Disappear (39 page)

The briefcase was two metres from the window and falling, another four metres below the level of the first floor when Roger Kaplan’s thumb pressed down firmly on the plunger. As he did so he averted his gaze, catching just a glimpse of the blinding white light that otherwise would have filled every corner of his vision. The force of the blast blew him off his feet and ripped the device from his grasp, sending it spinning through the air.

The explosion could be heard, a deafening crack to some, a low boom further afield, up to a radius of fifty kilometres.

A hole, ten metres in diameter, was torn into the rear wall of the Kaplan mansion. The wind from the explosion caused fractures to appear in every wall, floor and most items of furniture.

Jennifer was thrown violently across the room and onto the floor. Her ears rang with the roar. Her cheekbone cracked as she hit the floor and blood burst from the torn skin of the wound.

Fractures rippled through the floorboards, spitting carpet and handfuls of timber, concrete and dust into the air.

Jennifer placed her palms down flat on the floor, tried to push herself to her knees, but she had no strength left in her arms and jolts of pain stabbed all over, like hot knives. Her head dropped, her breath coming in short, sharp gasps as she fought against the darkness.

Kaplan and Masterton were hurled across the room beneath a flying wall of debris. Kaplan was sure he screamed yet he heard no sound, other than a deafening boom, which rang and rang and rang in his ears, an endless echo. The air around him filled with swirls of dust, churning like storm clouds, and a steady shower of masonry and slivers of brick drizzled across the room.

Nothing looked familiar. The house had become a shambles, every nook and cranny transformed into something twisted and grotesque.

Pain pulsed from everywhere. Kaplan was aware of enormous pressure on his chest, and he moved his arm to the area of pain. Looking down and across his body, he saw he was drenched in blood. He’d never seen so much blood.

‘Oh … God.’ He groped about, squinting through the grey cloud. ‘Harold!’

Masterton appeared beside him, dishevelled, bloodied. He hooked his arm around Kaplan and painfully dragged him towards the door. ‘We’ve got to get out, Henry.’

‘Harold … what has he done? What - has my son done - to us?’

Moments before, the police car had screamed to a halt on the street outside. Lachlan and Aroney looked at the cars in the driveway and exchanged glances. ‘Henry Kaplan’s here,’ Lachlan said, ‘but who else?’ He didn’t know Helen’s car. They were about to open their doors when the roar of the explosion filled their heads. The car rocked.

They looked to the house. Every window had blown out, sending a stream of shattered glass over the front lawn. The front door had been ripped from its hinges.

‘For Christ’s sake,’ shouted Aroney, ‘he’s bombed the bloody place.’

Lachlan darted from the car and raced into the house, Aroney on his tail. They entered a virtual war zone. A burning, acrid smell, dust as thick as a winter fog, furniture twisted into tortured shapes and scattered piles of metal and brick. One dead body. Masterton scrambling for the door, supporting a badly hurt Kaplan.

Sirens wailed from the street outside. The first of the squad cars belatedly reacting to the all-points bulletin.

‘Where’s Jennifer?’ Lachlan stopped in front of Kaplan and Masterton. The once powerful tycoon was a mere shell now. He stared up at Lachlan with a broken expression that said I don’t know.

Lachlan stepped past them, mounted the stairs. The banister, still holding until then, shifted with his weight. Part of it began to crumble. He moved cautiously along the first floor hallway, aware of the danger of falling debris. He coughed. The dust was thick so he took his handkerchief from his pocket to cover his mouth. He glanced into each of the rooms as he passed.

‘Neil!’ Aroney’s voice came from below. ‘We’ve got to get out. Gas fumes, coming from the kitchen. She’s gonna blow again.’

‘Sweet Jesus,’ Lachlan muttered under his breath. Where was she? He reached the doorway to the rumpus room, saw Jennifer sprawled on the floor. A trail of blood circled her.

He felt for her pulse. Found it. ‘Thank God.’ He lifted her over his shoulder and retraced his steps quickly. As he passed through the remains of the ground floor living room, a gaseous aroma filled his nostrils. He fought back nausea.

Aroney had helped Kaplan and Masterton across the lawn and was heading back down the driveway when he saw Lachlan. ‘Hurry,’ he called frantically.

