Floored (45 page)

Sean watched him unwrap a packet of honey roast ham. He thought about that word and why he’d used it. “She tests me. She doesn’t always make it easy. I don’t always get things my way. She’s not afraid to make me cranky.”

Dad made a strangled sound; his eyes were down on an avocado. Sean realised he’d just described his father’s relationship with his mother. He laughed. “Now would be the time to warn me off, Dad.”

Dad looked up, looked solemn. “It’s been my experience you can live with crazy if you have a handle on compromise, and no one loves you harder than a woman who can make you crazy.” His eye went back to the avocado. “If you tell your mother about this conversation, Sean, I will come to you when you’re sleeping and I will fuck you up. Now for Christ’s sake go and have a shower, you’re stinking up the place.”

He showered. He had a sandwich and a beer. He slept for an hour. Refreshed both physically and mentally he went back to Cait. Whatever she needed he was ready to do.

But he’d left it too late. Blue was barking. The house was empty. She was already gone.

49: Over

Stud whistled. That was the signal to call it off. Justin was a no show. The sting was a bust. They’d been in Centennial Park ninety minutes, most of which Caitlyn had spent alternatively jogging, and pretending to do up her shoelaces on sporadically located benches. She slowed and stopped at the nearest one.

Stud jogged up behind her and threw himself on it. “Fuck.” He had heavy elasticised braces on both knees and he was a good twenty years older than she was, but he was in very good shape, his wet t-shirt sticking to a well toned chest and arms. “Sorry, sweetheart. This happens sometimes, it’s not a perfect science.”

She sat beside him. “What do we do now?”

“Pack up and go home.”

“Is that it?” If she’d known it was going to be so painless, she’d have saved herself the agony of fear.

“We’ll see.” Okay, maybe not so painless.

At a sudden shout they both looked up. A runaway horse thundered towards them; the rider, a small child in a big helmet, a man limped along behind calling frantically for help.

Stud groaned and looked about; the park had started to empty out with rain threatening, but there were still cars and people about, though no one who looked prepared to tackle a horse. The two jogging cops ahead of them were making their way back. He spoke into a tiny microphone, so that the crew in the surveillance vehicle would know what he was doing. “John Wayne moment.” Then to Caitlyn he said, “Stay here.”

He got off the bench and walked a few steps forward to stand in the path of the horse, both hands up and out. He looked exactly like he knew what to do. He made soft crooning noises. The horse slowed to a trot, eyeing him suspiciously, blowing and prancing about. The child was laughing. Stud reached up to take the reins. The man had almost caught up.

She only noticed someone behind her when she heard a voice. “Hello, Caitlyn.” She spun around, leapt to her feet. Justin. She shouted for Stud, looking back for him. She saw the man crash tackle him into the sand, almost between the horse’s feet.

“You really didn’t think I’d let you go, did you?”

She shouted again as hands grabbed her around the waist and hauled her backwards. The other two undercover jogger cops had weapons drawn and were coming towards them.

Another voice, aggressive, somewhere behind her shouted, “Stay back.” Rough hands were dragging her across a grass verge. She saw the two cops hesitate. There were other guns drawn on the cops in the surveillance vehicle.

She heard the horse screaming, the sound of an engine, rough shouting, then a single shot and she was deafened by its closeness. Someone hit her hard on the back of the head and pain sent her vision flaring blue-white. She was lifted up. More voices threatening. Leather and sweat. She saw red, then black, then nothing.

When she next opened her eyes she was on bumping along on the floor a van. Shelving all around, bits of hardware for a carpenter or a builder. Justin was sitting on an upturned milk crate in front of her. His arm was in plaster. He mouthed something at her she couldn’t hear through the ringing. Her head was pounding. She put her hand to it and it came away bloody. They were travelling fast. She tried to listen for a siren, was Stud’s team following? Did someone get shot?

Justin snapped his fingers in front of her face and got close so she could smell him. “I’m talking to you.”

What would he do if she didn’t answer? He spoke to someone in the front. “You hit her too hard.” She couldn’t answer. She closed her eyes. She didn’t want to see him and her head hurt.

