by Kylie Kaden
‘Have they identified who owns those feet yet?’
‘Not for release.’
‘For release? But you know?’ Her jaw dropped. ‘A local?’
Blake looked down his nose at her. He had spent a good part of his afternoon loitering around the smokers’ corner at the station, just to overhear any morsel of information: a suspect, a lead, anything to show he wasn’t in the firing line, about to be arrested. One of the pavement pounders from the local jogging group produced a photo of a toned Trevor Adler stretching before a fun run. A clear view of his shoes. An exact match with the crime scene.
Bone marrow was present. They were close to confirming the victim’s identity. An investigation would ensue. Blake thought of all the cases where he’d prayed for a rapid response, a cut-tape approach – and the powers that be had to choose this one to lift their game.
There was no way he could hunt around records without official clearance. He’d seen more mates discharged for unauthorised IT access than any other breaches. He just had to lay low, act normal and keep breathing till it was over.
The investigation had narrowed its focus with political pressure due to the media coverage. It wouldn’t take long.
‘I feel bad for the families of missing persons, wondering if it’s their person. God, imagine that. How do you have a coffin, with nothing but body parts in it!’ Hannah said.
Blake stiffened, then shook out his limbs to compensate, which he suspected only made him look stranger, so he pretended to be distracted by the sizzling steak. ‘We’ve had empty coffins before. Crime scenes with blood loss to indicate it’d be impossible to sustain life, but no body.’
‘That’s awful. Imagine living with that hanging over you. Wondering.’ She shook her damp hair. ‘So, about the feet …’
‘Foot. Second one they found on the beach was a fake.’
‘A fake foot?’ Initially she’d been upset about the ghastly act in her home town but these days she was treating it like an episode of CSI, and she wanted the next instalment. This was a game to her.
‘A prank. Like the small intestine the other day. Waste of a perfectly good lamb shank, if you ask me. But nah, couldn’t tell you. Some new hotshot from CIB’s problem now. But something was going down this arvo – secret squirrel stuff from the incident room.’ He tried to sound nonchalant, like the case was just one of many. ‘I won’t get much out of them. They only want me for the grunt work, as usual.’
‘But, I mean, how does the foot separate? Did the ankle get ripped off with the movement of the tides, or what?’
Whatever appetite he’d mustered, evaporated. His gut was a pit of flames. ‘Can’t say I’ve gone into the pathology of it, exactly.’ Except he had. He’d seen Hannah’s beloved teacher buddy bobbing in his dreams, caught on roots, wedged under embankments. Those images were preferable to the zombie versions – foot dragging, limbs hanging like a promo for The Walking Dead. He’d never had trouble sleeping till the night Abbi rang with her little predicament. Since the nightmare that followed.
‘Did you see Abbi’s article on it today?’ Hannah asked. ‘Reckons it was just a suicide.’
‘Yep. Change from her usual rants on keeping Lago Point McDonald’s-free.’ He wasn’t surprised by the level of manipulation in Abbi’s story on the foot – fear mongering, blame deflecting. It was perfect.
‘It was quite an intelligent, well-reasoned article.’
‘You sound surprised.’
Hannah shrugged. ‘I thought she did journalism to get a job at Cleo interviewing bachelors of the year. I didn’t expect her to be covering issues like mental health.’
‘She’s a grown-up, now. You can thank Will for that.’
It was rather genius how Abbi had subtly rebranded the suspicious-death angle into more evidence of our country’s suicide emergency. Hannah patted Newman, who had been besotted with her ever since she arrived. Traitor, Blake thought, realising the dog seemed to love her more than his frisbee.
Hannah grabbed the newspaper, feeding Newman a crust on her way. ‘Apparently thirteen feet have washed up in Canada – something to do with new shoe designs being more buoyant. Most of them took their own lives, they reckon. Rather spooky, when you think of it. How many of those missing persons are actually suicide victims, bobbing in the ocean? One every three hours in Australia. Isn’t that shocking? Eight per day! Mostly men. It’s now the leading cause of premature death.’
