.” He poked his chest. “That would be me. And by co-operating, I mean doing what I, or anyone else with a badge, bloody well asks. If you’d fucking understood that two days ago we wouldn’t be here now.”
Sean was warmed up. He knew where this was going and it wasn’t about a stray blue cattle dog. “If you’d understood that last time we were here and quit lying to me—”
“Oh right! Where would we be? Were you suddenly going to forget you were the law and I was a thief? Is that what was going to happen? Were you going to march me into the nearest cop shop and wash your hands of me? Were you going to run away with me and live happily ever after on the proceeds of crime? Or compromise everything you stand for to make an allowance for me, because we were fucking?”
Cait was red in the face and her anger was ugly. Her words slapped his chest, lashed his ribs and robbed him of air. She kept it coming and it rocked his mental balance.
“Tell me, Sean, what was going to happen if I told you everything? That’s right, you coward. You have no answer to that.”
He dug in. “You should be careful about calling me a coward.”
“Why? The description fits.” Her voice was high and tight with rage. “I might as well be a dog you want to put down. You got involved, I was too much trouble for you to bother with, and you abandoned me when it got too hard.”
“You’re fucking rich.” He got in her face. “You think that’s what I did. Abandoned you? I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want you safe, if I trusted anyone else to keep you from harm. But you’re too stupid to realise I’m still trying to help you.”
“Now who’s the liar? You can barely look at me.”
“I can barely look at you because you’re a fucking liar and a thief.”
She laughed. And maybe it was that, or because he burned with the need to hit something. He grabbed her arm and dragged her close so she was crushed against his body.
She didn’t flinch. “So why don’t you put me down and be done with me.”
He let her go so suddenly she staggered back. He’d have bruised her arm. She was turning him into a brute, a monster who’d hurt a woman. The one woman he’d wanted to keep safe.
“Get in the car.”
She walked around him. “I’m going to see Blue.” Now her voice shook.
“Get in the car, Driver.”
She stopped but with her back to him. “What do you care what I do?”
“Get in the fucking car. We can’t do anything for Blue till the morning.”
“What do you mean?”
“If she makes it through the night we can decide then.”
She turned and looked at him, and now he saw her anger for what it really was. Fear. It flickered like flames in her eyes and made her sway on her feet. He’d done that to her. Sucked out her courage and left her frightened. He let her go back inside the clinic.
Cait was Blue. In the wrong place, at the wrong time, trusting the wrong people, but brave and good and worth so much. He’d found her, loved her and judged her. He was everything she accused him of, a quitter, a gutless coward who’d abandoned her emotionally when she needed him most, and punished her for the major crime of not trusting him.
He rang Dave. He’d have the other team drop a driver over. He didn’t want to be in the car with her anymore.
41: Bleeding
Paul let Caitlyn give Blue the sick dog equivalent of a sponge bath and she got two happy yips and much tail thumping for a reward. It was a dirty trick and she knew it. The vet had identified her as the softy and was doing his best to see she bonded with Blue. If only he knew how strongly she already had, and how powerless to change things she was.
She knew the dog was too sick to go anywhere and Sean wouldn’t wait, so sometime in the next day Paul would stop medicating Blue. She didn’t want to think about it, and falling into Paul’s trap was dumb—a gilt-edged invitation to heartache, with raised lettering that would shred her throat as she ate it up. But it was less dumb than getting in the car with Sean. Getting in the car with Sean was certain heart failure, because the way he was making the blood pound through her veins had to mean something inside her was going to burst open and kill her.
Never in her entire life had she gone at anyone like she’d gone at Sean outside the clinic. It made her cheeks heat up thinking about it. She’d had her disagreements with Justin, but never had there been shouting, never had there been going for each other like Jerry Springer ratings winners in the street. With Justin it’d been civilised, adult, utterly unmemorable, but with Sean it was out of control, and she never did out of control.
“He’s a hypnotist, Blue.” It was the only way she could explain how she’d fallen for his act, even though she’d known as far back as the McDonald’s car park, as the night she’d stapled him, he was an actor. She simply hadn’t appreciated how good a fake-out merchant he was. He was lure you in so close you think you love him, and worse, you think he loves you, then flip on you and show you such distain and coldness you doubt your own sanity. And his own enjoyment of that was so outrageously perverse he’d volunteered to be the one who transported her back to Sydney. How he must be enjoying her humiliation, while getting his kicks from ordering her around.
