It was a brilliant stroke, the jogger reasoned, to return here for his rebirth. And that’s how he thought of this, his return, his freedom. His resurgence. He couldn’t believe his luck when he found that this beautiful young female jogged here every morning. Alone.
This was perfect. A dream come true, as though it was meant to be. Of course, he told himself, that’s it.
Fate. This is meant to be.
The girl was pulling further away. The jogger increased his pace, came up behind her, the coil of wire unravelling in his hand. All of a sudden he felt as though he’d done this only days ago; the long years of frustration melted into nothingness.
He was exploding inside with his need. Adrenaline surged; the dark power gripped him and rocked him feverishly. It seemed so natural, felt so right. He lunged forward swiftly, slipping the wire around the girl’s neck, pulling the loop tight.
Trish Van Helegen gasped for air. The wire cut into her flesh and squeezed the breath from her throat. Despite the shock and the sudden searing pain, her mind snapped to the alert. She swung her elbows back, searching for her attacker’s rib cage, but the jogger easily sidestepped her arms while maintaining his vice like grip on the wire. This one was going to fight.
He kicked his leg forward, smashing into the back of Trish’s knee, causing her to lose her sense of balance. Her hands went to her throat now in a vain attempt to loosen the garrotte, but the thin steely band was imbedded in the skin, blood seeping from the gash.
The jogger pushed her to the ground and straddled her from behind. He released the tension on the wire slightly. He knew he was playing with fire - after all, this one had guts - but he wanted to play. He deserved to prolong his pleasure after waiting almost two decades.
Trish was weak, disorientated and barely breathing. She felt the loosening of the wire and somewhere, in her mind, came a flash of understanding, a ray of hope. Got to fight this, a voice screamed inside her head. Got to … She tried to push herself up again, using her knees while simultaneously raising her hands to her throat. Her assailant snapped the wire tight once more and pushed his knee into the small of her back, forcing her further toward the ground.
Now she began to writhe, a curious gurgling, whining sound escaping her lips as her body jerked in a series of spasms. They were violent, desperate movements. Then they stopped, her body limp.
The jogger’s excitement was at fever pitch, his own breath coming in short, deep gasps. Still straddling the corpse of his victim, he felt as though he was going to explode. He whipped his head about. The reserve was empty, as it had been on the previous two mornings he’d come to survey the scene. It was early, little chance of anyone happening by.
He pulled the girl’s shorts down, ripped her panties feverishly with his bare hands and thrust himself roughly into her. He shivered with the sweet sensation of relief as the morning light strengthened, streaming through the crossbeams of the branches in spidery patterns.
EIGHT
Todd Lachlan stepped from the car and waved as his best friend, Mark Harris, and Mark’s father drove away in their brand new Holden.
It was late – eight-thirty-five, almost his bedtime. The air was balmy, the first real taste of spring. He bounded up the front steps and through the front door of the modest brick and fibro home.
His mother, Marcia, was vacuuming the lounge room. She smiled and called out to him over the roar of the appliance, ‘How was soccer tonight, love?’
‘Soccer practice Mum.’ Todd shrugged, walking into the kitchen. ‘Fine, I guess.’ A bright, energetic ten-year old, he had an impish grin and a mess of curly brown hair.
‘I’ll be finished here in a minute,’ Marcia called after him.
Todd poured a glass of coke and sloshed it down. Just a couple of days to the weekend and this one he spent with his father. It seemed longer than almost two weeks since the last one and he was longing to spend time with his dad.
The drone of the vacuum cleaner stopped and Marcia Lachlan came into the kitchen. ‘I’ve a thirsty little man here, have I?’
‘Mmm.’ Todd took another mouthful.
‘Bedtime,’ Marcia said, indicating the wall clock.
‘Uh huh.’ Todd grimaced and placed his empty cup on the counter top. His mother placed her arms around his shoulders and they went into his bedroom.
‘I’ve got some news, good and bad,’ Marcia said.
