A Dark Place to Die (41 page)

North grips the gun with some difficulty, the grip slick with his blood.

'You bitch. You fucking bitch
.' His voice is teary, disbelieving, the frightened tone of an adolescent boy, his Belfast accent unadulterated now. Zoe fixes her eyes on him and smiles a dreadful bloody smile. North steadies his gun hand and points it at her face. His finger curls against the trigger and he squeezes.

Koop slams into him like a stampeding buffalo as the gun goes off, missing Zoe's head by centimetres. North hits
the salt flats hard, and feels his skin tear as he's crushed into the ground under Koop's weight. Koop rolls up and headbutts North savagely, feeling the man's nose shatter.

Menno Koopman doesn't exist.

In his place is a natural force of white-hot hatred and he slams punch after punch into North as the man bucks beneath him. Their bodies are greasy with the Irishman's blood.

'MENNO!' screams Zoe.

As if in slow motion, North's gun is coming round, the barrel turning towards Koop's back as North's blood-slicked fingers grope for the trigger. The bullet rips a shallow path through Koop's flesh as he twists away. Ignoring the flash of red pain he places North's gun arm in the crook of his elbow and breaks it. Blood bubbles in North's mouth as he screams. He's bitten through his tongue. Koop staggers to his feet and stamps hard on North's groin. This time there's no scream from North, just an awful dull groan. Covered in blood and caked in salt, Koop slips, staggering momentarily away from the wrecked figure writhing on the white surface of the flats.

Before he can recover his equilibrium, Koop sees North twist the gun out of his smashed fingers and point it at him left-handed. Through a mask of blood, North's eyes show white. There's a feral gleam of ultimate triumph as he squeezes the trigger.

A bullet rips through the night and takes out the top of North's head just as his own gun barks. For a millisecond his confused eyes catch those of Menno Koopman before North slumps sideways, blood pooling darkly around him.

Disoriented, Koop jerks his head in the direction of the shot, but sees nothing. Instead his eyes focus on a silent
Zoe, her head slumped, a thick line of blood running through her blonde hair and splashing onto the ground, where it joins North's blood and forms one slowly growing black lake. With a strangled sob, Koop rushes to Zoe and falls to his knees.

A hundred metres away, Dragoslav Bregovic stands, deliberately gathers his kit into his rucksack and shoulders his rifle. He turns away from the scene and starts to retrace his steps back to his vehicle, feeling glad that he waited to fulfil his contract on the Irishman.

That shit
had
been worth seeing.

77

'Come.'

Keane glances at Em Harris before he pushes open the door to Perch's office. He wrestled with it before phoning her. She made the wrong choice siding with Perch but it wasn't a bad shout. In another life it might have been the call he'd have made. Pointless to rub it in any further; he and Harris have too much history to throw it away. Besides, knowing Harris, she might still end up C of C one day and Keane doesn't need any more enemies than his current abundant crop.

And here they were. Reader and Moresby were gracious enough to let MIT make the formal collar. Perch is – was – one of their own, after all.

Perch is behind his desk. He doesn't glance up, instead waving an imperial hand towards the chairs. The hand missing two fingertips.

Keane and Harris wait for Perch to look up. When he does his face pinches in annoyance.

'Keane. Harris. Sit.'

'I don't think so, Eric,' says Keane. 'Not today.'

Perch looks like he's been slapped. 'You'd better have a
good reason for that tone, DI Keane. I'm not in the mood for insubordination, is that clear?'

'Come on, Eric,' Keane says. 'It's over. We know.'

Before Perch can respond, Harris steps in. 'Let's do it by the book, Frank.' She fixes the DCI with a neutral look. 'Eric Perch, we are arresting you for conspiracy to commit murder, supplying illegal drugs with intent to distribute, and other charges that will be discussed at a later date.'

'You must be insane!' Perch is on his feet. 'Get out!'

'You do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned something which you later rely on in court. Anything . . .'

'I'll have you fucking gutted, you black bitch!' Perch, snarling, moves around the desk towards Harris but Keane puts out a restraining hand. At his touch, Perch recoils.

'. . . you do say may be given in evidence.' Harris finishes the arrest caution as though Perch hasn't spoken.

'You got any cuffs?' Keane looks at Harris. 'I forgot we needed them.'

