Jay negotiated the backstreets around Coomera and, fifteen minutes later, pulled off the main road to a place he knew well. He was back in the Gold Coast hinterland, a place in which he’d spent many years training and instructing his favoured skill: interrogation. The particular spot he’d pulled into was deserted, as expected. The firing range wasn’t used that much. When he left the military, he hadn’t handed back the security key that unlocked all of the dozens of training area gates in the district. It had remained fastened to his key ring. Handy now.
He positioned the Chevy close to an old range shed, killed the motor and searched his glove box for a packet of cigarettes. Bingo. He used the Chevy’s lighter and took a few drags to fill his lungs. In the moonlight, the smoke played across the windscreen and quickly filled the interior as Jay exhaled. No need to look in the rear-view mirror. The coughing behind the gags alerted him to his passengers’ disgust. He left the smoke to linger in the interior as he exited.
The range was a couple of hundred metres long and looked like a small airstrip under the moonlight. Except for the couple of firing mounds at the one hundred-and two hundred-metre marks. A few brass shell casings, missed in the habitual clean-up after a firing practice, glistened in the moonlight. The area was eerily silent and the trees at either side of the range swayed under a light breeze, their branches extended like fingers inviting one into their dark depths. Soldiers were always attracted to them, towards the dark. For the dark is a soldier’s friend. Jay remembered those days fondly. As a young soldier, he had embraced nature’s dark side. As an interrogator, he had embraced humanity’s dark side. Both kept him in good stead. Made him more aware of the capabilities of nature and man. He’d witnessed firsthand the dark side of both.
After extinguishing the cigarette, Jay called Bill, who picked up on the second ring.
‘That you, Jay?’
‘It is. How’d you go?’
‘No Rachael Sharman born twenty-sixth of February eighty-three in Emerald.’
‘No real surprise there. So who is she?’
‘Like she’s made out all along, Mark Simpson’s cousin, Toni Griffin. Confirmed by her commanding officer.’
‘Let me guess. Captain Toni Griffin was supposed to deploy to the Middle East and didn’t make the plane.’
‘Not exactly. She went to the Middle East, but was flown back for a family emergency two weeks ago. Hasn’t been heard of since. Wait ... how did you know she was in the Middle East?’
‘Lucky guess. What was the emergency she came back for?’
‘Her father was killed in a hit-and-run.’
The pieces were starting to fit together. ‘Anything else?’
‘Yeah. Call your dad. He’s been trying to call you on your home phone and has asked me to send someone around to check on you.’
‘So tell him you checked and all’s good. Took some painkillers and went to sleep. Or something like that.’
‘Why don’t you want to call him?’
Jay thought about the response. He didn’t really know why. He still didn’t have an accurate read on Toni. He didn’t know if the CIA were involved. Better to delay and wait for the truth. Shouldn’t be long. ‘As soon as I call, he’ll send in the troops. I’m fine. Just sorting out a few details then I’ll let him know.’ He changed the subject. ‘Did you get hold of the New South Wales Police Commissioner?’
‘I did. What kind of reaction were you looking for?’
‘Surprise that Peterson was with me, and relieved he was dead.’
‘More like methodical. I really couldn’t get a read, Jay. What’s going on?’
Jay told Bill about the information relayed by Toni and Peterson in the ambulance. He concluded by asking if Bill could follow up on the patents and let him know who owned them.
Bill whistled. ‘No problem. So you think the New South Wales Police Commissioner owns one of the patents?’
‘I doubt it. But I really don’t know anymore.’
‘How about the other two?’
‘I’m thinking the Chief of Army’s brother, head of ASAP, may have his name on one.’
‘Makes sense. And?’
‘And I suspect I just ran into another possible owner. An old friend of mine.’
‘Who’s that?’
‘Remember the military police Major you helped me escape custody from?’
‘Yeah, he had a funny name.’
‘Major Sergeant.’
‘That’s it. You telling me he was at the warehouse? What happened?’