Todd was curious. ‘Yeah?’ He pulled his soccer shirt off over his head.
‘Your Grandpa is quite ill. He’s in hospital with bronchial pneumonia.’
‘What’s that, Mum?’
‘It’s a serious infection in the chest, love. A bit like the flu, but much worse. That’s the bad news. Anyway, we’re going to Brisbane to visit him. We may be there for a week or so. That’s kind’a the good news, because you get a trip away and a few days off school.’
‘When?’
‘We’re going to fly up tomorrow, darling.’
Alarm bells rang in Todd’s head. ‘Tomorrow! But, Mum, that means I won’t be here for the weekend. I’ll miss seeing Dad.’
‘I know, dear. I know how disappointed you must be, but sometimes these things just can’t be helped.’
‘Mum, I don’t want to miss seeing Dad.’ Todd’s voice rose. The one thing that made his temper flare more than anything else was the anxiety he felt over his parents’ separation. ‘Can’t we see Grandpa next week?’
‘Todd, don’t make this any more difficult than it already is. Grandpa is sick now. When you’re going somewhere to support a family member who’s ill you can’t just put if off.’
‘I don’t care. I’m not going!’
‘I won’t enter into an argument over this, Todd. We’re flying up tomorrow and that’s that.’ Marcia headed for the door. ‘And if you’re going to make this so damn hard for me then you can get ready for bed on your own.’
‘You just don’t want me to see Dad,’ Todd screamed after her, ‘because you hate him, don’t you?’
Marcia paused at the door and glared back at her son. ‘You can be terribly cruel sometimes. Of course I don’t hate your father, how could you say such a thing?’
‘Yes, you do. You hate him and you don’t want me to see him!’
Marcia slammed the door behind, tears stinging her hazel green eyes. She feared there was some truth to what Todd said. She wanted what was best for her son, but was it true, did she always jump at any chance to stop him seeing his father?
A large part of Marcia Lachlan wanted desperately to start a new life. That was so hard, though, when she was still tied to her ex-husband by their son. A father and son deserved to spend time together. As a result Marcia found it difficult to break out and begin afresh. She felt as though she were in a rut, working part time five days a week at the local leagues club and sending Todd off to be with Neil every second weekend.
Todd always came home telling her what a fantastic time he had. The weekends spent with Neil were one long boys own adventure. Playing and watching sport, lunches at McDonalds, trips to the movies. Then it was back to her and the drudgery of school, homework, brushing teeth and taking baths.
It damned well wasn’t fair, Marcia thought. She went to the bathroom mirror, wiped the tears from her eyes with a tissue and brushed her long, brown hair. She was thirty-eight years old, carrying a little too much weight around the hips and she didn’t like the hard lines developing around her mouth. She’d met a man at the club, a local electrician. He was an old fashioned type, solid and reliable, a tall man with a big, hearty laugh. She knew he liked her.
She wanted to start again but it was so damn hard …
Much later, Todd crept from his room. The house was dark. He peered into his mother’s bedroom and saw that she was asleep. He watched the slow, rhythmic rise and fall of her chest, listened to her breathing, low and steady.
He returned to his room and called his father’s number on his cell phone. He glanced at his bedside clock as the dial tone
hummed in his ear. It was 11.20.
Earlier, Lachlan had arrived home and listened to the TV news from the adjoining room while he fixed dinner in the kitchen. He lived in a small, one bedroom apartment, first floor, tiny balcony crammed with pot plants left behind by the previous occupant. Lachlan had made an attempt to look after the plants but he had no experience with gardening and he suspected they were beginning to wilt. It was a furnished rental, the furniture of a streamlined, angular style, considered modern ten years before. Now it looked dated, not to mention knocked about.
The news broadcast made no impact on him. The mystery of Brian Parkes’ corpse had been imbedded in his mind all day and it wasn’t going to go away, no matter how hard he tried to shut it out.
