Hindsight (56 page)

‘Back there,’ he said, ‘I thought you looked keen to get away from his place?’

‘Partly, but only because Ben needed me gone before he can come home to heal.’

‘You’re living apart now?’

She shrugged and swallowed hard. ‘Slow light always keeps us together. Slow light means my energy lives with his now forever.’

‘Mine too, if you think of it that way. Did he at least have the guts to dump you to your face?’

‘He didn’t dump me! It’s temporary! Can we talk about something else, please?’

‘Love to,’ he said, with that molten chocolate voice that reminded her so much of Ben again.

‘How’s your shoulder?’ he asked.

‘Ask me again when I’m an old woman.’

‘I hear that. It heals well enough for now but in wet weather —’

She stared out the window. ‘Everything aches.’

He shifted gears on approach to a stretch of signposted roadworks and Mira gripped her seat, expecting a rough ride, which never came; just a ripple of shivers as the new four-wheel drive skimmed over the peaks of the worst ruts and corrugations.

‘So why did the snipers do what they did?’ she asked, still mystified by the unexpected dropping of bodies all around her on the cargo ship. ‘General Garland must have been fuming. She was so close to nabbing Colonel Kitching again, she probably would have succeeded in tracking us all the way to the people she wanted more than anything.’

‘I wondered about that too. At first I thought it was because Greggie gave the order to kill you or because Patterson waved for air support — and both actions did play a part. The snipers were already in place with orders to ensure your survival, but during my debriefing this week, General Garland advised me that the clincher — the main reason it went down that way — was due to a queer stroke of fate. She received a message from a new source aboard the rogue submarine — someone who’d managed to smuggle a civilian phone aboard — and as you know, a civilian mobile phone is one of the easiest things in the world to track, even submerged to a certain depth.’

‘So why would she tell you that, if she didn’t have to?’

‘She expects me to tell you, I dare say; part of her final peace offering.’

‘Peace offering? She made Patterson’s team put us through all that for
nothing
! She played with our lives
—
and yours — and she barely cared who got hurt in the process!’

‘I wouldn’t go that far. She was certainly ruthless, but she’s paid to be. The face of war has changed, Mira. The battle lines are all inside our own borders, and using the oldest weapons — fear, power and commerce. At least you’re free now, and all your friends survived. Even Ben will recover eventually.’

‘I don’t see how — not while Greg and Gregan Greppia still draw breath in this world.’

‘Oh, didn’t Gabby tell you? They’re both dead.’

‘Dead?’ Mira shook her head. ‘I suspect Gabby’s been keeping tight-lipped about a few things, lately, trying to spare me. How did they die?’

‘Tarin put a knife to good use in Greggie’s back, while Gabby took care of his father — that all has to stay confidential though, sorry, or they could both end up with murder charges to answer.’

‘Who could
I
tell? Not that I believe Gabby could do such a thing anyway. She may be feisty, but she’s no killer — unless she did it in self-defence?’

‘More like reflex. The official story will be published in tomorrow’s papers. I can arrange an audio version if you want, or ask Detective Innes-Grady if you’d like a second take on it from him? Police reports confirmed that Gregan’s body washed ashore north of Cairns, and the autopsy reveals that he suffocated.’

‘No way! Gabby’s the furthest thing from a “Straddie strangler”.’

‘I didn’t say she strangled him. She tore off the yellow marker from Greppia’s postal package as it rolled overboard. Nobody aboard the sub could have known to open it. He must have been stacked with the other cylinders for at least three days, since that’s how long the autopsy report said he’d been dead before his body was jettisoned into the water — through a metal chute, according to the marks on his body, which all occurred post-mortem.’

‘I don’t believe it. He would have tapped like mad to attract attention!’

‘Oh, yeah, apparently he did. His fingernails were full of rubber — the same kind that lined the tube to prevent the contents from rattling.’

Mira screwed up her face, feeling ill to imagine it. She wondered if his torch had run flat before his oxygen while trying to claw his way out, but it hardly mattered now. ‘I suppose that’s poetic justice.’

‘You could say the same for his son. Greggie’s fate was a lot more gruesome, though, so it’s probably best if you never know.’

