Blood & Dust (4 page)

Choking, he flailed upward. Soil cascaded from him, leaving his skin - his entire body - feeling
as if he'd been sand-blasted. Blazing heat and brightness scorched his naked body as he dragged
himself like a newborn calf into the nearest shade: the rusted shell of the Ford truck. All around,
the grass was burnt and littered with wreckage. The service station was a tumbled ruin, blackened
timbers thrusting toward the sky amid sheets of buckled iron and tangles of wire. A listless line of
yellow plastic tape hanging from short iron pegs bordered the devastation.

Across the singed fence, he saw his home, sagging wearily on its posts. Meg's little Suzuki soft
top was parked out the front near his father's work ute. His Commodore and his mother's sedan were
vague shapes hidden by the slats that walled in the ground floor.

He clambered over the fence. Fire had sneaked through the palings and scored the lawn; a few
scorched patches showed where embers had landed but failed to spread. He crawled more than walked,
sheltering in the shade of the sparse, threadbare fruit trees and two towering gums, their bark
hanging shredded and curled as though from torture. Sheets hung limp on the Hill's Hoist. He barely
noticed the ash spotting them before he yanked one down and wrapped it around himself, grateful for
any defence against the sunshine that baked his skin.

The dogs didn't come out to greet him; there was no sign of either of them.

He grabbed the rail of the rear stairs like an old man clutching a walking frame and hauled
himself up, one painful, lead-heavy step at a time, until he reached the shade of the verandah. He
went to open the back door but his legs gave out and he lurched into it; the door fell open under
his weight and he sprawled on the lino near the dining table.

Voices came from the living room; footsteps; gasps. Hands rolled him over, and tears soaked his
mother's cheeks as she looked down on him in shock and wonder.

'My God, Kevin, they said… The police said they looked
everywhere
. Where have you
been?' She hugged him, her body painfully hot, and he clung to her, shivering.

Meg stood nearby, hands to her face, eyes wide. She was in jeans, T-shirt and cardigan, her hazel
curls bouncing loose around her face.

'Let's get him into the bedroom.' His mother's voice faded in and out like a radio off-station.

They helped him to his room at the far end of the house. Meg drew the curtains, blocking out the
cracked and shattered windows, the view of the devastated service station.

'Meg, go call for an ambulance,' his mother said.

'That's two hours. Maybe we should drive him ourselves?'

'Just go call triple-0.'

Meg left and his mother told him, lullaby-style, to lie still; to tell her if
this
hurt;
or this, or this. His mother's hands probed and lifted. 'I think you're all right, under all that
dirt and muck.' She sounded surprised through the sniffles. 'Let's get you cleaned up.'

'Mum?' he mumbled, reaching tiredly. 'Megs?'

'Relax, Kevin, you're safe now. Safe. I'll be back in a jiffy.'

She brought a bowl and some towels. When she'd washed him down and pulled the blanket up, she sat
by his side, holding his hand and feeding him sips of water. It didn't bring much relief. Maybe it
was the smoke or maybe the dirt he'd swallowed, but the thirst just wouldn't go away. His throat was
so raw and tight; the water hurt like pebbles going down.

'You're cold, Kevin,' his mother said. 'You want more blankets?'

'Hot.' He took another sip of water, choked it down.

'You're okay,' she told him, sniffling, her eyes red and puffy. 'Dehydration, sunburn. Shock.'

'Where's Dad?'

His mother dabbed at her eyes with a bunched tissue. 'He's gone, son.'

'Gone?'

'Found him in the servo, after they'd put the fire out. So they think. Took him to Charleville,
to be sure.'

She sniffed and pulled herself straight. 'Thought you were in there, too. The policeman, he said
you were both… He said he'd seen you both, before he dragged his partner out, before it burnt
down. Thank God he was wrong.'

'I don't understand.'

'They even killed Bill and Ben.'

Kevin closed his eyes against the memories, the scarlet-tinged playback of his world falling
apart: his father and the biker talking, gunshots, the sound of Molotovs exploding, the rush of heat
and smoke. Boots, pointing to the ceiling, over by the door; scuffed and stained, a split in the
side - his father's most comfortable pair, 'still a few miles left in them'. That cheeky grin.

