Donna Joy Usher - Chanel 01 - Cocoa and Chanel (18 page)

The noises continued. Coming closer. Each one winding me tighter and tighter. I stared towards the sounds, terror bubbling inside, horror crawling over my skin. A shadow morphed in the alley taking on human form. A scream formed in my chest, worked its way raggedly up to my throat and then Roger stepped out of the shadows.

I sagged, dropping my gun back in my bag and starting to cry. ‘Thank God it’s you,’ I said, walking towards him.

‘Who did you think it would be?’

‘Look.’ I gestured towards the woman.

‘Oh dear,’ he said, ‘not another one.’ And then he pulled out a cigar and lit it with a glove covered hand.

It took a few seconds for the synapses in my brain to connect the dots. When they did the horror was almost too much.

‘You,’ I panted, unable to comprehend it. ‘You?’

‘Poor sweet Chanel,’ he said, walking towards me. ‘So trusting, so desirable.’ He ran a hand down my cheek and I shuddered and backed away.

‘Don’t touch me,’ I said.

‘Or what? You’ll scream?’ I could see his sneer in the dim light from the restaurant.

‘No,’ I said, taking my gun back out of my bag, ‘I’ll shoot.’ I tried to sound brave, but my voice shook, and my hand trembled. Even though I was the one holding the gun I was terrified.

He backed away from the barrel as he shook his head. ‘Tsk, tsk, Chanel,’ he said. ‘You brought your gun home from work.’

‘If you didn’t want me to start carrying my gun around you shouldn’t have sacrificed a rabbit on the bonnet of my car.’ I took my phone out of my bag and waved him towards the end of the alley, away from any chance of escape. I really didn’t want to try and shoot him if he fled.

‘How did you do that?’ I asked. He raised an eyebrow at me and suddenly all the pieces of the puzzle clicked into place. ‘That’s why you said you’d meet me out the front of the hospital,’ I said. ‘You’d already been released.’

‘Clever, clever,’ he said.

‘I don’t know how you thought you were going to do this and still meet me for dinner.’

His smile hardened, taking on a vicious edge. ‘Oh Chanel, you were never going to make it to dinner.’

‘Why me?’ I felt ill. Discussing why Roger wanted to kill me had not been in my plans for this evening.

‘You’re far too curious for your own good.’

And then I really understood. ‘The killer in London you told me about, it was you, wasn’t it?’

He smiled and raised the cigar to his lips. ‘You’re not as stupid as you look.’

His insult had an effect he hadn’t considered. It helped turn my fear into anger. Don’t get me wrong, I was still mind-numbingly terrified, but my limbs were no longer paralysed. Before I had felt like a mouse with a cat, now I had turned into a terrier.

‘Hula Girl cigars?’ I said.

He lifted the cigar, examined it and then shrugged his shoulders. ‘What can I say? I like the coconutty flavour.’

‘Why’d you have to kill the tobacconist?’

‘His blood is on your hands, not mine.’

‘How is that even possible?’

‘If you hadn’t stuck your pretty little nose into the case I wouldn’t have had to shut down the lead.’

I felt sullied. Manipulated and sullied. I had admired this man and, if I was totally honest, had been falling in love with him. All this talk made no difference. He was a psychopath and it wasn’t my job to try and make him see the error of his ways. It was, however, my job to stop him.

‘Tell that to the judge,’ I said, shaking my head. I looked down at my phone for a second, scrolled to work and hit the ring button. That second of distraction was all the time he needed.

He struck like a snake, his movements a blur to my peripheral vision. He grabbed my right arm and twisted rapidly, karate chopping the outside of my elbow.

I heard the crack a couple of seconds before my brain registered the pain. Two blissful seconds before agony raced from the wounded joint, ripping from my throat in a raw scream. The gun fell from my hand, my injured arm unable to support its weight.

