Black & Blue: BookShots (Detective Harriet Blue Series) Page 9

  ‘Coastguard, coastguard, this is Detective Harriet Blue, over.’

  ‘Coastguard here.’

  ‘Can you guys wait a few minutes, then switch your lights off? I’m trying to set up a path in, over.’

  Hope had noticed I’d switched my spotlights off, and that the ocean in front of my boat was black. I played it casual, leaning on the top of the bridge, talking to Tox. If I was careful, she’d think I was just switching the big light off to conserve my boat’s battery power. I could feel her watching me, but she said nothing to Chris about it as they negotiated over the radio.

  My plan was working. After a time, one coastguard boat switched off its light. Then another. Hope hardly noticed. She was ranting and pacing.

  ‘You don’t fucking understand. You’re a man. How could you? You probably grew up in some mansion in bloody Mosman or something. You probably went to private school, didn’t you? You were a poor choice of negotiator, my friend. There’s no way you could possibly understand me. All right? So don’t say that you do.’

  ‘We had another negotiator for you,’ Chris sighed. I could hear his dismay over the radio. ‘He’s been held up.’

  Half the ocean around the New Hope was in darkness. The police boats cut beams of light through the black waves. It was time to go.

  ‘You coming?’ I asked Tox. He looked bewildered, until I started taking off my shoes.

  ‘Oh shit,’ he sighed, peeling off his jacket.

  CHAPTER 51

  AS WE SWAM along the side of the New Hope to the diving ladder, the sounds of Hope’s yelling from the upper decks reached us. We’d dived deep from the back of our vessel, popping up just once in the dark between the boats to breathe. The threat of Hope seeing us and firing into the water made my jaw lock with terror. I pulled my gun out of the back of my pants and put it on the deck in front of me as I got to the top of the ladder. I hoped that if I needed it, it would still work. I didn’t know how it would react to the saltwater.

  The cold seized everything, made every muscle hard as stone. I stood shivering on the deck as Tox climbed out. We were near a dark, cluttered galley. Our socks squelched on the polished wood. We listened to the voice above us, her footsteps on the floor. Tox was sniffing the air. He went to the pantry and pulled open the door. Leaning against it was a heavy man in a white business shirt. Tox checked his pulse, but he was long gone, his whole body a sickening purple.

  ‘Water safety guy,’ Tox said. He pushed the limp body back into the pantry and shut the door. ‘Probably caught on to her.’

  We crept around the back of the galley and up the stairs, stopping when we were high enough to look across the floor to the bridge wing. Jenny was on her belly now, unconscious. She seemed to be breathing. There were no open wounds on her that I could see, adding hope to my theory that the gunshot earlier had been a bluff. The compressor she was tied to was hanging halfway out over the side of the boat, its small wheels spinning. I could see Hope’s leg by the entrance to the bridge. She paced, wandering over to Jenny and then back to the helm, never leaving her alone for more than a few seconds.

  ‘We’ll come up the other side,’ Tox breathed. ‘Get her from behind.’

  ‘We should split up in case she lunges for the compressor. I’ll go up this side.’

  My partner’s eyes glittered in the dark. He nodded and checked the magazine in his gun. We were set to go until Hope’s voice rose in pitch and volume, stopping us in our tracks.

  ‘Where are the occupants of that boat?’ she screamed.

  CHAPTER 52

  I LOOKED, AND saw her pointing off the port side. It was our boat that had caught her attention. The water police on the vessel beside ours had seen us go into the water and lashed our boat to theirs, but hadn’t sent another officer over to cover our absence. Hope had been watching our boat and noticed no one was on board.

  ‘Shit,’ I whispered.

  ‘The officers who were on that boat moved over to the next one.’ Chris tried to cover us. He didn’t sound confident enough. ‘They’re there, Hope. No one’s—’

  ‘Someone’s boarded me,’ Hope snapped. ‘One of your officers has boarded me, haven’t they? You people have no regard for life, do you? I’m going to kill this innocent woman if you don’t get your officers off my fucking yacht.’

  She went to Jenny and actioned the rifle, pointed it at the woman’s head. The wind whipped the young woman’s hair as she stared out defiantly at the boats around her. I got up on my haunches and got ready to run.