'A gang, the police said. The Night Riders.' His mother pronounced their name as though it was a
foreign language; something curious. 'They wanted to get their leader back. Bad luck, the policeman
said. Just bad luck.'

'The leader, he was-' More memories: dark skin and white eyes and even whiter teeth. Kevin
kneaded his temples as though he could massage the thoughts into some kind of sense.

Meg came back and sat by his side, her brow creased, those honey-brown eyebrows almost meeting.
'I rang Smithy. He's on his way.'

Kevin heaved himself into a sitting position. 'Did he say anything about that city cop, Hunter?'
The more he thought about Hunter and his partner Dave, the more he thought that maybe calling the
cops wasn't the best idea.

'No, Kev, just that he'd be straight out,' Meg said.

'What about Hunter? He tell you about that bikie? About what happened to Dad and me?'

'Just what I told you already,' his mother said, plucking at the fallen sheet. 'But I don't think
Hunter was his name.'

'And I'm okay?' He examined his stomach, his chest, his throat. 'I haven't been, like, shot or
cut or nothing?'

'No, nothing.' Her brows wrinkled with concern as she touched his forehead, her hand like a
branding iron against his skin. 'A touch of fever, maybe.' She dabbed him with a wet cloth. He was
so thirsty! He could suck that towel dry. He reached for it, but his mother had moved away.

'Take it easy.' Meg patted his arm. 'It's okay.'

He caught her hand and pulled her in, her scent wrapping around him, but she extricated herself
from his desperate pawing and stood up.

'Rest now, Kev. When you're better, you can tell me what happened with your clothes, eh?'

A kiss on his forehead and she was gone, they were both gone, leaving him alone in the dark, a
vague hunger gnawing at his insides, fevered exhaustion smothering him.

As the weariness claimed him, the loneliness swept in; swept him up and threw him, litter in a
willy-willy, and dropped him on a different bed, in another house, in another time.

A white woman straddles him in a room smelling of violets and the heavy, sweet
aroma of sugar cane. It's him, but it's not him; his skin is black, and yet it
is
him. Sweat
beads on her lip and dangling breasts as she gasps above him. Then her teeth grow, mesmerising in
the candlelight, four fangs gleaming. Nails, clear and sharp, slice into his chest where, in another
age, he might have worn the charcoal-filled scars of manhood. His mind screams at the wrongness as
she bends over him, breasts pointed and firm, stomach flat, hips wide. She pins him, then latches
onto his throat. He flows into her. He is in her and she is in him and it is rapture, rapture that
tears his soul as a cockatoo's scream slices across their panting. She bleeds for him, binding him
to her - for now but not forever.

A flash of white by the bed. A girl - Willa - in bleached blouse and skirt, a ghostly presence in
the fluttering candlelight.

'Welcome, Chris,' she says, and places a hand on the woman's sweaty shoulder where her hair
sticks like weed on rocks. 'Welcome to the family.'

He screams in fury. In shame. In hate. Then he is free. Free to run. Free, too late.

Kevin jerked awake, fighting the bedclothes, his chest heaving. What the hell was
that about? He grabbed the bedhead for support as he levered himself up. Still a bit weak around the
knees. And very, very thirsty. Running a fever, maybe, like his mum said. Is this what having
concussion meant - weird dreams and a cold sweat? It was so quiet: midnight quiet. He cracked the
curtain - just gone sundown. He shook his head - hadn't been out that long, then - and dug jocks and
jeans and a shirt out of the drawers. A crow's call rasped like a rusty hacksaw as he left the room.
The hallway light was on, making him squint against the brightness. The house was still, like a
museum. It felt as if they were leaving, as if everything was just waiting for the removalists to
come. It was not a happy move. Tea. He could smell tea. Hear the chinking of china; murmured
conversation interspersed with sobs. Voices: his mother and Meg.

He walked faster, bare feet making barely a sound on the threadbare runner, its burgundy faded to
brown. To his left, the familiar sofa and armchairs and television, the front door; straight ahead,
the breakfast bar with the kitchen beyond; and to his right, the dining room, just big enough for a
cabinet and table. The women were at the table, his mother facing him at the kitchen end, Meg on the
far side from him near the back door. His father's .243 leaned in the corner behind his mother with
a box of bullets nearby on the bench. Strange, to see the rifle there instead of in the gun safe.
Strange to see it there without his father holding it.