Harris takes a pair of cuffs and hands them to Keane. He moves towards Perch who makes an ineffectual attempt to push him away.

'You've got to be kidding,' says Keane, smiling. He twists Perch's arms and slams his face down into the polished wood of the desk. Placing a knee in his former boss's back, Keane slips the cuffs on and snaps them shut. His mouth close to Perch's ear, Keane whispers. 'How are you feeling, Eric? Like to add anything?' He hauls Perch to his feet, the Chief Inspector's spectacles askew. His breathing is ragged, his face red.

'Get me my lawyer,' he says. 'You clowns have stepped out of your league.'

'Seen much of Matty lately?' says Keane. Perch stops moving. Keane sees the arrow reach its target.

'Frank.' Harris's tone is half-warning. 'We can do this in interview. By the book, right?'

'It's OK, Em,' says Keane. 'We've got this fucker tied up nice and tight.' Keane looks at Perch. 'Just how you like it, eh, Chief Inspector? You and Matty taking turns. Each to his own, I suppose, although you might have thought twice about filming the fucking thing.'

'I . . .' Perch has tears in his eyes. With an effort he pulls himself together. 'That's personal. If it's me. And it proves nothing.'

'We've got it all, Eric,' says Harris. 'The tapes. The bank accounts. We have you on CCTV at the Halligans' lock-up. They kept tapes, as security, didn't you know? More diligent than most legit companies. We have what's left of the coke. Matty rolled over like a tame dog this morning. Gave you up without a murmur for a reduction at sentencing. We know the lot. They served you up to us. It's over.'

Keane opens the door to the office where Reader and Moresby are waiting. At the sight of the two OCS officers, Eric Perch slumps. The office behind is fizzing with adrenaline as news of Perch's arrest spreads like ripples on a lake.

'Look on the bright side, Eric. It could have been worse,' says Keane as he prods Perch towards the door. 'If Koop was still here we might be bagging you up for the coroner.'

78

Mel is going home to Sapporo to be buried by her family, but before that happens, there is a gathering at Nashua for everyone who knows her and Zoe.

Kenji Ato, Mel's older brother, has come out from Japan to accompany her body home; their parents too traumatised by the loss to make the trip. At the site of Mel's death, around the back of the fig tree, Kenji has built a small tower of flat stones he's collected from a beach at Lennox Head. The smooth black rocks are carefully arranged into a circular cone. On the top stone Kenji places a votive candle in a protective lantern and lights it. He and one of Mel's colleagues from the university embrace as a thin ribbon of smoke rises into the air. Some of the twenty or so people gathered in a loose circle around the makeshift altar sniff and dab their eyes.

From the steps of the deck, Koop watches the smoke drifting up into the branches of the fig. He has no idea if the ceremony has any religious meaning, or if it is simply something Kenji has cooked up to mark Melumi's death for a disparate group. He should have asked, he knows, but
since coming back from Lake Ballard he's found himself to be short of some social skills. It's as if he is observing familiar things from underwater: he can recognise what they are but his responses feel sluggish.

It is two weeks since he raced across the salt flats, dodging Gormley's nightmarish black skeletons – two of which reared up in his beams – and found Zoe.

He can't get the image of her out of his head.

I'm too late. That was his first thought. He was so close, so very close.

Picked out by the harsh spotlights of the hired Toyota, she looked like a sacrificial offering. Naked and on her knees, her blonde hair showing a stark red bloom running down across her blood-spattered breasts and thighs. In front of her, North holding a gun to her head, ready to deliver the coup de grâce.

It was the worst moment of Koop's life. All his fault. Everything. He hit North with everything he had.

'You okay?' Koop feels a hand on his shoulder and turns to see Zoe. She wears a scarf wrapped around her head to conceal the bandages. North's bullet carved a path along her temple, taking off the tip of her ear on its way past and knocking her instantly senseless.

Koop reaches up and pats her hand. 'I thought you'd be out there.' He nods towards the gathering.

'Looking like this?' She points to her black eye and heavily bruised face. 'People will think you've been knocking me round.'

The medical diagnosis is promising. No internal damage from the bullet, no signs of brain damage from the beating she took. She'd have a small scar across her temple and there was nothing to be done about her ear, but in all other respects Zoe would make a full recovery.

