Darkening Skies (38 page)

These dickheads
? Was she talking about Flanagan? And who? McCarty? And why the hell wasn’t Mark to be touched?

Mark’s voice came from close to the window. ‘So, now you’re going to
deal
with us all to wipe the whole slate clean, aren’t you, Vanna? Just me and Dan or McCarty as well?’

‘What?’ Flanagan’s voice, Jenn thought. Rising in volume and tone. ‘What do you mean?
Vanna
?’

‘They’re going to kill you, Dan.’ Mark, still so even and calm. ‘Or at least I am. Before I shoot myself.’

‘Oh Jesus, Vanna, you can’t.’

He cried out and Jenn heard a thump. But no gunshot.

She looked around, desperate for something, anything to use as a weapon. Two bricks on the ground nearby alongside some cracked terracotta pots. She stuffed some pieces of terracotta in her pockets and took a brick in each hand. She drew in a deep breath and flung the first brick at the window as hard as she could, hoping desperately that Mark wasn’t standing next to it. The glass shattered and she followed it with the other brick, aimed at the remaining window. Then she ran as bullets fired from the room. But instead of running to the trees she ran back to the door she’d left through, keeping close to the house.

Police
? Mark thought as he jerked away from the shattering glass. But the brick that landed on the floor inches from his feet probably wasn’t police equipment. McCarty and the guard spun away from him and fired their guns out the remains of the window as Vanna wiped blood off her cheek and swore and Dan gripped the edge of the table and started to haul himself up.

No orders
from police were shouted, no rush of officers, but they’d unchained him from the chair a few minutes before and he was no longer helpless.

McCarty, with his gun still in his hand, jumped through the window frame and started towards the trees.

One guard with a gun remained, and Vanna, both looking to the window. Dan was still reeling from the blow to his head. Mark raised his eyes at him. A man scared for his life could become an ally. The laptop sat on the table just inches away but as Mark shifted his feet slightly to find a better stance, he caught a shadow at the half-open door.
Jenn? Police?

He moved, grabbing the laptop and flinging it sideways towards the guard’s head, then leapt after it with his cuffed hands raised to strike. As he hit the ground with the man, he was vaguely aware of Dan moving, of Vanna’s shout, of Jenn rushing in. He rolled with the guard, grappling for the gun.

Someone screamed and a gun fired. Rolling over the guard, Mark grabbed the guy’s head and pounded it against the floor, and out of the corner of his eye he saw McCarty in the window, gun aimed towards him. McCarty fired once as Mark grabbed the guard’s gun. He squeezed the shot as McCarty fired again, and pain erupted in his side as the man fell.

‘Mark!’

He staggered to his feet, ripping the handcuff keys from the guard’s belt. Vanna had Jenn by the hair but Jenn’s fingers
gripped Vanna’s face, digging in near her eyes, and with one hand she dragged a rock down the older woman’s face.

Mark grabbed Vanna and flung her into the table, following with a hard blow across her bleeding face. She tried to kick away but Dan, on the floor beside his feet, grabbed her leg, dragging it down with his weight as he pulled himself up.

McCarty was stirring, the guard starting to moan.

‘Mark! We have to go!’ Jenn yelled, grabbing his arm.

Dan shoved him aside and started to pound his ex-wife’s face.

With all his concern for Jenn and no sympathy for either Flanagan, Mark didn’t hesitate to leave them to each other and McCarty.

The gun held awkwardly in one cuffed hand, he pressed the other hand against the damp burning at his side and followed Jenn as she darted out of the room and across a hallway to the open front door.

‘There’s another guard, somewhere,’ she said, pausing for an instant to check beyond the door. ‘We have to get to the trees.’ She glanced back and her eyes dropped to the blood staining his hand. ‘You’re hurt. Oh fuck, oh shit.’

‘It’s okay. Just run. I’ll be right behind you.’

‘No. I won’t leave you.’

He tucked the gun into the waistband of his jeans, then grabbed her hand and set off, forcing his legs to run, each hard step on the ground jarring pain through him. The dark blur of trees ahead was the only thing in his vision, and he kept going, because if he stopped, Jenn would stop.

He heard a shot.

He couldn’t let her stop.

In the trees it
was cooler, the light not as harsh, and they slowed but kept moving, deeper, deeper into the cover. His side ached, but he was still upright, still walking.

Jenn breathed heavily and Mark’s own breath rose in gasps. He thought they’d come about a kilometre from the house, and ahead the trees seemed to thin out. The mix of mulga, native cypress and eucalypt was dry and scrubby but he steered Jenn towards one of the few larger red gums that dotted through the shorter growth.

He leaned his back against the broad trunk, grateful for its support. Jenn immediately moved his bloodied hand aside and pulled up his shirt, wiping away blood with the bottom of it.

‘It’s not bad,’ he told her. ‘Just caught me on the side. I think the bleeding’s stopped.’

‘Not quite yet, it hasn’t.’

Probably because he’d been running, pumping blood through his body – and out of the wound. She uncuffed his hands, helped him tug his shirt off over his head and then hastily folded it into a pad, wrapping the sleeves around him to tie it on.

She straightened up, steadying herself with one hand against the tree, and he didn’t miss the catch in her breath.

‘Are you okay?’ he asked sharply. He’d assumed she was, because she’d run without stopping, making good speed, but he had no idea what she’d endured in the hours since their abduction. Her shirt still bloodied from the bus accident and from his blood, her hair dishevelled, she looked like she’d been through hell but he couldn’t see signs of external injury.

‘I’m fine. Just a twinge from my ankle and a bit woozy from the drug and no food. Do you know what time it is? How long were we out?’