  ‘Hold your fire!’ someone yelled on the wind. ‘Hold your—’

  A couple of shots clanged off the edge of the vessel, just above Hope’s head. She slid down to her backside and growled with rage.

  ‘Fuckers!’ she yelled.

  I watched the fury tremble through her, down her chest and through her stomach like electricity in her muscles. It was anger that moved her, taking over and crushing her logic. She kicked out and toppled the compressor over the edge of the boat.

  ‘No, Hope!’ I yelled. ‘No!’

  It was too late. I saw the heavy machine go over the side.

  CHAPTER 53

  THE COMPRESSOR HIT the water with a massive splash. The rope around Jenny’s legs whizzed over the side. I sprinted along the deck and reached it, just as the rope ran out and yanked the wounded woman off the side of the boat.

  I dived in after her, the fifteen feet of free air between the deck and the water feeling like ten minutes of sheer terror before the blackness of the ocean swirled around me.

  The water was so cold that for a moment I didn’t know if I’d been successful in grabbing at Jenny’s hands. I held tight, and as we sailed downward I realised that I had a death grip on one of her wrists. We were sinking fast. There was no sound. The woman in my hands had come to and twisted and bucked as we plunged towards the depths.

  We sailed downward. The pressure on my chest and head was too heavy to bear after only seconds. A voice in my head began screaming.

  It’s over. Let go. Let go. Get to the surface!

  But I refused to let go.

  CHAPTER 54

  HOPE WATCHED THE bubbles rise from where her hostage and the cop had disappeared into the black depths. A couple of officers from boats nearby leaped into the water, diving low to try to help, but Hope knew there’d be no saving them. The deaths were easier now. She hadn’t meant to make the compressor go over the edge. The anger had zinged through her, taking possession of her limbs. She was surprised at how little impact the killing made on her psyche. There was a heat, a ringing in her ears, a pounding in her skull, but no regret, no paralysing sorrow. That was good. If she needed to kill more now to get free, she knew it would be achievable.

  ‘Is she coming up?’

  The voice came from behind her. Hope turned and saw a man standing there, the rifle she’d been holding trained on her face. He was soaked through to the skin, blond hair plastered to his forehead, two black eyes and a bruised nose. His face seemed passive, but when Hope didn’t answer, he snapped.

  ‘Is she coming up?’

  ‘No.’

  The man with the gun sneered. ‘I actually didn’t mind that woman.’

  He turned the gun swiftly and slammed the butt into Hope’s jaw. She staggered, and her legs went from beneath her. She felt teeth wobble in her mouth, swimming in blood. The man must have been a cop. In the spinning world, she saw him go to the edge of the bridge wing and wave at the boats below.

  ‘Suspect down!’

  I’ll never go down, Hope thought. She reached up while he was distracted by something below, her hand shaking. She slid her index finger into the trigger guard and pulled.

  The gun roared, kicked out of his hand. The cop fell.

  CHAPTER 55

  I’D CLIMBED ALONG Jenny’s body, pulling at handfuls of her clothes, and got to her ankle. It seemed years passed as I yanked at the rope. When the weight came free, we hung in the blackness. My eyes were bulging in my skull
. She did nothing. The fight had gone out of her. I grabbed, clawed at her neck and head, yanked upward at her arms.

  There was water in my lungs. My limbs were starting to shudder. I was drowning. I couldn’t tell if we were rising or not. Jenny’s hopeless eyes stared up at me. I needed her to kick. Do anything. Keep me down here with her, when every cell in my body was telling me to let go.

  Suddenly, she started kicking. We grabbed at each other, pulled upward. The surface came unexpectedly. There were hands under my arms, wrapping around me, dragging me onto my back. I vomited water. Jenny was wide-eyed, being dragged towards the boats by cops.

  ‘Let me go,’ I said. ‘I need to get to the boat.’

  ‘You’re all right now.’ The officer who had me was trying to pull my head back, relax me, get me to safety. ‘Take it easy. Breathe.’

  This was no time to take it easy. I wriggled out of his grip and swam as hard as I could for the New Hope, kicking faster as I saw smoke rising from the back deck.

