Cooper wheel-slid the motorcycle in the thick mud, avoiding a head on collision with Rosedale, who sped directly towards him in the Toyota, sliding to a halt, blocking his way.
Rosedale opened the car door. Got out. Stood on the running board. ‘I’ve been looking for you Thomas.’
‘Well now you’ve found me, you can go right ahead and turn round.’
With the rain still hammering down, sounding like steel percussion on the bonnet of the SUV, Rosedale had to raise his voice over the noise. ‘Thomas, listen, I have to talk to you.’
‘Thing is, Rosedale, I’ve got nothing to say to you.’
‘Thomas, come on. You’re acting crazy.’
‘I don’t think I am. I know exactly what I’m doing.’
‘You don’t think dosing yourself up with all kinds of medication and carrying dead bodies around, pulling your gun on your team, is a little crazy? Not to mention this really wasn’t the brief Granger gave us.’
‘Rosedale, I know you. We go back a long way, and in that time, you must have pulled your gun on me at least a dozen times. And how come I didn’t say that was crazy?’
A hint of amusement came into Rosedale’s tone. ‘It wasn’t. I actually wanted to kill you.’
‘Did you believe what you said back there about Ellie coming back to me?’
‘No, Thomas, I didn’t, and deep down I don’t think you believe it either. Guilt has a way of doing strange things to folk.’
‘So why say it?’
‘To make you shut up, and stop me having to put a bullet in you.’
Needing to use his whole arm to wipe away the rain from his face, Cooper said,
‘Leave me alone Rosedale. Just go!’
‘I wish I could but I made a promise, and I take my promises real seriously. Don’t think for a moment it’s got anything to do with me liking you.’
‘Thought never crossed my mind…Where’s Maddie, anyway? Is she in the back?’
‘No, she’s safe though, but she doesn’t want to see you. She’s going home, Thomas. I’m going to put her on a plane. She doesn’t deserve what you did to her. She has her own stuff going on too, but you wouldn’t know about that because you’re too busy chasing your ass to care.’
‘Does she know I didn’t mean it? That I didn’t mean a word. Does she know I love her? Always have. But I just don’t know how to do it her way. How to be what I should be. To love the way other people do.’
‘No, she doesn’t, and I think it should stay like that. It hurts her now, but it’ll be best for her in the long run. She’ll finally be free.’
‘I didn’t just say it because you told me to, I wasn’t going to do that. Well, not the way I did it. I was angry. Took it out on her. And I’m sorry, will you tell her that for me, Rosedale?’
‘I will.’
‘But as for you, Rosedale, you need to stay the hell out of my way.’
Rosedale climbed down from the Toyota to walk towards Cooper. ‘I have something to tell you.’
And suddenly Cooper felt like a cornered animal. A deep agitation came into his manner. ‘Don’t come any closer, Rosedale, don’t try anything stupid.’
‘It’s about Jackson.’
Cooper began to back away. Dragging the bike with him as Rosedale came closer. He pointed angrily. Emotion consuming him. ‘Don’t you mess with me, Rosedale! Don’t you mess with my head. Not about Jackson. Not about him. You… you leave him alone.’
‘I’m not, I wouldn’t do that to you. There was a call. That fool, Levi, said Beau had been trying to contact you urgently. So I called Beau, and we spoke about Jackson.’
Cooper’s gaze darted across Rosedale’s face, seeing if there was any trace of lies. Of game playing. But all he could see was sincerity. Candid sincerity.
‘You’re being serious aren’t you?’
‘Yeah.’
Cooper almost couldn’t stand to ask. His single word was breathless. ‘Well?’
‘Jackson’s in hospital. He… there’s no easy way to say it…’
‘He took an overdose, didn’t he?’
‘Yes, he did.’
Despite anticipating the answer, it still stunned Cooper.
‘And you know with Jackson, it’s not even a cry for help. It’s a cry to end it all.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘He must’ve been in a dark place. And with him it comes from nowhere. We can be having a good time, doing a cook up, you know; ribs, steak, corn, like they do in Jerry’s in Scottsdale, and everything seems to be fine. The next thing you know this dark cloud just descends. Weighs him down like nothing I’ve ever seen before. And that’s it. I can’t reach him. He’s gone until that cloud lifts.’
‘Sounds a bit like you, Thomas. There’s a lot of pain about. A lot of people hurting, and there’s a lot of healing still to do. A legacy from what happened.’
Bracing himself, Cooper asked, ‘How bad is he?’
‘Still unconscious. You need to go back home. I think we all need to go back. Kindoki force or not, this place is making us all crazy. Me, you and even Maddie. All of us are saying things we wouldn’t normally say. This place has some kind of special… power.’
The stress Cooper felt was intense. ‘No, no way. I can’t leave here, not now, not with all this stuff going on. I’m not going to abandon it.’
Rosedale’s shoulders slumped. His concern genuine. ‘Listen to me, Thomas, I know you feel like you didn’t save Ellie, that you could’ve done more, and if you had, she’d still be here. But that don’t mean you have to make up for it by going around saving everyone else, even the ones who don’t want to be saved. Don’t make this a crusade, boy. You against the world. That’s not how it works. Let it go.’
Cooper shook his head violently. His eyes wide open and deeply painful from the effects of the Iboga root. ‘No… No… You see that, you see what you did, what you’ve just said. Well that’s what they told me to do about Ellie. Let her go, and I did. Well, I tried to, but I’m not letting this go. I can’t.’
‘Thomas, you’re worrying me. I gotta get you home. I heard what happened to you before. Maddie’s right. You need to get help.’
‘Why, because I want to find out the truth? The old woman, Zola, I’m not going to let her die for nothing… because of me.’
‘But it was, I should’ve been watching her but I got a chance… A chance to see Ellie. She helped me see Ellie, Rosedale.’
Rosedale rubbed his chin as he stood in his soaking clothes. Shivered. Looked directly up to the sky and let the rain force him to squeeze his eyes shut. He spoke quietly.
‘I get it now… Jesus, Thomas, is it that bad? Does it hurt so much you need to mess up your brain more than you do already with hallucinogenic crap? I’ve seen what that kind of thing can do to men’s minds, especially if they’re already out on that ledge. And you are, Thomas, you are… Look, you can’t stay here, you need to go and see Jackson.’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Okay, look. How about this? I’ll stay here, Thomas. If it gets you to go back home, then alrighty. I don’t know about Maddie, because I think she needs to go back, but I’ll carry on. Find out what needs to be found out, and I’ll keep you informed. When it’s all settled with Jackson, and you’ve had a few days’ break, then maybe you can come back. I’ll keep Granger sweet, give him some bull. It works every time. The border of Rwanda isn’t too far from here so you can fly almost directly from Kigali to DC. It’ll take you less than twenty-four hours. What do you say, Thomas?’
The emotion cut at the back of Cooper’s throat. He stared at the ground, not trusting himself not to cry. But eventually he spoke, looking directly at Rosedale. ‘I say thank you, and yes… Yes.’
Rosedale chuckled. ‘Oh don’t thank me, boy, thank whatever strange and weird forces are at play here.’