She’d half expected him to follow her into the clinic and cause another scene so it was bliss to be alone with Blue, though she knew the longer she stayed, the harder it was going to be to leave her.
Once Blue fell asleep it became clear she was in the way and she couldn’t keep hiding out forever. She had to face Sean. Find a way to keep facing him, not that she even knew how long they were meant to spend making this trip. He could drive nonstop if he wanted to. Thinking about that she wondered why he hadn’t insisted they leave now. Of course, he still might. It’s not like she had any say in the matter.
She gave Blue’s wide head another stroke, but the dog was unresponsive, other than a twitch of her muzzle. It was time to face the music outside. When she got off the floor, Paul was there.
“Come back in the morning. See how she fares over night.”
“You really can’t find a home for her here?”
“Whoever takes her on has fairly significant costs to pick up. I can’t think of anyone I’d want to ask that of and I can’t tell you how often I’ve had trouble paying the rent because I’ve treated animals for free. My wife will skin me alive and hang me up for maggots to eat if I take Blue on myself.”
She wanted to say she’d be back in the morning. She wanted to go into the clinic’s reception and buy a collar and tag for Blue. She wanted to delay going outside to Sean forever. She opened the Statesman’s back door, a rehearsed apology of sorts in her head. It might never make it to her tongue, but she had to try. It wasn’t his brilliant blue eyes that scored her in the rear-view.
“Hi, where’s Sean?” It was the man who’d shadowed her on her run.
“I’m George. I’m going to take you back to the motel. Do you need anything at the shops first?”
“Hi, George. Do all you guys go to a special school for not answering the question?”
“Yes, we do.”
“When are we going to Port Augusta?”
“You know that school? Well, I was one of its top students.”
She sat forward to look at him between the seats. “Why can’t you tell me a basic thing like that?”
“I get that you’re frustrated.”
“God! You must’ve been a straight A student.”
George laughed.
“That’s not funny.” She buckled up and George started the engine, twenty minutes later she was back in her room with a bag of random groceries: French onion dip and crackers, a couple of apples and a block of chocolate. She lay on her bed and tried to read. She read the same page twice then put the book aside; nothing was going in. She rolled on her back and looked at the painted spray-cement ceiling. She was still lying there, her face wet, when there was a knock on her door.
A voice, not S
ean’s—George or Dave’s. “We pull out at eight in the morning. Do you need anything?”
He wouldn’t hear her sniffing through the door. She wiped her cheeks. “No. Thank you.” She wanted to ask where Sean was. Not knowing was worse than dreading he’d appear suddenly, but she knew there’d be no answer worth having. “Wait.” She heard feet shuffling. This was going to be a waste of breath too. “Ah. Can I ride with you guys tomorrow?”
There was a low murmur, more moving about. She’d have opened the door but she didn’t want to have to explain she’d been crying about a dog she’d known for two days or a man she’d known for less than thirty.
“Are you okay?”
Shit, that was Sean. She cleared her throat. “Of course I am.” She rested her forehead against the door and whispered, ‘go away’ to the varnished wood.
“Open the door. Open the door, please.”
“I’m fine. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Driver.”
“Go away, Sean. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t want to see you.”
“Open this door now?”
“No.”
She heard scrabbling, a key in the lock. She reefed the door open. “What!”
Sean, both hands up and out. “I need to see you’re okay.”
She swung the door hard to close it but he stopped it with a booted foot and pushed it open.
“I can’t believe you were going to bust in.”
He removed his foot but held the door and studied her. “I won’t. Not unless one of us is bleeding. I needed to see you’re all right.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not.” He spoke so low it was almost inaudible. He took his hand off the door.
She slammed it on him shouting, “Fuck you,” then stood in the middle of the small room feeling her whole body tremble from a surge of emotions that were too quick to process.
She sat on the bed, then pulled her legs up and curled into herself. She felt her heartbeat slow and the surface heat of her anger cool. She wasn’t a shouter, or a door slammer, or a person who cursed. She didn’t understand how those things came so easily now when they’d never been her way. When her breathing was steady again she recognised the emotion sitting under the rage was satisfaction.
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