Blackout (32 page)

After ten minutes he reached the shore, his teeth chattering from the cold.The beach was made up of tiny pebbles. Josh lay still for a moment, recovering his breath. He cupped some water in his hands, drinking as much as he could get inside himself, then crawled forwards. The trees were ten yards away. He curled up behind one of the massive pine trunks. The shoreline was completely empty.

I need a few minutes to rest, he told himself. Then I make my escape.

His clothes were sodden. Every inch of his skin felt damp and chilled. He struggled to pick himself up, standing uneasily. Got to get away, he tojd himself, staggering forwards. Got to get away.

If they find me, they're going to kill me.

Josh walked for two hours through the forest that ran down to the lakeside. He knew there would already be hunting parties out looking for him, but the national park surrounding the lake covered a hundred and fifty square

276

miles. Locating a single man would take a team of hundreds. For a few hours at least he should be safe.

He still had money on him. Two hundred dollars in cash, and a pocketful of loose change: the notes were dripping wet but would dry out in time. Eventually he found a small road and, after walking along it for an hour and a half, a payphone placed there for anyone who broke down in their car. He called Kate on the payphone that she'd said she'd be waiting by and told her what had happened. 'Stay right where you are,' she told him. 'Hide in the woods. I can drive down there in a couple of hours.'

After speaking with Kate and giving her his position, Josh retreated fifty yards back from the road, into a thicket of tall pine trees. He pushed some leaves together to form a bed, then lay down, his eyes closing almost instantly. He breathed deeply, drawing in the rich restorative oxygen of the woodlands. For the first time in weeks, his mind was clear. He knew who he was. And he knew what he had to do.

He rested for -two hours, catching enough sleep to get some strength back into his system: the ability to sleep on demand was one of the first lessons he'd learned in the army. Then he trudged back up to the road, settling behind a group of trees close to the spot where he'd told Kate to meet him. It was past two in the morning, and the narrow strip of tarmac running through the forest was empty. His heart pounded inside his chest in the twenty minutes he had to wait until he s^w the Mustang pull around the corner. Kate was the only person he could think of who could help him now. And if they didn't get to Luke soon, then Azim would find him.

After the Mustang pulled up to the side of the road, Josh waited a couple of minutes, making sure it hadn't been followed, then ran out to meet Kate. They drove the car fifty yards into the woods so that it wouldn't be visible from

4

277

the air, then went back towards Josh's hiding place. The air was damp and cold, and a light breeze was whistling through the trees. But it felt good to have her back at his side.

'How much damage have I taken?' said Josh as Kate started to examine his wounds.

'Too much,' she replied. She bathed the wound in his neck with a swab of disinfectant, then replaced the bandage.

'Normally, I'd recommend at least a week or two of complete relaxation and recuperation,' she said with a gentle smile.

'Doctor's orders?' said Josh.

Kate nodded. 'But you're a bad patient,' she said. 'The kind that doesn't listen to their doctor.'

He reached up to kiss her. Her lips felt warm and soft and moist, and as her tongue stabbed against his skin he could feel some of his wounds starting to heal. When a man feels certain that he is about to die, Josh reflected, there are many things that he thinks about. There are a hundred different regrets that flash through his mind: places he never visited; people he never met; the daughter he wouldn't see again. But foremost among them is the realisation that he'll never hold a woman in his arms again, never feel her yield under his touch, nor hear her whisper in his ear.

Over the last few days, there had been many moments when he'd felt he was about to die. There'd been times when he would have welcomed death as warmly as if it were a long-lost brother. But now that he'd escaped death's clutches, he was grateful to be alive. Every moment, he resolved, was there to be savoured as if it were a succulent piece of fruit hanging from a tree.

So Josh held Kate tight, drawing strength from the warmth of her body. She lay down next to him, resting on the strip of ground surrounded by the tall pine trees that filled this bank of the lake. For a few minutes, Josh was content just to

278

feel her embrace. It was only after a while that he started to unbutton her blouse, and slowly and gently make love to her.

'You told me something wasn't right,' he said, lying next to her when they had finished.

Her lips caressed his forehead, soothing him more effectively than any tranquilliser could. 'Don't worry, baby. It doesn't matter. We'll go find Luke now.'