When she woke next she was in a dingy room with yellowed paint and 1950s furniture, a bed, wardrobe and dresser. It smelled musty, dusty. The room swam when she sat up, the nausea almost overwhelming. There was blood on the pillow where she’d been laying and her hand was sticky with it, her hair matted and clotted with it. There was a window but it was barred. It looked out on a side passage. Without getting up she knew the door would be locked. She tried to stay awake but her head hurt badly.

It was dark when Justin woke her. He was sitting on the end of the bed with a glass of water and a packet of Panadol. She glanced at her watch, 9.30pm. More than three hours after they’d snatched her from the park. No one had come looking for her. She tried to hold on to the panic, settle it beside the nausea and not throw up. If no one was coming for her she had to help herself.

“Take these.” He popped two from the pack and held them out to her. “Might help. What will help is you telling me where the money and the ledgers are. You do that and you can walk out of here and you won’t see me again.”

She took the water and the pills, but put them on the dusty glass topped bedside table. Her tongue was thick, her brain was pulp. Once she’d lied easily, now she couldn’t think of a plausible lie to tell. But she knew she needed one. Justin wasn’t going to win if there was anything she could do to prevent it.

“I spent the money.”

“On what, you were living in a cockroach infested hovel.”

She attempted a shrug and discovered her shoulder hurt too. “The casino.”

“You’re telling me you lost it all.”

She nodded and the room shimmered.

“Try again. You’re a dreadful liar.”

“I gave it to charity.”

Justin was on his feet. Yes that was more plausible. It was even close to the truth in a roundabout fashion. “Lying bitch,” he hissed.

“It was dirty money. I gave it all away.”

He started shouting, he was incoherent with rage. How had she ever loved this man? She didn’t recognise him as the sweet boy who’d made her feel like it was the two of them against the world. She had so many mistakes to pay for, to learn from.

“The prisoner not co-operating?”

A new voice. She turned slowly to see Wacker in the doorway. He was ignoring her, focused like a laser beam on Justin.

“She’s being a little bitch, but she was always hard to get along with. Nothing I can’t handle.”

Wacker grunted and backed away. When he was gone, Justin leaned over her. He was sweating and red-faced. His usually tidy hair was oily and needed cutting. He wasn’t her Justin, master of his the universe. This was someone else.

“You’ve got to help me.” He spoke quietly now. “They’ll kill me. They’ll kill both of us.”

“I don’t have the money.”

“Forget the money. Where are the ledgers?”

He knew about the flat, he’d know they weren’t there. “I burned them.”

Justin’s eyes widened, his face registered shock, “Don’t lie to me.”

“Why would I keep them?”

“Because that’s what you’d do. You’d have known they were important. You’d never destroy them. Giving the money away, yeah, that’s you, but burning the books, no way. Don’t lie to me.”

“You lied to me every day.”

“No, not in the beginning. In the beginning it was all legal and we were good together. I loved you. But it was too slow and you were too damn straight for me. I changed, I wanted more and you were never going to agree to what I wanted and come with me.”

“I changed too. I stole your money, I gave it away. I fell in love with a bikie and I burned your precious ledgers.”

“Fuck. We’re dead.” He stood up and paced to the window and back. “That cop, what did you tell him? Why were you with him?”

“Nothing. I didn’t tell him anything.” Her head hurt, thinking quick hurt. “He was nice to me. I didn’t know he was a cop. He had money hidden in a cake tin. I thought he was a thief like me.”

“Now that’s a pretty lie from a pretty lady.” Wacker was back and up close he was huge. He had thighs like bridge pylons. “Don’t lie to a liar, slag.”

She nodded and the whole room moved. “I knew he was a cop, but I thought he was bent. He had the money. Justin found out my new phone number, got into my bank account. I thought he could protect me.”

Wacker’s eyes shifted to Justin. “She lyin’?”

Caitlyn held her breath, held so still maybe they’d forget she was there. Whatever Justin said next would make things better or worse. He glared back at Wacker, but she saw fear and defiance rather than strength.

“Probably not.”

Wacker was suddenly in the room, he reached for her and she tried to scramble away but his arms were like kite strings, never ending. His hand wrapped around her shoulder and he pulled her across the bed, reefing her to her feet. The room tilted sideways and she would’ve fallen but he bore down over her, the weight of his hand like bag of cement mix slung over her shoulder, anchoring her to the floor. “Where’s the cop now?”

