Deadly Secrets

by Sarah Barrie

  ‘Jordan, wait!’

  Jordan turned around and saw Madi jogging to catch up. ‘Oh, hi Madi. What’re you doing here?’

  ‘Looking everywhere for you! Are you alright?’

  ‘Super. You?’

  Madi pulled a face. ‘What happened? Dad’s beside himself.’

  ‘What happened? What happened is I appear to have entered some alternate reality where I’m some sort of drug addict and everyone knows it but me.’

  Madi pulled a face. ‘That’s ridiculous!’

  ‘Of course it is!’ Jordan snapped in frustration. ‘But the doc said the drugs were in my system. So how the…I just don’t…’ She lifted and dropped her hands, shook her head. ‘Reid left. He just went. I don’t know what to do.’

  Madi took Jordan’s arm and steered her back around. ‘Okay, let’s go to Mary’s, have a cuppa. We’ll figure this out.’

  Reid sat at his desk in the city staring blankly at the paperwork in front of him. Nothing could shift his mind from Jordan and how he’d left her this morning. He should call it in. He knew the doctor wasn’t obliged to, but he should. Being tough was the best option for her. He’d watched his parents take the softly-softly approach with his sister. Too late they realised they’d put a nail in her coffin by not being strong enough and seeing through the lies.

  But in Jordan’s case it would be seen as a second offence. She could lose her farm. Could he really do that to her now, after everything she’d been through? What options were there? He told himself he didn’t care, not now. But he did. He needed to see her. He couldn’t bear to see her — he’d falter in his resolve and he knew it.

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Your suspect is ready.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Inside the interrogation room, Reid paced restlessly. This was the third interview with this particular lowlife and equally as useless as the first two.

  ‘I’m running out of patience, Ezio!’ Reid warned the man sitting handcuffed in the seat in front of him. ‘All I need to know is who your boss is and you walk, understand?’

  Nothing. Reid closed his hands into fists, desperately fighting the urge to knock it out of him. If he was honest, it wasn’t the first act of violence he’d considered today.

  ‘Come on!’ he exploded, ‘You want to spend the rest of the best years of your life behind bars? Do you think he’ll care?’

  His mobile phone interrupted the tirade he was unleashing, and when he saw the number he left the room to take it.

  ‘Tim,’ Reid answered, ‘I’m guessing you have results?’

  ‘Reid, yes. Jordan’s system contained high levels of methamphetamines as you suspected. But there’s something else. There were also traces of GHB — it’s a date rape drug.’

  ‘I know what it is,’ he said impatiently. ‘They’re sometimes used together to level out the high, but why would she say cocaine? Is it possible whatever she took contained that too?’

  ‘Not according to the tests. She was probably telling the truth about the Coke being the soft drink.’

  ‘Makes sense. She’s always drinking the stuff.’ He sighed. ‘Thanks for the update. How is she?’ He couldn’t help but ask.

  ‘A bit…shellshocked. I have to admit that if I didn’t know better she would have had me fooled into believing she’d never touched the stuff.’

  ‘Yeah well, she had a lot of people fooled. Let me know if anything else crops up. I’ll be down there in a couple of days.’ He ended the call, turned to see Tony standing behind him in the hallway.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Meth and GHB. Shit.’ He rubbed a hand over his head.

  ‘Sorry Reid, I know she means a lot to you. What are you going to do?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just don’t know what to do because she won’t admit to it; certainly doesn’t appear to want help.’

  ‘You’re thinking about Annabelle.’

  Yeah, he was thinking about his sister, about everything they went through to help her, only to have her overdose in a friend’s toilet. ‘I don’t want to go through that again, Tony.’

  ‘Doesn’t sound like you have much choice.’

  ‘I don’t have time for this now. You here to play good cop?’

  ‘Yeah, I’ll join the party. You sure you’re right to go back in?’

  ‘I’ll lead.’

  ‘How long do you want to sit here?’

  An hour later, Reid and Tony were still working on Ezio. Reid didn’t need to pretend at bad cop. He was at the end of his tether.

  ‘Come on, detective, give him a break,’ Tony suggested wearily. ‘He’s gotta be worried he won’t live to see freedom if he talks.’