Lachlan stumbled through the doorway. He was almost to the driveway’s end when the second explosion rocked the grounds. He lost his footing. Jennifer slid from his shoulders and crashed to the lawn.

The blast blew a small hole in the front wall of the house. The escaped gas inside had ignited with sparks from the electrical wires. It sent another wave of red-hot flame through the house, shooting from the windows and all the cracks.

Jennifer opened her eyes, raised her head to see Lachlan, kneeling beside her. He clasped the palm of her hand in his.

‘You okay?’

‘Okay,’ she rasped. Her hands flew to her neck, her fingers gently trailing the ugly red welt. ‘We’ve got to go after Roger.’

‘Where is he?’

She banked her head towards the house. ‘Must’ve taken…the rear. He had …’ She stopped briefly, gulped in a lungful of air. ‘…a remote device for the bomb.’

More sirens. Several cars screeched to a stop along the street. The footpaths were lined with residents, all gaping in astonishment at the wreckage of the Kaplan home.

Lachlan sprang to his feet. Three police officers ran towards him.

‘You all right, sir?’ one asked.

‘Fine. Is an ambulance on the way?’

‘Yes, sir.’

He pointed to one of the men. ‘Stay with Ms. Parkes.’ He cocked his head towards the other two. ‘Come with me. The bomber is at the rear of the property.’

‘Be careful,’ Jennifer called after them, but her voice was barely a croak. No-one heard her.

The young officer’s hand came to rest on her shoulder. ‘Take it easy, Miss. The medics will be here in a moment.’

Jennifer’s thoughts, however, were on Neil Lachlan. She watched him race around the side of the shattered building and said a quiet prayer:
Please, God, don’t let anything happen to him.
And in the fantasy realm of her mind’s eye, she dropped a five-cent coin into the old wishing pool.

After the first explosion, Roger scrambled to his feet. The rear of the property didn’t have the extent of damage he’d expected. He feared that Jennifer and his father might not have been killed in the blast. He had to be sure.

If I can get back in, I’ll finish them off before the emergency services arrive.

He sprinted across the garden and up the steps of the wide round patio. Chunks of timber and metal and glass lay everywhere. He heard Neil Lachlan’s voice from inside.

‘Where’s Jennifer?’

Damn him to hell,
thought Roger. What was he doing here so soon? The explosion had only just occurred. Was he psychic? Whimpering sounds came from Roger’s father.

He turned and ran full pelt back across the property, down the slippery embankment to the water’s edge. He ran along the shoreline, under cover of the thick brush and overhanging trees. There was practically no beach here, just a thin stretch of sand littered with seaweed and stones.

He heard the second explosion.

The flag of freedom had, until now, been flying high in his expectations. An undiscovered country. Freedom from his father. Freedom from the watchers. Freedom to kill.

Sirens wailed from the street. Now, instead, he’d been discovered; his plans foiled. Now he was the hunted.

He reached a grassy knoll. It stood at the point where the houses stopped and a bend in the shoreline created a natural reserve. He paused to catch his breath.

All’s not lost, he told himself. He simply had to alter his plans. The money was still there, untraceable. Underworld contacts such as Hargreaves, who’d helped him in the past, could assist him in escaping to a new life.

‘It’s over, Roger.’

Roger’s head whipped about. Lachlan was approaching, several metres back along the strip of land. Two other police officers were coming up behind him.

Roger felt an overwhelming desire to squeeze the life from Lachlan. The meddling copper had been a thorn in his side for over a week now, always arriving on the scene at the wrong time. Was there something between him and Jennifer? That might explain it.

Roger threw his hands in the air, a gesture of defeat. ‘Okay, okay.’ He began marching, shoulders slumped, back towards them. ‘I don’t have a weapon,’ he called out.

When he made his move it was sudden and swift. He shifted direction with a violent twist of his limbs, propelling himself into the water at a run, diving when he felt the sand give way to greater depth.

‘Stop!’ Lachlan’s reflexes were equally quick. He drew his gun but immediately saw it was pointless. He cast it aside and ran into the water, feeling the sudden steep slope away from the shallows. He dived.

Roger was a strong swimmer. He hurtled through the water. He didn’t intend to outswim Lachlan - that wouldn’t work. What he did intend was to swim to a point where the current changed, then across, coming back into a stretch of shore on the other side of the point.