'Mum?'

She jumped, knocked her tea over. Swore, dabbed at the mess, then ignored it to hug him. She
smelled of English Breakfast and sweat; she wore sorrow like an overcoat. The lines in her face had
never seemed so deep. Fresh tears brimmed and she gestured for him to sit at the table. It was as
old as he was, big enough to comfortably seat six though there'd only ever been the three. Knife
cuts, coffee stains and teapot burns marred the timber. Looking at it now, running his fingers over
that abused surface, it was as if he'd never seen it before.

Meg fetched a cloth and mopped up the spilt tea where it puddled around the little glass vase in
the centre of the table; a single rose curling to brown drooped over its lip.

'You should be lying down, Kev,' his mother said. 'How do you feel?'

'Just hungry.'

'That's a good sign. I had snags out for dinner.'

'Don't, Mum, it's okay.'

'Don't be silly. We have to eat.'

She went into the kitchen and dug out utensils.

Meg pulled up a chair next to Kevin and said, voice low and anxious, 'Smithy only let us come
back to collect some stuff. We weren't meant to stay.'

God, she was beautiful. That tanned skin, smooth there on her chest and the side of her throat
where her pulse bobbed. His throat constricted, his stomach tightened with love or lust or both. He
needed her, needed to bury himself in her smell and her heat and -

A sharp clank made him jump. He swallowed, aware of the tension in his muscles, the shame of his
distracted daydream; here she was, all care and concern, while he could think only of jumping her
bones. And with his mother standing right there, too. With his mother standing right there, and his
father not.

Meg lifted her hand to reveal a set of keys. 'Smithy gave us these. Found them out the back of
the servo. Yours, see - the key ring I gave you. It's not scratched up too bad.'

He mumbled an embarrassed 'thanks', his fingers lingering on hers as he took the keys, the Holden
emblem unmarked. He shoved them in his pocket. Keys to a servo that didn't exist, but he'd take them
off the ring another time. When he could do it without crying or smashing something.

'We're going to have your mum stay with us for a few nights, at least until the police are
finished down at the servo,' she said. 'You can stay, too. Mum and Dad won't mind.'

A car drove past, slow, its headlights glaring against the front windows.

'Is that the ambulance?' his mother asked as the sausages sizzled in the pan. The room filled
with the smell of meat frying. 'Or Smithy?'

'I'll check,' Meg said. 'If it's Smithy, let's hope he's got good news.'

Reece, barefoot and shirtless, cradled a stubby of beer and forty years of regret.
He took in the massive wall of storm clouds building in the west; the humidity had thickened during
the day to be almost choking. His body ached all over, as if he'd been dragged here from the
roadhouse behind Smith's Land Cruiser rather than in the passenger seat.

He felt bad for Diana Matheson. She was an impressive woman. If his own mother had been that
strong, that stoic, well, maybe he wouldn't have joined the cops. If his mother had stood up to the
drunken thug of a husband of hers, maybe Reece would've gone on to a respectable public service job,
or even, who knew, if he'd stuck with the schooling, to university. Now that would've been funny. It
might've been him brandishing a sign on the street march instead of taking names and busting heads.
Maybe he wouldn't have had to drive over to the morgue and ID his sister, just another overdosed
prostitute dredged up from a Valley gutter. Or maybe it wouldn't have made any difference at all.

The story about the Night Riders being drug traffickers wasn't a line. Taipan's bunch would sell
anything, do anything, if it meant staying a step ahead of the Hunters. Whereas drugs were the one
thing that the Von Schiller organisation would not touch. Despite the lure of big turnover,
Maximilian would have nothing to do with what he described as pollution in society's bloodstream.
His people had carte blanche to deal with drug dealers any way they felt fit, as long as it didn't
come back on the firm. Reece had done his share, and it still hadn't made up for the loss of his
sister. Hell, he'd never even found out who'd sold her the junk. That'd been the spring of '71 and
he'd been on Springbok duty. His path had crossed with Mira's and, well, here he was. Smoking and
shooing flies on the back veranda of a decrepit pub in a dying town, waiting for the axe to fall.
Him and everyone else here, by the look of the place.