She raised her eyebrows. ‘So you weren’t really at your mother’s?’
His cheeks turned redder.
‘How’d it go?’
‘Not really my type.’
‘And what is your type, Harry?’
‘Dunno. Just somebody nice.’ He looked at his hands. ‘And small.’
‘Small!’ She laughed.
‘Well, not small — you know.’ He looked up at her eyes. ‘Just not bulky, or solid.’
‘Do you know Carla Flanagan?’
‘The new cop?’
She nodded.
‘Yeah. Why?’
‘What do you think of her?’
‘She’s all right.’
‘Do you think she’s attractive?’
‘S’pose.’ He shrugged. ‘Bit big, but. Solid.’
She laughed again.
Harry poised the bottle over her glass. ‘More wine?’
‘Does a koala shit in the … Where do they go?’
Zippy had fallen asleep. He kicked his paws through a dream. She ran a finger absently around the rim of her glass, thinking about Aidan’s nightmares. He’d never told her exactly what they were about: just something to do with the raid at Laurie Hunt’s house. The Homicide Squad had been tipped off that a man wanted for several drug-related murders was residing there — they weren’t even after Hunt. Something had gone wrong; they’d gone in too soon. Hunt had shot dead Aidan’s partner, Drew Borchardt, and then shot Aidan, who had returned fire. Hunt had been related to some cop at the time, so it was kept quiet, no names mentioned in the news.
Brigitte remembered opening the front door that morning to the two uniformed officers standing on her doorstep. A memory within a memory: Aidan standing in that same place four years earlier, telling her that her first husband, Sam, had been killed in the line of duty. The two officers had the same remorseful looks on their faces as Aidan had had.
Time folded like a paper fan.
She remembered, strangely, noticing how mild for autumn the weather was on the morning Aidan was shot: it would have been a nice day for taking the kids to the park. And then the rush, the blur, the disinfectant smell, the cruel lighting and anaemic colourlessness of everything in the hospital. The dull electronic droning, and the blips of the monitors and machines that had kept Aidan alive.
She shivered. Zippy whimpered. ‘What do you think they dream about, Harry?’
‘Dunno.’ He was looking at her finger on the glass. ‘Probably chasing cats.’
‘No cats allowed on the island. Bloody koala conservation program.’
‘In a past life.’
‘Do you believe in reincarnation?’
‘Turn it up.’ He scrunched his head to his neck, creating three chins.
‘I think certain souls are connected and reincarnated time and time again, crossing ages.’ Where was Maree Carver’s soul now?
‘Really?’ Harry said. ‘Sounds like Cloud Atlas.’
‘You’ve read that!’ She was impressed.
‘When you’re dead, you’re dead, love. Like Tom Waits says: “Dirt in the Ground”.’
‘I didn’t know you liked Tom Waits, Harry.’
He tilted his head. ‘Lotta stuff you don’t know about me.’
When they’d finished the wine, Brigitte scraped back her chair and walked across to the pantry for another bottle. She paused at the breakfast bar on the way back, pressed the button on her phone, slid her finger across the screen, and searched for Tom Waits in her music, connected it to the speaker.
‘This song was in Twelve Monkeys,’ Harry said.
‘God, I’d forgotten about that film.’ She sat next to him. ‘Was that the one with Gwyneth Paltrow’s head in a box?’
‘Nah. That’s something else with Brad Pitt.’
She opened the bottle and poured. ‘“Goin’ Out West” was in Fight Club.’
‘Oh, yeah — the bar scene. I love that film.’
‘I love Brad Pitt.’
‘People used to tell me I looked like him when I was young.’
She lowered her head and rubbed at a mark on the table, trying not to laugh. Lucky she didn’t have a mouthful of wine. She cleared her throat. ‘“Underground” was in Robots.’
‘You got me there.’ Harry sipped his wine. ‘Is that scar on your forehead from the car accident when you were young?’
She couldn’t remember telling him about that; maybe Aidan had. She shook her head.