But he didn’t want Lachlan on his tail the whole way. He was a dozen metres out when he stopped. He yanked the loop of wire from his trouser pocket, and then dived again. He opened his eyes. The salt stung them and the light was dim. The shadow cast by Lachlan’s form cut a swathe along the surface. Approaching rapidly.

Roger swam in a sideways pattern, attempting to position himself beside or behind the advancing swimmer. His lungs screamed out for air but he figured he could last a few seconds more. If he broke the surface directly behind Lachlan, applying the garotte instantly, then he knew he’d win. He’d force the copper down and his victim would be in the weaker position, grappling to maintain equilibrium in these depths. The survivor would be the one with the most air in his lungs.

Lachlan reached a spot roughly above his prey. Roger was slightly to his opponent’s left now, just a half a metre below him. His lungs were about to burst but the adrenalin surge kept him going. His vision was a blur of shadows and shapes, dark and shifting, silhouetted by a thousand points of shimmering green light.

Now.

He pushed himself to the surface, thrusting the loop of wire blindly towards Lachlan. His aim was off, missing by a hand’s space. Lachlan banked to the side, whipping his head about to face Roger, but the killer had slipped beneath the surface again, his body brushing against Lachlan’s legs. He surfaced again almost immediately, to Lachlan’s rear once more, and this time the wire snapped into position around his quarry’s throat.

Despite the sharp bite of the wire, Lachlan arched his body into a backwards flip and pivotted. Kicking his legs up, he placed them in a scissor grip around Roger’s neck and pulled him forward. Surprised, Roger’s grip on the wire faltered and was lost. It fell away into the depths.

Roger allowed himself to fall forward and sink into the ocean under the force of Lachlan’s pull. Then he jerked his body free and propelled himself away. He had no choices left. He had to beat Lachlan to the shore at the far side of the point.

He could hear his pursuer thrashing through the water behind him. Roger dived, kicking furiously. Perhaps he could outdistance the copper if he swam underwater for long stretches at a time.

He saw long stems of reed and fern rise like tentacles from the ocean floor, tangling with chunks of seaweed. A school of fish, bright vibrant colours, darted away as he approached. He looked back. Lachlan had also submerged and was gaining on him.

An incredible tiredness gripped Roger. His arms and legs felt as though they were weighed down. He expected that Lachlan was feeling the same but he knew the copper wouldn’t give up the chase. He’d follow until they both drowned.

Stupid, arrogant copper.

I’ll have to go back with him.

As the reality hit him, that he’d finally lost to Lachlan - game, set and match, Roger registered surprise at reconciling himself to the fact. He felt almost calm. Philosophical. He needed air so he stopped swimming and pushed upwards. His body began to rise but then, a sudden jerk, and he stopped. Something was tugging at his left foot. He looked down and could see nothing but ferns and flowers and the tentacles of a thousand colours, billowing in the shadows.

He tried to pull his foot free but it wouldn’t budge. Lachlan was beside him now. Roger looked into the pinched, distorted face of his nemesis, eyes open just a slit and smarting against the sting of the saltwater. Their eyes made contact.

Lachlan recognized the terror in Roger’s face. The language in the killer’s gaze cried out for help.

Both men bent down, searching for the source of the problem. Roger’s hands grappled furiously at the trapped foot. A thick, fibrous stem of a sea plant had coiled itself tightly around his ankle. The coils, looped like a tight fish, allowed no slack.

Lachlan’s lungs were aflame. He rose quickly to the surface and sighed with relief as air filled him and noted that they were approximately a hundred metres from the shoreline. The two police officers were in the shallows, waiting and watching for a sign. Lachlan waved frantically, gesturing for them to come in. Perhaps the three of them could free Roger Kaplan before he drowned. Lachlan had begun to fear, though, that they would need a chainsaw to hack through that tentacle.

Roger Kaplan was a psychotic madman and a sociopath, but Lachlan couldn’t leave him to drown. The thought of him down there, lungs bursting, the ocean pouring into his throat, sent a chill to the very core of his soul.

He sucked in as much air as he could, held it, dived again.

Jennifer raised her head and looked to where Henry Kaplan sprawled nearby on the grass. Masterton sat a little further along, conferring with two police officers. She thought she heard one of them say something about internal bleeding and that an ambulance was coming.