Double Cross (16 page)

'Tobey, can I come in?' Mum's voice was soft outside my
door.

I didn't answer.

'Tobey, please.'

Silence.

I heard Mum sigh, but she respected the fact that my
door was firmly closed and headed back downstairs. Mum
had been knocking on my bedroom door at periodic
intervals all morning – ever since she'd got in from work.
How I wished she'd give up and leave me alone. I sat
on the floor in the corner of my room directly opposite
the door. I'd been sitting there ever since I'd arrived
home the night before, with one knee drawn up, the other
leg flat against the carpeted floor. In my left hand, my
fingers worked at the super ball I usually kept on my desk.
It was the size of a large marble and decorated with swirls
of different shades of green and brown. Callie had given
me the thing years ago, I can't even remember why.
I hadn't moved from this corner all night, only shifting
positions slightly when one leg or the other threatened
to go numb. I'd never watched the dawn break before. In
the middle of the night, the dark seemed so dense, it
was easy to believe it would perpetually paint my room.
But the grey-blue light had pushed slowly but irrevocably
against every shadow until they were all but gone.

And whilst watching the arrival of dawn, I'd been
thinking. I'd been thinking a lot.

Callie's mum Sephy considered me gutless, as did the
police. I wasn't about to argue with them. In spite of what
Sephy had said to me the night before, I'd stayed at the
hospital until Callie was out of surgery. I didn't sit with
Callie's mum. She made it very clear that I wasn't wanted
anywhere near her. I listened on the periphery when the
surgeon finally arrived to tell us what was happening.
Callie had been shot twice, once in the chest and one
bullet had glanced off her temple. The bullet in her chest
was out, but Callie was still in a critical condition.

'Callie has lost a lot of blood and there's considerable
tissue damage, so she's not out of the woods yet. The
bullet that entered her chest missed her heart by about a
centimetre,' said Mr Bunch, the Cross surgeon. 'And the
bullet that caught her temple caused a hairline fracture of
her skull, but at least the bullet didn't penetrate. However,
the next forty-eight hours will be crucial.'

'Can I see her?' I stepped forward to ask.

'She'll be unconscious for quite some time,' the surgeon
warned me.

'I need to see her,' I insisted.

'No,' Sephy began. 'I don't think so . . .'

'Please, Sephy. Please.'

Sephy emphatically shook her head.

'I'll camp outside Callie's room or the ward or the
hospital building if I have to until you change your mind,'
I said desperately. 'Please let me see her.
Please.'

Sephy scrutinized me for several seconds. Her gaze slid
away from mine and a frown appeared across her forehead.
When at last she looked at me again, she nodded, albeit
reluctantly. I wondered what had made her change her
mind, but I wasn't about to push my luck by asking. Mr
Bunch led the way to the Intensive Care Unit. Callie was
in a room by herself, the closest one to the nurses' station.

Nothing could've adequately prepared me for what I
was about to see. Callie Rose was hooked up to all kinds
of monitors and beeping machines. She had plastic tubing
running into her mouth and an IV drip, plus a blood bag
running into her arm. Her head was swathed in a bandage.
Her whole body seemed so much smaller, like she'd
shrunk in on herself. And all the paraphernalia around her
was overwhelming. She was almost lost in the middle
of it all.

I walked over to her and stroked the back of her hand
which lay above the white sheets. For a long time I could
do nothing but look down at her. Then I bent and
whispered in her ear before kissing her forehead. I
straightened up slowly, unable to take my eyes off her face.
She looked fragile as crystal, like one more knock and she
would irrevocably shatter.

Callie Rose, forgive me . . .

I took hold of her cold hand and held it in my own,
never wanting to let it go. You see it in films and on the
TV all the time. Someone's in trouble, dying, and their
mum or dad or partner or best mate makes all kinds of
promises and begs anyone who'll listen to swap places.
Well, that's what I did. I would've swapped places with
Callie quicker than a thought. But no one was listening.
She remained in the bed, hooked up to all those machines.
I stood beside her, helpless.

My throat had swollen up, making it difficult for me to
catch my breath.

Callie, if you can hear me, please . . .

But before I could finish my silent plea, the rhythm in
the room changed. Where the monitors were beeping
slow and steady before, now there was just a continuous
droning hum coming from them. An alarm began to
sound. Suddenly the room was full and I was shoved
backwards out of the way. The pillow was whipped
out from beneath Callie's head as a wave of doctors and
nurses appeared from nowhere to swarm over her. And a
continuous flat line continued its slide across the heart
monitor. Sephy tried to get closer to her daughter, but
they wouldn't let her stay either. The door was closed
behind both of us. Sephy watched through the small
window, her fists clenched against the pane as if she
wanted to batter at it. She turned to me, her dark-brown
eyes blazing.

'You . . .' she hissed. If words could kill, that one
accusatory word would've butchered me where I stood.
'Who did this?
Tell me!'

I looked through the window at the doctors and nurses
still trying to resuscitate Callie, before turning back to
Callie's mum. What would she do if I told her? Sephy was
tough – with everything she'd been through in her life,
she had to be. But she was no match for the Dowds or
McAuley and his hired muscle-heads. If she went after
them, which she undoubtedly would, Callie would end up
an orphan . . . if Callie survived.
No. When
Callie
survived. She just had to make it, and so did her mum. In
that moment, I made my choice.

'I can't say 'cause I don't know.' The small words were
outsized and razor-sharp in my mouth.

Sephy turned away from me. At that instant I ceased to
be for her. We had nothing else to say to each other. I
turned away and left the ICU and the hospital.