Physically, at least. Koop knows from long experience rape victims carry more damaging scars.

He hasn't yet discussed in detail with her the days leading up to North's death, although Zoe told the West Australian Police everything. Which she then had to repeat for the Queensland OCG and for Warren Eckhardt at Homicide. Eckhardt offered to go through everything with Koop, but he declined. Zoe would tell him when – if – she felt the time was right.

'We'll be fine,' says Zoe, softly. 'You found me. You saved me.'

'And Mel? I didn't save her, did I?' Koop speaks in an angry enough tone for several of the mourners to turn their way. Zoe wraps her arms around him.

'You can't help everyone.' Zoe pulls away and holds him at arm's length. 'Listen, Koop, I'm only going to tell you this once because I don't want to think about it any more. Mel didn't suffer. She was out before . . . before he did what he did. He was an animal. We – Mel and I – just got in the way.
It wasn't your fault.'

Koop appreciates it, he really does.

But she's wrong.

It is his fault, his foolish decision to chase Stevie's killer, and he is going to live with it for the rest of his life. As a copper – correction, ex-copper – Koop knows he has the capacity to compartmentalise things like this. He'll put Melumi Ato in a sealed room in his mind, but she'll always be carried around with him; he'll be able to function, but with part of him irrevocably damaged.

So he nods to Zoe. 'I know. I'll be fine.' The words stick in his throat. That's great, Koopman;
you'll
be fine. What about your wife? Her girlfriend butchered in front of her, abducted by a psychopath, raped, shot and left for dead
in the middle of nowhere and she's comforting you? Top class.

He gets to his feet and puts his arms around his wife, feeling her involuntary and unnatural stiffness in his embrace.
'We'll
be fine.' They kiss awkwardly. Zoe is going to take some time to face physical contact after what happened. The two break apart and Zoe retreats to the kitchen to keep herself busy. Koop watches a friend put her arm across her shoulder and the two of them begin quietly talking.

'Hell of a thing.' Warren Eckhardt materialises on the deck. He casts an appreciative Aussie eye around the area. 'Nice size deck you have here, Koop.'

'It looks bigger because the, er, because the tub's gone. You know.'

'Oh, shit. Of course. Tactless as usual.'

Koop holds up a hand. 'That's OK.'

Eckhardt lifts out his cigarettes. 'You mind?'

Koop shakes his head. 'Help yourself.'

His cigarette lit, Eckhardt eases his generous backside onto the rail and puffs happily.

'Like I said, hell of a thing.'

'Did you hear from Frank?'

'Keane? Yes, they made the collar yesterday.'

Koop imagines Keane clanking the cuffs on Perch. Jesus, that would have been a thing to have witnessed. 'How did Perch take it?'

Eckhardt smiles. 'Not well. Frank said he tried the stonewall approach first – then he switched to "this was all an operation, I was undercover", all that sort of crap. When that got nowhere Keane said he let him marinate overnight. Put him in a cell next to a screamer. In the morning Perch wanted to talk. Funny thing was he was
more worried about word getting out he was a poofta – sorry, gay – than he was about looking down the barrel of a life sentence. He's trying to negotiate something in return for the Halligans.'

'And the Halligans?'

'They're doing exactly the same. And giving up more than Perch in the hope that will seal the deal. Same the world over. Maggots.'

Eckhardt blows out a long plume of smoke into the night and the two men are silent for a moment.

'Any news on the shooter?' says Koop. Both know he is talking about the man who killed North as he pulled the trigger on Koop.

'Nothing. And we won't, if you want my personal opinion. This bloke knew what he was doing. North's vehicle was stripped bare of the cocaine. From the info Frank's getting in Liverpool and from what Chakos is giving me from OCG, there would have been around fifteen million dollars in that vehicle. If I'm putting it together right, and I think I am, the shooter was sent by Liverpool – meaning, obviously, Perch and the Halligans – to tie up the loose end. He will have had something worked out about getting the coke, or the money from the sale, back to Liverpool minus a cut. With that side of things all tucked up, I'd make a serious bet the shooter has pocketed the coke and is now busy making himself disappear.'

'It all came down to money in the end, didn't it?' Koop suddenly feels like getting hammered. He looks into the kitchen where Zoe is surrounded by a group of friendly faces. He turns to Eckhardt. 'Fancy a drink?'