The Holdup

Chapter 1

1

I wake up. A face full of hard rubber. Head pulsing with pain and the sound of a car horn blaring. I can barely move, a tightness in the back of my neck. Sweating heavy, I'm leaning forward, almost bent over double in my seat. And that damn sound, invading my skull. I force myself to move, everything fuzzy.

I lift my head off what I realise is a steering wheel. The blaring sound stops. My face was against the horn.

I see a smashed windscreen in front of me. A smoking bonnet crumpled against a telephone pole. The car is dark-grey. The logo on the steering wheel foreign to me.

I sit up. Feel woozy. I catch a glimpse through the windows. See a vast blue sky. Beneath it, a dirty yellow dustbowl sprinkled with cactus plants and hard, thorny scrub.

I lean back in my seat. Turn one way and see a stretch of highway. Turn the other and see a guy in the passenger seat. His head rests on his right shoulder. A gold Mexican wrestling mask over his head, stained in blood—matching stains on the cracked windscreen.

Looks like he took a mighty hit. If he's not already dead, I reckon he's halfway there. I twist in my seat and see the rear passenger-side door wide open.

I put a hand to my face—feel a mask of my own. I loosen the strings at the back and pull it off over my head. It's blue, spotted with blood. The air is hot, but still a relief on my face. I realise I'm wearing a pair of thin black gloves. The kind I'd wear for jobs. Serious, heavy jobs.

What the hell did you do, Charlie?

Last thing I remember is . . . s**t, my head hurts too much to remember. Makes me sick to even think.

I run a gloved fingertip over my hairline. A big bump that stings to the touch.

It hurts to turn, but I force my upper body to rotate slow. To crane my neck around the seat and check behind me. There's another guy unconscious in a bright-green wrestling mask. He's dressed in black combats, t-shirt, gloves and boots. Same as me and the dead guy.

But this one has a large black holdall next to him. The zip half open. A wad of shrink-wrapped hundred dollar bills peeping out. An automatic assault rifle across his lap.

Looks like a Colt M16.

Coming to my senses, I realise there's the same model of rifle on the central console. Another in the lap of the guy in the front passenger seat.

I notice other details, too.

Shell casings on the seats and in the footwells. A blown-out rear passenger window and a trail of blood on the backseat leading out of the open door.

Whatever happened—whatever I've done—I've gotta get out of here.

I try the handle on the driver-side door. But the door's stuck fast. I swing both feet around in the seat and deliver a double-booted kick. The door opens halfway. I kick out again with the soles of my boots. The door snaps right off its hinges and lands in the dirt.

At six-five and built solid, there's a lot of weight on my bones to haul out of the car. I use the door frame as leverage and put both feet on the ground. I'm as wobbly as jelly, but I can stand. I look around and get my bearings. The wind blows hot and dry across the flat plains. Only the highway for company and the shadow of a mountain range lurking behind a liquid heat haze.

I turn to the rear driver-side door. There's damage all down the side of the car. The rear passenger door is crumpled to s**t. I force it most of the way open and reach inside for the bag.

The guy in the back stirs. He wheezes and snots blood through his mask. I see anger in his eyes. He picks up his rifle. But he's slow. And I've seen enough dying men to know a corpse in denial.

I put a hand over his mouth. Pin his head back.

After a long minute, he stops breathing. The rifle drops loose to his lap. I take the holdall from the backseat and walk around to the other side of the car. It's a family saloon. Big and modern. A Chrysler 300.

I notice a trail of blood and footprints leading away from the car and into the desert.

No doubt about it, there were four of us in that car.

And I'd wager a second bag of money.

I scan the horizon, but can't see anyone. Only vultures circling high overhead.

I open the front passenger door and reach into the cabin. I open the glovebox and tear off the front panel. I dump the bag on the ground and rest the glovebox panel on top.

A quick pad down of the guy in the gold wrestling mask brings up a chrome-plated lighter. A fumble in the glovebox finds me a yellow dust cloth. I release the fuel flap and unscrew the cap. The cloth goes in and I light the end.

I toss the lighter in the car along with my gloves and mask. I pick up the glovebox panel and haul the heavy bag of money over my shoulder.

I zip the holdall up all the way and start walking along the side of the highway. The car catches fire behind me and the whole thing goes up in a ball of flames.

I use the glovebox panel as a sunshield. In the distance, I notice a car breaking out of the heat haze. I take no chances, quick-shuffling off the highway and taking refuge behind a tall cactus.

A police cruiser wails past, pushing a hundred. With the car long gone in the distance, I figure this is as good a place as any, so I wander away from the road in a straight line. There's a rock formation a little off the highway. It's jagged and white, like a shark fin rising out of the sand. A tall cactus plant to the right, missing an arm.

This is perfect. Easy to recognise. So I start with my heels at the base of the rock. I pace out a short distance in my shoe size, counting under my breath.

I drop the bag and start digging, using the glovebox panel as a makeshift shovel. I don't dig too deep, in case I need to access the cash fast.

Once I'm a few feet down, I drop the bag in the hole. I peel open one of the wads and prise out a fistful of bills. I zip up the holdall and drop the glovebox on top.

Next, I pile the sand back in. I flatten it out the best I can.

Hot, thirsty and with the mother of all headaches, I walk back to the highway. There's a road sign a little further on.

Welcome to Rattlesnake, Arizona.

I walk towards the town.

How the hell did I get here? And what the hell have I done?