The Sand Men (34 page)

‘I don’t understand what you’re saying.’

She sat down in the chair next to Cara. ‘You’re the distraction, the release valve. Now if any questions are asked they can say it was you.’ She tried to explain about how the vault had always been there, an ancient spot where the Ka’al elders gathered, set deep in the rocks. How the company had built the complex around it, adding the private apartment, a meeting place for modern elders. She explained why it was on every single map going back through the centuries, and what they used it for now. She mopped at her forehead, feeling dizzy. ‘Do you have anything cold to drink?’

Cara stayed silent, but reached under the table and pulled a plastic bottle of water from a mini-fridge, rolling it across the table-top to her. Lea drank a third and pressed the bottle to her forehead.

‘They didn’t want the whores from King’s Road, the ones everyone else used. What’s the point of having power if you still have to do that? They started taking girls. Afterwards they dumped them at sea but one washed up in the creek. It wasn’t enough to take the workers’ children, and they made a stupid mistake. Her name was Joia. Tom Chalmers’ daughter. She was thirteen. Tom suspected the truth. He told Milo they had taken her. Milo told Rachel and Rachel said something, so they followed her out into the desert and staged another accident. They took her pendant as proof. Rachel was found without her neck-chain.’

‘This is insane. You’re talking about—’

‘The rituals were secret and sacred,’ said Lea. ‘Now they’re just expedience. They provide... an outlet. This land has only just turned its back on the old ways.’ She wanted to reach over and touch her daughter, but Cara shifted away. ‘Your father and the others, they let you build the website and do all this. They encouraged you. You think they didn’t know about Dean right from the start? An angry kid with a backpack, planting home-made bombs on a high-security site? Now they can make you disappear. You and anyone else they want. Your father sold you to them, Cara. A new city built on ancient ground, that’s what they promised to deliver. They even brought back virgin sacrifice. The sins of men never change.’

Cara rose to her feet, looking back at the shimmering screens. ‘You’re crazy.’

‘They’re cleaning up before the resort opens. Getting rid of anyone who knows and keeps making a fuss. That won’t be hard; we’re all contracted to the company. The police will come back here. You’ll be taken to the vault and your disappearance will be explained away.’

‘You’re wrong. You’re sick, everyone says so.’

‘You’re in danger, Cara. We need to go back to the house and get our passports. We’ll have to be fast. They’re looking for you.’ She grabbed Cara’s hand, but the girl pulled away and stood her ground.

‘I don’t believe you. I don’t believe that Dad—’

‘Your father made his choice long ago. Before we moved out here.’ She spoke with slow deliberation.

‘
I don’t fucking believe you!’
Cara shoved at her furiously.

Lea grabbed her hands. ‘I went there, Cara. I saw it for myself.’ She waited for Cara to stop fighting her, then slowly released one hand. Digging into her jeans, she pulled out the chain she had found in the corner of the vault. ‘They always take something.’

Cara turned the identity bracelet over in her hand and read the inscription:

Joia Chalmers

‘You’re lying, you’re lying!’

‘Am I? Think about it, Cara, use your brain! Think about everything that’s happened. You play at being rebels, but if you decide I’m right then you have to do something real instead of all this—posturing.’

‘I can’t—get away from me.’ Cara leapt up, pushing Lea to the ground, tipping her chair over and knocking down the computer screens. Lea felt a searing pain through her right elbow as it connected with the concrete floor. By the time she had climbed to her feet and ascended the stairs, her daughter had gone. The beach house was surrounded by rustling dark bushes.

As she left the building, she saw the dark outlines of men hopping and running across the distant dunes, slowly coming closer.

Chapter Forty-Three

The Escape

F
ROM THE MOMENT
she had arrived, the Sand Men had told her where to go and what to do. They all just wanted her to shut up and go away. There was never any proof of wrongdoing. No evidence, no guilt, no shame.
The private conversations of company men would horrify you
, Rachel had said.

She had nothing on her but the money in her purse, and there didn’t seem to be any stores open. She would go back to Dream Ranches and wait for Cara to return.

There had to be evidence against the directors somewhere. Andre Pignot ran the oldest local magazine. He’d been here since before the oil boom, he had to know about the vault.

