Crime Always Pays (41 page)

          Rossi with a jones for this guy Niko, the cop who'd brought down Sleeps, man, if he could've bottled it they'd never make Viagra again.

          He was already a little spooked, the place dead and bleak, this bluey light from the moon making it all ghostly-like, when he heard the first faint howl.

          He revved the moped, thinking, no fuckin 
way
 …

          Except it was. The wolf. There in the mirror, coming down out of the hills like a furry fuckin Panzer. Headed straight for him.

          He kicked the scooter to life, the back wheel skidding out as it lunged forward. Got out ahead but couldn't pull away from her, the road gouged and rutted, bad drops on the bends, a lot of tight turns. His good ear tingling, Rossi feeling the hound's hot breath on the back of his neck, the bitch every second maybe half a stride off making a lethal leap.

          Rossi wouldn't have minded so much, but he could've just as easily stole the helmet when he was taking the scooter.

          Safety first, he fumed as he banked into a long bend, safety fuckin 
first
.

          It occurred to him, as he came off the bend and left the road going over a small hump, to wonder how many races Rossi, the Doc, would've won with a fuckin
wolf
 on his ass …

          He whined through the parking area scattering gravel, flashed past the jeeps, a glimpse of Doyle's Suzuki, kept going out into the scrub, the moped bucking now on the rough terrain, slowing up, Rossi bouncing around rodeo-style. 

          Another piercing howl. Rossi turtled up, skin crawling, hearing a note of savage glee as the hound readied to --

          Except the wolf hit the gas, the moped by Rossi's clock doing thirty miles an hour and it just went by him like he was standing still, heading for this ravine gouged out of the cliff, ears flat, tail streaming out behind.

          Rossi hauled hard on the brakes, brought the moped slewing around in a clanking half-circle. Thinking, what the fuck …?

          Then realised, shit, yeah, Karen …

Doyle

Niko stationed Doyle behind a low ridge where the soft sand of the beach dropped two feet to the hard-packed strand and told her to let fly if she heard as much as a bat fart, then took off his shirt, his tanned skin taking, Doyle couldn't help but notice, a nice bluey sheen from the moonlight. The beach narrow between two high headlands that were virtually sheer, a long channel leading out to the placid open sea. Niko ripped off one of the shirt-sleeves, tore it into strips, then broke his Zippo apart and squeezed the spongy bit onto one of the strips, which he rolled in a ball and tucked into the shirt's breast pocket. Then he put the Zippo back together again.

          The faint echo of a mournful howl came wafting down the gorge.

          'You see that wolf,' Niko said, 'you shoot to kill.'

          'Sure thing.'

          'Actually,' Niko said, holding out his shirt, beckoning for the gun, 'you signal the boat, I'll watch the gorge.'

          'That's okay,' Doyle said. 'I'm cool.'

          'I mean it. You ever shot to kill before?'

          'Never, no.'

          'Then give me the gun. Here.'

          Doyle had a split-second to consider the options, one being to back off and hold the gun on Niko, hope Ray arrived before the boat, this while not knowing if Ray'd heard her conversation with Niko, or even if it'd been any use to him if he had. If he hadn't, Doyle was looking at holding off Niko and a whole boatload with a gun she didn't know how many rounds it had, fighting a rearguard action up the ravine with, Christ, ten miles back to civilisation across an island she didn't know, this if she ever made it out. And nothing back at civilisation except a load more local cops curious as to why she'd unilaterally declared war on Greece.

          She swapped the gun for the shirt and the Zippo.

          'You hear the boat,' he said, 'see it pass across the top of the channel, then get --'

          Another howl, this one louder, magnified by the ravine. More vicious than melancholy, Doyle thought, now that she could hear it right. Niko dropped to one knee and snapped one off into the darkness.

          When the echoes died away, Doyle could hear a faint hum. Tinnitus, she decided, then realised it was the boat.

          'Light the rag!
 Light
 it!'

          Doyle held the Zippo to the pocket of the shirt and made a half-hearted attempt to flick the Zippo. What sounded like a small avalanche now tumbling down the gorge. Niko fired another one off, then thrust the gun at her and snatched away the shirt. Doyle let the Zippo drop onto the hard, damp sand.

          'Fuck!' he said, snatching it up, flicking desperately. A thin lance of light shot out from the boat to probe the beach. 'We're 
here
!' Niko bellowed, still flicking the Zippo.

          Anna came around the final bend like a two-hundred-pound Fury, paws sliding out from beneath her as she skidded on loose shale, the one amber eye glowing in the dim shadows. Fangs bared and gleaming as she found her feet again, surged forward.

          Niko yelped, dropping the shirt and Zippo as he turned to sprint down the beach and plunge into the water, waving wildly at the boat. 'Here!' he screeched. 'We're here!'

          Doyle went down on one knee and gripped her gun-hand by the wrist, took a quick aim, loosed off three in quick succession. On the last one she heard a metallic plink as the bullet found metal.

          The searchlight snapped off. An engine throttled up and then boomed, churning a phosphorescent wake as the prow angled up and the boat veered away in a wide semi-circle.

          'Nooooooo!' Niko screamed as he ploughed deeper, thighs pumping but going nowhere fast.

          Doyle pivoted on her knee to find Anna coming straight at her, two strides away, slavering drool, the amber eye fixed on the shirt at Doyle's feet. 

          Doyle dropped the gun and opened her arms wide, went to meet her.