He’d bet
her ankle more than twinged. Practical, uncomplaining and focused – just as she’d always been when it mattered. His captors had taken his watch and phone but the sun had already passed its highest point before they unchained him. ‘It’s early afternoon. Maybe one or two o’clock.’ And getting hotter, which worried him. Weakened physically by the after-effects of the sedatives, the heat and lack of water would make them even more vulnerable.

‘Do you know where we are?’ Jenn asked.

‘No. I’m guessing west, because of this mulga. West of Dungirri, certainly. West of Birraga, maybe. A lot of the land around Birraga is cleared but there are a few pockets of scrub,’ Mark said. ‘Let’s keep moving,’ he suggested. ‘We might be able to see more once we’re out of this.’

He pushed himself away from the tree and took her hand. But as they stepped out from the protection of the broad trunk, a bullet gouged into the bark of a cypress pine, passing just inches from Jenn.

Her
hand gripped tightly in his, Mark led her on a zigzag path through the trees. Her head pounded, branches whipped her face and her ankle jarred every time she leapt over a rock or a fallen log, but somehow she managed to stay on her feet despite the rough ground.

She heard four more shots, and saw two of them strike nearby.

She didn’t turn her head to see their pursuer but she heard him crashing through the bush. She kept her gaze focused on the ground in front of her boots, desperate not to trip and fall.

But she almost stumbled when Mark stopped abruptly. Lifting her head, she saw the landscape opening up in front of them – cleared paddocks, only a tree here and there. No cover.

‘There’s a road over there,’ Mark said. ‘And I think there’s a vehicle coming.’

They set off again, twisting along the edge of the trees, and she caught glimpses of the dirt road. But she’d lost her sense of
direction, and she wasn’t sure whether they’d run away from the convent or had zigzagged back towards it, didn’t know whether that track went through the trees and reached the convent, or somewhere entirely different.

The sound of their pursuer’s footfalls receded, but twice more shots were fired. He was still out there, looking for them, but now he was some distance behind them.

When the man fired another shot, Mark stopped, pushing her behind a large tree, withdrawing the gun from the waistband of his jeans. ‘You go on. I think those are police cars on the road. If they are, see if you can get their attention. I’ll wait here and keep this guy off your tail.’

She wanted to protest, but as she opened her mouth he cut off her words with a brief, hard kiss. ‘Go, Jenn. I’ll see you soon.’

If he hadn’t looked so grey and exhausted, if the wound on his side wasn’t still seeping, she’d have argued with him. But he must be almost at the end of his endurance and it
did
make sense for her to run for help. Besides, of the two of them, he’d always been a far better shot.

He stepped out to cover her, firing a shot into the trees behind her as she sprinted towards the road, dodging through the edge of the scrub.

She could see the cars through the trees. Four cars. Relief flooded her to see the police markings. They’d stopped on the road and at least half a dozen officers in protective gear spilled out, taking defensive positions behind open doors, weapons drawn. She skidded to a halt thirty metres away as one of the windscreens shattered. The shot had come from in front of her, not behind her.

Two gunmen
now, armed police ready to fire – and she was in the middle. She dropped down into a crouch, her breath coming in hard gasps from the run and her ankle throbbing. For long seconds she froze, undecided. Then she forced in a deep breath and stepped out into the open. Waving her arms to attract the police she screamed, ‘We’re here! Mark’s hurt!’ before she dropped low to the ground again.

In the protective gear and helmets she didn’t recognise the first two who came running but she knew the third, a few metres behind them. Steve. He crouched beside her and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. ‘Jenn, it’s okay, there’s an ambulance not far away. Where’s Mark?’

She wanted to collapse with the relief but she had to tell them what she knew. ‘Mark’s back that way a little. Gunshot in the side. He’s walking but he’s lost blood. There’s at least two gunmen – one beyond Mark, one over that way. Five people, total, but I don’t know where they all are. Dan Flanagan, Vanna, McCarty and two others. Some might be dead or injured at the convent.’

‘Go find Mark,’ he ordered the two others.

She started to scramble to her feet to go with them but Steve pulled her back down. ‘Stay here. We’re going to run for the car in a minute.’ He spoke briefly on the radio, passing on her information, ordering the officers by the cars to proceed with caution.

In the distance she heard over her thudding pulse the beat of a helicopter, coming closer. The police by the cars fanned out and began to move forward.

‘Okay, Jenn – can you make a last dash for the cars with me?’

‘Mark—’

They heard
a shout, then a second call in return. Steve’s radio hissed and a man’s voice reported, ‘Mr Strelitz located. Ambulance required.’

Ambulance required? Had he collapsed? Been shot again? She didn’t wait for Steve but leapt to her feet and blundered back into the trees, running towards the movement she could see in the direction she’d left him. Running to Mark.

He sat on the ground, his back against a tree, eyes closed, one of the officers hunkered beside him pressing the makeshift pad against the wound, the other standing guard, weapon ready.

As she dropped to her knees, his eyes shot open. ‘I’ll be fine, Jenn,’ he said, reaching with one hand to grip hers. ‘But you need to get somewhere safer than here.’ He looked up at Steve. ‘Get her out of here, Steve. Please.’

Emotions crashing around her, she shook her head in a wordless refusal. Always, his first thoughts were for others, but no way would she leave without him. She knelt on the ground on the dead leaves and twigs and dirt and fought back tears, fought for control of herself. She couldn’t cry. She
wouldn’t
cry. She had to hold it together, get through the rest of this. Be strong enough to love him. Strong enough to leave him. Because he could have died and she had no knowledge or ability to deal with how lost and vulnerable that made her feel.