  Ezio’s eyes shifted, Reid shook his head, playing the game. ‘Forget it. He’s staying until he gives me what I need.’

  ‘What if we offer him witness protection?’

  Ezio sniggered, both men turned, pouncing on the first sign of communication since his arrival.

  ‘You think this is a joke?’ Reid demanded.

  ‘Take it easy, detective,’ Tony warned. ‘Ezio, you don’t think we can protect you?’

  Ezio shifted in his seat, mumbled, ‘Not a chance.’

  ‘You’re missing the fact that if we have him in custody, he can’t touch you,’ Reid bit out.

  ‘Fuck that, Bruno’s connected to everyone, a couple’a small-time pricks like you guys couldn’t protect no one from a fuckin’ mosquito.’

  Reid lunged and had his hand around Ezio’s throat in a heartbeat. ‘Watch who you’re calling a prick. Bruno who?’ he demanded.

  ‘Suck my dick.’

  Temper snapping, Reid slammed the man’s head down on the table, leaned in and whispered in his ear, ‘This is your last chance. You talk, or I will make every moment of the rest of your life so much like hell you’d rather be dead. Got it?’ His voice rose as Tony dragged him from the room while another officer rushed in to stem the bleeding from Ezio’s nose.

  ‘Just what the hell?’ Tony exploded once he had Reid out the door. ‘What the hell was that?’

  ‘Oh come on, Tony. He deserved it.’

  ‘Never — never — in the last ten years have I seen you cross the line like that. Never. You’re one of the best damn cops I’ve ever worked with. This isn’t about Ezio, this is about Jordan and you need to sort it out. Until you do, you’re off this case.’

  ‘I am this case, Tony! I’ve worked it for three years. You can’t pull me off now. We’re this close.’

  ‘You know what a decent dose of police brutality does to a case? The guy could walk — and press charges! Screw your head on, sort yourself out. I’m going to clean up your mess.’

  ‘Detective?’ The sergeant poked his head out the door, nervous of interrupting.

  ‘What is it, Neil?’

  ‘He says he’ll talk — with conditions.’

  Tony exchanged glances with Reid. ‘This doesn’t make it right.’

  ‘Meanwhile we’ve got Ezio in there waiting to talk. Can we get this done before he changes his mind?’

  ‘You’re not going anywhere near him. Go home. Call Kelly, see if she’ll talk to Jordan. Sort it out Reid.’

  Reid watched Tony disappear back into the interrogation room and stared at the door as it closed behind him. He knew what he had to do. Doing nothing wasn’t going to help Jordan. He was going back to Whitewater Creek . And no matter what it took, he was getting Jordan clean. He picked up the phone — Tony’s suggestion had already played through his mind. Calling Kelly would give him somewhere to start.

  Jordan sat staring at the television in a kind of mentally exhausted stupor. She and Madi had sat for over an hour at the café discussing what had happened, but had come up with more questions than answers. It had to have been the Coke, they’d decided. But how had drugs gotten into a Coke bottle in her fridge? Hal was in custody…who else would do something like that? And why were there other drugs in her house?

  The quest
ions floated around in her head in an annoying loop. When the phone rang, she automatically reached back and picked it up. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Hi Jordan,’ Reid replied.

  She was happy to hear his voice, but his tone made her wary. ‘Reid.’

  ‘Jordan…I’m sorry about the way I walked out. I shouldn’t have left you like that.’

  Relief flooded through her. ‘Damn straight, but…forget it. I know how it looked. I just need to figure this out.’

  ‘Why didn’t you trust me enough to tell me?’

  What? She didn’t respond straight away. It took her a couple of attempts to make her voice work. ‘You still don’t believe me?’

  ‘I’m kicking myself that I didn’t see it. You have quite the explosive moments, don’t you? Looking back, I bet you were on something just about every time we had a run in.’

  ‘I don’t think you understand,’ she replied slowly.

  ‘No, I do. You lost both your parents at a difficult age in terrible circumstances, had access through your friends at the time to drugs that kept you going…and you have had to keep going. You’ve worked hard every day for years to keep everything going under a stack of pressure. You were always going to be a prime candidate. I’m not mad, Jordan. I want to come back. I want to help you.’