‘That goes double for veterans and cops, I reckon.’ Blake had two mates from the academy who had taken their own lives after crumbling from the stress of their jobs.
They sat down for dinner, Hannah rattling on about other matters now – schoolyard gossip and the Gonski report, and Blake started to miss quiet dinners with Newman warming his feet. As he chewed his steak half-heartedly, a distorted reflection of the blue-and-white checked banner arced across the glass doors of his TV cabinet. The only squad car in the area, other than his own, was signed out to CIB. Everything clenched.
Air sucked out of his lungs. This is it.
He saw the shadow moving to the left of the door, the way they were taught to avoid perp through-door gunfire, and heard the confident knock of knuckles on wood. Blake walked in a daze to his front entry, his resentment towards Abbi building, his life flashing before him with each step – everything he’d worked for, his house, his girl, his career.
Blake tried telling himself there was another explanation for why the detective was here: he needed the station alarm code or clarification on something. He squeezed his name out. ‘Mason.’ The hotshot looked younger than he had earlier. Awkward. Blake noticed he had an offsider, one of his minions from the big smoke. Not a good sign.
‘Sorry to disturb, Sarge,’ Mason said.
The detective made small talk, commented on the landscaping like a bastard, prolonging Blake’s terror. Just say it, say it, you prick. ‘You are under arrest for interfering with a corpse. You have the right to remain silent …’ Blake swallowed, hoping to stop the acid pooling in his throat. ‘Has there been a …’ His breath caught. ‘Any development?’
‘The magistrate granted our search warrant for the Adler place. The lead checked out. Just waiting for pathology now to confirm – might take weeks.’
His stomach flipped. ‘You’ve done his place over?’ Blake tried to focus, but none of Mason’s words registered. He could feel his life, his freedom, being chipped away.
Detective Mason prattled on and Blake realised he was delusional to think he ever had a chance. There were more holes in this harebrained plan than a cast net. He considered coming clean right then and there. Taking it on the chin. After all, he hadn’t killed anyone. His career would be shot to shit, but his sentence could be as little as a year or two if he played nice. Maybe prison wouldn’t be so bad?
But then there was Abbi: testifying in court, Eadie crying while visiting her mum through bullet-proof glass. Blake understood how they’d zeroed in on the victim’s identity, but not on his part in this mess. There was no logical link, no motive, for a murder.
Seconds ticked by.
‘Sarge?’ Mason waved a hand in front of Blake, sensing he was deep in thought. ‘Is she here?’
She?
Mason glared at him. ‘Just a few questions – just to rule her out.’
‘Her?’ It wasn’t him they were after.
Abbi. His vision started to blur. That was worse. As useless as he felt, she was riskier. She’d blab like a drunk at closing time. They’d both be in handcuffs by night’s end.
‘Is she able to chat with us?’ Mason craned his neck to check the hall, impatience showing. ‘Mate, it’s just an elimination. We understand she’s been staying with you since she returned from the States, which records show was, no doubt coincidentally, just around the victim’s estimated time of death.’
Mason stopped staring long enough to signal to Blake he was meant to respond. Blake rubbed his forehead, the pressure inside his head immense. ‘Sorry?’
‘Mate? You with me? We need to speak with Hannah about her old boss.’
* * *
She couldn’t believe it. Trev was dead. But once she’d got over the fact that an old friend may have actually been murdered, Hannah was happy to help with the investigation and find the bastard that did it; having them here to question her gave Hannah a shameful feeling of inclusion, something she lacked most of the time.
‘People in town were saying it was a suicide.’ Her hand covered her mouth. ‘But now that I know the foot was Trevor Adler’s … I haven’t seen him for years but he wasn’t the melancholy type. I mean, it seems impossible to me that he ended his own life. It must have been suspicious – is that why you’re interviewing people who knew him?’