The wind blasted a sheet of rain from nowhere against the back door. The lights flickered, and they looked at each other. Zippy twitched in his sleep. A few further sheets pounded the door, and then the rain settled to a downpour.
‘I am a bit spooked, Harry.’
‘Yeah.’
‘I don’t think she drowned.’
‘Nah.’
‘Aid’s worried about something, but he won’t tell me what. He’s acting like we’re at risk, but why would we be?’
‘Everyone’s a bit on edge.’
‘Cop car out the front, the gun.’ More than on edge.
‘How’d the shooting lesson go, anyway?’
‘Couldn’t do it. I freaked out. Stupid.’
‘You’re not stupid, Brig.’ He finished his drink. ‘The gun’s nowhere the kiddies can find it?’
‘No. Locked away in the bedroom.’
‘Be right. Aid’ll sort it all out.’ Harry touched her shoulder.
11
The photocopier in the stationery room wasn’t working. A light on the front flashed. Out of paper? Jammed? Something went wrong every time Brigitte used the fucking thing. She checked the trays. Plenty of paper, not jammed. She pressed some buttons, but the light continued flashing. She’d have to get Kumiko to help her.
Aidan’s voice boomed, greeting the staff out in the office: ‘Cam, Kumiko, Johnno … and?’
‘Tate,’ said Tate.
‘The firebug’s doing some photocopying,’ Cam said to him.
‘No, I’m not.’ Brigitte stood in the doorway. ‘Photocopier’s not working again.’
‘Funny it only ever goes on the blink when you use it. You didn’t set fire to it, did you?’ Cam said. ‘Thought I told everybody to hide the matches.’
So predictable. Brigitte ignored him, and turned to Aidan, who was smirking, too. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘In the neighbourhood. Got time for lunch?’
She looked at Cam.
‘A quick lunch,’ he said. ‘Two voiceovers for you to write this afternoon.’
‘An hour,’ Aidan said. ‘Don’t want somebody in here about workplace relations, do you?’
Outside, the sky was grey. A pack of youths walked past as Brigitte and Aidan got into an unmarked Commodore.
‘Fuckin’ wog pig,’ one of them said. ‘Shoulda been you in the lake.’
Brigitte frowned; Aidan ignored the taunt. Another of the youths spat on the windscreen. Aidan turned on the water and wipers. ‘Always nice to be respected in the community.’
He started up the car, indicated, and pulled out into the road.
‘How’s the investigation going?’ she said.
‘Which one?’
She shot him a sideways glance.
‘Depends on tomorrow’s paper test.’
She could play ‘cop speak’, too: ‘And what were the Coroner’s findings into the death with inquest?’
‘Hasn’t been done yet.’
‘Results back from the forensics?’
‘It’s not CSI, Brig.’
‘SVU? NCIS?’
It didn’t get a laugh. ‘Whatever. I can’t believe you still watch that shit.’
She tried again: ‘You’re a bit broody at the moment, McNulty.’
‘That was
The Wire.’
‘I know.’ Another Tom Waits theme song. She’d have to tell Harry. ‘Was McNulty Italian?’
‘Irish.’ He checked in the rear-view mirror as he changed lanes. ‘Williams is setting up community vans and giving orders to his task force.’
‘Why aren’t you in charge?’
‘Not Homicide anymore. Bottom of the food chain.’
She was unsure if it was sarcasm or grief she heard in his voice.
She gripped her seat as he ran the red at the last set of traffic lights in town. He drove down the creek road, and parked in a secluded spot under a big eucalypt on the embankment.
‘Salad with cheese or ham?’ He unbuckled his seatbelt, and reached for the plastic bag on the back seat.
‘Cheese.’
‘New bakery’s not bad. Got you an orange juice, too.’
She looked down at the creek. The water frothed white over a section of rocks upstream, and then flowed dark grey-green. How deep was it? How cold? She shivered and turned to him. He was staring at the creek, too, a tiny tic in his left eyelid. She took the plastic bag from his hands, placed it on the floor, and kissed him. When she opened her eyes, his were already open — looking in the direction of the eucalypt. She frowned when he got out and strode down to pick up something that looked like a takeaway food box. He threw it in the bin before walking back up the embankment.
