***
I wake to the crackling of a fire and find my arms are bandaged. The neck cut is not deep. D.S. Wyndam is boiling a billy. I’m wrapped in a blanket now and he’s wearing his blood soaked shirt again. I see a water bottle beside me and grab it, draining the last drop. Drinking is unspeakable pleasure - a phenomenal, sensual experience. When I notice a gun with his things, I find my voice.
‘Why didn’t you hold him up with that?’
‘Time! He had a knife at your throat, if you remember correctly. Some psychos would slit it just to spite me.’ The shuddering takes me again.
We huddle in silence, shoulder pressed to shoulder in the firelight and drink hot sweet tea. When my shivering finally ceases, endorphins take over. I feel high. Man was my enemy, now man is my friend. This one doesn’t say much, but his sweat smells sweet in my nostrils. For one astonishing moment, we seem to merge through our touching shoulders. I sense a solid core in him, a strong heart and suddenly know him beyond words. As stealthily as it came, the extraordinary doorway closes. Did he feel it also, or is it only me?
‘Just an illusion caused by trauma,’ blarts my logic.
‘Shut up. You don’t have a chance,’ instinct snaps back.
I ask D.S.Wyndam. ‘Why did you come alone?’
‘Three girls have already gone missing! I did call for backup, but I knew I had to get here quicker than it would move. Actually, I was on leave, visiting my real mother at Barlow Station about ten kilo meters as the crow flies. A police helicopter looking for some lost tourists gave me Lynch’s camp co-ordinates. I knew he was travelling this way and asked them to keep an eye out. When they said there was a girl with him, I freaked out, took Gunshot, and rode cross-country. I knew this bloke was a killer, but I couldn’t convince my superiors. They said there was no hard evidence, and that he would have to be caught doing something. Bit close. Sorry.’
I shudder, ‘How did you know it was him?’
He turns his head now, and looks at me with dark, smoke coloured eyes. I see a quadrant of blue light in them at the three o’clock mark and something else I can’t define. With a start, I realise I could love this man. His eyes draw me beyond the superficial world of civilization. There’s no dingo there, but my new self sees a kind of panther. Its luminous eyes glow in the fire light. His lip curls to reveal two side teeth. The shadowy beauty is like a dream-time creature. Oh the stealth! No wonder he was right behind, right up close and I never saw him.
With a shrug, he answers my question, though I already understand it was his panther who let him know. ‘I interviewed Lynch once. Evil like that can’t hide.’ I catch a flicker of respect in his eyes as they search me in a similar way they did at the Larsen/Lynch’s camp. ‘It would have been over sooner if you weren’t so damned clever. I’m afraid I underestimated the girl from the city. Can she ever forgive me for allowing her to be bait?’
I don’t flinch, don’t answer, just stare back into his eyes. The fire and our allies dance for a moment. There’s power between them, sleek, delicious, living power. I can’t believe I wore a straight-jacket and worked in a bank for seven years.
Though I could sit in silence with him all night, his back-up arrives, shattering the desert silence with spot-lights, whoops and whistles. They put me on a stretcher and load me into one of the four wheel drives. Larsen – Lynch, who’s just coming around, is bundled into the other.
D. S. Wyndam rides off on Gunshot to fetch Lynch’s ute, while we take a short cut. A fat chatty cop keeps me company. He’s a mine of information, though I’m drowsy and don’t take in much of what he says. I’m aware of how tired and starved I feel, but I manage to whisper,
‘Is D.S. Wyndam married?’
‘Married? Na,’ the fat cop chuckles, and offers a short summary on his colleague. ‘Got a woman in Broome, but I reckon she ain’t his type. Don’t know who would be. They try but they can’t snare the bugger. Unusual dude - clever. Mixed blood. One of the “stolen generation” I’m told.
I’m aching all over, but I can’t stop smiling. I came so close to dying horrifically out in that desert, yet I love the place for forcing me to find my life and my passion. That freezing, burning land ignited parts of me I never knew were there. Now I know there’s more to me than I ever could have imagined. I’m no longer the pale excuse for a woman I once was. My blood is awake, I’m honest, alive, and I won’t hold back. If that half wild cop, known only to me as D.S. Wyndam agrees, he’s going to cop the lot. After all, we have an affinity. Amid this rugged beauty, on the brink of death, we’ve tasted each other’s blood.