‘I’ll fill you in later. Can you confirm the patents and let me know as soon as you do?’
‘Will do.’
Bill offered to take the hour drive down the coast to meet up with him and lend a hand, which Jay declined, for the time being.
He hung up and spent a few minutes going over in his mind how to approach the questioning of Sergeant and Toni. Normally Jay would never consider physical threats. Just didn’t fit with his previous interrogator training and moral standings. He’d never considered it necessary, until now. He justified the plan through necessity and the fact he was no longer a military interrogator. No Geneva Conventions to abide by. Time to revisit his own darker side. Just an actor playing a part in a play; or was it stepping out of his acting part of life in the ‘real world’ and visiting his actual self? Something he’d always contemplated and never figured out. It scared him to think what he may be capable of deep down in his soul. Maybe that’s why he’d been a successful interrogator – the ability to reach down and let his soul run free.
A moment later, he found himself breaking from a trance and behind the wheel of the Chevy as it crept towards the bottom of the range. The powerful headlights lit up a huge cliff that acted as a backdrop and convenient backstop for catching bullets. The cliff monstered over the range. With the trees on either side with the branches acting as fingers, the cliff seemed like a torso leaning forward to scoop up those choosing to fire at her belly.
Jay shuddered involuntarily at the thought as he moved the vehicle through a pack of mesmerised kangaroos caught in the Chevy’s headlights. They scattered at the last moment and bounced off majestically into the dark, enveloped by the trees. He watched the last kangaroo bounce into the abyss and pulled up around twenty metres from a set of targets.
Rope from the boot of the Chevy sliced easily under the razor-sharp blade of Sergeant’s knife. Two even lengths – perfect for binding Jay’s captives to a target each. Sergeant was easy enough to drag to a target due to his injuries; however, keeping him standing at the target was a pain in the arse and took Jay a little longer and a little more energy than expected. Toni, on the other hand, kicked up a storm, as expected. Both of the captives squinted against the bright lights and tried hard to break free of the ropes.
Jay leaned against the Chevy while they expended their energy, at the same time gearing himself like a fighter before a big bout. He let his mind clear thoughts of everything except the task at hand – he had a part to play. With a shake of the head and a deep breath, he walked forward, standing dead centre about five metres from his targets. He made a show of checking his pistol. Methodical. He wanted them to think they would be executed by a professional. The amount of panic shown confirmed the ruse was working.
‘Listen up. This range was selected by the military for a reason. Small arms fire from pistols and rifles won’t carry to the main populated areas of the hinterland. The couple of farms within hearing distance won’t bother reporting anything unusual. They hear firing from here all the time. Means that if I shoot you, nobody will bother reporting it. Also means that if I remove your gag you can scream and carry on all you like; nobody will hear you. Nobody to care.’
Jay rubbed the pistol barrel against the side of his head and said, ‘Logistically, it’s gonna be difficult dragging you both around with me. I could probably only manage one of you. One of you will have to stay here. Dead or alive is up to you. Depends what is said and if I’m satisfied you’re telling the truth.’ He spread his legs and adopted a firing position, moving the pistol from one target to the next. ‘So who wants to speak first?’
Both nodded with vigour.
Jay sighed, brought his legs together and tapped the pistol against the side of his leg. He said, ‘Only one way to settle this.’ He pointed the pistol at Toni, ready to move it back and forth between the two. ‘Eeny, meeny, miney, moe. Catch a killer by the toe. If he squeals, let him go. Eeny, meeny, miney, moe.’ His pistol pointed at Sergeant. Toni shook her head and roared behind her gag. The noise stopped as soon as Jay continued. ‘My father says that you are it.’ The pistol now pointed to Toni. The transformation amazed Jay. He could have sworn she was grinning behind her gag.
‘Interesting, Toni. You seemed to assume if the pistol landed on you that I’d be letting you talk first. What if it meant you were the first to be shot?’
Like a kangaroo caught in the Chevy’s headlights, Toni’s eyes bulged as Jay resumed the firing position, aimed and pulled the trigger.