‘What was that?’ she said as he sat back in the car.
‘Nothing. Just rubbish.’ He took a bottle of hand sanitiser from the console and applied some.
He was jiggling his leg again. She leaned across and put her hand on it. He clicked the doors locked; she took that as a hint, and kissed him again, harder, placed a hand on his groin.
‘Don’t,’ he said.
‘What you need …’ She fumbled with the button of his trousers, unzipped them, and slid a hand inside.
‘Stop it, Brig.’
‘… is something to take your mind off things for a while.’ She lowered her head and, with her free hand, released the lever to lean back his seat.
She paused for a moment and looked up sideways. His eyes were closed, lips slightly parted. No flinching now.
As the urgency in his body — as well as hers — increased she moved her hand and mouth faster. Her skirt rode up; she spread her knees apart as far as she could, given the confines of the Commodore. She guided his hand down between her legs, and her fears started melting away. Sex always made things better. One of her knees smashed against the radio.
‘Stop,’ Aidan said as he pulled up his hand. She didn’t stop, so he pushed her away.
The car jolted and her head crashed against the steering wheel.
‘Fuck!’ Aidan slammed his foot on the brake. Too late. She’d knocked the gear lever to ‘Drive’ and the eucalypt had already stopped the car. ‘Brigitte!’
As he got out to survey the damage, she straightened her clothes and held the bottle of OJ to the lump forming next to the faded, silver scar on her forehead.
‘Broken headlight, a dent in the bumper.’ The car rocked as he swung back into the driver’s seat. ‘How am I supposed to explain this?’
‘Aren’t you the boss down here? Don’t need to explain.’
She expected a squeaky laugh, at least a half-smile, but he shook his head — soon those frown lines would become permanent.
‘Why don’t you ever listen!’ He thrust his seat forward.
The sharp edge to his voice hurt almost as much as the flinch. She scrunched up her body and looked out the window.
He softened his tone, but it was too late. ‘Your head OK?’
She nodded and tickled the roof of her mouth with her tongue, which was supposed to stop tears from reaching your eyes.
12
Mike the butcher greeted Brigitte and Ella as the door tinkled. Brigitte screwed up her nose. She hated the smell, the meat, the blood on Mike’s apron. She preferred the unscented, cryovacked meat at the supermarket, going to Mike’s only to buy cheap bones for Zippy.
‘Any update on the lady in the lake?’ Mike said.
Wasn’t that a Raymond Chandler novel? Brigitte shook her head.
‘Cops been questioning all the shopkeepers for some reason.’
‘Just normal procedure. They need to gather as much information as they can.’
‘Waste of time.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Wasn’t a local did it.’
‘What are you suggesting?’
‘Foul play. Reckon it was the husband.’
Mike had obviously read more Chandler, and watched more CSI, than she had.
‘You after dog’s bones?’
She nodded.
‘Got rump on special. Premium Black Angus Grass Fed. Very lean.’
‘OK, I’ll get a kilo of that too, please.’
‘Lot cheaper if you buy in bulk. For ninety bucks I’ll give you seven kilos.’
‘That sounds like a lot.’
‘You got a big freezer? I’ll make it ten kilos for a hundred.’
She twisted her mouth.
‘Can’t do better than that, ten bucks a kilo.’ He started piling up steaks. ‘You coming to the council meeting about the ferry fees?’
‘Don’t think I can get away.’
He winked as he sharpened his knife on the steel.
Brigitte took a bowl of corn chips and Cloud Atlas outside, and sat on the porch couch to read. In part two, the nineteenth-century journal was found by a 1930s composer. Separate stories, different styles, but somehow connected? Zippy lay at her feet. The last of the lazy golden sunlight streamed through the eucalypts at the fence-line. The kids were imprisoning creatures in their bug catcher. A rump steak stew was simmering on the stove. Domesticity. Joan would be appalled.
