Mitch swayed slightly and his hot blood dripped on to the parched dusty ground. The large man walked back to the bike, where he removed one of the beers from the handlebars. Sparking it open, he took a deep gulp, belched, and settled back to watch the show.

32

Leighton stood on the balcony of Vicki’s apartment and watched the ocean waves as they crashed in long explosions on the beach. It was a warm afternoon, and the beach was crammed with families. Behind him, Vicki was peering intently at a computer screen. She had been silent for over half an hour. Leighton was lost in his own thoughts, remembering taking his daughter to the beach, where she had dug for pretty shells, and he had read trashy novels. If he could have a second chance, he would have put down the book and spent more time digging with her.

‘Okay there?’ Vicki called to him.

‘Sure. How you getting on?’ Leighton moved back into the apartment, sat down on the sofa alongside Vicki, and rubbed his hands together.

‘Hmm.’ Vicki frowned at the screen. ‘There’s not much data, but what there is generally suggests the site would sit on top of a genuine web page. Only it would be fake.’

‘Like a fake ATM fascia crooks use to scam bank cards?’

‘Exactly. Anyway, it would filter the data …’

‘Filter for what?’

‘Whatever made the ideal victim - solo travellers, one-way tickets, isolated age, gender …’

‘Okay, so what can we do with this?’ Leighton tried to sound hopeful.

‘Not a lot,’ Vicki admitted. ‘But, because the memory had stored the general parameters, I was able to go to various bus companies, and activate the automatic page redirect.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘I found the only sure-fire way to find the damned bus.’

‘And what would that be?’ Leighton asked quietly.

‘To book a ticket on it,’ Vicki said, and met Leighton’s eyes.

‘No way!’ Leighton shook his head.

‘Hear me out,’ she said, widening her eyes.

‘I said no way. Look, Vicki, these are killers - real sadistic bastards. This isn’t CSI!’

‘I don’t need to physically get on the bus,’ Vicki persisted. ‘We just make a booking, and wait out of sight at a bus stop to see if actually shows up. I’ll bring a camera - even if it speeds on by, I can get the plates and a shot of the driver, too, maybe.’

‘And then what?’

‘We follow it at a distance and call your old boss, give them everything we’ve got’

‘Yeah, sure.’ Leighton shook his head dismissively.

‘You don’t agree?’ Vicki turned around fully to look at Leighton. ‘Then, explain what we should do, Leighton. Otherwise, we’re doing nothing!’

‘I just think we could explore other options.’

‘Like what, stake out every bus stop, and hope we get lucky?’

‘It would be a hell of a lot safer.’

‘Well, to be honest, it’s all academic now, anyway.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I’ve already booked the ticket.’

‘What?’

‘I got a ticket under a false name for a pick-up from outside Blythe, tomorrow afternoon. A similar bus stop to the one Laurie was picked up from. I was going to use the exact same one, but I reckon that would arouse suspicion.’

‘It’s not safe. Christ, Vicki, you don’t want to put yourself in the lion’s den.’

‘So, what are we meant to do, Leighton, huh?’ Vicki stood up in frustration. ‘How the hell do you think we can get these people?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said honestly, and pinched the bridge of his nose, ‘but this isn’t it.’

‘You ever here that line about how all it takes for evil to succeed is for good people to do nothing? Well, that’s what we’re doing - nothing!’

Leighton looked shamefully at the ground.

‘Look, as long as we waste time eating nice food, and thinking up plans, people are dying! I know you have your demons, Leighton, but this is your chance to save someone else’s son or daughter.’

‘I know,’ he said flatly.

Vicki came over to sit with him and took his hand. ‘If you do this, the next time you go to the cemetery and stand by her grave, you won’t be so hard on yourself.’

Leighton’s gaze met hers.

‘I’ve never been,’ he said in a tone of contrition.

‘What?’

‘I’ve never been to her … you know … the cemetery,’ he said quietly. ‘I don’t want to stand there and make it okay, as if what happened was fair.’

‘Do you never feel like going?’

‘Yes, I do … every birthday, every holiday, each time I pass any cemetery or any florist. She loved daisies - those crazy, oversized ones.’

‘Then, why don’t you?’

‘Because I’m not that guy - I wasn’t there for her. Hell, I was supposed to keep her safe. And now to go there - to stand on that neat grass, playing the poor grieving father, while my daughter has nothing, seems wrong. Does that make any kind of sense?’

‘You’re a good father, Leighton.’

‘You don’t know me.’ Leighton shook his head. ‘I was average, at best. Even as a kid, there were things she loved, really loved. When she was eight years old, I took her over to the Bird Sanctuary in Del Mar, and she got all attached to this little injured Merlin hawk they had there - bright red, it was. We were there the day the rescue team brought it in and she held it so gently. Man, she pestered me every single weekend to go there.’

‘Did you go back?’

‘Only once or twice, but the Merlin was gone by then. You see – that’s the busy kind of dad I was. I bought her a little toy, one she took to bed every night, but by then, I’d already let her down.’

‘Nobody’s perfect, Leighton - I wasn’t the best daughter to my parents, or the best friend to some lonely girl stuck in a dust bowl town with no family, but that doesn’t make me label myself as bad and just roll over and quit. It makes me more convinced I owe it to my friend to stop the people who took her life.’

Something in Vicki’s eyes convinced Leighton she would not be dissuaded on this one.

‘Look,’ he sighed. ‘If we do this, we need to plan this out. I can call both the Bureau and the station in the morning. I can ask dispatch to let Gretsch know what we’re planning to do. Maybe they could send some support. But, if the bus actually shows up, you do not get on it, okay?’

‘Of course.’ Vicki nodded enthusiastically.

‘It might be better if I stood with you.’

‘Then, the bus maybe wouldn’t stop - all the missing people were travelling alone. Plus, if it slows down long enough for me to make like I’m going to get on, you would still be able to call in the cavalry.’

Leighton turned his head, and looked back towards the ocean.

‘If we are going to do this, I want you to be armed. Take my revolver, okay?’

‘Sure.’

‘You’ll be armed, you promise?’

Vicki nodded. ‘I promise.’

‘Okay, we’ll do it.’

33

The night shift in the Midland Truck Repair Centre was thankfully over for Mike Bernal. As he drove along the deserted stretch of road from Peoria to Blythe, he was lost in thought. When his radio crackled, and hissed to life he switched it off, and sighed.

Things between him and Janey had been at a low point, and he felt something needed to change. It seemed they rarely spoke, except to exchange functional information, and even these simple conversations seemed to be loaded with unexpressed dissatisfaction.

On some nights, he would go sit in the truck, smoking a cigarette, and listening to the emergency channels on his scanning radio. He knew it was illegal to listen in on those crackly frequencies, but it beat the hell out of cable television. As he sat in the darkness, he often stared at the stars, and visualised whatever drama was unfolding out there on the roads or in the nearby towns.