‘And he’ll get the scent of a body even if it’s not there anymore?’
‘It depends on whether the decomposition process had started or not. If your body was frozen like you told me, he might not get much. If there was a lot of blood he’ll get the scent of that, but you told me your vic suffocated, so again, we might be out of luck.’
‘Unless there are other victims we don’t know about yet,’ Ed said.
It was their best chance of getting Smythe if he was their guy, but it wasn’t something they were hoping for. No one ever wanted to find a body.
Bruno whined again, summing up how they were all feeling.
The cold was starting to seep into Ed’s bones and through the soles of his shoes when Dave finally appeared in the doorway and waved them over.
They trooped down the slope from their car, crunching their way along the gravel driveway before stepping onto the painted red-cement veranda.
‘Your turn,’ Dave said.
‘Anything?’
Dave shook his head in disgust. ‘Nothing much so far. He handed over a shotgun, registered, and an old army pistol, unregistered. We didn’t see anything that looked like a crime scene, unless you count the crimes against fashion in his wardrobe. Johnson’s taken the others to start on the sheds and the rest of the property.’
‘Thanks, where’s Smythe?’
‘He’s been following us around. I think he’s gone with the rest of the team over to the sheds but don’t be surprised if he pops up to watch what we’re up to. He’s pretty antsy about us being in his house. He reckons it’s a set-up.’
‘A set-up? By who?’ Ed said.
‘Whom,’ Russo corrected.
Ed shot her a look.
‘He doesn’t know,’ Dave said.
‘That’s convenient. So he’s got no enemies?’ Ed said.
‘None that’d set us lot onto him he reckons. Anyone he knows who had a beef with him would deal with the issue more directly.’
‘Well, let’s see what Bruno has to say about things. Come on, Bruno.’ Russo pushed past the men and walked into the house with the dog by her side, his fringed tail wagging eagerly from side to side.
Dave and Ed followed. There was a centre hallway with rooms on either side; two bedrooms at the front followed by a bathroom on the left and a lounge/dining room on the right. At the rear of the house was an old-fashioned, lean-to style kitchen and laundry. The house was surprisingly tidy. The furniture was old and worn and it didn’t look like Smythe had spent a single dollar more than he needed to on the place, but it wasn’t the man-cave that Ed had been expecting.
‘Has Smythe got a woman in his life?’ Ed asked.
‘Nothing to suggest it.’
‘Keep an eye out for any signs of another person. If there’s a partner we might be able to interview her as well.’
‘Or him,’ Dave said.
‘Nah, no way is Smythe gay,’ Ed said.
‘Who says? Just because he’s a burly ex-biker doesn’t mean he doesn’t take it up the arse,’ Dave said.
‘Whatever,’ Ed said.
They started to look through the bedrooms, opening drawers and wardrobes and searching for anything that might suggest more than a passing acquaintance with their victims. It didn’t take them as long as they were expecting it to. Billy wasn’t a hoarder. He kept only a few important papers and a handful of photos.
‘Man, this guy really doesn’t like to hold on to the memories, does he?’
‘Nope, not much baggage at all,’ Ed said.
‘Don’t you think that’s kind of weird?’
‘Maybe. Some people don’t like to have a lot of stuff. Too much makes them feel weighed down, claustrophobic.’
‘Thank you Dr Dyson. It could also indicate he’s not big on keeping evidence, stuff that might incriminate him.’
‘Maybe. Keep looking.’
They moved into the bathroom. Brown and orange geometrically patterned wallpaper decorated the walls above orange and white tiles. The tub, washbasin and toilet were all chocolate brown porcelain and the taps were worn gold. The matchbox-sized tiles on the floor were mustard yellow. Ed felt like he’d stepped through a time portal back to the seventies.
‘Imagine this after a big night,’ Dave said.
‘No thanks.’
They worked their way through the drawers. You never knew what you were going to find. It was amazing what killers kept. Smythe could have taken prescription meds from one of the victims. It wouldn’t be the first time a killer had been caught that way.
