by A N Drew
Filsche had been in the job a long time, at least forty years I guessed, being close to retirement. But cases like this could crack the most hardened cops, including Filsche.
"Who found her?” I said.
"Couple of hikers walking through Sherbrooke Forest.”
"At night?"
"Yeah well, not far from a known spot for romantics. Decided to take their love outside,” Harry said.
"I'm in on this one, but I’m also looking for similarities to another case, little girl about the same age. Found in Sherbrooke Forest but a different part. Her name was Jessica Holmes, you called me on it?"
"Yeah, that's right. This girl was found in a creek. I'll send you the GPS details and a map. She’s on the opposite side of the forest to where your girl was found. Might need your hiking boots.”
"What else can you tell me?"
"Uniform’s secured the scene. Forensics are on the way, called out maybe half an hour ago; won't be long." Harry cleared his throat. "He stabbed her. I just hope she went in peace. DS Swanson will know more."
"Get her to call me, will you?"
"Sure thing. I'll send her a text. She'll want to nail this bastard.” said Filsche
"Don't we all, Jack. I'll message you the details like I said. Hope you nail the son of a bitch."
"Yeah, me too. Thanks, Harry,” I said and hung up.
Most people familiar with Sherbrooke National Park knew it was massive. 87,000 acres. I'd need the name of the creek and the nearest access point. Just as well I had my boots in the car; it was time to do some hiking and get to the scene.
Most of the others had left, and the press was gone, only Hicks and Holmberg were hanging around. I walked away and gave Hicks a half-wave.
"Jack,” she said, lifting up her head, and beckoning to me. I walked the few steps back. Holmberg stood beside her, one foot against the wall, watching me.
"Easy on this one. I get it, it's rough, it's a kid. If you need time off, take it. There's already a detective on this one. You can talk to her tomorrow.”
She eyed me, watching for some indication of a mental collapse. She wasn't getting it. Hicks's stare went right through me, and I wondered if she knew about the booze, the nightmares, the fights with Abbie.
"Look, I want this scumbag bad, we all do. I want in early, I’ll talk to Swanson on the scene. I'll do whatever it takes to put him away."
"No, Jack, not whatever it takes. There's always counselling, it's confidential, Jack, you know that, between you and them. I don't need to know about it, except that you're going.” She pressed her lips together, an expression I recognised. She knew I wouldn't accept; like most cops, I wasn't keen on counselling. But she had to offer it.
"Okay, okay. But not yet. Let me put the scumbag away first. I have to do this.” I stared at her. "My Maddy is the same age as Jessica.”
"I know,” she sighed and dropped her head momentarily. "Okay, Jack. Go do what you got to do. But remember, after another murder’s announced, they’ll all be watching us. No more public outbursts, okay? No moments like you had with Richards."
"Yeah,” I muttered and rushed away from Hicks and Holmberg towards the underground car park. Unlocking the car, I started it up and settled in for the drive. Thankfully traffic wasn't too bad, and I mulled things over on the way.
The scumbag had planned this, and most likely abducted and abused before. So far, I had little to go on other than that we’d discussed, taking DNA from Marlin Jones. So, the question remained; how had a weasel that abducted, sexually abused and then murdered little children evaded capture so far? Sweat formed at my temples, and I gripped the steering wheel tightly.
Eventually, following both Harry's directions and the map located on my phone, I pulled into the Sherbrooke Picnic Ground car park and parked at an incline. The usual inky darkness had been alleviated by a temporary spotlight. There were three other cars parked, most likely the detective and a couple of forensic investigators.
I locked the door and opened the boot, where I found a heavy-duty torch, a pair of gloves, and my work boots. I sat on the edge of the car, changed into the boots, threw my dress shoes in, and stuffed the gloves into a pants pocket. I turned on the torch and shut the boot.
Other than the sounds of lyrebirds, the forest sat eerily silent, not even the sound of passing traffic. I aimed my torch at the edges of the cark park and swung it around looking for a sign.