‘You suggested before that Tarin used his back for a scabbard?’

‘She did, but that’s not the wound that killed him. It’s just the one that ensured it.’

‘Now you’re talking in circles.’ Mira frowned, remembering how Ben had pleaded for more details of the crime scenes she’d seen, and finally she knew how he felt. ‘I’ve had nightmares,’ she confessed. ‘If it involves me, I need to know everything — especially how it really ended, so I can put it all behind me. I dare say Ben needs to know how it ended for everyone else too.’

‘Grady’s taking care of that. A thorough debriefing is part of standard recovery therapy for trauma victims.’

Mira closed her eyes, feeling the ache again of missing out on holding Ben’s hand through it all. ‘Then tell me, too.’

Lockman wound down his driver’s window first, letting in a larger flow of fresh air for her. ‘He was found near the port of Brisbane — for the most part. Are you sure you want more details than that?’

She nodded and turned her attention to the timeless sky and passing scenery — the last time she was likely to see the sandy forests of Straddie.

‘Greggie’s left hand was missing, along with his favourite appendage. Both severed cleanly, so it’s not hard to guess who took care of them, but he was also badly burned. The autopsy report shows that he was still alive when the trawler sank, so the salt water must have stung like a bitch. I know that much from personal experience. But it wasn’t the pain that killed him either, or the burns. I’m told he lived through the first five or six shark attacks — mostly small jaws since all the big boys and girls were busy elsewhere with us and the bigger shark carcass — until he lost too much from his legs, an arm and a large portion of his stomach. His head was also recovered from the belly of the second placegetter.’

‘Nice.’ Mira squirmed, feeling quite the opposite, and tried to imagine how Ben might have reacted to news as gruesome as all that. Weeks ago, she might have imagined him cheering, but Ben hadn’t turned out to be quite the person she’d expected him to be. Even so, he had to feel relief, not just for himself, but for Chloe and all the other friends he’d lost to the Greppia family.

‘That’s the whole branch of their cartel collapsed.’ He decelerated as he entered the small port settlement of Dunwich, and turned right, down to the pier. ‘Detective Innes-Grady obtained all the evidence he needed to clear Ben’s name from Chloe’s car, so you achieved everything you set out to achieve for Ben. Detectives Symes and Moser recovered eight hundred million from the sunken trawler, so the feds are happy — and Kitching’s gun-runners are not only that much poorer, they’ve also lost the network they’d been using to launder their dirty money. That makes them severely crippled and General Garland satisfied enough that you’ve held up your end of the deal to the best of your ability.’

Mira shook her head in disbelief. ‘Garland wanted Kitching and Mr Mystery — and got neither, just bits of Greppia. That’s like one step forward and two back.’

‘She also wants the weak link in her satellite observation division now too.’ Lockman drove aboard the first ferry of the day and cut the engine. ‘But she wants you to know she’s set to do all that without you. She asked me to tell you — to reassure you, really — that she won’t be asking you for any more help, and she won’t be forcing you either.’

‘You’re
still
her messenger boy?’ Mira asked suspiciously. ‘I thought you quit?’

‘I did, I just —’

‘… found it hard to take off the uniform?’

‘No! It’s not that!’

‘Oh, really? So why are you here, exactly? To see Ben, me, or deliver her message?’

‘Can’t I tick more than one box?’ He sounded hurt. ‘I just had to … I can’t … Damn, you’re good at making things difficult! Call it what you want. Garland intends on finalising a peace between you and her, and I offered to play intermediary one last time. It’s that simple — almost.’

‘It’s the “almost” that worries me. Haven’t you people sabotaged my relationship with Ben enough yet?’

‘Listen, as far as I knew, you and he were back together, safe and sound. I just needed to see that for myself, in the hope I could get a little closure too. You’re in my head, Mirage, and I can’t close my eyes without seeing you.’

‘Don’t say that! And don’t call me that!’

‘It’s the way it is.’

‘I don’t want to hear it!’