The first shafts of daylight were breaking through the trees. 'Christ, it's morning,' said Josh. 'We've wasted time.'

Kate looked behind her. The sun was rising above the horizon. Through the trees they could see the still waters of the lake, the orange light of early morning playing across its surface. 'It would be nice just to enjoy this place for a few days,' she said. 'It's so beautiful.'

Josh hugged her closer to him. 'After we've completed the mission,' he said. 'We'll go somewhere together.'

Kate nodded: 'Here?'

'Maybe. But next time I'm not jumping out of a bloody helicopter.'

There was a silence between them. It was foolish to talk of the future. There was too much to do. 'You know where Luke is?' said Kate.

Josh nodded.

They drove due north from the lake, tracking the minor roads. When they reached a small town, Josh waited in the car while Kate went into the mall to run her errands. His eyes scanned the horizon carefully. He could see a security guard patrolling the outer perimeter of the car park. He could see a man ambling though the parked cars, checking each one. Just some guy who's looking for his own vehicle? wondered Josh. Or a Fed? Josh ducked, shielding his face so that no one could see him.

You watch everyone like a hawk, Josh told himself. That what it's like to be a hunted man.

279

Kate slammed the Mustang's door shut. 'Here,' she said, handing across a large Burger King paper bag.

Josh glanced down at the food. A Bacon Double Cheeseburger, a Whopper with cheese, two extra-large portions of fries, and a big carton of Coke. The first meat he'd have eaten in days, he suddenly realised. I need it.

He pulled the Mustang out of the parking lot and started heading due north, away from the town.There was a sheriff's office by the side of the road, and as they went past it Josh instinctively felt himself gunning the accelerator. Take it easy, he warned himself. This is a big country, men get lost for years. So long as you stay calm you can buy yourself the day or two you need to find Luke.

His head had been spinning ever since his arrest. That was the last thing he'd expected. For the first few hours he'd been driven just by the adrenalin of his escape,-then by finding Kate again. But he still didn't know what he could have done to make the Army turn on him so viciously.

My memory, he reflected grimly. It's still shot full of holes. Something happened between me and Luke. Something that is still unfinished. Something that the Army didn't like.

I just don't know what it is.

I have to find him. I have to find out what happened in those few hours and minutes before I was shot.

He pulled the car into a lay-by at the side of the road. The forests that surrounded the narrow stretch of irrigated land bordering Lake Mead had long since faded from view, and they were now driving through the harsh wilderness that separated the lake from Las Vegas. There were signs on the road offering land for sale at a dollar an acre. But no takers, decided Josh: it was a brutal landscape, untouched by rain for years at a stretch, where even the toughest, hardiest of animals would struggle to survive.

Josh took a bite of the Whopper, gobbling down the

280

?

food. He needed protein, carbohydrates, and sugar, and he needed them fast.

The main battle still lay ahead. He would need whatever strength he could summon up.

'Did you get all the stuff?' he asked Kate.

She nodded.'A GPS locator. And a copy of London Calling by the Clash.' She hesitated, holding up the slim black machine that could locate any spot in the world from a single set of coordinates, and then a copy of the CD, with its iconic cover of Paul Simenon smashing his bass guitar against the stage of a concert hall. 'The GPS device I understand. It'll tell us where Luke is, so long as we have the right numbers to feed into it.' She held up the CD, glancing at its cover. 'And this. Well, I don't know'

Josh grinned. 'London Calling, right?'

'He's in London?'

Josh shook his head. 'Three letters, that was the signal. L, B, and J.'

Kate looked confused. 'Okay, tell me.'

'The first three' tracks of London Calling. The title track, that's an L.'

Kate flipped the CD over, looking down the track listing. '"Brand New Cadillac". Followed by "Jimmy Jazz".'

'Right. L, B, and J.'

'So where is Luke?'

Josh reached across for the CD. He ripped off the plastic covering and pulled out the inner sleeve. 'Take the times of those three tracks, then feed the number of seconds into our GPS locator. So if the track lasts three minutes, twenty eight seconds, put in twenty-eight.' He handed the CD back to Kate. 'Whatever comes out, then that's where Luke is.'