Mason’s offsider was as wide as she was tall and smelt like spearmint gum. Hannah wondered what sin she was trying to mask with it. She reached over the table and squeezed Hannah’s hand. ‘I must stress, Miss Worthington, we are yet to confirm he’s deceased; however, things aren’t looking good.’ The cop’s bun was so tight it made her eyes slant like a bad facelift, so impeccably groomed, yet so padded.
Hannah was no stranger to weight problems, but now that she’d finally overcome that challenge it made her feel oddly superior. Then she felt like a bitch for thinking that way, and that, in turn, made her want to eat cake.
The officer switched gears, now the niceties were ticked off. ‘We found letters at his premises.’
‘Letters?’ Hannah frowned. Who wrote letters, these days?
‘And emails. From you.’
Oh, God. Hannah couldn’t remember the exact content of said letters, but she was fully aware of her mental state at the time she’d penned them: grief-stricken, self-absorbed, desperate not to be alone. She had been crushing on a bloke sixteen years older than her, even if he was fit for his age. ‘It was years ago. How’s that even relevant?’ She sat back in her chair, feeling far less comfortable than she had moments before.
The cop’s lips thinned. ‘You expressed a rather … strong reaction to his decision not to continue with the relationship.’
Hannah’s eyes skittered towards the doorway to the kitchen. To Blake. ‘There was no relationship. It was a fling, really, that never quite took off.’ She felt her cheeks redden. Blake’s eyes were on her, and she couldn’t believe she had felt chuffed to be involved in this ridiculous farce. ‘I was surprised, perhaps. Things seemed to be going so well – him not wanting to pursue things came out of the blue. We’d just had a few great nights out, a few dinners in, and the next thing he was dumping me. So yeah, I guess I was rather shocked at first, but that was more out of ego than any real love lost.’
A charity root – that’s what the music teacher had referred to it as when she discovered Hannah was canoodling with the then school principal. She’d felt stupid at staff meetings, appalled by the inferences that the whole thing was ‘screwing up’ – a career move. When it all got too much, Hannah took a leave of absence from Education QLD and bought a one-way ticket to JFK. It occurred to her that these cops thought she might have killed the guy. ‘Do you seriously think I might have had something to do with this? I mean, I haven’t even been in the country for the past six years.’ Detective Morton held up his palm, but before he could refute any suggestion she was a suspect, Hannah went on. ‘I can see how you could think I’m some sort of jilted lover out for revenge based on those stupid old letters, but I’ve barely given him a second thought since. I was just hurt. It’s not like I’d give him a second look now. And that beard. Eww.’ Her lips stretched wide like a duck’s beak.
Both cops outwardly cringed at her lack of sensitivity.
Hannah grimmaced. ‘Sorry. He was a lovely man, actually. Quirky, but nice.’
‘Was?’
‘Jesus. Sorry, I sort of thought that was … I hope very much he still is, of course.’
The officers eyed one another as they both made mental notes. ‘And what do you mean, “quirky”?’
‘You know, a little eccentric. Had his way of doing things, strange sort of dress sense, obsessed with making those traditional toys – he’d hand-paint the faces and sell them at a stall at the farmers’ markets. Always screamed ‘poor business plan’ to me – he’d spend all weekend crafting one and make less than the materials cost, but he enjoyed it, I suppose. He was a woodwork teacher, originally. Good with his hands.’
Blake groaned from the kitchen.
‘Thanks for your time, Miss Worthington. That’s all we need at this stage.’
Hannah felt a surge of disappointment that the drama had ended. ‘So are you seriously thinking he may have been murdered?’
‘We’re just making routine enquiries at this stage.’
When they left, Hannah asked Blake if she’d blown it. ‘God. I sounded suss.’
‘You didn’t. It sounded natural. Grubs don’t blabber so much.’
‘Then why the long face?’