He decided on a treat for himself tonight and cooked a pasta, with meatballs, and tomato and basil sauce. He deliberately made it extra spicy. Lachlan had always enjoyed cooking. He found it satisfying and relaxing, the total antithesis of the stress in his job, and probably the last thing anyone expected of a homicide detective.
He’d always got a kick out of cooking for the family on weekends. Yes, on the weekends when you’re home, hardly ever, he could hear Marcia’s taunt, and he was filled with the same sense of sadness that he felt whenever his memories ran free. He thought: at least I didn’t run away for eighteen years like Brian Parkes.
But had Parkes run away? Lachlan fixed himself a Scotch and dry, while he waited for the pasta to boil. From the other room he heard the Channel Nine newscaster launch into a story on the fallen business tycoons from Australia’s history - Bond, Skase, Goward.
And now, post-GFC, the enigmatic Henry Kaplan.
Had Brian Parkes been in financial strife? Lachlan gulped down large mouthfuls of the Scotch and decided to make some garlic bread while he was at it - going the whole hog tonight.
He had put two separate streams of his investigation into place. The first was to find out where Parkes had been in the intervening years. That wasn’t going to be easy. All the items on the body suggested he’d simply stepped from the distant past to the present day in the blink of an eye, and been run down.
Lachlan had circulated Parkes’ photo to every police station in Australia and to the offices of Interpol overseas. If Parkes had been photographed by police for any reason over the years, regardless of what name he might have used, then the computers would match the photo to the police image they had on file. That would yield the first clue to his whereabouts.
If Parkes had vanished for criminal reasons, if there was a side to him his wife knew nothing about, then possibly he’d been in trouble with the law at some time or other. Nevertheless, Lachlan knew it was a long shot.
The second stream of his investigation focused on the instrument of his death. The car. Lachlan was waiting for a detailed forensic breakdown of all substances found on Parkes’ body. A trace, however microscopic, of the car’s paint could help identify the make and model. The layer pattern of paint was often confined to just a few models manufactured between certain dates. The police laboratories kept those paints and patterns on file. Lachlan would then trace any such models stolen prior to the hit and run.
There was no certainty the car had been stolen, it was simply another angle to try. So far this case relied heavily, too heavily, on long shots and that fact made Lachlan wince.
Then there was the question of Parkes’ youthful appearance. So far he’d drawn a total blank on that. And the coroner’s office wasn’t going to be any further help. Without conclusive evidence, that was to be expected. But he wasn’t satisfied about the question of Brian Parkes’ age. And the out-of-date driver’s licence and the post-mortem incision played on his mind.
After his meal he fixed another Scotch and dry and listened to a retrospect of 60’s music on an FM station. So many evenings he should have spent like this with Marcia, feet up, listening to music, one or two drinks. He noted the bitter irony that now he’d left the narcotics work and was keeping more regular hours, he was spending the evenings alone in a rented flat in the inner city suburb of Glebe.
He looked forward to the weekend and his time with Todd - the one thing that would take his mind off the job, help him to relax. He missed Todd and the one thing he hated most, the thing that tore at his insides, was when he and his son parted again at the end of each of these alternate weekends. Lachlan tried to push away the memory of the last such time, but the image was too strong and once more it took centre stage in his mind.
‘Can’t you stay this time, Dad? Please.’ Todd’s voice was plaintive, touched by a sadness no ten-year old should feel.
‘Wish I could, tiger.’ Lachlan punched his son reassuringly on the shoulder.
‘Why don’t you talk to Mum, make up or something. Couldn’t you do that, Dad? Couldn’t you?’
‘We have talked, Todd. Too much water under the bridge. But I’ll see you at your soccer game next week, and the week after that for the whole weekend again.’
‘But I want you to stay with us now.’
‘I’ll always be around, Todd. Even though your Mum and I aren’t together, we’ll always be your parents, we’ll always be there for you.’
‘Todd?’ From inside the house came Marcia’s voice. Footsteps. The exterior light flooded the front porch, and the door opened.