My grip on the super ball tightened. It wasn't like in films
and games and on the TV. What had happened at the
Wasteland hadn't been choreographed into chaotic
elegance. No make-up person had drawn in cuts and
bruises. No costume person had decided which knee of
which pair of jeans needed to be torn. The bullets started
flying, everyone started screaming and scattering and
diving to the ground. The cuts and bruises had been all
too real. Torn jeans and dirt-stained clothes had happened
spontaneously. And the blood on Callie hadn't been
sprayed on. It'd been pumped out. There was no one to
shout: 'Cut. Great take,' or 'Let's do it again. Action.'
Only now, for the first time, did I truly realize what Mum
meant when she kept insisting that 'Life is not a dress
rehearsal'. There were no rewrites, no retakes, no re-do
icon to click on. Callie had been shot. Real life was
agonizingly hard to handle. Real life was just agonizing.

I couldn't get the image of Callie lying on that hospital
bed out of my head. I knew I never would. No one told
me that helplessness made you feel so minuscule. At
school, at work, even here in my own bedroom, I occupied
very little space. Was it so wrong to want just a little
bit more from life? I'd convinced myself that that was
what Dan had been offering. Just a little bit more than
I already had. And now everything had fallen to pieces. I
stayed in my room throughout the night and most of the
morning, only leaving when I needed to go to the loo. I
didn't eat, I didn't sleep, I couldn't think straight. Jessica
and Mum left me alone for the most part. Mum put a plate
of ham sandwiches outside my door, even though I'd
called out after at least ten minutes of her cajoling me to
eat that I wasn't hungry. To get her off my back, I even
tried one, but it was like chewing a crumpled-up page of
printer paper. It didn't taste of anything and it wouldn't go
down. So I spat it out into my bin and gave up. I greeted
the following night lying on top of my bed, staring up at
my ceiling. Closing my eyes, I waited for sleep to come
and get me. But it was as if a switch had been flicked on
inside my head and now my brain wouldn't stop whirling.

McAuley.

It had been McAuley's car at the Wasteland. McAuley's
men had walked towards us on the football pitch.
McAuley's men had shot first. And the two Cross guys
who'd returned fire, they had to work for the Dowds. Was
the shootout planned between them? Somehow I didn't
think so. If they wanted to shoot it out, they could find
somewhere better than a public park. So why had both
groups turned up at the Wasteland? It didn't make sense.
They weren't there to kill each other. One set of gangsters
had to be there for another reason entirely. And the other
lot – well they were there by either luck or design. I didn't
know anything about the Dowds, except by reputation.
They were ruthless and deadly when crossed, just like
McAuley. All I knew about McAuley were the stories
about him that were common knowledge and the
things I'd learned from Dan. Had McAuley's men been
after Dan? That didn't make sense. Dan had been working
for McAuley for ages now. Dan and his deliveries.
My luck had seriously run out from the time I agreed
to . . . to . . .

Deliveries.

Ross Resnick.

I'd delivered the parcel to Ross Resnick's wife, just like
Dan had asked. Was that the reason McAuley came after
Dan? Because Dan should've delivered the package
himself ?

Or maybe . . . just maybe McAuley was after me?

Had Dan told McAuley what I'd said about not taking
the fall alone if the police came knocking at my door? Was
that what this was all about? Did McAuley decide I was far
too dangerous to him? Godsake! I'd said a lot, but I hadn't
meant it. It was just a lot of angry hot air released on the
spur of the moment. I mean, as if I could take on
McAuley. He had to know that I couldn't touch him. But
McAuley and his men had evidently decided they needed
to take care of business. McAuley'd be safe and I'd be too
dead to be sorry. Was McAuley after both Dan and me?
Was that the idea, to kill two birds with one stone? Or
maybe I was the only one who was expendable. Either
way, McAuley wanted me gone. Permanently.

That was the only explanation that made sense.

The only thing I didn't understand was how the Dowd
family thugs had turned up at the same time. How did
they know what McAuley had planned? There was no
way they would've turned up just to save my sorry hide.
They didn't know me, and even if they did, I meant less
than nothing to them.

I sought out some other more rational, reasonable
explanation for what had happened – but there was none.
The more I thought about McAuley coming after me, the
more it seemed right.

The question was, what was I going to do about it?

As long as McAuley perceived me to be a threat, I was
up shit creek with both hands and feet tied. I might as well
just paint a bloody great target on my back. Is that how
Dan was feeling? Where was he now? Hiding out somewhere?
Or did he know he wasn't the intended target?
Was he going to do a runner?

At long last, after three a.m., I finally passed out. It
didn't last long. A couple of hours, according to my alarm
clock. And no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn't get
back to sleep.

Blood running down Callie's skin, spreading out across
her blue T-shirt . . .

Blood running down the side of Callie's face . . .

Callie's eyes closing as she toppled over in front of
me . . .

Gunshots like fireworks exploding all around us . . .

Those were the nightmares that forced me awake.
Those were the images in my head that wouldn't leave,
even with my eyes open. Especially with my eyes open.
There was only one thing I could do. It was so dangerous
– and not just for me but for those around me – but what
choice did I have?

I had two options. I could either run and never stop, or
I could get McAuley, before he got me.

Get McAuley?

Get real. Why didn't I stop all the wars on the planet and
cure all diseases known to humankind whilst I was at it?

Get McAuley . . .

But I had to at least try. I owed Callie that much. He
had to pay for what he'd done. And it was a simple matter
of McAuley or me. What was that saying about keeping
your friends close and your enemies closer? Experience
was the greatest teacher. I had to get close to McAuley,
convince him that I wasn't a threat.