The annoying multicoloured bird she’d named Cheeky perched on an arm of the couch. He took two hops and then flew at her. She screamed and shoed him away. Zippy lifted his head and barked, but nothing would get rid of Cheeky — except a corn chip. She threw one for him, knowing he’d attack her again for more in a minute.
Zippy heard Aidan’s car first; his ears pricked up before it crunched up the driveway. He took off, barking madly.
Aidan swore as Zippy knocked him against the broken gate. Cheeky dive-bombed Brigitte’s head with renewed vigour. She threw him another chip.
‘So at one with nature,’ Aidan said as he stepped onto the porch.
She didn’t bother asking what was in his pocket.
Ella sprinted across the yard and followed him inside.
Brigitte heard him say: ‘Something smells good in here.’
Ella told him, ‘The husband killed that lady in the lake.’
‘What?’
There was a crash from the kitchen; Aidan swore and Ella giggled.
Brigitte put her book down and went inside to see what was going on. Aidan was barefoot, hopping in front of the fridge. The freezer door was open, a package of half-frozen steak on the floor.
‘What have you been telling Ella?’
‘Nothing. She just heard Mike gossiping.’
‘What’s all this in the freezer?’
‘Premium Black Angus Grass Fed steak.’
‘I thought we were supposed to be eating less red meat.’ He stopped hopping and examined his foot. ‘Don’t let Phoebe see.’
‘Why not?’
‘She’s vegetarian, remember?’
‘That won’t last.’
‘Stop being so hard on her. She’s a good kid.’ He picked up the steak, put it back in the freezer, and re-stacked everything so it fitted in neatly. ‘Why so much?’
‘On special at Mike’s. Lean and cheap.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘Same way I like my men.’ It won her a half-smile as he took out a
beer. ‘So, no news?’ she said.
‘Gunna be a media conference in Melbourne tomorrow.’
‘You’re not going down?’
‘No. But speaking of which, how’s your head?’
Touché. ‘Fine.’ She lifted his hand that was holding the cold beer, touched it to the bruise. ‘Or at least that’s what you used to tell me.’
He let that one go through to the keeper, pulled away, and went to the lounge room.
She tasted the stew and screwed up her face. Really tough. Bloody Mike. She heard the couch creak and Aidan turn on the TV news.
The reporter said: ‘Detective Senior Sergeant Steven Williams of the Homicide Squad has revealed that, after reviewing the crime scene, celebrity chef Maree Carver may have been murdered.’
Brigitte spat the unchewable meat into the bin, and rushed in to watch.
They cut from the agent’s photo of Maree Carver to footage of Steve Williams on the Paynesville foreshore. ‘The circumstances around Maree’s death are suspicious. She may have met with foul play.’ The wind ruffled his shirt, but not his crew cut. ‘Maree had been dining with local Gip TV staff at the Bateau House restaurant on The Esplanade in Paynesville on Thursday the seventh of March. It should have been a short walk to the Mariner’s Cove motel where she was staying, just 350 metres up the road. At about 10.30 she declined an offer from a male Gip TV staff member to walk her to the motel, insisting she would be fine alone.
‘Ms Carver had consumed some alcohol, but by all accounts she had not done so excessively.
‘I’ve been told by local residents that people would usually feel safe in that area at night. Having said that, we don’t know what happened to Maree between the time she left the restaurant and her body being discovered in McMillan Strait.’
Fade to footage of police vehicles and tape flapping along the foreshore. And then Maree Carver’s distraught husband, Michael Gorr, explaining why he hadn’t reported his wife missing when she didn’t answer her phone on Thursday night. ‘She was frequently away from home on work trips and often didn’t answer her phone. I didn’t think anything of it,’ he said. ‘I rang her mobile repeatedly on Friday morning.’
And back to the reporter. ‘Mr Gorr, who described his wife of ten years as his “best friend”, said he believed her phone was out of range or had run out of battery.
Dead in the Water Page 6