  ‘I – You – I beg your pardon?’ she asked, astounded.

  ‘Look, the more you do it the more likely you are to have those psychotic episodes.’

  ‘Stop!’ Jordan ordered. ‘The doc said the reaction I had could have had something to do with the quantity or the quality of whatever mix I was given. It’s not just long-term use that causes it. Reid…I’m not a drug addict.’

  ‘Maybe you believe that —’

  ‘Excuse me?’

  His voice softened. ‘You’ve got to get off that stuff. You don’t need it anymore. And I can’t help you unless you take responsibility for this. I’m coming down and bringing someone with me I’d like you to talk to. She can help you.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Her name is Kelly Sullivan: she’s a D and A counsellor.’

  ‘This is unbelievable…don’t you dare bring her here!’ Jordan slammed the phone down. She was shaking; her voice had been starting to waver. She needed to process.

  She was still trying to do that as the clock ticked over to three o’clock in the morning. She’d tried to sleep. It wouldn’t come, so she was roaming the house aimlessly, Mack at her heels. Why couldn’t she stop thinking about Reid? Surely it was more important to put some time into figuring out how this had happened. But it was no use. Her thoughts just kept straying back.

  With nothing else to do, she went into the office and typed the name of the woman Reid had mentioned into her computer. Immediately, she got a hit. It seemed his friend was a top criminal psychologist.

  ‘Criminal psychologist,’ she muttered. ‘That’d be right.’ Damn it — she’d only known the man a couple of months. Why did it hurt so much?

  She brought up the site and, as if to add insult to injury, the woman staring back at her was a picture-perfect blonde in an expensive-looking suit.

  ‘Just let him bring her down here,’ she grumbled to Mack. ‘We’ll see how that turns out.’

  Flicking through a couple of pages, she saw the woman had written some articles, so she read them. She told herself that at least then she’d have an idea of what to expect from ‘Barbie’ if they did show up. She spent quite a bit of time scanning the articles — after all, forewarned was forearmed, right?

  Eventually she made herself stop, get up and let Mack out. Her foot scuffed something as she walked to the door and she absently picked up the piece of pink paper. Pink paper? Her heart jumped nervously. Hal?

  ENJOY YOUR TRIP? NO NEED TO THANK ME. I’M COMING SOON, ANGEL. WE’LL BE TOGETHER.

  Jordan’s hand curled into a fist around the note before tossing it on the table as though burned by it. Something cold and threatening ran up and down her spine. Her father had called her his angel. It made her feel sick. The flowers, the notes, the break-in…it didn’t make sense.

  Jordan ran to the phone and called Reid. When he answered sleepily, she cut right in. ‘You told me Hal was locked up!’

  ‘Jordan?’

  ‘He’s supposed to be locked up!’

  ‘Hal? He is. What are you talking about?’

  ‘He left me a note.’ She paced, waited for his response. It took a moment.

  ‘You found a note you think was from Hal?’

  ‘Yes!’

  ‘Jordan, that isn’t possible.’

  ‘He says he drugged me. This proves what I was trying to tell you!’

  There was a lengthy pause, then, ‘Okay. Okay, great. Why don’t you go to bed, get some sleep. You sound a little…strung out.’

  ‘I sound strung out?’

  ‘What are you doing up at this time of night?’

  ‘What’s that got to do with anything?’ she asked. Then it dawned on her. ‘You think I’ve taken more of those drugs?’

  There was a sigh. ‘I didn’t say that. But maybe you should just get some sleep. We can talk about this —’

  ‘Thanks for your support!’ she cut in, her voice dripping with sarcasm. ‘I can’t believe I thought…’ Mack had stopped wagging his tail and was staring out the window. Hackles up, he crossed the room, a low growl sending a new and terrifying chill through her system.

  She dropped the phone, ran for her gun, loaded it with trembling fingers and crossed back to the window. ‘What is it, mate? Who’s out there?’ Mack jumped onto the window ledge and sniffed and whined nervously. She forced her shaking legs to move to the door.

