Matt stood on the spot for what seemed an eternity. Why would Warren do this? Why isn’t it more painful? Surely a bullet ripping through your body hurts more than this.
He stared at Warren in shock.
Warren returned his stare with the same look of horror and confusion. Then, as Aimee broke free from his weakening grasp, Warren slumped to the ground clutching at his chest. The ground didn’t catch him. The weight and direction of his fall tipped him over the edge of the cliff. He fell to the rocks below with a muted thump. Matt continued to stare in disbelief at the void that remained where Warren had stood.
Aimee was on her feet, looking over the cliff edge. Hemi lay in a bloody heap on the ground. Sirens wailed as cars bumped down the road towards the beach.
Matt walked over to the cliff, completely oblivious now to his fear. He looked down and saw Warren’s body among the rocks below. His blood spilled into the sea. His head was badly messed up with blood, and his chest was drenched in the stuff. If the shot to the heart hadn’t killed him, the fall would have. Matt felt the tingly sensation of bile rising to his throat moments before he threw up.
The next thing he knew, Aimee was at his side.
‘Are you OK, Matt?’ Aimee asked, her voice calm and assuring.
‘They’re dead.’ Matt said, his voice crossing the border of hysteria. ‘How can I be OK? What the hell just happened?’
‘Warren shot Drew.’
‘I know that!’ Matt exclaimed. ‘But who shot Warren?’
The sirens stopped wailing as the police car and two black 4WDs arrived at the small car park. Beyond the hill above them, a helicopter was approaching. Aimee pulled at something in her pocket and showed it to Matt.
‘I imagine that it was one of our agents,’ Aimee said, as Matt stared at her DCI identity card in stunned silence.
The world was spinning. Voices were muffled and noises blurred together in a muddled mess. Hemi felt like he had been on a drinking binge. He shot me, Hemi thought. Warren, that bastard shot me. Twice. Hemi had counted the shots. He felt sleep coming, but fear told him to stay awake. You sleep, you die. He felt the warmth of the sun on his face. He felt the warmth of the bullet. Hemi had to live. He had to tell Matt what he knew. Matt didn’t know who he was dealing with. That is, of course, if Matt lived through the day.
Hemi tried to hear what was being said around him but couldn’t make out any words. He couldn’t even tell whose voice belonged to whom. There was just that muffled drone. He concentrated on his pain. Why did he only feel the one wound? Did Warren shoot him twice in the same spot or did the second bullet miss? He knew he felt the first one as it ripped into his chest near the shoulder. ‘Drew?’ Hemi’s father said to him. ‘Drew?’
That was it. Hemi knew he was dead. It felt terrible. He punched his thoughts to his father, because he couldn’t speak. I’m sorry Dad. I couldn’t get justice for you. I failed you.
His head thumped. At first it was a gentle thump, but in the minutes that followed the thump got louder and harder. The sleep came on stronger now. The thumping was so present he could feel it on the outside of his body. The world around him trembled and the warmth of the sun disappeared from his face. He started to feel cold. The wind had picked up considerably. Hemi lay listening to the thumping, the only thing he could hear now. His father’s voice was gone. He was alone, again. Thump, thump, thump. He tried to open his eyes, but the sleep came instead.