Her fingers worked feverishly. Josh sat patiently, chewing his way through the rest of the Whopper, then attacking the Bacon Double Cheeseburger. He took a handful of the fries and slipped them into his mouth. At his side, Kate was

281

holding the GPS device in one hand and the CD in the other. Her fingers were hitting the tiny plastic keyboard with the force of a carpenter banging a nail into a wall.

'Swansea,' she said, her tone excited. 'He's in Swansea.'

Josh felt a couple of fries lodge themselves in his throat. He started coughing violently. 'What's he doing there? With the bloody Taffies?'

'What?'

Josh looked at her expression. Blank. She's never heard of Swansea, he thought.

'Where is it?' he asked.

'Swansea, Arizona,' said Kate. 'About a hundred miles north-east of here. In the middle of just about nowhere.'

'Then that's where we're going,' said Josh.

Josh slipped the CD in the Mustang's audio system, then fired up the engine and pulled the car out into the road. The first sweeping, howling chords that opened the album boomed up through the Mustang's speakers.

'London calling,' yelped Joe Strummer's rasping, hoarse voice as the song cranked up.

Josh tapped his fingers against the dashboard, allowing the beat of the music to surge through his veins. Instinctively, he started to mouth the familiar words. For an apocalypse, there was no better soundtrack.

282

?

TWENTY-TWO

Tuesday, June 16th. Noon.

The road twisted up the side of the mountain, its surface pitted with holes and strewn with dust and boulders. Josh was gripping onto the wheel of the Mustang, letting it roll with the bumps. His body had taken so many knocks in the past two weeks that he could no longer locate the pain precisely: there was just a dull, insistent ache that seemed to be burning up every nerve in his body.

It had taken three hours to drive here, longer than Josh had expected. They had stopped once at a gas station to shower and get some coffee. Then they had stopped at an all-day store to pick up some fresh supplies for the day ahead: water, matches, some tinned food and biscuits, plus as much spare petrol as they could get into a selection of jerrycans and fit onto the back seat of the Mustang.

The route had been a long and hard one, taking Kate and Josh through the empty back roads of western Arizona. They drove up through high mountains, coloured a mixture of reds, bronzes and yellows, and twisted their way through steep valleys filled only with boulders and a few stray cacti barely managing to stay alive in the miserable soil. The heat of the morning was baking, and as Josh looked up at crystal-blue skies uninterrupted by even a whisper of cloud he could feel himself growing wary of the sunshine. They were only a few dozen miles from Death Valley, the hottest place in North America, where

283

the heat still claimed a few careless tourists every year.

Swansea was a mining town, started by the Clara Consolidated Gold and Copper Company in 1909. It had remained inhabited until the mine finally shut down in 1924. At its peak, it had had a population of 750 people and a railway that connected it to the main Arizona transport arteries. As well as the mine, there had been a smelter, a barber's, a hotel and a sheriff. Now nothing remained. Unlike many of the Arizona ghost towns, it wasn't on any of the tourist maps: it was too new for anyone interested in the history of the Old West, and it had been home to none of the famous gunfighters of an earlier era. Year by year, it was turning back into the dust from which it had been built.

Josh's gaze flickered up to the horizon. The ground levelled off at an altitude of around a thousand metres. There were deep gullies and crevices etched into the side of the mountain where the rain had washed off its sides, but as they climbed higher the ground became smoother, its surface covered with fine dust. 'There,' said Josh, spotting the small collection of tumbledown buildings emerging in the distance. 'That's it.'

The road broke out onto a plateau, and suddenly widened. The layout of the town was clearer now. A main street, with a collection of ruined buildings. A flat mountain top. And just beyond that a huge ditch, hundreds of metres long and at least fifty metres deep, sitting like a giant scar on the side of the town: the familiar debris, reflected Josh, of opencast mining. ^

He pulled the Mustang up at the side of the road. It was difficult to say where the town started or ended. The buildings broke down into splinters of wood and rubble, and whatever fences there might once have been had long since rotted away. Josh paused at the beginning of the street. At its edge was a sign, broken in two. 'Swan--'it read. 'Popi