Read Challis - 01 - Dragon Man for Free Online

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    Take it easy, Ange.

    I shouldnt be here, Hal. I dont
belong, not really.

    Challis said gently, I know.

    Its not as if I did anything.
Conspiracy to murder, God, how did I know hed try it?

    Ange

    She sighed. Spilt milk, eh?

    Spilt milk.

    Get on with my life.

    Thats the spirit.

    I cant believe I wanted him
instead of you.

    Challis drained his glass. He said, Ange,
I have to go now. Take it easy, okay? Keep your spirits up.

    Youre my lifeline, his wife said.

    * * * *

    Three

    T
    hat
same night, a woman on Quarterhorse Lane jerked back her curtain and saw that
her mailbox was burning. Now the pine tree was alight, streaming sparks into
the night. God, was this it, some twisted way of telling her that shed been
tracked down?

    Shed been briefed carefully,
eighteen months ago. Never draw attention to yourself. Keep your head down. Dont
break the lawnot even drink driving or speeding, and especially nothing that
will mean youre ever fingerprinted. Dont contact family, friends, anyone from
the old days. Change all of your old habits and interests. Dress differently.
Learn to think differently. You liked collecting china figurines in the
old days, right? Went to auctions? Subscribed to magazines? Forget all of that,
now. Switch to sewing, cooking, whatever. Its good to give people a box to put
you instereotype you, in other words, so that their minds fill in the gaps in
your new identity. Above all, dont go back, not even if you get word that your
mums dying. Check with us, first. It could be a trap. You make one mistake, or
ignore what weve been telling you, theyll find you and theyll kill you. Youve
got a new ID; its pretty foolproof; youll do all right. Youll be lonely, but
plenty of people start over again. Just be wary. Watch what you tell people.
But youll be okay. Plenty of New Zealanders in Australia, so you wont stand
out too much. Meanwhile well do what we can to keep you alive from our end.

    Thats what theyd told her. She
hadnt made much of an effort. There hadnt seemed much point, because the
situation had begun to unravel even before the plane that was to take her out
of the country had left the ground.

    Shed been in the departure lounge
of Christchurch airport, eighteen months earlier, seated with the detective
assigned to escort her across the water and into a new life, when two men from
her old life had waltzed in and sat down nearby. The detective tensed. He knew
who they were, all right.

    Terrific, shed said. Theyve
found me already.

    Wait here.

    She watched him walk to the desk and
show his warrant card. For a while it looked like a no-go, but then the
reservations clerk turned sulky at something the cop said and punched a few
keys and stared at his screen.

    Meanwhile one of the men had spotted
her. He nudged the other, whispered in his ear, and now both were staring hard
across the dismal green carpet at her. She saw hatred and hunger in their
faces. One of them enacted a pantomime of what lay in store for her when they
caught her: a bullet to the head, a blade slicing across her windpipe. She hauled
her bag onto her lap, got to her feet.

    A hand tightened on her shoulder.
The cop said urgently, Clara, come with me.

    She pulled away. You must be
joking. Im pissing off.

    No. If you leave here theyll track
you and youll be dead meat.

    Theyve already tracked me down,
she said. Fat lot of good you people are. Look at them sitting there, large as
life.

    Coincidence, the cop said, forcing
her to go with him.

    Yeah, sure.

    I checked. Theyre both getting off
in Auckland.

    But theyll know Im going on to
Australia, she said. Theyll come looking.

    Australias a big place.

    Not big enough.

    Look, for all they know, youre
going on to Europe.

    She had glanced back. One of the two
men was standing now, watching her. She saw him tap his temple, grin, and flap open
a mobile phone with a neat gesture of his wrist. He was flashily dressed, like
they all were from that corner