Roger leapt forwards and kicked the gun away from me. I turned and ran, sprinting towards the road. My jolting steps banged my ruined arm against my side, bringing tears to my eyes.

If I thought I could have gotten away from him I was mistaken. He was much faster than me. He caught me by my ponytail and ripped me back, flinging me to the ground at his feet. I tried to stand but he kicked me in the stomach, and then smashed the back of his hand across my cheekbone.

I doubled over and fell, catching myself with my good hand, the phone falling from my fingers. My stomach protested at the rough treatment and I heaved a few times before rolling to the side and crawling to my feet. Before I could run he grabbed my damaged arm, wrenching the ends of the broken bone against each other as he threw me against a dumpster. I screamed with pain and felt a second crack as my back hit the hard metal. Sharp pain radiated through my chest making breathing almost impossible.

He pulled me upright with one hand, the fist of the other smacking into my cheek. My head snapped back and before I could recover, he slapped me as hard as he could.

‘Nosey bitch,’ he growled, slapping me again.

I shrieked and put my left arm up to protect my face. He moved to my stomach, punching me again and again until finally I collapsed onto the ground, my useless right arm collapsing under me. As I panted and cried and retched I saw the light glint off the metal of my gun. I rolled and lunged towards it with my left arm, feeling the cool metal slap into the palm of my hand just before he threw me back again. I landed with my back against the bin and shakily raised my left arm, the barrel of my Glock once again trained on his chest. He backed away, his arms held up.

For a second we stared into each other’s eyes. I took pleasure in the shock that I saw there, the uncertainty. Then I pulled off the first shot without even thinking.

It wasn’t at all like in training. In training I had been calm and collected, had had time to aim. I hadn’t been terrified. My eyes hadn’t been clouded with tears. I had been aiming at a piece of cardboard, not a real breathing person.

And of course in training my hand hadn’t been shaking so hard that I missed the target totally.

Roger’s laugh was evil, excited. ‘Shoot me once shame on you,’ he said.

I squeezed again, and missed.

‘Shoot me twice shame on me.’ He lashed out with his boot, smashing my head into the hard metal of the bin. Pain exploded through my mind and darkness threatened to take me. But I held on. I wasn’t ready to die. Gripping the gun I raised it again, screaming hysterically as I fired again and again and again.

I missed him every time.

‘Jesus Chanel,’ he said, ‘that’s the worse bit of marksmanship I’ve ever seen.’ He shook his head at me as I lay panting in the dirt at his feet. ‘If I’ve been counting right, and I’m not sure if I have, you’ve fired 14 of your 15 shots. That leaves one.’ He laughed quietly to himself before saying, ‘Do you feel lucky punk? Well do you?’

‘That’s…my…line,’ I said through gritted teeth, and then I aimed at his stomach and fired.

He had counted right, and the last of my bullets must have missed him by millimetres. I saw the look of triumph on his face. He threw back his head to laugh, and then he stopped. His eyes went blank, rolled back in his head and then he collapsed forwards on top of me.

When I came to, Roger’s weight was pinning me to the ground. I screamed and fought, biting and clawing and then I realised he wasn’t fighting back. I managed to shove him off me and I crawled to the side and threw up. My head was throbbing, my ribs were aching and I was still having trouble breathing. On a scale of one to ten my arm was a twenty.

It seemed like a good idea to have another little nap.

I could hear my name being called through the fog in my mind. It was distant and crackly and it sounded like Dave. I felt around on the ground, finally finding my phone, and I lifted it to my ear.

‘Mmmm,’ I said.

‘Jesus Chanel.’ It
was
Dave. ‘Are you okay?’

‘I hurt,’ I said. And I started to cry.

‘The boys are on their way. Where are you exactly?’

‘In the alley,’ I whispered.

‘Behind the Fook Yuen?’

‘Yes.’ I put my head back down on the ground but kept my eyes open, trying to stay conscious. Tears trickled down my cheeks and onto the ground. It felt like forever in my world of pain before I could see the torch lights bobbing down the alley. I tried to stand up to meet them, but my body refused to co-operate.