‘Hello, Marcia.’
‘Hello, Neil.’
All so formal now, Lachlan thought, like two acquaintances whose children happened to go to the same school.
‘You take it easy, tiger,’ he told Todd. ‘I’ll see you later.’ Their eyes connected, a mutual resignation between them, and Lachlan left, waving to both of them. In the car, driving home, he fought back tears.
He felt tears well up in his eyes again at the memory. These past few months had been the only times he’d come close to tears since his childhood. The one thing, in all these years, to cut him so deeply was the sad, lost little boy who didn’t understand, nor accept, that he couldn’t have both his parents with him, as a family.
And it’s all because of me, Lachlan thought.
Lachlan was sipping a late night Scotch when the phone rang. At 11.15 at night he didn’t expect to hear his son’s voice on the other end of the line.
‘Dad?’
‘Todd? What’s up?’
‘Nothing.’
‘You sure? It’s very late for you to be up, making phone calls. Where’s your mother?’
‘She’s asleep.’
He sounds distressed, Lachlan thought, and he realised he wasn’t helping matters. He wondered whether his words were slurred. ‘It’s always good to hear from you, tiger, no matter the hour. But I get the impression something’s bothering you. Can I help?’
‘Mum says I can’t spend the weekend with you and it’s our turn, y’know.’
‘I know. Why did your mother say that?’ Lachlan tried to sound positive, assured. His kid needed at least that much from him. But deep inside he was feeling the same as Todd. He didn’t want to miss out on his weekend with his son. What had Marcia cooked up this time? Why was she doing this more and more lately?
‘We’re going to Brisbane to see Grandpa. He’s sick. Mum says he’s in the hospital.’
There was a lump in Lachlan’s throat. ‘I’m sorry to hear that about Grandpa. Your mother’s right about going to see him, he’d love to see you both right now …’
‘But we’ll miss being together.’
‘These things happen. Sometimes we just have to put up with them. I’m going to miss you like crazy, sport.’
‘But why can’t Mum and I wait ‘til Monday? It’s only a few more days.’
Lachlan wasn’t sure how serious the matter might be. He hadn’t heard from Marcia with regard to her father. ‘I’ll tell you what, tige, how about you and I have two weekends together after this, to catch up?’
‘You said that last time and Mum said no.’
‘Yes, but that was then. This is the third time we’ll have missed our weekend, so I�
�m sure we can work something out.’
‘No, you won’t!’ Todd was on the verge of tears, the rage building within him. ‘You never do ‘cause you don’t want to have more arguments with Mum, so you give in. And Mum will say no, I know it, I know it!’
‘Todd, mate, listen …’
‘No, I don’t want to listen to you any more!’ The crash of the phone being slammed down boomed in Lachlan’s ear.
He hung up, feeling helpless. There was no point calling Todd back; there would be no talking to the boy while he was like this. He wanted to talk to Marcia about the situation. No doubt she would have phoned him the following morning, but Todd had beaten her to it. You wouldn’t think a quiet night at home could be so lousy. He decided to pack it in, knowing he needed to sort out the problem as soon as possible the following day.
Hours later, though, he still lay wide-awake in bed. His temples ached. He longed to hold Todd close, comfort him, tell him everything was going to be okay.
But it wasn’t. Nothing was okay. The future was uncertain, his son was hurting, and his sense of failure was like an anchor, pulling him down.
NINE
You never get used to the sight of a dead body. Joe Caseli’s first sergeant had told him that. Now a sergeant himself, Caseli had been called to the scene of a murder only a few times in his twelve-year career but on each occasion he remembered those words. They were the truest he’d ever heard.
He and Constable Lewis Harrap strode across the leafy reserve in the northwest suburb of Dural. The path circling this reserve was a popular one with runners and another jogger named Cal Birkenshaw had made the discovery. Birkenshaw had brought the local police to this spot, but stood back alongside the police car, pointing in the direction where he’d seen the body.
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