Sadly, it wasn’t that easy. They’d moved into the dining room and were searching through an impressively ugly teak-veneer buffet and hutch when Russo found them again.
‘Bruno’s not getting anything in here. I’m going to start outside,’ she said.
‘Fine,’ Ed said.
‘Let us know if you find anything,’ Dave said.
‘That’s what I’m here for, isn’t it?’ she grunted before walking into the hallway and striding towards the front door.
‘She hates me,’ Dave said.
‘Just because she’s not falling at your feet doesn’t mean she hates you.’
‘Nah, she hates me. I can tell.’
They found some photo albums in a drawer in the hutch and carefully bagged them to take back to the office. They would need to study them to see if there were any pics of the victims. Group pictures could tell you plenty about a person and their circle of acquaintances.
‘At least we won’t go back totally empty-handed,’ Ed said.
‘Maybe he keeps all the good stuff in the kitchen. A man-sized freezer with Ben Taylor’s wallet conveniently lying under the frozen peas.’
‘I love your optimism.’
They walked back to the hallway and into the final room. There was no freezer, just an old Kelvinator, another relic from the seventies.
‘This thing still works?’ Dave said.
‘They made them to last.’
They were interrupted by Bruno barking.
‘Sounds excited,’ Ed said.
‘Hope it’s not a rabbit.’
They walked over to the back door. Russo was heading their way. She was smiling.
‘Fuck, I think she looks even scarier when she’s happy,’ Dave muttered under his breath.
‘Shut up,’ Ed said. ‘Did you find something?’ he called to Russo.
‘There’s something under the woodpile near the back of the main shed. I haven’t touched anything. It’s your scene.’
‘What’s the rest of the team doing?’
‘Waiting for you to come and look. Smythe’s there too, swearing black and blue that the dog’s got it wrong.’
‘Does that ever happen?’
‘Sometimes, but Bruno’s the best.’
An ember of excitement ignited in the pit of Ed’s stomach. Maybe they’d got lucky. Maybe Smythe was their man.
They traipsed across gravel to the main shed about twenty metres from the back door. The team was standing in a semicircle around the woodpile which was stacked against the shed. Smythe was off to one side. His face was flushed and he was moving backwards and forwards in agitation. He watched them approach, then walked up to Ed until he was only inches away from him. He waved a finger under Ed’s nose.
‘This is bullshit. I know it, you know it. I’m going to sue the arse off your department for harassment.’
‘Step back please, Mr Smythe. The easier you make it for us to do our job the sooner we’ll be out of your hair.’ Ed stepped around him and walked over to the team. ‘Are we ready to go?’ he said.
A small mousy-looking officer from Johnson’s team waved a camera at them. ‘I’ll take photos of everything you do.’
Ed nodded. He and Dave snapped on gloves. ‘Have we got a clean tarp? I want to lay the wood we take off the pile on a clean surface in case there’s evidence we can’t see,’ Ed said.
Johnson hustled back to the cars and returned with a blue t
arp a few minutes later. He unfolded it and spread it on the ground next to the woodpile. Slowly, they started to remove the wood and lay it on the tarp in neat rows. Bruno whined and fussed. Russo shushed him and gave him a treat.
‘I don’t even use the bloody woodpile anymore. I got rid of my combustion heater last year. The firebox burned out. I’ve got gas now. I haven’t been near that pile in over twelve months,’ Smythe said.
They ignored him and kept working. Despite the cold, beads of sweat started to form on Ed’s forehead. He worked slowly and methodically. He hoped that if there was a body it was close to the top. Fifteen minutes passed with no result.
Ed stood back and stretched to ease the knots in his back and shoulders. With every moment that passed his hopes were sinking. There was no odour. If there was a body then it was a fresh one that only Bruno could smell. Ed looked over at Russo; he could see the tension on her face.
‘Hey!’ Dave yelled.
Ed’s attention snapped back to the pile.
‘You got something?’
‘Looks like it.’