‘Over here.’ My voice was pathetic.

‘Christ,’ Trent said, shining his torch on the dead woman. The light scanned around onto Roger before he finally found me. He knelt beside me and examined me in the torch light. ‘You look like shit.’

‘I’ve felt better,’ I croaked.

‘The ambulance is on the way,’ he said.

‘What happened to Detective Richardson,’ Daniel asked.

‘I tried to shoot him,’ I said, ‘but I missed.’

Trent snorted and shook his head. ‘You’re lucky to be alive.’

‘Lucky unlucky,’ I said. And then my brain decided to turn off for a while.

***

When I woke I was lying in a bed in a strange room. I gathered by the pristine white sheets that were tucked tightly around me that it was a hospital bed. Mum sat by me reading a book. She had on a full face of make-up and was wearing a low cut blue dress. The colour looked amazing against her fiery hair.

‘Going somewhere?’ I mumbled.

She dropped the book and smiled down at me as she held onto my hand. ‘No just here with my hero daughter.’

I snorted. ‘Hero Schmero. You’re awfully dressed up for the hospital.’

‘Never know when a cute doctor might walk by.’

‘If anyone’s getting the cute doctor it’s me,’ I said. I tried to sit up and winced. Wow, I really hurt.

‘Careful darling,’ she said. ‘You’re pretty banged up. I doubt you’re going to get the doctor looking like that.’

She handed me a mirror and I automatically reached for it with my right hand. I stared in dismay at the cast that covered my entire arm.

‘You had an operation,’ she said. ‘They had to put some pins in.’

I reached out my left hand and grasped the mirror. I had two black eyes and my nose was strapped and swollen. There was a large bandage wrapped around my head.

‘I might get the pity vote,’ I said, handing her the mirror. The image disturbed me more than I was letting on but there was no use crying over spilt milk, or in my case a split lip.

‘That’s the spirit,’ she said. I got the feeling I hadn’t fooled her.

‘Detective Bailey rang earlier.’

‘Detective Bailey?’

‘Trent.’

‘What did he want?’

‘Well apparently they heard a lot of what went on through the phone – that was a stroke of brilliance darling – but he still needs to talk to you.’

I wasn’t sure if I was ready to relive it yet; didn’t know if I ever would be ready to relive it. I wasn’t just physically battered I was emotionally destroyed. Someone I trusted had violated that trust in the worst possible way and I didn’t know if that was something I was ever going to recover from.

I looked around and realised that vases of flowers covered every available surface in my room. ‘Who?’ I said, pointing at them.

‘Ever since the news got out they’ve been turning up.’

‘That’s nice.’ I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep but my mind had woken up even if my body didn’t want to. There were a lot of unanswered questions. How long had I been unconscious? What had killed Roger? Where had Mum got that dress?

‘Detective Bailey I assume,’ I heard Mum say. I opened my eyes to see Trent stride into the room.

He had a small bunch of pansies in one hand and he stopped and stared at all the others flowers. ‘Umm,’ he said, ‘these are from my garden.’

‘I like a man who knows his flowers,’ Mum purred, jumping up and taking them from him. She put them in a glass right beside the bed and sat back down, crossing her legs to reveal a length of brown thigh.

‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘Trent, this is my Mum, Lorraine.’ I tried to smile but my lips were too swollen to move much.

He nodded his head at her and then looked back at me, shaking his head. ‘You look worse every time I see you.’

‘You know how to make a gal feel special,’ I said.

‘You’re lucky to be alive.’

‘You said that last night.’

‘And that was before I counted the spent shells.’

‘I told you I missed him,’ I murmured.

‘Fifteen times? He was standing, what, two metres away? How is that even possible?’

‘I was using my left hand. And it was trembling.’ I tried to cross my arms, but the blasted cast got in the way totally ruining the effect. ‘And I had my eyes closed.’

