Evil Genius (56 page)

"I need to go to the bathroom," Cadel added.

"Right. Okay." Bronwyn rose. "I tell you what—you follow me. I'll show you where to go, and while you're in the toilet, I'll get somebody. All right?"

"All right."

"You don't have to take that." Cadel had just picked up his backpack. "You can leave it here."

"No," said Cadel, clutching the backpack to his chest. "It'll be safe."

"How do
you
know?" Cadel snapped. His hands were sweaty, but his voice didn't tremble. "I'm not leaving this anywhere."

"Why not?" Bronwyn had paused, with her hand on the doorknob. "What's in it?"

"My
stuff,
" Cadel retorted, as rudely as possible.

"Can I have a look?"

"Why?"

"Because I wouldn't want you trying to kill yourself or anything." Bronwyn spoke matter-of-factly, but Cadel was appalled. It must have shown on his face, because Bronwyn smiled.

"
Kill
myself?" Cadel cried. "I don't want to kill myself!"

"Or anyone else?"

"No!" Something about Bronwyn's expression—the detached, quizzical look in her eye—upset Cadel. "I'm not like my father! You're not being fair! I wouldn't kill anyone..." He trailed off suddenly, as he recalled that he
had
killed someone. Several people, in fact. Though he hadn't meant to.

The memory brought tears to his eyes; he felt dirty and ashamed and frightened. What would happen when the police found out about
that
? Would they send him to a juvenile correctional center? Would the name Darkkon protect him
there
? Not without Thaddeus, it wouldn't.

He had to get away.

"It's not my fault," he said thickly. "I mean, I didn't—you—you don't understand."

"Calm down," Bronwyn crooned, patting his shoulder. "It's all right."

"Here! Take a look!" He thrust the backpack under her nose, praying that she wouldn't unwrap the sweater at the bottom of the bag. "Do you
see
any guns? Do you
see
any knives? I hate all this! I just want to be normal!"

He pulled out the T-shirt. The jacket. He dropped them on the floor. Bronwyn held up her hand apologetically as she glanced into the bag. "It's okay," she said. "Calm down. I believe you."

"Well, don't
look
at me like that."

"I won't."

"It's not
my
fault I've got a maniac for a father!"

"No, no. Of course not."

As Cadel knelt down to retrieve his jacket, Bronwyn crouched beside him. She stuffed his T-shirt into his bag. She smelled of flowers. Cadel suddenly thought, with a pang,
I wish I didn't have to trick her.
But he had no choice.

"Okay," said Bronwyn, straightening up. "Let's go."

She led him out of the room and down a corridor until she reached a door marked with a male and a female figure. On the way, they passed a bank of elevators, a kitchen alcove, six office doors, and one labeled
FIRE STAIRS
. Cadel made a mental note of the fire stairs. He saw several uniformed police officers drinking coffee, or hurrying along with colored files tucked under their arms. Every one of them stared at him curiously.

He must have looked out of place, with his grubby old backpack. Unless they had been told about him?

"Here," said Bronwyn, stopping in front of the restrooms. "This do you?"

"Thanks," Cadel replied.

He plunged through the door, which opened into a very small vestibule. On the right was the ladies'; on the left was the men's. Cadel tapped on the right-hand door.

There was no reply.

When he pushed it open, he found himself in a bathroom containing three stalls and three sinks. He immediately locked himself in one of the stalls and started to change. He took off all his clothes except his underwear. He put on the Indian-cotton skirt, the leather shoes, and the T-shirt that he'd packed, as well as the sweater in which he'd wrapped his makeup. He pulled a shoestring out of his brand-new sneakers and tied his hair back. Then he shrugged on the jacket that was lined with forged documents.

His discarded clothes went into the bag, which he decided not to take with him. Instead, he stuffed it into the big plastic garbage bin under the hand dryer. He used the mirror over the sinks while donning his makeup, acutely conscious that anyone might walk in at any minute. But he had to be thorough—even the mascara had to go on. He looked a lot different with mascara in his lashes.

Time was slipping away. Cadel wondered if Bronwyn had gone to fetch one of her superiors. He wondered if—more importantly—she had returned. But just as he reached the door of the ladies', he heard the outer door squeak open.

