Cop and Robber, page 1
About the Book
If your mum was a cop and your dad was a crim who needed your help to commit a crime, would you do it to save him? At what cost?
Nash Hall’s dad is a criminal who just can’t seem to go straight. He wants Nash to help him commit a robbery. A big one. The trouble is, Nash’s mum is a cop. And the robbery is at Nash’s school. But his dad owes a lot of money to some very dangerous people and if Nash doesn’t help him do the job, it could cost both their lives.
A new nailbiter from the best-selling and award-winning author of Two Wolves, The Fall and Detention.
Contents
Cover
About the Book
Title Page
Dedication
One: Raised on Robbery
Two: Chase
Three: Sleep Tight
Four: Strike Three
Five: Limitless
Six: The Summons
Seven: Mum
Eight: Storm Brewing
Nine: Escape
Ten: Capture
Eleven: The Threat
Twelve: The Ultimatum
Thirteen: Running on Mars
Fourteen: 1 in 67 Million
Fifteen: Hunted
Sixteen: Plans
Seventeen: Broken Ridge Bowl
Eighteen: The Proposal
Nineteen: Stakeout
Twenty: Police Escort
Twenty-one: Target Practice
Twenty-two: Wolf in the Hen House
Twenty-three: On the Run
Twenty-four: Trapped
Twenty-five: Sleepover
Twenty-six: Cop & Robbers
Twenty-seven: The Truth
Twenty-eight: The Fair
Twenty-nine: The Race
Thirty: Redhanded
Thirty-one: Pursuit
Thirty-two: The Other Job
Thirty-three: Eyewitness
Thirty-four: Caught
Thirty-five: Disclosure
Two Weeks Later
Thirty-six: Hypocrite
Thirty-seven: Confession
Thirty-eight: The Visit
Thirty-nine: Love and Hate
Forty: Starting Line
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Tristan Bancks and Room to Read
Books by Tristan Bancks
Imprint
Read More at Penguin Books Australia
For Luca
ONE
RAISED ON ROBBERY
Nash is in the passenger seat of Dad’s truck – the old, blue Holden HQ ute, his ‘work’ truck – parked at pump number seven. It’s 11.42 pm and Nash is playing a game on his phone. His eyes sting and he wishes he was in bed already. He looks out through the hot-breath-fogged side window towards the shop, but his view is blocked by the petrol bowser. He leans forward to peek around it and sees Dad at the drinks fridge – black hood up, the bill of his ‘lucky’ Eels cap poking out, bandana over his face. Nash knows right away that something’s about to go down.
The service-station attendant, an old guy with a big nose and a red cap, sits on a stool at the cash register on the far right of the store. The attendant looks on as Dad moves quickly towards the counter, up an aisle between two rows of shelves.
Nash ducks down, eyes peering, crocodile-style, through the trickles of condensation racing each other down the glass, watching events unfold through the widescreen of the petrol-station shop window.
Six months ago, Dad had promised Nash he would stop committing crimes. As far as Nash knew, Dad had kept his word. But in the past week, Nash could tell Dad was on edge about something. He has two strikes to his name from a year ago – one for break and enter, one for stealing tools from a worksite. They were the only ones he was charged for. The judge said one more conviction and he’ll go to jail.
Nash’s left leg jumps up and down, and he uses his hand to steady it. His knuckles are scabby from hitting the heavy bag with Dad. The leg wants to run. Every part of him wants to run, to disappear around the back of the shop and show Dad that he won’t put up with this any more. And once Nash starts running, there’s no way Dad, or anyone, could catch him.
But he doesn’t. He watches, waits, pushes the thoughts away.
Dad approaches the attendant. He doesn’t have a weapon. He has two. His fists. He used to be a professional boxer and he’s found it a bit hard adjusting to life since. He reaches over the counter and grabs the guy by the front of his shirt. Nash flinches. He wants to tell the man it’s all right, not to be afraid, that Dad is one of the nicest robbers he’ll ever meet.