Ed walked over to his partner. Where he’d removed the last piece of wood he’d exposed something that looked like denim.
‘Jeans?’
‘Yeah, with something pliable inside them,’ he said, poking at the material. ‘I reckon we’ve got ourselves another victim.’
‘Fuck! It wasn’t me! If there’s someone buried there it’s a set-up! I didn’t kill anyone!’ Smythe shouted.
Ed turned to Johnson. ‘Please take Mr Smythe inside the house until we’re finished here.’
Johnson and another officer disappeared inside with Smythe. His denials echoed across the yard until they shut the door.
Ed and Dave turned back to the woodpile and worked in silence for another ten minutes. With every piece of wood they removed it became more and more obvious they had another victim. With infinite care they worked their way up the legs of the jeans, reaching a dirty yellow top. The thick, well-muscled torso told them it was a man.
They finally uncovered the face, or more accurately what should have been the face. Ed gagged and turned away. He could hear the quick intake of breath from the officers close enough to see the victim. Ed forced himself to look again. The face was mottled and bloated, the eyes bulging and the tongue swollen and protruding. Whoever it was, there would be no chance of identifying him from his appearance.
CHAPTER
40
Smythe demanded a lawyer as soon as they got him back to their office. He’d kept up a constant monologue in the back of the van, denying all knowledge of the victim and how the body had got into his woodpile.
They put him in a small interview room while they waited for his lawyer to arrive and watched him through the one-way glass. The room held four chairs and a small table and nothing else. Smythe twitched and fidgeted in his chair and finally got up and paced around the small space. His agitation didn’t tell them a great deal. Innocent or guilty, being arrested for murder was guaranteed to elicit a stress reaction in most people.
The lawyer arrived an hour later and demanded a short private interview with her client. Another half-hour passed before they started to question him. They’d only been at it for five minutes when there was a knock on the door of the interview room.
Ed paused the recording and he and Dave stepped into the corridor. It was Janice.
‘You got a hit?’ Dave asked.
‘We did. Took a while for the crime scene team to finish at Smythe’s place. The pathologist has only been back with the body for twenty minutes. He got a hit on the fingerprints straightaway. Want to guess who it is?’
‘Monaghan?’ Ed said.
‘Yep, you got it. Pathologist reckons he’s been frozen too, just like Taylor.’
‘Any thoughts on the cause of death?’ Dave asked.
‘Nope, he wasn’t willing to speculate.’
‘All right, thanks Janice,’ Ed said.
They went back into the room. Two sets of eyes locked on them.
‘Seems you have some explaining to do, Mr Smythe,’ Ed said.
‘What the hell does that mean?’
His lawyer, a fresh-faced brunette who looked about twenty, laid a hand on his sleeve.
‘If you have a question for my client, then ask it,’ she said.
‘When we first visited you at the NA meeting hall the week before last we asked you whether you recognised a number of names. Do you remember that?’
‘I remember you asking about Ben Taylor. I don’t remember the others.’
‘Paul Jenkins, Roslyn MacDonald and Sarah Jones,’ Dave said.
‘You didn’t really tell us the truth when you said you didn’t know any of them, did you?’ Ed asked.
‘I didn’t know them.’
‘And yet you did time with Paul Jenkins and got into a fight with him that earned you an extra six months for assaulting a prison guard.’
‘If I saw him at the centre I didn’t recognise him. I don’t remember seeing him.’
‘If you saw him? Let’s talk about who you did and didn’t see for a minute. You said you didn’t have anything to do with the Tuesday meeting that Taylor attended.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Don’t you participate in the special group sessions that Dr Metzger runs?’
‘The other leader and I share the load.’
‘Dr Metzger told us that Ben Taylor and other members of the Tuesday group attended those sessions.’
‘Yeah, maybe. Taylor’s been missing for ages. I don’t remember whether he attended the groups back then. I definitely don’t remember Jenkins being at any of them.’
‘What about a guy called Carl Monaghan?’ Dave asked.
‘Monaghan? Why is that name familiar?’
