Garry Disher - Cross Kill

Wyatt stopped, looking for leverages. He couldn’t find any. The men were keeping well back from him and the woman posed problems. If she’d had long hair or loose clothing there would be something he could hold, jerk or twist, but she had a short fine down over her scalp and skintight jeans and top. There was only her body, hard, quick-looking, like a coiled black spring, and the tiny pistol she let him see in her gloved palm, a chrome automatic gleaming against black leather. She jerked her head at the alley, meaning in there.

Wyatt walked a few metres into the alley and stopped. He turned around. The woman was following him, and she stopped when he did. The others were stationed on the footpath behind her. She didn’t speak, just stared flatly at him. The gun was in view now. She gestured with it. He turned and began to walk again. After a few seconds he heard soft footfalls as she paced him. If this was a professional hit it would be done in silence-no arguments, no explanations.

Wyatt stopped. The alley was damp and narrow, smelling of urine and garbage scattered by rangy cats. Faint grey light leaked in from the street behind him. In front of him was a wall.

They were not counting on what he did then. He spun around. He began to shout. At the same time he moved, zigzagging down the alley toward them, bouncing from wall to wall. The woman swung her gun, tracking him, but she lacked the time she needed to aim and decide. One second. Wyatt reached her and raked the keys across her face. Two seconds. Her eyes filled with blood. She screamed and, her first instinct, put both hands to her face. Wyatt wheeled, swung his fist, drove the air from her body.

Three seconds. The men reached for their pistols. They hadn’t expected this. They had thought it would be easy, four against one. Now they didn’t know if they should shoot, or keep Wyatt trapped, or rescue the woman. ‘Bastard,’ one of them said. They started toward him.

Wyatt continued to run, swift, low, shouting unnervingly. He ran right into the face of their guns. They aimed, but he was crouched over, weaving rapidly. They jerked, trying to aim, but the woman was in their line of fire, and they didn’t want ricochets, the metal fragments flying like hornets in that narrow space.

Five seconds. Wyatt’s shoulder drove into the weightlifter, who doubled over, his mouth opening and closing. He dropped his gun, then fell. Wyatt scooped up the gun, a 9mm, and swung it around on the other two. They backed onto the footpath, shocked at the speed and fury of the turnaround, then fled, scuttling in panic down the street. Seven seconds.

A small boy and an elderly woman had seen everything. The boy began to cry, the old woman was gulping, but they didn’t move. Wyatt walked past them and across the street. They looked wonderingly after him, then back at the woman in the alley.

Wyatt walked south toward the city, then down onto Elizabeth Street. He would be able to catch a tram to the hotel from there. They wouldn’t be expecting him to do that. They would be expecting him to go deeper to ground.

Shortly after Wyatt had left via the back fence, cops were pounding on the front door. At first Eileen thought the two factors were connected, but it was her son they wanted. She knew it would be a waste of time asking to see a warrant. The local jacks had it in for the Rossiters. She herself had served six months in Fairlie for receiving. Ross had done time for armed robbery all over Australia-Boggo Road, Long Bay, Wacol. Leanne had been lumbered with a community order when she was just seventeen. Last year Niall had served six months in Pentridge for burglary and assault.

And now they were threatening to chuck the book at the poor little bugger. She leaned forward across the table. ‘An offensive weapon? You must be joking. Not Niall.’

They were in the kitchen, and it seemed to be full of cops. One stood behind her chair, another behind Ross’s, a third behind Niall’s. Thank God Leanne and the kids weren’t here to see this.

‘We’ve had complaints.’

It was the local sergeant, Napper, a spongy, beer-fed man with a ginger moustache who uttered soft grunts from time to time. Eileen had seen him off-duty wearing short-sleeved shirts with polyester trousers that ended well short of his ankles and divided his balls and the cheeks of his backside.

He drove an unroadworthy Holden ute. He also had a girlfriend in a flat a couple of streets away. Sometimes you’d see the ute there, sometimes a cop car. Eileen tried her drowsy, wet-lipped smile on him, for the hell of it. ‘What kind of complaints?’

‘The dog, I bet,’ Niall said.

Napper smoothed his moustache. ‘That dog of yours is going to earn you a lawsuit one of these days, Niall old son. It’ll take someone’s hand off and you’ll be up for a million bucks in damages.’

‘He’s got instincts. You can’t do anything about that.’

‘You could try tying him up. You could try cutting his throat.’

Niall looked away, muttered, screwed up his face at the table. Don’t rile them, son, Eileen thought.

Napper cupped his ear. ‘What’s that? Did I hear a threat? A man of violence, are you, Niall old son? Bit of a hard case?’

Eileen looked across at her husband. The contempt was clear on Ross’s face. He folded his arms across his chest. ‘Knock it off, Napper. Just get on with it.’

‘Fair enough. Where’s the crossbow?’

‘What crossbow?’

Napper said, ‘I ask the questions. What is it, Niall? Do you hate the way your neighbour looks, maybe? You think he’s got no right to park his truck in the street?’

Niall made the mistake of sniggering. ‘Doesn’t park it there anymore.’

The sergeant straightened, stood back and nodded at the uniformed men. They left the room. Eileen knew they’d find the crossbow without any trouble. She hoped it would be all they found.

Napper seemed to be settling in for the duration. He opened a Herald-Sun that had been left on the fridge. ‘You wouldn’t have been circling the funeral notices, would you, Niall? Wouldn’t be thinking of visiting the homes of the bereaved while they were gathered at the graveside, by any chance? A little drop-kick like you, that would be about your style.’ He grinned, his eyes creasing in the folds of his heavy cheeks. He turned the pages. ‘Looks like another innocent citizen has been bashed and robbed in his own house. A lot of it about these days. You’d have to be a hard man to go in against someone just off to bed in his pyjamas, what do you reckon, Niall old son, old pal?’

‘Don’t know what you mean.’

‘Bit of a hotshot, eh, Niall? Bit of a bully? Like hurting people when they’re down?’

‘Look,’ Niall said, ‘there are blokes on your most-wanted list walking around and you’re farting around with me.’

He meant Wyatt. Eileen looked across at her husband and saw a warning, a coldness in him. Ross wasn’t a dog, he’d never shop anyone to the cops, and it was a rule he expected the family to live by.

But Napper wasn’t listening to Niall. ‘You don’t like it when somebody else gets the upper hand, do you, pal? You turn to water, you lie down and roll on your back and give them everything they want, don’t you, matey?’

Eileen watched her son flush. ‘Take it easy, son,’ she warned.

Niall ignored her. ‘You’ll fucking get yours, Napper. I want a lawyer.’

‘A lawyer?’ Napper said, open-faced, amused, getting ready to play with that idea. Eileen prepared herself to intervene again, but Niall was saved from his tongue when the uniforms came back into the room. One of the young constables was carrying the crossbow. Eileen looked at Rossiter, frowned, a way of telling him to say something.