‘They could have given me the courtesy of a heads-up.’ His attention was elsewhere. He sat quietly for a moment, before he shook his head, pushed his chair in and tapped his foot on the barstool. ‘So, you and Principal Adler. It wasn’t just gossip?’ Hannah sucked in her cheeks. It had happened when they were on a break. He had no right to judge her. But she guessed he had a right to ask. ‘Jesus.’ He thumped the benchtop. ‘Trevor Adler? That old prick? Was he the only bloke left in town you hadn’t been with? Was that it?’
Hannah felt tears well. ‘Excuse me?’ She got enough of that from her father; according to him, boys will be boys, but women with multiple partners were common whores.
‘Sorry. I’m just …’ Blake shook his head. ‘I’ve gotta get some air.’ He bashed the stool beneath the breakfast bar.
Hannah baulked. ‘Blake? What’s wrong? You’re not jealous? Seriously?’
As if he hadn’t heard, Blake grabbed his keys and walked out.
* * *
Halfway to Abbi’s, Blake stopped, bent over, palms to his knees and breathed in, slowly, slowly, but it didn’t help settle the panic thrashing inside. Air. Blake felt it on his face, felt it rush through his nostrils in quick erratic breaths, but it didn’t seem to land in his lungs. His vision blurred. His chest pounded. ‘Fucking, Abbi,’ he mumbled as he exhaled, half crying, half laughing at the ridiculous mess they were now in. How did I let this happen?
He raced the rest of the way to her house, pounded up the stairs, half hoping he’d have the heart attack he’d feared just to stop this sinking feeling. ‘Abbi?’ He knocked hard on the front door. He could hear Game of Thrones blaring on the TV inside. This had all gone too far. ‘Abigale?’
He felt like their secret was a rotten appendix. If he didn’t get it out now, it would blow up. He fumbled for the key, opened the door and barged into the living room to find Will crunching on chips, eyes fixed on the screen (no doubt looking forward to an opportunity to see Daenerys in the raw) and Abbi tapping her toes on Will’s hairy legs like nothing was amiss.
Blake muted the TV. ‘We need to talk.’
* * *
Hearing that an ex-sort-of-boyfriend was possibly murdered should have been an entirely negative experience. But Hannah felt a buzz inside, a tingle on her tongue at the six degrees of separation between her and a potential murderer, like it had awakened the Nancy Drew part of her brain that had lain dormant for years. She racked her mind for any clues to Trev’s obvious connection with at least one seedy character. Normal people don’t wind up as disembodied appendages without something overshadowing them: bad debts, jilted lovers, drug cartels.
All of those things seemed too adventurous for such a conservative, community-focused bloke like Trevor Adler. He was benign: a lacklustre lover, a rule-following, level-headed environmentalist. A teacher with integrity. What scandal could have possibly resulted in his becoming fish-bait? She knew he dabbled in politics a while back, before deciding it wasn’t for him, and was passionately opposed to development on the point, a
fact that made him unpopular with some of the business community. But it all seemed so unlikely to have landed him in the drink.
Abbi’s article assumed suicide, and the stats were alarming, but he had been such an advocate for healthy minds and bodies. He’d taught his students to become experts in their own weaknesses and personal strengths, and strive to improve. Kids do well when they can, was his motto. It was simply incongruent that the same man would give up. It must have been accidental. Had he slipped down that slimy boat ramp off his garage? Or maybe he’d been diagnosed with some aggressive cancer and simply preferred to die by his own hand?
Poor Connie Adler – one son lost to mental illness and now this? It felt like this development unveiled a large piece of the puzzle in the mystery bubbling beneath the surface of this town. Hannah returned to her stone-cold steak, to the empty chair before her, and wondered what other key pieces she was missing.
* * *
The next few days since the ‘talk’ at Abbi’s had been as hellish as he’d feared. Blake didn’t like attention, as a rule, and the CIB identifying the victim had brought a flurry of interest in Lago Point once more, and particularly at his police station. They’d sent out a Significant Event message, something they always did when a body was a well known. They rarely bothered for druggos and sex workers – even old men never got the funding for a proper investigation. It was all about the level of publicity a job would attract, and keeping up the illusion of justice for the common folk.