He burst out laughing. ‘Your eyes were closed?’

‘It was pretty scary; you had to be there to appreciate it.’

‘Scary for the far wall,’ he said. ‘Anyway you only missed him 14 times. The last one rebounded off the dumpster hinge and hit him in the back of the head.’

‘Pardon?’

‘You shot him in the back of the head,’ Mum said, standing up and leaning towards me so that Trent copped an eyeful of cleavage.

‘Jolly good,’ I said. I’d never realised how impressive her breasts were before. Between them and the head injury I was feeling pretty distracted.

‘Anyway you’re being given a VA and Ramy has reluctantly withdrawn your formal warnings.’

‘That’s big of him,’ Mum said, leaning back against the bench behind her.

‘Between us,’ Trent said conspiratorially, ‘the head honchos weren’t too happy with him giving their shining star two formal warnings. They’re looking into it even as we speak.’

‘Isn’t that good Chanel?’ Mum turned to look at me.

‘What about my gun?’ I said. I mean surely I was going to pay for that. I was pretty sure that my career in the Police Force had finished in this blaze of glory.

‘You mean your gun that I gave you permission to take with you when you followed a lead?’

I stared at him for a few seconds before his words sunk into my drug stupored head.
Wow
. He had covered for me.

My arm had started to ache with all the talk of shooting and the pain was increasing with each beat of my heart. ‘Thank you,’ I said, tears welling from the pain.

‘You don’t look so good.’ Trent stared at me, concern etched his features.

‘I feel awful,’ I croaked. I was suddenly extremely tired, and sad. I felt like someone had died, and then I realised they had, and I felt even more tired and more sad. Combined with the pain, it was overwhelming and I wanted to dive deep into the unconsciousness I had only just returned from.

Mum hit the call button and within a handful of seconds a nurse had appeared by my bed. She seemed more interested in Trent than me, so I let out a pitiful moan.

‘Goodness,’ she said, suddenly the picture of efficiency. She left and was back shortly with a syringe which she injected into my intravenous line.

Almost immediately I started to feel better. The world took on a rosy, smudged glow.

‘For the pain,’ the nurse said to Mum. ‘It’ll make her drowsy.’

‘Trent,’ I said dreamily, wondering which of the two Trents I could see was the real one, ‘what’s a VA?’

‘You can’t remember?’

‘I have a head injury.’ I figured I may as well take advantage of my injuries while I could.

‘It’s the Valour Award, an in-service bravery decoration.’

‘Oh,’ I said. A tear slipped out of the corner of my eye and trailed lazily down my cheek.

Trent moved closer to Mum, and even through the fog starting to cover my mind it seemed weird, as though he was standing too close to someone he had only just met. He leant back against the bench behind them, his shoulder almost touching hers. She turned her face towards him and for a wild second I thought they were going to kiss. My heavy eyelids traitorously drifted shut of their own accord, and I could feel myself being drawn away from the room and reality.

Just before I passed out I distinctly heard Trent’s voice. It sounded amused and a little frustrated as he said. ‘So Tess, long time no see.’

And then my head was filled with white fuzz.

***

I would like to thank you for purchasing
Cocoa and Chanel.
I really hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it. Please feel free to check out my website
www.donnajoyusher.com
or find me on twitter @DonnaJoyUsher.

About the Author

Born in Brisbane, I started my working life as a dentist. After 15 years of drilling and filling I discovered there was more to life, and put pen to paper. Now I drill by day and write by night.

When not doing either of those things I like spending time with my husband and two little dogs, fishing and camping, motorbike riding, traveling, drinking wine on my deck and eating chocolate. Last year I ran my first half marathon and took up paddle boarding.

I have lived in a myriad of places: Melbourne, Perth, England, Rockhampton, Roxby Downs, Sydney, Cairns and am now situated on the New South Wales Central Coast.