"Cadel?" said a voice.

It was Bronwyn's.

Cadel stopped, his heart in his mouth. Then his mind began to race, leaping ahead of the action, whirring fiercely through the probabilities. She would go to the door of the men's. She would knock. She would enter.

"Cadel?"

He heard the knock. He heard the door of the men's squeak. When it flapped shut behind her, he waited an exactly calculated three seconds (to give her time to reach the stalls) before sliding into the vestibule and out into the hallway.

There was no one waiting there. Just as well, because somebody like Kale Platz might have seen through his disguise. But there
were
people around—in an office, in the kitchen alcove—so Cadel didn't rush. He didn't run. He walked briskly to the fire stairs and calmly through the door.

Only
then
did he run.

He knew that he didn't have much time. Bronwyn would check the ladies', then sound the alarm. This thought had barely entered his head when he hit the second-to-last flight and caught a glimpse of his destination. Ground floor.

The stairs kept going, down into the underground garage. But Cadel wasn't heading for the garage. He was heading for the street, and—lo and behold!—there was a street exit! Not just a foyer exit, but a street exit as well!

It hadn't been locked from the inside. Someone was following the fire regulations. Cadel slammed through it, then stood still for a split second, panting hard.

There was a brick planter in front of him, full of low bushes that fenced the building off from the street. Across the road was a kebab shop, a Laundromat ... of course!

The taxi stand!

Cadel hurled himself across the road, dodging a motorbike. He didn't look back. He didn't want to know if anyone was chasing him. He focused all his energy on the intersection, the bus shelter, and the taxi stand, which, if his eyes weren't misleading him, had a taxi parked in it.

Cadel scurried toward the taxi, desperately afraid that someone might reach it before he did. That man, for instance—the one in the leather jacket—but no. That man walked right past. Cadel nearly knocked into him, dodged his leather-clad elbow at the last possible instant, and began to wave at the taxi. He didn't think to check whether its
FOR HIRE
sign was illuminated.

He just yanked open a door and threw himself into the backseat.

"Miss!" the cab driver was saying. "Miss, I'm on my lunch break—"

"Blacktown!" Cadel gasped, wildly plucking a distant suburb out of his head. He knew, from his long study of the Sydney Rail network, that from Blacktown he could catch a train to Lithgow, and from Lithgow a bus to the country—Bathurst, perhaps...

Then the driver's words sank in.

"I'll—I'll pay double," he stammered, forgetting to disguise his voice. "Triple! Look, I've got the money—"

"
Cadel
?"

He almost choked. The driver turned. There was a
click
as the central locking system engaged.

Wilfreda was sitting in the front seat, wearing a black wig under a knitted beret.

"Christ!" she exclaimed, and the engine roared to life. Cadel couldn't believe it. His mind went blank.

The taxi burned rubber swinging into the street. Wilfreda scrambled for her phone. She jabbed at a single key and started to gabble, driving one-handed.

"Rudy!" she said. "It's me! I need backup; I've had to leave. Yes, the whole team. No, and I can't! Because I've got
cargo!
Of course I know what I'm doing!"

She stamped on the brake. Cadel banged his nose on the headrest in front of him. "Sorry," said Wilfreda. She opened a window, and yelled at the man in the leather jacket who had passed Cadel not a minute before. "Get in!" she cried. "Quick!"

He didn't protest. Cadel heard the door locks again, but before he could pull at a handle, the man in the leather jacket was beside him.

"What the hell?" gasped the man.

"Cargo!" Wilfreda growled, hitting the accelerator once more. Cadel's head snapped back.

"Who's this?" The man was staring at Cadel. He was unshaven, with floppy black hair and cold eyes.

"Guess," said Wilfreda.

"It's not—it can't be—"

"It is."

"Bloody hell!"

"There's Nikolai."

Nikolai was a fat, bald, elderly man in shirtsleeves, slouched on a foldout tin chair that had been placed in front of a row house. He was nursing a string of blue worry beads, and he struggled to his feet when he saw the taxi come to a halt on the other side of the road.

At Wilfreda's signal, he waddled across to her.

"In," she said.

Next thing, both of Cadel's escape routes were cut off. On one side of him sat the man in the leather jacket; on the other sat a big, fat, snorting old man who looked vaguely familiar...

