St Kilda Blues (Charlie Berlin #3)(91)
Egan still had his head up, facing the direction of the trapdoor. He was swaying slightly to the left, disoriented and temporarily blinded. Berlin knew he only had seconds. He slammed his left fist as hard as he could into Egan’s solar plexus and then swung his left leg and hip up, tipping the man off him. He grabbed his right wrist and Egan began reaching blindly with his left hand, trying to place Berlin, find a target, find a spot to put his dagger. They tumbled over and now Berlin was on top. Egan’s eyes were wide open and Berlin could see the tiny pupils, like little pinpricks, already beginning to readjust to the dim light.
Egan’s left-hand found Berlin’s face, tearing at it. Berlin knew he couldn’t let the man get at his throat. He opened his mouth and bit down hard, tasting flesh, feeling bones give under his bite and then there was the taste of blood. Egan pulled his hand away without making a sound and swung his hips upwards suddenly. The two men were on their side now, Berlin with his hands on Egan’s left wrist, the dagger between them. Egan’s bloody left hand was grasping at the ground behind him, hunting for the crowbar. Berlin could feel the adrenaline kick in but he knew he was years older than Egan and would be the first to run out of energy.
Egan gave up his search for the crowbar and tried to get back onto Berlin, both hands on the dagger now. Berlin resisted with every ounce of energy he had and then suddenly gave way and rolled back. Egan, on top but momentarily off-balance and confused, took one hand from the dagger to steady himself. Berlin used his own two-handed grip to force the point of the double-edged blade away from himself and towards the middle of the other man’s chest. He gritted his teeth and shoved upwards as hard as he could.
Egan gave a short, sharp gasp, then exhaled slowly. Berlin’s hands were wrapped around the man’s fist, hard up against his chest. They were wet, Egan’s blood blue-black as it dripped off the clenched fists and down onto Berlin’s chest. Egan made one more gasp, then slumped as if he was going to sleep. He lay against Berlin’s cheek, mouth next to his ear, and Berlin heard one last, weak exhalation before the man went limp on top of him.
FORTY-FIVE
‘Jesus, mate, you’ve either got a pretty good tolerance for pain or that’s someone else’s blood. It didn’t all come from the gash on your cheek, that’s for sure.’
Berlin looked at the closest of the two ambulance officers, the one who had spoken, then down at the front of his shirt and trousers. There was no way in hell any of that blood was going to come out of his clothing, no matter how long he soaked it. The blood was already starting to harden and felt strange against his skin, but at least it was better than the warm, sticky wetness that had washed over him earlier.
‘It’s back that way.’ He was standing in the middle of the photographic studio area and he indicated the direction of the darkroom with a tilt of his head. ‘You’ll have to go down through a trapdoor and it’s a bit narrow so I wouldn’t bother with a stretcher. You should be able to walk the girl out after they get the chains off her. They’re using bolt cutters. And there are quite a few bodies down there as well. It’s all a bit grim.’
The ambulance officer nodded. ‘I’ve been around the traps, mate, I reckon me and Merv here can probably handle it. She’ll be apples.’
Poor bloody you, Berlin thought to himself. The day I say I can handle something like that is the day I pack it in for good.
‘Go gently with the girl. There’s a lady down there with her, listen to her.’
‘We’ll take good care of the girl, don’t you worry. She’ll be right, mate.’
No she f*cking won’t, Berlin wanted to scream. How could anyone ever be right after going through something like that?
They brought Gudrun up five minutes later. The girl was shaking under the blanket they had wrapped around her shoulders. Rebecca walked beside her, holding her hand and murmuring in her ear. The ambulance officer who had spoken to Berlin was white-faced and there were flecks of something on the corner of his mouth and on his chin, his dinner probably. He glanced at Berlin for a second and then turned his eyes away.
Berlin followed them out the front door of the studio, watching from the landing as they slowly made their way down the stairs to the waiting ambulance. It was raining again, just sprinkling really, and the flashing blue lights on a dozen or so police vans reflected off the wet black surface of the roadway. The press and TV people were being kept back across the other side of the road behind a police cordon. Berlin recognised Tony Selden amongst a group of detectives and uniformed senior officers. Selden seemed confused and when he spoke to the other officers they shook their heads.
The ambulance turned left out of the driveway with just the red lights flashing. A dozen or so reporters, press photographers and TV news cameramen broke through the police cordon and chased after it, looking for the words, for the photograph or the flickering moment of film that would sum up the horror and illustrate a headline or lead into a TV news bulletin.
Berlin stood on the landing, looking down on the flashing blue lights and then up towards the trees on the median strip, then past them to the park and the lake lost in the darkness. He tried to imagine Melinda Marquet, trapped in the blackness of her prison on a Sunday night, hearing the electric lock click open, not knowing it was a power failure and not her torturer. How long did she wait in silence and terror for the cold touch of the knife before finally realising that no one was there, no one was coming, at least not then.