Grant Mckenzie Read online

  ‘You shouldn’t have tried to burn me, Luke. I took that personally.’

  ‘It was a test.’ Crimson foam bubbled from his mouth. ‘I knew he wouldn’t do it.’

  The gun fired again and Lucas howled as his left ear vanished in a puff of blood.

  ‘J–Jesus, Davey, we’re partners.’

  ‘Partners?’ Davey laughed. ‘You’re living the high life while I make do with fucking hand-outs. I watched your back inside for years and how did you reward me? As soon as you were out you forgot I even existed.’

  ‘I–I never forgot,’ Lucas croaked.

  ‘Nah, you just never gave a shit. Well, now you know, neither do I.’

  Lucas reached out his hands in a plea for help.

  Davey shook his head. ‘It’s not the bullets that kill you, Luke,’ he said calmly, ‘it’s the shock.’

  Lucas’s eyes grew wider as his breath became more laboured. From there, it only took seconds before a final hiss rattled from his throat and the flow of blood began to ebb.

  Davey turned to Sam. A playful smile danced across his lips, but failed to find purchase.

  ‘It was fun being together again. I really missed you, man.’

  ‘Then why, Davey?’ Sam groaned as he pushed himself into a sitting position and cradled his broken wrist. ‘Why this?’

  Davey’s eyes turned dark. ‘I was angry at you, Sam. I was just the clown, the sidekick, someone to be overlooked. I was the one nobody took seriously – but when we were inside, Lucas listened. He saw what I had to offer and helped make me realize all that I was capable of. Without me, he was weak. But together we were unstoppable.’

  ‘I always knew—’

  ‘Knew what, Sam?’ Davey snapped. ‘Knew that I was destined for nothing? What did you see when you met me under the bridge? A bum who had wasted his life? Someone you felt sorry for? You never once thought of me back then, did you? Even when I called from prison, you could never be reached. I was told you would return my calls, but you never did. You were more interested in living your dream. But what about mine, Sam?’ Davey wiped at his eyes. ‘I only wanted you to need me again, like old times, but Luke fucked that up, too. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.’

  Sam’s voice caught in his throat, but another voice spoke the words.

  ‘How was it supposed to be?’ Zack walked out of the tunnel, holding hands with a woman of indescribable beauty, despite the cuts and bruises that marked her chocolate-brown skin.

  Sam’s heart ached when nobody else appeared and the stark realization sunk in.

  ‘I’m sorry, Sam,’ Zack said. ‘Hannah wasn’t there. I prayed we would find her.’

  ‘What about MaryAnn?’ asked Jasmine.

  ‘She’s safe,’ Sam answered. ‘Up above.’

  ‘Why don’t you join her?’ Davey said. ‘You’ve all been in the dark far too long.’

  ‘Just like that?’ said Sam. ‘You’re going to let us walk away?’

  Davey shrugged. ‘Luke was the one into blood sports. I only wanted some money of my own and a chance to relive old times. I never expected a new life. Besides, I lived better inside jail than I ever did out here.’

  ‘You bastard!’

  Davey raised his arms too slowly as Jasmine launched herself at him, the gun flying free from his grasp.

  ‘Get her off!’ Davey cried in panic as Jasmine went for his face.

  ‘Jasmine!’ Zack snatched up the loose gun. ‘I can end it.’

  Jasmine released her grip on Davey as Zack moved forward, aiming the gun.

  A gunshot, louder than all the others, made everyone freeze.

  ‘Police, goddamnit!’ Detective Hogan entered the cavern from the same short tunnel Sam and Lucas had used. ‘Nobody move. You need him alive.’

  ‘Why?’ Sam’s voice was cold as he stared across at the boyhood friend he had never really known.

  ‘Think about it,’ Hogan snapped. ‘He has the evidence to clear you. He can show you were coerced to save your daughter.’

  Davey and Sam locked eyes, blood dripping from a serious gash along Davey’s cheek. In the briefest of instants they shared a hundred memories and a thousand laughs from their youth. But when Davey tried to move, Zack cocked the hammer.

  ‘Don’t do it!’ Hogan warned. ‘If you kill him, it’s murder. That’s a lot of years behind bars. Your wife doesn’t deserve to be without you again. You need to bury your daughter. You need to heal.’

  Zack reached his free hand behind his back to be met by Jasmine’s. They squeezed tenderly.

  ‘Lower the gun, Zack,’ Sam said softly, his own need for violence now quenched. ‘It’s over.’

  Sam turned to look behind him and say, ‘He’s all yours, Detective,’ when his words were lost in the sharp report of a tiny, stainless-steel handgun.

  Zack dropped the smoking gun on the ground. ‘I’m already going to jail for Ironman,’ he said with a shrug. ‘Nothing I can do about that.’

  He locked eyes with Sam and smiled weakly. ‘For Hannah and Kalli, that prick really deserved to die.’

  122

  Sam found his daughter wearing an oversized cowboy hat and devouring a hamburger within the Victorian-era walls of Wilf’s Restaurant connected to the station.

  When she saw her father, MaryAnn dropped her hamburger and rushed into his awaiting embrace. Sam dropped to his knees, his broken wrist held tight by his side as his daughter kissed his filthy, unshaven face over and over. Sam closed his eyes and breathed her in, never wanting to let her go.

  ‘Jasmine!’ MaryAnn squealed in delight as the rescued woman appeared over her father’s shoulder.

  Jasmine rushed forward and fell to her knees, too. She patted the girl’s face through a veil of tears as MaryAnn wrapped one of her arms around her neck and squeezed tight.

  ‘Jasmine protected me,’ MaryAnn told her father breathlessly. ‘She was a tiger.’

  ‘I got my strength from you,’ said Jasmine. ‘You were so very brave. You remind me of my own daughter.’

  More tears sprang to Jasmine’s eyes as she moved away from MaryAnn and returned to her husband.

  ‘Where’s Mom, Dad? I thought I heard her crying, but . . .’ MaryAnn paused at the pain that crossed her father’s face. ‘She died, too, didn’t she?’

  Sam nodded, his face wet with tears.

  ‘Why did this happen?’ MaryAnn asked.

  ‘No reason.’ Sam thought of the two men rotting in the tunnels beneath their feet. ‘No good reason at all.’

  THE END

  Acknowledgements:

  My agent, Amy Moore-Benson, for believing; my editor, Selina Walker, for saying ‘Yes’; Danielle Weekes for her infectious enthusiasm; Emma Musgrave for her skill and support; and Sally Riley for telling the rest of the world to climb aboard. I would also like to thank the wonderful people at Transworld who embraced the book from the beginning and expressed their continued excitement about it. And to you, the reader, who has taken a chance on a new author. You’ll never know how much that means to me.

  a cognizant original v5 release november 02 2010

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