Dad sometimes pretends he has a real weapon, like the time he robbed a fruit shop with a banana in his hoodie pocket. He pretended it was a gun, but the shopkeeper called his bluff, then called the cops. Dad didn’t even get any money. He was a kilometre up the road when the police arrested him. His lawyer got him off the hook on that one. Dad loves to tell the story. He says it’s one of the top five dumbest things he’s done, and that’s saying something. Nash wonders how Mum put up with him as long as she did.
The attendant opens the register and lays the contents on the counter. He has one hand in the air, the other grabbing money.
Run, Nash’s body tells him. But his head says no.
He hears an engine, and suddenly Dad’s ute lights up from behind. He looks over his seat and through the back window, over the pile of pumpkins in the tray, as a car whooshes by on the road.
Dad backs up to the door, fast. Nash can see a beef jerky stand right behind him, at the entrance. He wants to yell out and tell Dad it’s there, but it’s too late. Dad trips over it and falls on his backside, spilling cash and packets of jerky everywhere. He scrambles to his feet, stuffing money into his pocket. He grabs a box off a shelf, sticks it under his arm and tries to exit, but he can’t. The attendant motions to push rather than pull. Dad, finally, gets the door open.
He hobbles to the car as quickly as his beat-up body will allow. Nash feels a cold trickle of sweat running from his hairline, down his spine, as he urges Dad to hurry up. When Nash runs, he always comes home strong and, right now, he needs his father to. Dad rips open the car door and jumps in, throwing a box of Turkish Delights in Nash’s lap. They’re Dad’s favourite.
‘Where’s my keys?’ Dad asks, head hunched so it doesn’t hit the roof.
‘You promised me you’d stop stealing stuff,’ Nash says quietly.
‘Where are they?’ he growls.
Dad’s always losing his keys.
‘In your pocket?’
And they’re always somewhere obvious.
The shop attendant is on the phone, staring right at them. Calling the police, probably. This jabs Nash with panic.
Dad rips a wad of cash out of his jeans pocket, and it explodes like a money fountain. It’s mainly fifties, a few hundreds, some twenties. The bills are all over the dashboard, on Nash’s lap, the floor. But no keys. Dad checks down the side of his seat, frantic now.
The old guy in the store puts down the phone, and a car pulls into the driveway. Nash turns and looks, face burning bright in headlamp light. The vehicle stops at pump five and the lights flick off. It’s not the police. It’s a dark green Volvo.
Dad is still searching. He’s panicky now. They both are. Nash looks through the rear window. The woman in the other car is filling up her tank. Nash suddenly realises who she is and his heart gives an almighty thump. He scooches down low in his seat.
‘That’s Mrs Diaz,’ Nash says, breath tight in his chest.
‘Who’s Mrs Diaz?’ Dad grunts.
Nash jerks his head back and Dad looks around to confirm that Nash’s school principal is, indeed, filling up her tank at number five.
TWO
CHASE
Metallic distortion screeches over the outdoor speakers. ‘Shopper at pump five, please be aware that there’s a potentially armed man at number seven who has robbed the station. Police are on their way.’
Mrs Diaz looks up at Dad’s truck. Nash can see her in the rear-view. She holsters the nozzle, sloshing fuel down the front of the pump, then gets into her car and reverses, tearing out of the driveway, skidding sideways across the two-lane road with a high-pitched rubber scream. She straightens up and takes off past a sign that says ‘Broken Ridge 4’.
One thing is clear to Nash: Mrs Diaz is an incredible driver. He wants to tell Griff tomorrow but figures it’s probably best not to mention it.
Now it’s just Nash, Dad, the shopkeeper, and four kilometres of desert night between them and home. Not home, Nash thinks. He never wants to think of this place as home.
In the way-distance, a siren sounds. Nash feels a wave of nausea wash over him and his head starts to throb.
‘Help!’ Dad pleads.