  CHAPTER 56

  SHE’D GOT HIM in the face, it seemed. The cop rolled away, scrambled until his back was to the helm. He got up, grabbed at the bridge to try to steady himself and knocked the throttle forward. The engine roared and squealed, tugging at the tangled ropes and sheets. Hope went for the gun but he kicked it away and lunged at her, grabbing at her hands, the blood making his fingers slick.

  They rolled, twisted, tumbled down the stairs into the galley. His face was a mask of blood, hideous and wet, two cool blue eyes bulging wild as he came for her. Hope grabbed a knife from the kitchen block and threw it, backed it up with a second one. He caught the blade in the air and kept coming. She fell beneath him, the blade inches from her face, and pushed upward with all her might. His blood dripped on her. Her hands slipped, and the knife shunted into the wood right by her ear.

  The smoke was sudden, thick with burning chemicals. The wind picked it up from the deck and blew it inside the galley where they fought. The engine had ignited, pushed over its limit by the sheets and ropes tangled around the propellers. The burning fuel seared in their eyes. They both rolled, fighting through the pain, trying to climb to their feet.

  Out of the glowing flames on the deck the woman cop emerged, the one who had gone after Jenny. Two other officers were close behind her on the ladder. The woman cop’s whole body was shaking with adrenalin and exhaustion. Hope backed towards the stairs as the two officers turned, blocking her exit. She grabbed at the counter, tried to find a weapon. A bottle. A glass. Anything.

  ‘It’s over, Hope. The whole thing’s going to burn,’ the woman cop yelled. ‘Put that down. You’ve got to come with us.’

  Hope thought about it. And a weary smile crept to her face at what she imagined, how similar it was to the life she’d lived before. Hands on her. Dark rooms and endless days passing the windows. A team of girls in the prison dorms who’d welcome her, who’d stick by her, cheer her on, try to keep her away from the needle. Sweaty sheets and thin pillows, and those faceless men wandering in the halls, never meeting her eyes, giving her commands.

  No. Never again.

  Hope went up the stairs and slammed the bridge door behind her.

  CHAPTER 57

  TOX AND I got off the New Hope just in time, falling into the water as one of the fuel tanks exploded and the back half of the yacht listed badly to that side. The water was slick with oil. I was so tired. My arms grabbed weakly at the waves, making no progress, the current trying to push me back against the hull of the burning boat.

  Tox pulled my arm around his neck. I held on to his hard, broad shoulders as we swam to the nearest police boat.

  As we climbed aboard, we turned to see the fire creeping into the bridge. I could hardly watch. There was no sign of Hope in the blackened windows.

  CHAPTER 58

  SOMEONE TOOK THE small boat we’d commandeered back to the marina while Tox and I rode home on a police cruiser with Chris Murray. I stood up at the front of the boat with the squat, ruddy-faced man while another officer commanded the helm. Someone had wrapped a blanket around me. But Tox sat unattended at the rear of the boat on a barrel with his own shirt clutched to the gunshot wound in the side of his face. He was watching the boat’s wake disappear into the dark of the night.

  ‘You did a sensational job out there,’ Chris kept saying. Shaking his head ruefully at it all. ‘You weren’t coming up. I was willing to put money on it. You dived in, and you were down there too long, and I thought, She’s got herself tangled up with that woman. She’s a goner.’

  ‘Cut it out.’ I jabbed him in the side. ‘You know I don’t like it.’

  We stared at our feet. I knew the answer to my question, but I asked it anyway.

  ‘The husband. Did he make it?’

  ‘No,’ Chris said.

  We shuffled away from the officer driving the boat. Chris’s eyes wandered the coastline ahead of us, picking out the clustered lights of Bondi and Coogee and the dark patches where the cliffs met the sea.

  ‘I did look up Tox Barnes,’ he said suddenly.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Chris glanced at me. ‘After you called me. I felt bad. I knew some guys in records who could pull some strings for me.’

  ‘I knew you did.’

  ‘I thought I’d get the details, just to arm myself, in case you came at me again. I was ready to cut you down about it.’

