Leah stood close to her open door, keeping it between herself and the man posing as Theo Reed. Who was he, really? Fortunately Tess was on the other side of the car, but wasn’t likely to stay there, for shed stepped into long grass at the edge of a rain-eroded ditch and was walking the length of the car, examining the tyres. Cant see any puncture here, she called across the roof of the car.
Leah and the killer were on the drivers side, nearest the middle of the road, standing on corrugations and an underpinning of rock that had broken through the gravel laid by roadbuilders long ago. She made no attempt to examine the tyres but watched the killer, just as he watched her.
He knew. A silent communication passed between them and he immediately fished inside his jacket, beginning to close in on her as he did so.
Leah pulled the door toward her as if in fear of him, as if it would shield her. The killer sneered. Futile, he started to say, when she shoved the door hard away from herself, slamming it against him.
He stumbled back with a soft groan of pain, momentarily holding both arms around his stomach.
Leah! What are you doing? Tess protested.
Leah ignored her. She sprang around her door, quickly kicking hard before the man could raise his gun. He fired uselessly into the ground, the bullet whining out over the dying wheat. He stumbled, fell onto his back and was raising the gun when she stamped on his wrist, forcing him to let go of the weapon. She scooped it up: a .22 target pistol, a killers gun, a close-work gun.
Leah, said Tess, he was helping us.
Leah shook her head. He was hired to kill you.
Leah had put it together in the past couple of minutes. The school had hired private investigators to find Tess and bring her back because police involvement might mean media attention and embarrassment for both the school and Tess’s high-profile parents. But the swimming coach, Vale, had taken advantage of this. Needing to silence Tess, he’d monitored the movements of the private detective who was tracking Tess and passed the information on to a hired killer, who had shot the detective, taken on his identity and now intended to complete his assignment.
Tess was watching Leah, open-mouthed with shock. Who would hire a detective to
Hes not a detective. The dead man I saw back at the farm was the detective.
Tess took it in. Oh.
Open the boot of the car.
What?
I want to stuff this character in the boot where he cant get at us or escape.
Then what?
Take him to the police? Something like that.
Okay.
Leah’s eyes didn’t stray from the man on the ground, who was watching assessingly. She heard Tess remove the keys from the ignition, walk around to the back of the car, open the boot lid.
And scream. Leah flinched. She didn’t dare shift her gaze. What?
Theres someone already in the boot, Tess said, her voice high, breaking with strain. He looks dead.
Theo Reed, Leah thought. She said nothing, merely watched the killer. Then she said, Search the car. You might find handcuffs.
The man on the ground gave her a slight twist of his lips, a fleeting look of disgust. She ignored him.
Two minutes later, Tess called in triumph, Found them.
Leah motioned the killer to his feet and trained the pistol on him while Tess cuffed his hands behind his back. Now I want you to climb into the boot with the real Theo Reed, she said.
The man swallowed. Hes dead.
Then he cant hurt you, Leah said.
The mans eyes were wide, panicky. Its not right, he said. Not… he searched for the right word … not healthy.
Leah shook her head. I’m not interested in your welfare, she said, and fired a shot past his ear.
He flinched and shuffled, bent over, to the boot of the car, and rolled in and began to heave about as if he were sharing a too small bed with someone.
Now, Leah said. Melbourne.
But first she took out her mobile phone, dialled, and asked for Jill Blair. She hadn’t called anyone in a long time.
The voice was remote, surprised at nothing in a chaotic world. Yeah?
This was going to be tricky. Sergeant Jill Blair had been at the guesthouse when Leah had been assaulted. Although shed played no part in the incident, and professed dislike for the male officers involved, she hadn’t actively supported Leah. Leah Flood.
There was silence. Then, I hope you’re keeping your head down, Leah. You’re not exactly on anyones Christmas card list.
I know that, Jill, Leah said. Look, do you want a crack at Carl Stannage?
Warily, Yes.
Don’t ask me how I know this, but a black Range Rover is heading for the city right now, probably along the Western Highway. Leah read out the registration number. The plates are false. Its being driven by a couple of Stannages goons. You’ll find drugs, cash and shotguns.
More silence. The Western Highway. Is that where you are right now?
No comment. You’ll also find damage to the passenger front bumper bar, maybe traces of red paint. If so, it will match the paint on a red Monaro that crashed and burned outside the town of Prospect a few days ago.
Leah, what are you getting invol—
But Leah had broken the connection.
chapter 18
You cant take me back to school, Tess said.
I wont.
I hate it there.
I know.
Vale wants to kill me so I cant report him.
This was getting repetitive. I know that, Tess.
So where will you take me?
Leah had thought long and hard about that. Her old house was out of the question, her parents lived on the Gold Coast, and she didn’t want to bring trouble down on the few friends and acquaintances she had left.
A motel.
Tess shrank sulkily into her seat. Now and then a muffled thumping came from the boot, muffled shouts, the frame of the car shaking minutely as the killer thrashed about in fury. I hate motels.
Where do you suggest, then? Leah demanded. Do you have friends you can stay with?
Their parents would turn me in.
Then it has to be a motel. Ill stay with you until everythings sorted.
What if that takes weeks, months? And what if other people come after me? You’re going to stay close to me every minute of every day?
Leah sighed, conceding Tess’s reservations. Ahead of her the fast dirt road climbed past a rusty iron barn and stockyards to the brow of a low range of hills. Beyond that would lie a broad plain and Horsham and the Western Highway to Melbourne.
You could take me home, Tess said. Hawthorn. Its empty, no tenants or anything.
Leah brooded. For as far as anyone knew, Tess was still on the road somewhere out west, the detective from Abbott’s following her. But things were falling apart for Vale, and he would soon think to look for Tess closer to home.
Too dangerous. What about your half-brother?
Ian? I don’t know. He lives in Southbank and hell probably have some chick with him. Usually his girlfriends don’t like me.
Then it has to be a motel.
I need stuff, Tess wailed. Clean clothes and stuff.
Leah thought it through, then slowly nodded. But we don’t linger, okay? We go to your house, grab a few things, then find a motel, agreed?
Agreed. Tess jerked her head. What about him?
Let me deal with him.
Tess directed Leah to a leafy street in Hawthorn, where even the humblest dwelling fetched close to a million dollars, and pointed to a large Edwardian house set on a broad, grassy corner block. At one time the house had been screened from the street by a tall box-hedge, but the hedge had clearly been torched recently. In fact, Leah realised, as she looked up and down the street, several similar hedges had been burnt to the ground. It was one of the hazards of living in the better suburbs of the city.