She knew then that she had to see him. He was the only one she could trust. As the Renault approached the run-down building that housed
Gulf Coast
, she began to get a bad feeling. Nathifa and Sergei from
Dream World
magazine had been at Pignot’s offices the last time she called him.

The cab stopped outside the door, and she saw that it had been removed and was being painted. Pushing past the decorator and climbing the stairs, she smelled turpentine and fresh varnish. Andre’s office had been emptied out. The rooms were completely bare. Dust sheets were down and the walls were being painted white. A stocky unsmiling woman with strong Russian features stood on the landing. She was writing notes in a sequinned pocketbook that looked as if it should belong to a teenaged girl.

‘I was looking for the offices of
Gulf Coast
magazine,’ Lea explained. ‘They were here.’

‘Gone now,’ said the woman curtly. She squinted at the wall and made another note. ‘Everything has gone to Dream World head offices,’ the woman replied. ‘Same company now.’

‘Do you know where I can find Andre Pignot?’

The woman looked up for the first time and studied her. ‘He’s gone too,’ she said, her voice lower.

‘Where did he go?’

The woman studied her properly for the first time. ‘Are you a friend of his?’

‘Yes, I am.’

‘Then I am sorry. He was drunk. He fell down stairs. Those stairs. Whisky.’ She pointed to the steep, narrow staircase ahead of her. ‘He broke his head. He did not live until ambulance arrive.’

She saw now that the wooden landing was petalled with blackish-crimson bloodstains. She had to get out of the building fast. Turning, she pushed down the stairs, past the decorators and out into the deserted street. She scanned the road to see if anyone had seen her enter the building, and ran to the car.

Nobody could afford to let Dream World fail. Not the Russians or the Europeans or the Arabs. Everyone kept telling her that. There would be firings and cover-ups and acts of damage limitation but nothing would change.

After getting no answer from Roy, she texted
Call me—urgent
. She needed to hear his voice, to see if she could discern betrayal in it.

Just as she was pulling back into the compound he rang back. She gripped the wheel, trying to stop her hands from shaking any harder.

‘Did you go to the beach house?’ he asked casually. ‘Did you find her?’

‘I couldn’t get there,’ she lied. ‘Hardy’s put the compound in lockdown.’

‘We’ve had more bomb threats. The security at the resort can handle the problem. So you haven’t heard from Cara?’

‘No, perhaps she’s gone to the mall with friends.’

‘Okay. I’ll be back later than I hoped. I have to go to the resort before I finish for the night. You know how important tonight is for all of us. Why don’t you go and prepare a nice meal, it’ll give you something to do.’

She refused to let her anger reveal itself. ‘Good idea, I’ll do that.’

I don’t know what to do
, she thought, suddenly overwhelmed with panic. The wives could be trusted; they would not have been made privy to the secrets of their men. But they were unlikely to trust her in return; she had been branded the troublemaker, the catalyst.

Heading upstairs, she added Cara’s passport to her own and filled a bag with clothes. She had some loose cash kept aside for tipping and her credit cards. Cara would have to come back to the house and when she did, Lea decided they would get away together even if it meant kidnapping her.

All she could do now was wait.

In the bathroom she found a packet of Zimovane sleeping pills in the cupboard, popped out two and washed them down with a glass of hot mint tea. She needed to rest, to gather her strength and be ready for Cara’s return.

She remembered something Rachel had said.
The world is divided into those who look for others and those who are looked for.
The men weren’t remotely concerned. Only Ben Larvin had suffered a crisis of conscience. How long did he live with the burden before becoming a liability?

Her thoughts fragmented. In the shadowed lounge she lay back on the couch, turned up the air conditioning and drifted into an uneasy, dislocated sleep.

S
HE HEARD HER
neighbour’s front door snick open. A homely figure in pink carpet slippers tentatively stepped out. Betty Graham was in her cornflower-blue apron once more, but now her hands were tied behind her back and she had been blindfolded with an absurd floral dishtowel. She was being gently led out of the house by two men in hooded grey tops and black jeans. Behind her, orange clouds pulsed like jellyfish, rising slowly in the night sky as the compound burned.