She looked in his eyes. She needed him to believe. “I don’t know. We’re not together. He was just using me as a cover. I left him in Perth.”

“Bullshit.” Wacker’s breath on her face was hot and dangerous. “You’ve been co-operating with the police this whole time.”

“No. No. They held me. They made me go to the park today. I told them exactly what I told you. I gave the money away and I burned the ledgers.”

“Why should we believe you?”

“Because I have no reason to lie to you.”

He shook her and her teeth clacked, she bit her tongue. “Why were they holding you?”

“Because they think I was part of it all. They don’t believe me either.”

“Wack.” Another voice in the hallway, another big man’s laughter. “Outside. Fucking dickhead came here.”

Wacker let go and she fell back on the bed. There was lots of movement in the house now. Men’s voices, excited curses. Whatever was happening outside was amusing them. Who came?
Oh no. Oh no!
But it couldn’t be Sean. He’d left her, walked out. He wouldn’t even know she was missing.

Wacker said, “Stay here,” and stepped into the hallway, crowded now with men. Justin lasted a second and joined them.

She went to follow, but another man blocked her way. “You’re not going anywhere, little bitch.”

“What’s happening?”

The man smelled of beer and ignored her, his focus was down the hallway and out to the front yard. There was a lot of shouting now, all of it in the yard, the house itself was still. Maybe this was the cavalry come to rescue her. Or maybe it was a rival gang and she was in the wrong place at the wrong time all over again. She had to do something to help herself. Her guardian gave her the opportunity to at least get out of this room when he moved up the hallway and stood in the front doorway.

She stepped into the hall. The choice was back towards what would be the kitchen, away from the noise outside, or forward to at least get a look at what was going on. If it was Stud’s crew maybe she could find a way to signal them. She went forward, staying behind the bikie guardian’s back and slipping into one of two rooms fronting the street, a master bedroom. Filled with the same old style of furniture, but someone had been using this one, there were clothes scattered all about and the bed was unmade. She went to the window, covered by dusty venetians and peered out into the darkness. It took a few moments to work out what she was seeing. A crew of bikers spilled onto the front lawn. No marked police cars, nothing in the street to indicate she was about to be rescued. No phalanx of bikes that might indicate a rival gang either. The street looked oddly familiar. It was the street where the Red Pariah attacked Fetch. This was the house in Walton Street she’d parked in front of that they’d run from.

There was movement amongst the bikers and then she saw him in the faint filtered light from the verandah. Sean. Alone. Feet planted wide, arms open to show he had no weapon. He was utterly surrounded. Defenceless. He was going to get himself killed.

She screamed and pounded on the window. His head came up, but it was too dark to see his expression and then suddenly it was surgically bright as a cone of daylight flooded the yard, the thud, thud, thud of a helicopter’s blades coming closer. She scrambled to unlock the window, coughing on the dust from the blinds. It was painted shut. Outside there was shouting, men running from the street. She looked around for something to break the window; the small door off an old dressing table leaned on the wall. A flat piece of wood with a handle. She swung it at the window and it shattered. Heads turned to the house at the noise, but there were fireworks now—no, that was gunfire. She couldn’t see Sean, but she could hear him calling her name. She dragged the bedspread to the window and pushed it through to stop from being cut to ribbons on glass shards. Then she was through the window and on the verandah of the house, and running into the light to where Sean was, on his knees, head down, bleeding.

Arms grabbed her, lifted her, dragged her away. She struggled, kicking, screaming to get to him. She saw Sean fall to his side and it was Stud holding her. “Wait. Wait.”

“No. No. Let me go!”

Other people went to Sean. Who were they? Not bikies. The bikies were all on the ground too, men with guns standing over them.

Stud released her and she ran to Sean, throwing herself down at his side. His eyes were open, but he was pale, so pale. He smiled when he saw her. “Baby, are you all right? Did they hurt you?”

“Sean, oh my God. I’m not hurt.” She looked for his hand to hold, but they were both pressed to his side. She put her hand to his cheek, brushed soil and grit away.