Sleeps

Once Niko realised Doyle was down and busy wrestling the wolf, it was basically a sprint to see who got to her first, Niko sloshing up out of the tide and making for the .32 in the sand.

          Sleeps was never going to win that race.

          Ray had the broken arm. Karen, busted ribs and all, just wasn't a sprinter.

          Niko came sliding in like it was bases loaded, bottom of the ninth. Came up in a blur of sifting sand pointing at Ray.

          Ray pulled up hard still ten yards short and overshot a little, bounced a couple on his rigid left leg. Then he went into a slight crouch, the hands going up and out, a goalie facing a penalty-kick. The .38 in his right.

          Doyle by now lying on top of Anna, the hound in a half-nelson. Doyle murmuring something in her ear. Anna twitching, growling low in her throat and straining away from Doyle, the paws churning up sand.

          Niko pointing at Karen.

'Easy,' Ray said.

          Sleeps, outraged by the guy throwing down on woman, said, 'Point that somewhere else.' 

          Niko didn't even glance his way. 'What happens now?' he asked Ray.

          'I don't know. Any suggestions?'

          'Everyone walks away. After that it's just detail.'

          'I can work with that. Now point the gun somewhere else.'

          'What about her?' Niko said. Karen with her .32 pointed at Niko's chest, a little hunched over protecting her ribs.

          'Karen?' Ray said.

          'Being shot I don't mind so much,' she said. 'It's the nose that bothers me.'

          'Don't worry about it,' Niko said. 'You weren't much of a looker before.'

          'Hey,' Sleeps said. 'We don't do personals.'

          'Shot is one thing,' Karen went on. 'Pistol-whipped, that's different.'

          'Are you going to tell her,' Niko asked Ray, 'or am I?'

          'You don't tell Karen,' Ray said. 'You ask nice.'

          'He's not leaving here, Ray.'

          'Karen …'

          And then Ray turned his head, cocking an ear to the ravine, hearing the faint hum grow louder, start to whine and snarl, become a rasping roar. This weird screeching wail floating above it aiming for a whole new frequency. 

          Ray glanced at Sleeps.

          'Cometh the hour,' Sleeps said.

Rossi

Rossi was only twenty yards into the ravine, slowly slaloming between the boulders and outcrops, the slope starting to get steep, when he realised he'd hauled on the brakes a little too hard back at the parking area. This after one gentle tug sent the cable twanging free, pinging past his face and scalping the Daffy Duck hat off his head. Rossi ducked under and watched the brake cable as it sprung back to flop out in front of the moped. Gave a low whistle, relieved.

Then the moped fell off the edge of the world. 

          The drop was only three or four feet but it was plenty. The moped bounced once on a sloping shelf of rock and shot forward, not so much rounding the sharp twists and turns as slamming into one wall and veering across to clang against the other, hot orange sparks blazing. Rossi dragged along in its wake, his hands at times the only contact he had with the screeching machine, the moped bucking and straining like it was possessed by the soul of Steve McQueen. 

          'Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck!' he screamed as the moped glanced off the canyon wall and caromed out of the ravine onto the beach, Rossi only dimly aware of figures scattering, diving for cover, as he zoomed past. Then the moped whumped into the soft sand atop a small ridge and sailed out into the Greek night.  

          Rossi, without even thinking, let go the handlebars and twisted to clutch at the tall beaky guy, catching him under the chin with his forearm and practically decapitating him where he stood with a classic clothesline. 

          They went down together in an explosion of sand, a tangle of arms and legs.

          Rossi kicked free and crawled away, rolled onto his back, already reaching for the CZ. Then realised the beaky guy was already on his knees, choking, one hand to his throat, the other – and Rossi couldn't help but admire the guy's balls – shakily pointing a gun at Karen. Doyle sprawled across the wolf.

          'I'm guessing,' the beaky guy rasped, 'you're this fucking Sicilian I been hearing so much about.'

Madge

'Except I'd already taken the bullets out,' Melody said. 'Even checked there wasn't one up the spout.'

          'The spout?' said Madge, sitting on the toilet, smoking.

          'That's what Ray called it, I don't know if it's a technical term.' Mel wadded another handful of toilet paper, began wiping down the sink, the girl with her sleeves rolled up. Madge, even looking at it, found it hard to believe one man could bleed so much, the bathroom not entirely unlike a Damien Hirst installation. 'Basically,' Melody said, 'it's when a bullet's ready to go.'

          'So the gun was empty.'

          'Sure. But Johnny didn't know that.'

          'Did Rossi?'

          'That I don't know.'

          Madge made a sweeping gesture encompassing the blood-streaked tiles, the bath and sink. 'So where did all this come from?'

          'According to Rossi, Johnny was up on his tippy-toes bent over, Rossi had the gun jammed up his wazoo. Then, Rossi pulled the trigger, Johnny toppled over or passed out. Anyway, he came down face-first on the taps.'

          Madge grimaced, the taps being old-fashioned, with four spokes rather than rounded. Johnny, slumped in the corner with a strawberry-coloured pillowcase jammed against his face, moaned a little. 'How bad is he?' she said.

          'Not sure. He won't let me touch him.' Melody indicated the little pile of teeth on the rim of the sink, some of them with lumps of flesh still attached. 'But it looks like he came down on his upper jaw, smashed the palate. I mean, he was still hooked onto the tap when I got in here. He was lucky it didn't punch through to the brain.'

          'He looks lucky,' Madge said. 'So what happens now?'