Puzzled, Lea slipped out of the car and followed. As they disappeared around the side, she heard Betty say something that sounded like ‘But I don’t want to leave.’ She had scratched her arm somewhere, and was dripping black spots of blood. She didn’t seem frightened, just confused. She still trusted the men who were leading her. She knew them, or at least recognised their voices.

They were Hardy’s men, and they were still talking softly to her as they carefully lowered her onto her knees in the side-alley. She addressed one politely while the other pulled a Swiss Army knife from the pocket of his jeans. When he opened the impossibly long serrated edge, only Lea’s sense of self-preservation kept her from crying out.

It was over very quickly. While one held Betty by her shoulders, the other pushed the blade into her pale throat, leaving it there for a moment while he wiped his hands on his jeans. Grasping the red plastic handle, he pulled it hard across and Betty fell silently forward, banging her head on the concrete with an audible crack. The whole operation had only taken a matter of seconds. Moments later a grey plastic body-bag was being unfurled and she had gone, as if she never existed. A trusting housewife, blindfolded and led to her death in a floral apron and dishtowel.

Tall figures shifted around her, watching and whispering. At first they seemed familiar and friendly, members of her family, her mother and father, her daughter. As they moved closer she began to panic. She tried to explain, but they weren’t listening. Nobody was listening. Hands guided her gently downwards, soothing voices were telling her to calm herself and rest…

L
EA AWOKE.

The room was in deep darkness. Her back was wet with sweat. A crushing pain pulsed behind her eyes. She could smell freshly baked bread. Puzzled, she opened her eyes and turned her head to one side.

There were thousands of stars above the rooftops.

‘You’re awake at last,’ said a figure beside her.

Mrs Busabi was knitting something, a vast unravelling maroon shawl of some kind, although how she could see the stitches was a mystery. A single candle flickered in a saucer on the side table. She rolled her armchair closer and smiled. She had put on weight. ‘I was beginning to think you’d sleep right through the night.’

‘Mrs Busabi, what are you doing in my house?’ Lea raised herself on one elbow and looked around.

‘Rosemary,’ said Mrs Busabi. ‘Call me Rosemary.’

Her head was swimming. The sofa was the wrong shape, and the chairs had been moved. A dresser full of floral crockery stood against one wall. A clock ticked.

She was not in her own home.

Shadows stretched and flickered about the room. Outside, there were no street lights. The road was pale blue, illuminated by the starfield above. The sky was pressing down over the compound, brighter than the black buildings.

‘Why is it so dark?’

‘The lights all went out. There must be a fault. A good job I had candles. I always keep plenty of candles for emergencies.’

‘Where am I?’ She tried to clear her throat. Her mouth tasted as if it had been filled with sand.

‘You’ll probably want some tea,’ said Mrs Busabi. ‘Let me get it for you.’

‘Wait, I should be in my own home, why am I here?’

‘Dr Vance is here, I’ll just get him.’ Mrs Busabi set aside her shawl and hastily rose, leaving the room. Lea tried to sit up but felt suddenly light-headed. She had taken sleeping pills on an empty stomach and then…

‘Mrs Brook, you’re with us again.’ A pleasant-faced man, American or Canadian, with thinning blond hair side-parted, and ridiculously bleached teeth. She’d seen him playing in a jazz band. Dr Vance was avuncular and old-fashioned, a character from a Norman Rockwell painting. He seated himself on the arm of the sofa and smiled. ‘It’s lucky you’ve got good neighbours, Mrs Brook.’

‘I don’t understand,’ she said thickly, ‘what am I doing here? I don’t remember leaving my house.’

‘You were in the street, very distraught about not being able to find your daughter. Mrs Busabi was driving past and brought you here. Don’t you remember?’

‘But she doesn’t live here. She moved to the other side of the compound after... something bad happened—’

‘Yes, and that’s where you are. On the North side. It’s only a short drive from your house. I was due to visit her and found you here. You felt quite feverish. I gave you a sedative.’

‘But I’d already taken sleeping pills.’

‘Don’t worry, it wasn’t very strong, it won’t do you any harm. You just needed to shut down that busy mind of yours for a while. Are you feeling better now?’