Suddenly Cadel remembered him. From the train to Strathfield. He'd been slumped in one corner, snoozing.

"By all that's holy," Nikolai said, as the taxi surged forward again, "Cadel Darkkon."

"He walked straight out of that goddamn police station," Wilfreda exclaimed. "All by himself."

"I'm not surprised," said Nikolai. "Dressed up like that."

"But
you
recognized him."

"I was trained to." Nikolai pulled a pair of sunglasses out of his breast pocket. "You should wear these," he advised, passing them to Cadel. "Your eyes always give you away."

Numbly, Cadel put on the sunglasses. He didn't know what to do. What was he going to do? How had this
happened
?

"I wasn't expecting
you,
Cadel," Wilfreda remarked, almost as if she'd read his mind. "Christ, I was here on another job entirely."

"We all were," said the man in the leather jacket. "What are you going to do about
that,
now?"

"This has priority." Wilfreda glanced up into the rearview mirror; for a moment, Cadel saw her eyes. "Do you know they've got Barry Deakin holed up in there?" she asked him.

Cadel stared at her, mutely.

"Well, they do," she continued. "
That's
who we were after. Thaddeus hadn't even tracked you down. I only just got the alert about you myself. I was on standby while he checked his sources." She chuckled. "God, he's going to be pleased."

"What happened to the others?" asked the man in the leather jacket. He was staring morosely at Cadel. "What happened to Sue Croft? She was with you, wasn't she?"

"Leave it, Busy." Wilfreda's voice was cold. "Watch the road. It could be a decoy. They didn't
let
you go, did they, Cadel?"

Cadel swallowed.

"No," he said hoarsely. "At least—I don't think so..."

"How'd you do it, then? How'd you get out?"

"I—I went to the toilet. Changed my clothes. Sneaked down the fire stairs." Feeling the tears rush to his eyes, Cadel clamped his mouth shut. All that work for nothing!

"What a stroke of luck," said Wilfreda. "Still, we'd better switch cars. I'll just take care of it."

"And use the Stage One car?" Busy protested. "What about Rudy's team? What if
they
need to switch?"

"I told you. Cadel has priority."

Cadel couldn't think straight. He was putting all his energy into fighting back his tears. It was a disaster, a total disaster. They had seen his disguise; he could never use it again. All he had now were his documents, and what use were they if he couldn't use his disguise?

Then he remembered. He had told Bronwyn about Curramulla.

Was that where they were going now?

"I'm—I'm thirsty," he said, grasping at straws.

"Sorry, Cadel. Can't stop now. Got to put some distance between us and them." Wilfreda glanced into the mirror again. "Maybe later. After we've switched cars." Once again, she picked up her phone.

Cadel subsided. He sat trying to focus, but all he could think was:
Thaddeus will know. If the police turn up at Curramulla, Thaddeus will
know
who told them about it.

Wilfreda was driving carefully. She didn't exceed the speed limit and was as brief as possible with her phone calls. Cadel wondered if there was any way he might get her to run into the back of somebody else's car, but dismissed the idea at once. If it was a minor accident, Wilfreda wouldn't stop. And if it was major, what chance would he have to get out, wedged as he was between two bodyguards? No—his best chance would be when they switched cars.

He would demand to go to the bathroom. Pee all over Busy's fancy boots if he had to. The important thing was to stay alert.

They drove for about twenty minutes, then plunged into a suburb of old brick bungalows, dodging and weaving through a network of almost identical streets. At last they reached a plain house with an attached garage. Wilfreda headed straight for the garage. Its blue door ascended as they approached.

Within seconds it was rolling down again behind them.

"Wait," said Wilfreda, her gaze on the rearview mirror. "Wait, wait ... now!"

Everyone moved with bewildering speed. The moment the garage door closed, Cadel was jerked out of the car and hustled to the back of the filthy old garage, where another door led to a paved backyard. "I need to go!" he exclaimed, but nobody seemed to hear. They all charged straight past a rotary clothesline into a corrugated iron shed, where a second car was waiting. This was a red Daihatsu four-wheel drive.

When Wilfreda tried to push Cadel into the backseat, he jammed his hands against the doorframe.