‘Hey, this is hard for me too. I understand you look at me sometimes — with your heart if not with your eyes — and you see Garland’s whole army. So sure, I’d expected you to give me a hard time tearing you away from him today. But honestly, I only intended to steal you away for five minutes, and I mainly did it for
your
sake. Or was I wrong to think you’d prefer to get Garland’s final message through me? Because the alternative was to have her show up on your doorstep.’

Mira sighed, knowing he was right about that much at least. She did prefer to keep him as an intermediary where Garland was concerned, but she was in no mood to admit it, especially now, if he’d quit. ‘How can you be such a survivor and still tolerate being her messenger boy, when you must know by now that all her messages to me have strings attached? She might as well send poison, or drug me and drag me away and be done with it!’

‘And you must know by now, I’d never let that happen.’

‘So she expects me to swallow her message happily, just because you bring it? Is that it?’

‘How you feel about it is your business, but I do expect that it’ll interest you, at least.’

‘The only thing that interests me is the truth, and tangible things in life that can’t be whisked away at the whim of somebody else.’

‘Yeah, I get it. You want the sky and the sea and the land never to change, but they
do
change, and you, of all people, should be able to see that. What you really want is reliability, and that’s what I’m bringing to the table. I wouldn’t bother passing on anything less from her, especially if I suspected it might get you hurt — not ever!’

‘Oh, I don’t believe this! How hard did that hunk of metal strike your head, Corporal? I mean Lieutenant. I mean Corporal again.’ Mira laughed at him. ‘It’s a wonder she didn’t attach your rank insignia by string to a yoyo. She’s gone back on her word to you more often than she has to me in the last week.’

‘I was discharged as second lieutenant, actually.’

‘So? How does that make it permanent? She’s an expert at ripping the rug out from under people. She went back on her promise to save Ben. After all the time wasted, all the effort in arranging donor eyes to trade, she didn’t even try to get him back.’

‘Who told you that? One of the Greppias? They didn’t
want
to give him back. They had all five of their yachts at sea as decoys, making it next to impossible to keep track from archived satellite photos or surveillance — all hampered by the foul weather. Those eyes eventually went to a young blind mother in South Australia, by the way. And sure, I’ve already admitted I have my doubts about Garland. I’m not defending her. But she did give me a few things as part of her final peace offering …’

‘She has
nothing
I need!’

‘Not any more she doesn’t. I have them. Listen, I didn’t come here to fight with you, and I certainly wouldn’t have come here at all if I thought it might undermine what little trust might have grown between us. I just want to show you a few things, and leave it up to you if you want them or not. They’re offered in the spirit of compensation for all the trouble—’

‘If anyone needs compensation around here, it’s Ben and his mother!’

‘Who do you think arranged to have the house fixed after the fire fight? All the windows repaired and holes in the walls plugged? Not to mention all the doctors’ bills and the private nurse. That was all General Garland. By the time she’s done with compensation, he may not need to work again.’

‘More dependency? That figures.’ Mira clenched and unclenched her fists in her lap. ‘Those doctors were hand chosen too, I’ll bet. They’ve made things worse for us. They haven’t let me anywhere near Ben, and they took the phone from his room so I couldn’t even ring him.’

‘I’m sorry I can’t help with that after the fact, but I
can
help you extract something more from the situation — and I did think you’d be curious to see what Garland’s been up to behind your back these past few days.’

‘Behind my back?’ Mira chewed on her lip. ‘Okay,
now
I’m interested.’

‘Then let me start with the little things she intended as gifts … Excuse me,’ he added as he leaned past her to get at the glove compartment. ‘Boomerangs, if you don’t want them.’

He transferred a flat vinyl pouch into her hands, inside of which she found a thin booklet and a plastic card. ‘The card gives you access to all your money. She assures me it’s limited only by the standard bank accountkeeping rules, same as anybody, while the booklet is a passport in the name of Ms Scarlet Pernel — a new identity, if you want it — and with it, the freedom to go anywhere, do anything.’

‘With all the usual strings.’

‘No strings. Garland said that since you “died” on her watch, it seemed only fair that she should offer you a new life — and I happen to agree. If she hadn’t, I would have offered the same thing, since I happen to have a little experience in that direction myself.’