  ‘I don’t think I even want to know.’ I held my hand up. ‘I think he’s all right. And if there was a time when he wasn’t all right, well, that seems to have been a long time ago.’

  ‘That’s the thing.’ Chris leaned in close. ‘He is all right.’

  Chris told me the story. It wasn’t close to any of the ones I’d heard.

  CHAPTER 59

  I WENT TO the back of the boat and sat beside Tox as we passed through the heads of Sydney Harbour. Somehow he still smelled of cigarette smoke. One side of his hair was plastered to his head, while the other, where he’d been shot, stuck up in wild spikes. There was blood all through his chest hair.

  ‘How bad is it?’ I asked.

  ‘Meh,’ he shrugged.

  He pulled the shirt away. The bullet had carved a vertical line up the side of his face from his jaw to his hairline, burning the flesh on either side, a straight gouge that looked half an inch deep. It was a grisly wound. Something he would wear well.

  ‘Wow, that’s disgusting.’ I reached out. ‘Can I touch it?’

  ‘Get off.’ He shoved at me. ‘Freak.’

  I looked out at the waves, and the words came easily. Seemed to flow out, unlocked by my exhaustion. I told him I knew about Anna Peake and her son. His victims. I knew that Anna had been heading west on the A32 highway towards Katoomba on a bright Tuesday afternoon when she’d driven under an overpass where Tox Barnes had been standing with a group of other little boys. He was the smallest in the group. Six years old. The oldest had been nine. The boys had been tossing pebbles onto the tops of cars as they drove underneath, cheering and laughing as the rocks clinked and bounced on rooftops and bonnets, no idea that what they were doing was incredibly dangerous. They’d got over the thrill of raining pebbles on the cars when one of the boys dropped a pebble the size of a penny onto the windshield of Anna Peake’s car. The crack of the rock on the glass had been so sudden, so startling, that Anna had swerved and got the afternoon sun in her eyes. She had gone across the double lanes and right into the path of an oncoming truck. The boys had rushed to the other side of the overpass and watched her car burn, the mother and her little boy inside.

  The five boys had been interrogated by police. The town had called for the oldest boy on the bridge to face criminal prosecution. In the end, none of the boys had been charged. They were so small, and so terrified by the awesome power of their actions, that the police had taken pity on them.

  All of the boys had changed their names legally at some point between the deaths of Anna and her son and their adult lives. Terrence Brennan became
Tate Barnes. The name change had not destroyed his past completely. Though his involvement in the killings had been suppressed, it had arisen when he’d tried to become a member of the New South Wales state police. The panel of admissions experts who’d approved Tox for service had been obliged to keep his childhood horror a secret. But it had leaked, like all secrets do. It had grown in size, warped, twisted. People had added things. Some had said the boys had stabbed the woman. Beat her. Raped her. Kidnapped her. The boys had grown older. Younger sometimes. New versions of the story had been passed down every year from older cops to the recruits in their charge. Like all rumours, it had its own life. No one knew the truth.

  CHAPTER 60

  WHEN I’D FINISHED talking I looked at him, expecting something. But he just watched the glowing Harbour Bridge in silence.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Well what?’

  ‘I need to understand.’ I held my hands out. ‘You’re innocent. Why do you do this to yourself? Why do you let the rumours go on? Why don’t you fix your life?’

  ‘My life’s not broken,’ he said.

  ‘Everybody thinks you’re some kind of vicious psychopath.’

  ‘This isn’t high school.’ He gave me a pitying glance. ‘You don’t need to worry about what people think any more.’

  ‘You said earlier that you deserve some punishment. Is that how you really feel?’

  ‘A bit,’ he shrugged. ‘Mostly, I just let people tell their stories because it keeps them away from me. I’ve said it from the beginning: I don’t work with partners. I’m better on my own.’

  I watched him, and slowly I began to understand. It was the same as my brother and me, the way we’d acted as kids, running away from the families that tried to take us in, behaving badly and shutting them out until they gave up on us. When we were on our own, we knew what to expect. We knew the rules of the game. Being ‘included’ was risky. Because we didn’t accept love and companionship, we couldn’t be rejected. Sam and I had known all our lives that we could only rely on each other. Tox Barnes knew it too.