  ‘Come on then,’ she ordered, and opened it.

  She made herself walk right around the house, then down to the stables and through the shed. She turned on every light, looked in every corner, constantly checking over her shoulder as she went. Mack ran, sniffed, danced around, seemingly forgetting any threat and simply wanting to play.

  ‘Okay…wild goose chase.’ Whoever it was had to be long gone, she reassured herself. ‘Let’s go, Mack.’ She walked back up to the house, still cautiously scanning for any sound, any movement.

  She reached the front door and, locking it behind her, she turned to the table.

  The note was gone.

  ‘No…no, that’s not possible.’ She forced herself to think, checked again, checked the chairs, the floor. Nothing. It was there — she’d left it there!

  Someone is in the house.

  ‘Mack…’

  She lifted her gun and held it shakily, while her heart pounded so loudly in her ears she could hear little else. Room after room she checked; in wardrobes, under beds, behind doors, making sure the house was locked up as she went. Nothing.

  Nerves jumping, she went back into the kitchen and checked the front door one more time. Automatically, she picked the phone up off the floor to call Reid back, then dropped it again. What could she say? He already thought she was lying to him. To comfort herself as much as the dog, Jordan ran a hand over him. He didn’t seem concerned about anything other than her odd behaviour.

  Screw Reid. She’d take the note to Harry tomorrow. He’d help her figure this out. Because if it wasn’t Hal, who was it? The idea that someone other than Hal had been stalking her made no sense. Except…Hal was always getting his goons to do his dirty work. This was payback, that’s all. Harry would know who out of Hal’s workers hadn’t been arrested. Yes, she’d go see Harry. The idea made her feel a little better.

  Insistent banging on her door and Mack’s barking woke her the following morning. She sat up, blinked and raked her fingers through her hair. The clock read 9 a.m.

  ‘Hold on!’

  It had been a long night. Despite telling herself there was no one there, despite locking the house up, despite Mack’s presence, she hadn’t been able to sleep. Every noise had her heart racing, and she spent most of the night patrolling the house, chasing shadows. Eventually, tru
sting Mack would wake her if anyone turned up, she’d closed her eyes only after dawn broke over the mountain.

  She found Joel on her doorstep and she unlocked the door, stepped back. ‘Come in,’ she offered, stifling a yawn.

  Joel’s gaze raked over her. ‘It’s not like you to sleep late.’

  Catching the implied accusation, Jordan bit back a sharp reply and shrugged carelessly. ‘Apparently I’m not myself at present.’

  He leaned back against the table and folded his arms. ‘Where’s the note?

  ‘You know about that?’

  ‘Reid called me, asked me to take a look at it.’

  ‘Did he? Well you’ve wasted your time. It’s gone.’

  ‘Gone?’

  She explained what had happened while Joel listened patiently. When she finished, he didn’t speak for several moments as he appeared to consider her story, then he sighed heavily. ‘So you found a note from Hal — who’s in custody — telling you you’d been drugged, and then it vanished before anyone could see it?’

  ‘I’m sure I left it on the table…unless I took it when I went to load the rifle or something…I can’t remember. I’ve been trying to — Joel!’

  Joel’s hand found a glass on the table, curling around it so tightly that it shattered. They both stared at his hand, bleeding from the shards.

  ‘I’ll get the first aid kit.’

  ‘I don’t need a bloody first aid kit!’ he exploded.

  Jordan jolted then scowled at him. ‘Would you take this then?’ she demanded, tossing him a tea-towel. ‘You want glass shards in your hand that’s up to you, but you’re bleeding all over my table.’

  He did as she asked and for a moment his eyes softened. ‘How long have you been hiding this from me?’

  Jordan’s head fell back and she stared at the ceiling. ‘I’m not hiding anything! Joel, you know me better than just about anyone. If you won’t believe me, no one will. And I need you to believe me,’ she pleaded, ‘because last night I was scared. How often have I ever admitted that?’

  Joel sank into the chair and spoke quietly. ‘Jordy, is it possible you imagined it? When you had that bad reaction you thought you saw all sorts of things.’