Nash searches under and down the side of his seat, before he catches the silvery glint of Dad’s keys hanging from the ignition.
‘Dad!’ he says, pointing.
That’s the thing with Dad. He’s a sunglasses-on-his-head kind of guy.
He turns the engine over and stomps on the accelerator. Bruce Springsteen, Dad’s favourite, bursts from the speakers – something about being born to run – as the ute jerks forward with a squeal of tyres. Police lights speed through the night towards them.
Rather than turning right onto Broken Ridge Road, Dad spins the wheel left and says, ‘Hold on.’
They race past the ice machine, the firewood and the tyre pump, towards a timber fence about two metres tall. The siren’s loud now.
‘Da d?’ Nash says, realising what’s about to happen.
‘Sorry, Nashy. It’s the only way.’
Nash clutches the armrest. The truck gathers speed. Nash places his other hand on the dashboard and presses his feet hard into the rusted metal floor.
There’s a sign on the fence that says ‘99c Doughnut and Coffee!’ with a picture of a doughnut with arms and legs, grinning, like it can’t wait to be eaten. Or driven through. Nash looks across to Dad, whose face is set, vice-tight, for impact.
Springsteen howls about everyone being out on the run tonight. Nash hits the power button to shut him up.
The engine snarls and the fence explodes with an almighty crack. The metal sign clangs against the windscreen, scrapes the roof and clatters into the tray at the back with the pumpkins. Shattered fence palings fly all over the place. The Holden launches off the edge of the petrol station’s concrete platform.
Nash’s stomach flies into his throat as the truck’s nose tips forward. They’re airborne and going to flip. He knows it. He’s screaming. He doesn’t mean to, but the sound roars up from inside him. Dad’s arms are dead straight and he has a white-knuckle grip on the wheel. His eyes are wide like he, too, knows the truck’s going to flip.
They land with a crunch of suspension on a steep, grassy hill. They bounce right, then left. Nash sees pumpkins leap for their lives out of the back of the truck as it hits the bottom of the hill. The front bumper scrapes flat ground hard and Nash jolts forward, sending pain shooting up his neck into his skull. They speed over clumps of desert grass in the direction of a dark wall of trees.
‘Wish we’d filmed that!’ Dad hoots.
Nash glares at him. Dad thinks he’s a modern-day bushranger and says they’re related to Ben Hall, one of Australia’s most famous bushrangers. But right now Nash is finding it hard to see Dad as an outlaw hero or a national treasure. He just looks like a straight-up crim.
Nash catches a glimpse in the side mirror of the police car appearing through the gap in the ‘99c Doughnut’ fence and flying off the edge of the platform, lights flashing, siren blaring.
Nash and Dad speed towards a chained gate with a sign that says ‘Desert Citrus’.
‘Dad?’ Nash says, digging his feet into the floor again.
CRUNCH! The chain snaps and seems to knock out the front left headlight as the fallen gate claws the underside of the truck with a metallic squeal. It makes Nash’s ears hurt.
Dad points the car at a narrow dirt track between rows of trees. He flicks off the remaining headlamp. The truck is swallowed by darkness as he guns it down the trail, branches flicking by. He’s hunched over the wheel, straining to see what’s coming up.
Nash looks over his seat and sees the cop car heading for the mouth of the track behind them, and he has never felt so scared in his life. He’s never been with Dad when he’s committed a crime before. He’s heard about the close scrapes and Dad going to court and spending a few days in the lock-up here and there. Dad makes them seem like funny stories. But this one doesn’t feel all that funny.
‘Dad, we should stop,’ he says, wishing he’d run when he had a chance. ‘Please.’
‘I’m sorry, buddy,’ Dad says. Mum reckons it’s his favourite word and that it gets him out of ever having to take responsibility.
Dad taps the brakes, flicks on the headlight – and Nash sees that they’re racing towards a tree in the middle of the track. He screams. Dad places a protective hand across Nash’s chest and jerks the wheel to the left, dodging the tree but snapping off the right side mirror with a ding and a crunch of glass.
