He would have to do something.
He came to a decision; the girl's life was the main priority. He pulled back the pistol's slide and gently closed the boot.
He was going in.
Then he heard the squeal of rubber on tar behind him and looked back. A SAPS patrol van came around the corner, drove straight towards him and stopped in a cloud of dust on the pavement. A figure jumped out with unkempt hair and gun in his hand.
Benny Griessel had arrived.
'Hey!' said Jeremy Oerson, but she didn't look up. She just lay slumped against the pole, stark naked, he could see everything, the tits, the bush between her legs, the bleeding right foot and three toes lying in the dust like fat insect grubs.
He stood with his feet planted wide in black boots, the pistol in both hands aimed at her head.
'Get her to look at me,' he said to one of them.
'Just fucking get it over with.'
'No. I want to see her face. Hey, Yankee, look at me.'
Slowly she lifted her head. Hair hung over her forehead in strings. He saw the eye swollen shut, black and purple, dried blood on her temple. 'You guys really fucked her up,' he said.
Her head was raised, but the eyes were still somewhere else.
'Do it, Jerry.'
'Look at me,' he said to her, saw the eyes rise to meet his. He pressed the safety off with his thumb.
Chapter 44
'Take the back, Vusi, there must be a door. I'll give you time,' said Griessel as he ran. He saw the black detective swerve off towards the corner of the building.
He reached the big white sliding door and pressed his back against the wall, service pistol in both hands in front of him. His breath was racing. He had to get it under control, he counted, thousand-and-one, thousand-and-two, thousand-and-three, wanting to give Vusi twenty seconds. He prayed. Dear Father, let her be alive.
Thousand-and-seven. When had he prayed last? When Carla was in mortal danger, his prayer had only been partially answered. He would take that, anything, just so that he could please phone Bill Anderson and say: 'She's alive.' Thousand-and-twelve. He heard a shot, jumped, grabbed the door with his left hand, dragged it open, ducked and ran in. He saw a young man, tall and lean, directly in front of him with a silencer aimed at his heart. He knew in that instant that it was all over, his own pistol was degrees too far to the right.
The shot cracked and blew Benny Griessel off his feet. His back slammed into the door and pain exploded in his chest. He was fleetingly aware of the strangeness, of feeling first the bullet and then hearing the shot. He fell to the ground.
That unease he had had all day, that expectation of evil, here it was.
Oerson waited for her eyes. He wanted his to be the last face she would see. He wanted to know what mortal fear looked like, he wanted to see the light of life fade out of her. But above all he wanted to know how it felt, the power, they said the power was indescribable. He had wondered for so long what it felt like to take a life.
She looked into his eyes. He saw no fear. He wondered if they had drugged her. She looked absent.
Then he heard the shot. He looked around, at the door.
Another shot.
'Shit,' he said.
Vusi sprinted around the first corner, along the short side of the warehouse, then the next corner. High windows, two metres off the ground. A single steel door with a big padlock on it. Locked. He did not hesitate. He steadied against the wall, aimed and shot the padlock, one shot. The nine-mm projectile blew it to bits. He tugged the door open. It was gloomy inside, a smallish room, a kitchen, with dirty glasses and coffee mugs in the sink and another closed door.
He heard a shot, not loud, a small calibre, perhaps. Benny! He ran to the inner door and opened it. It was a large open space, equipment in piles. A beam of light shone from the front through the big sliding door. Someone was lying there dead still. Oh God, it was Benny. Movement, a young white man to the left of Vusi, a long weapon in his hand. 'Don't move!' No good, the young man swung around. Vusi fired. The man fell in slow motion. Vusi had never shot anyone before, uSimakade, what was this city doing to him? A bullet smacked into the wall beside Vusi. It came from the right. He dived behind drums and rolled to the right, stood up, pulled the trigger, once, twice, three times. The man staggered and fell on a stack of plastic cans. He had had no choice - it was survival. He had killed a man, he realised. He stood up slowly, eyes on the still figure, watching the blood run out of the body and over the white plastic of the cans in long trails. Life blood.
A shadow moved on his right, he came back to reality, too late, the pistol pressed against his head. 'Black cunt,' the voice said.
Awful pain in his chest, Griessel could not move, could not breathe. He was lying on the cement floor. Death would come, it was all over, he should have waited for the task force. At the periphery there was movement, on the other side, he tried to turn his head. Vusi. A thundering shot, someone fell, further to the right. Everything in slow motion, unreal, vague, detached. This was the beginning, the tumbling away from life, he would hear the scream of fear, the terrifying scream when you fell into the deep dark abyss. Why wasn't he afraid? Why this .. . peace, just an intense longing for his children, his wife, Anna. Now he knew he wanted her, wanted her back, now, too late. Movement. He could see. Not dead yet. Vusi fired again, three times. He watched his colleague. His breath came more easily now. Why? Benny's hand moved slowly to his chest and touched the gaping wound. Dry. No blood. He looked, and felt. A hole in his breast pocket. No blood. Why the pain? He felt the hard object, gripped it.
The Leatherman. The bullet had struck the Leatherman. Relief burned through him, a shooting consciousness. He had made an utter fool of himself, thinking he was going to die. He heard a voice. 'Black cunt.' He looked up. The one who had shot him stood there, with a long-muzzled gun to Vusi's head.
Griessel reached for his pistol on the floor, grasped it, raised it, no time to aim. Pulled the trigger, saw the man's arm jerk, saw Vusi fall, fired again, missed. The man just stood there. His silenced pistol had disappeared. Benny tried to stand, his whole ribcage on fire, pain burning white, Leatherman or not. He crawled first, got to his feet and stumbled closer.
Vusi moved.
Griessel aimed his service pistol at the man. 'Don't move,' he said. He saw the man was holding his arm. The elbow was shattered, lots of blood, a mess of tendons and fragmented bone.
Vusi stood up. 'Benny ...' His voice was faint, Griessel's ears were deafened by the shots.
'I've got him, Vusi.'
'I thought you were dead.'
'So did I,' said Griessel, almost embarrassed. He jerked the man by the collar. 'Lie down,' he said. The man sank slowly to his knees.
'Where is Rachel?'
The man looked around slowly, at the closed door behind him. 'There.'
'Is she alone?'
'No.'
'Is Jason in there, Jason de Klerk?'
No response. Griessel prodded him again with the pistol. 'Where is Jason?'
A moment of silence. 'I'm Jason.'
Rage swept over Griessel, frustration, relief. He grabbed de Klerk by the hair. 'You fucking rubbish,' he said, and felt a powerful desire to kill him, shoot him in the throat, for Erin Russel, for everything, his finger tightened around the trigger.
'Benny!'
There was a noise behind them, a door closing. Both detectives spun around and aimed.
'Don't shoot!' another young man stood there, hands in the air, looking scared, blood on his upper lip.
'On the floor,' said Vusi.
'Please,' he said and lay down immediately.
'Where is Rachel?' Benny asked.
'She's in there,' said the other one.