~35~

JACK SAW KIM FIRST. On the corner of York and Market streets, where the post office was situated in the arcade below street level. Shiny black raincoat, red tartan-patterned umbrella, red tartan-patterned miniskirt, black ankle boots. There was a package under her arm — and parked next to her, a medium-sized red wheelie suitcase with the arm extended up into the air. She was watching for a cab, but the only thing moving with any consistent pace in the city right now were umbrella-wielding pedestrians, and the monorail splashing everybody with more water from above.

Jack was on Market Street, in the middle lane. He glanced at Kim and said nothing. The lights turned green. The traffic moved up slowly.

‘Can you see her?’ asked Larissa, her voice tight with frustration.

‘No.’

‘We need to park somewhere.’

Jack was sweating, trying to keep an eye on Kim, and watching the brakelights flash on and off on the car in front, and willing the river of traffic to move, to pull them out of there and away down the hill. Larissa was turned to the driver’s side, one leg bent and up on the seat, trying to see through the half-fogged windows. Ducking her head, looking around, left and right, up the street and down, desperate. She frowned at the rain and the blur and the fucking traffic. Then she put an arm on Jack’s shoulder and leaned into him, hard.

‘There she is! Quick, pull over!’

Jack looked at Larissa, hands on the steering wheel. The traffic going nowhere. She stuck the gun into his belly. ‘Pull over, Jack.’

‘I’m trying.’

The traffic surged forward about ten metres and then Jack was past the QVB, almost across from where he had seen Kim. Susko Books was just down on his left, at the end of York Street. Home. The traffic halted. Horns blared. He swung the BMW into the next lane and pulled up. More horns blared: then a taxi stopped right on his tail and flicked its hazard lights on and in the rear-view mirror Jack saw a couple of umbrellas lean in towards it. Larissa was yelling at him, desperate now, ‘Come on! Let’s go!’, and she already had her leg out of the door, into the loud wet city, her Campers being rushed by the water in the gutter. Jack searched for Kim through the window, but could not see her anymore.

Larissa was out on the street now, looking over the roof, stepping up into the car with one foot and stretching for height, holding on to the edge of the open door, rain streaming over her and into the car. Then Jack heard a thud, a fist, or maybe the gun, hitting the roof. He was looking over at the corner, trying to see, taking snapshots in his mind with each gap in the traffic, searching for Kim with her tartan umbrella, straining through the sheeting rain and willing the stream of cowering pedestrians to get out of the way.

Then he saw. She was gone.