They continue speeding down the trail, dead-straight now, hemmed in on both sides by orange trees. The cops are closing in behind. Nash hopes they see the tree in the middle of the track earlier than Dad did.
‘Where are we going?’ Nash asks.
Dad looks in the rear-view mirror, eyes lit up in a rectangular strip, like a Lone Ranger mask. The strip turns hot white as the police close in.
‘Dad, stop the car!’
‘Sorry, mate.’
His favourite word.
‘Hold on tight.’
Nash does, and Dad pulls on the handbrake, turns left, drifts sideways. They’re skidding towards a wall of trees lit up red and blue by police lights. Nash braces for impact, closes his eyes – but at the very last moment, Dad drops the handbrake, the tyres grip and he speeds out of the slide, snapping branches and missing the trunk by millimetres.
Through the back window, Nash sees the cop car miss the turn and fly past, down the dirt road. Tree limbs rush at them, oranges smacking the windscreen hard. The gap between rows of trees doesn’t look wide enough to get through, but the path keeps opening as Dad plunges onward. The whip of branches on the body of the ute reminds Nash of when he was little and Dad would take him to the car wash with those big red and blue rollers pummelling them from all sides.
Seconds later, the scratching and scraping suddenly ceases and they’re out of the trees. They mow down a barbed-wire fence and speed across red dirt and up an embankment to the road, a few hundred metres along from the fuel stop. Their tyres hit tar and they’re away.
Dad breathes a long, steady sigh, pulls his hood and cap off and runs his hand through what’s left of his hair.
‘You okay?’ he asks, exhilarated, squeezing Nash’s knee.
Nash turns away and stares into the starless night as they speed along Broken Ridge Road. He’s so relieved they didn’t get caught, and so ashamed of his dad. He watches the reflection of his eye against the blur of nightscape all the way into town, past the ‘Welcome to Broken Ridge, pop 20,138, elev 51m’ sign, past the farm-machinery sales yards, past his school and the hospital, all the way to Dad’s place. And he doesn’t say a thing.
THREE
SLEEP TIGHT
A hail of gunfire. A man screaming. People running. Horses galloping.
Nash stares at the ceiling of his shoebox bedroom. It flickers with TV light from the lounge room. He takes a sip of water and checks his phone: 1.17 am.
More gunshots. Nash jams the wings of his pillow up to his ears. Dad’s watching Mad Dog Morgan again – his favourite bushranger movie starring Dennis Hopper as Dan Morgan. Dad has shelves of Westerns and bushranger movies on DVD. Mum says it comforts him to live in the past, so he doesn’t have to face the present.
What if the attendant had a gun? Nash wonders. Or if Principal Diaz had recognised us? What’ll I say to Mum when she asks what me and Dad got up to last night?
Four nights at Dad’s, three at Mum’s. That’s the split. Dad has a little more time on his hands. Nash hates changeover day, no matter which house he’s switching to. It’s like moving to a new country. He has to re-learn the language, adapt to new laws, different food. It’s been six months since they moved out here. Five since Mum and Dad broke up. Nash wasn’t exactly shocked when it happened.
The gunfire pauses. There’s a groan. Footsteps. Nash looks out into the cramped lounge room. Dad’s place is about half the size of a normal house but has enough stuff crammed in to fill two. Dad’s shadow falls across the lino and Nash’s eyes snap shut.
‘You still awake?’
Nash says nothing.
‘I’m sorry, mate,’ Dad whispers.
Nash grits his teeth.
Dad comes over to the bed, sits on the edge. The mattress bows heavily, like a baby elephant just sat down. The elephant smells like beer and Turkish Delight. Dad runs his fingers through Nash’s hair. His hands are huge and knobbly, like rusty old diggers. Boxer’s hands. A finger is missing from his right hand. A chainsaw accident. Dad’s hands wouldn’t be comforting to anyone but Nash. And, tonight, not even to him.