‘He attacked Dr Metzger.’
‘Right, Carl. Yeah, I remember him. He went to some of the groups I attended, I think.’
‘Did you know him well?’
‘No, I didn’t.’
‘Then how come we just found his body in your woodpile?’
By the time Ed got home it was well past 10pm. He ate his way through the dried food in his pantry, stuffing down a packet of crisps and a handful of crackers bordering on stale. He was so hungry he didn’t care. If they’d been mouldy he probably would have scraped the blue bits off and kept on eating.
He was so wound up from the day’s events that he knew sleep would be out of the question so he watched some mind-numbing late-night TV before finally throwing himself into bed in his boxer shorts at around two.
The minute he put his head on the pillow an image of Cass popped into his head. A rush of guilt made his eyes snap open. He stared into the darkness. He’d meant to try ringing her again. He should have made the effort. She’d been attacked by her stalker and he’d not even bothered to find out if she was OK. He couldn’t even pretend that he hadn’t heard. Her mother had probably told her about the flag on her name.
He couldn’t seem to get it right when it came to Cass. He was always doing the wrong thing or behaving badly. What was it about her that brought out the worst in him? He wanted to be the best he could be for her but he always managed to fall short. He sighed and turned over. He would ring her first thing in the morning. She’d be glad to hear that they’d brought Smythe in, assuming she’d answer his call.
When Ed’s alarm went off he would have done a deal with the devil for another few hours of sleep but he had to get his butt back to the office. The pathologist had promised to give the autopsy on Monaghan top priority and with a bit of luck, the preliminary results would be in. There’d been no obvious signs of cause of death: no wounds, no peri-mortem bruising. Knowing how he’d died would help with questioning Smythe. They’d interrogated him for hours the day before and they were still none the wiser about how or why he’d done it. He refused to admit anything.
Ed hurled himself in and out of the shower without bothering to shave. With a coffee in one hand he picked u
p the phone and called Cass. It was early, she’d probably be pissed off with him for waking her, but if he didn’t call her now another day would wing its way past and he’d be feeling even more guilty. She answered on the second ring.
‘Cass, it’s Ed, sorry for ringing so early.’
‘I was awake.’
He could hear the hostility. She was still pissed with him. He rushed to fill the silence. ‘I just wanted to see how you were. I heard they arrested your stalker.’
‘They did, his hearing was yesterday. They refused him bail.’
‘Who was he?’
‘You don’t know?’
‘No.’
‘Claire’s brother.’
‘No way!’
‘He’s some kind of religious nutcase. Took it into his head that the world needed to be cleansed of people like me.’
He wasn’t sure what to say. He wished he didn’t have to go to work so he could go over and see her. She sounded like she needed some company. ‘I would have called sooner but we were on a raid yesterday. We’ve arrested Smythe.’
‘I thought you weren’t convinced about him?’
‘We found a body in his woodpile.’
‘He really was your guy?’
‘Looks like it, nothing confirmed yet.’
‘Who’s the body?’
‘A guy called Carl Monaghan.’
‘Has Smythe confessed?’
He paused. The call was taking a turn he hadn’t intended. She was going to think he’d called to ask for her help, that he wanted her to touch Monaghan and see what had happened to him. It hadn’t even crossed his mind until now.
‘Not yet.’
She let the silence stretch. He could imagine what she was thinking. He felt like a schmuck for not waiting until after they’d finished with Smythe to call her.
‘Cass, I didn’t ring for your help.’
‘Right.’
‘I just wanted to know how you are.’
She sighed. ‘Do you really think I’m that dumb?’
‘No, I don’t, but I really didn’t.’ Ed cringed inwardly.
‘You know what, it doesn’t matter. I can’t do this anymore, Ed. You can’t seem to make up your mind whether you want me around or not. One minute it’s too hard, the next minute you want to try again and we’re having sex. Last week you wanted me to use my gift to help you, Tuesday you were yelling at me for using it. I can’t deal with your shit as well as my own.’
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