Chapter 39
Thirty-nine
The Hellhound tore across the land like a beast let off its leash, sending dust plumes to roll like a storm front. The engine snarled as they raced through the saltbush, while the sun bled low on the horizon.
Porter gripped the steering wheel, eyes narrowed behind his sunnies, ignoring the rub of the racing straps over his sunburnt shoulders, his police overalls soaked with sweat and dust, as he sped across the outback.
Tracking the trail from the passenger seat, Craig rode shotgun—literally, with his shotgun resting in the holder—while Porter’s assorted arsenal was securely strapped to the gun rack. He was never going naked again.
Even though they were two hours behind Sawyer, they’d been making up the distance, and fast. Yet, there’d been no sign of the quad’s movement, no dust kicking up behind it, nothing.
All they had to follow were those quad tracks.
Thin twin lines carved into the soil that they’d been following for hours.
But they weren’t on any roads or stock routes, not even a wallaby track. This was a cross-country chase that had them weaving through the spinifex and down rocky gullies, dodging termite mounds that rose like crooked towers of clay.
Sawyer’s tracks led them through dry creeks, only to double back through shallow dips and stony ridges in a pattern that made no sense.
Where the hell was Sawyer going? The way his tracks zigzagged through the brush, obviously trying to throw them off his scent, seemed to be more filled with panic than precision.
If Sawyer had been hiding out here for years, surviving in the dirt and shadows, surely he knew he couldn’t vanish again. Not now, with the net closing in.
But, then again, spending his days digging holes for a deed had to do something to a person.
It wasn’t logical.
‘He’s running hot,’ Craig called out over the wind and roar of the engine. ‘After chopping through that last dry creek bed, and then all this bulldust, that quad’s gonna overheat if he pushes it much longer.’
‘Good,’ Porter said grimly. ‘Don’t worry, the Hellhound will handle it. It’ll go all night if need be.’ And he wasn’t giving up, not when he wanted Sawyer in cuffs. Today.
‘Fuel?’
‘Double tanks, plus one for water.’ To never again be in danger of dying of thirst.
He leaned into the next bend as the Hellhound bounced over a washed-out gully.
Fuel and water weren’t a problem, nor was food.
Not after he’d torn through his carefully organised meal plan, raiding the fridge he’d once warned Amara not to mess with, just to load up the esky.
A handful of protein bars for the glove box, a mug of strong coffee, and he was gone.
No system. No routine. Just the mission.
Light was the problem.
Painting the sky with fire, the sun had dipped too low, to potentially force this manhunt to come to a screaming halt for the night.
Craig pointed. ‘That rise. Go slow. I don’t like this terrain.’
Porter eased off the throttle.
They crested the hill—and the tracks just stopped.
The quad’s distinctive tread had disappeared. No sharp turn, no breakaway. Just… nothing but the breeze.
Porter killed the engine. Silence fell. Even the wind paused.
Craig was already out of the cab, crouching low, scanning the ground. ‘This makes little sense. He didn’t turn off… he didn’t loop back. It’s like he vanished.’
Porter climbed out slowly, stepping into the hush that fell over them like an invisible cloak, where not even a bird or bug made a sound.
‘Tracks.’ Craig pointed to the scrap of dirt at the far end. ‘It’s from a ute.’ He leaned down, touching the intermittent tread of four chunky tyre tracks amongst the gravel. ‘And one that’s as common as muster dogs out here.’
‘But where did it come from?’ Porter’s chest squeezed at the thought of that arsehole getting away from him.
Craig stood, pushing back the brim of his cowboy hat. ‘Beats me. But they’re as fresh as Sawyer’s.’
‘Like at the same time?’
Craig nodded.
‘Did he get help?’ Dammit! Porter scowled at the soils, trying to tell a story. But the sinking sun was sending a warm wind to make the sunburnt topsoil shift and settle in the grooves of the freshly laid set of tracks. They’d be gone by morning.
‘No one got out,’ continued Craig, as he walked around the new set of tracks. ‘It’s like that ute stopped, then drove straight past.’
Porter stood scouring the area that was a minefield of saltbush and cattle dust, searching for a plume of dust, a reflection from metal, something to hint at another vehicle.
Problem was, there were plenty of places to hide. One side had black soil flood plains, the other had stock routes and slanting red roads that rolled ahead like twine.
‘Do you think Sawyer’s erratic driving was to kill time, to meet up with someone?’ Porter asked Craig.
‘It’d make sense of his patterns.’
‘Can we see any footprints? Maybe they dumped the quad, and he got away.’ The thought burned, as he scoured around the shrubs, checking the undergrowth, the gaps between rocks, widening his circle over coarse rubble.
Porter went back ten metres or so, then followed the quad bike’s trail, which disappeared over the crumbly soils. The stones and gravel were disturbed enough to show Sawyer must have gunned the bike, up the small rise…
Given the new set of tracks, from that mystery ute, where it had stopped in the centre, would that have been enough for Sawyer to suddenly divert?
That’s when he saw it, just on the other side, shaded by the saltbush. A strange shift in the bulldust. Too flat. Too smooth. Like glass.
‘Over here.’ He dropped to one knee and brushed some of the fine powder filling a cracked wedge that ran deep like a pit filled with bulldust.
Craig crouched beside him. ‘You think his quad’s in here? It’d make sense if he flew over that rise, then had to divert from hitting that ute—’
‘Which means he’s here.’ Porter voice was filled with urgency.
Together, they scraped deeper, revealing a punctured tyre. Then the handlebars. And then… a hand.
No pulse.
‘Did he get a puncture, lose control, and get pinned by his bike and drowned,’ Craig said grimly.
‘Possible.’ But to Porter—it wasn’t that simple. Those extra set of tracks, belonging to that unknown ute, showed it had driven directly across the quad’s path. Did it stop to help or…
Porter stared out across Dixby Downs, the country sprawling from horizon to horizon beneath a sky as old as time. The sun sank lower, ending a chapter of its own story. This land—she’d seen men like Sawyer before. Men who killed to claim her and tried to carve her up for profit.
But the land kept her own score, and she’d outlast them all. That’s the thing Porter had learned from living out here: this country, this ancient land, she could be your greatest ally or your worst enemy—and today, the outback had claimed the missing overseer for good…