I found one that said, Sherbrooke Falls walk: 1.8km and knew from my map that the creek should be about a kilometre in. With a sigh, I headed off. I used the torch to guide me along a path, really only a narrow section worn down by other walkers. I lifted my knees up high through the wet grass and did my best to push down the surging heat in my chest and the burning in my throat. I wasn’t sure if the cause of the burning was the urge for another drink, or the thoughts of what Jessica Holmes went through before she died.
Instead, I took another deep breath and focused on the impenetrable darkness, and the path in front of me, in a bid to push the thoughts away. It didn't stop the ache in my throat though. After walking for what was probably five minutes but felt like fifty, I saw a spotlight in the distance.
The murder scene.
As I got closer, I saw the tape set up, and the spotlight increased in size. I eventually could make out that it appeared to be on the incline of the bank on the other side of the creek to my left. The noise of lightly rushing water in the creek grew louder.
A figure in a forensic suit took photographs on the bank of the water, another dressed similarly bent over on the other side of the creek.
About three metres behind the doubled-over forensic tech, stood a woman with dark brown hair in what looked like office clothes. Her head hung low, hiding her face.
As the forensic tech stood and walked towards the woman, I made out his face. Jarrod Milne; we'd worked together on another incident, a murdered mother found in a car boot, a horrific case that was solved eight months later. I shivered and stopped a couple of metres from them both. They turned their heads in my direction.
I pulled my badge out of the inside pocket, flipped it open and stopped moving. The female detective was now about ten metres away.
The grass rustled beside her, and she took a small step towards me with her hand out slightly, offering a handshake. I walked slowly towards her and took her hand. "Detective Sergeant Rae Swanson, Maroondah," she said.
"Jack Fletcher,” I said, in a voice rough even to my own ears. I walked closer. “We spoke, in fact… a little while ago, about the murdered girl, Jessica,” I added as we shook hands. I needed to say it to jog her recall. She simply nodded and smiled.
"Jarrod,” I said then, nodding in his direction.
"Jack," Jarrod said, holding a camera in his right hand.
"Did you forget to call me back?” I said to DS Rae Swanson, not letting a simple smile answer why she hadn’t done what she promised.
Detective Sergeant Rae Swanson looked to be in her late thirties, reasonably tall and brown pools of eyes that saw all. Except, how angry I was inside, the heat rising up the back of my neck.
"No.” She swallowed hard, and her face looked like it had collapsed in on itself, flushed and possibly suppressing a whole lot of shit going on below the surface. I felt sorry for the woman now; this was a struggle I recognised.
"Louisa Fein," Rae said, staring at the creek, with fixed unseeing eyes. "Missing for three weeks. Her parents wouldn't give up hope, and I don't blame them. We all hoped she was abducted not murdered. The government pathologist will have to confirm it, but it’s her, I'm sure of it."
"This looks like the case I called you about, Jessica Holmes. Remember—Jessica went missing six days ago. It would have been helpful to speak back then. But now we have to deal with it all over again."
"I’m sorry,” she said. “Tell me about Jessica? I really am interested. It was just—"
I cut her off. I wasn’t interested in hearing the why; we had to move for
ward for the sake of the girls’ families and the safety of all the kids in the area. I told her about Jessica.
"She was found on the opposite side of this forest, in a different clearing. She was seven, and her parents called her in as a missing person four days before she turned up dead. Any idea of Louisa’s cause of death?” I said.
Rae shoved her hands into the pocket of her grey jacket and looked down before lifting her head. Jarrod answered this time.
"Stabbed, through the chest, Nicki, one of the forensics techs, says she was probably sexually assaulted, but we won't know for sure until the autopsy's finished. Judging by the body, I'd say she’s been here only a day or two, and possibly kept somewhere else before death at a guess.”
"Thanks, Jarrod,” I said.
Swanson didn't speak.
"Right, well, I better get back to it, then get her ready for transport,” Jarrod said. He walked slowly back towards the creek.
"How did she disappear?” I said.
Swanson cleared her throat. "Playing at the local park; she was flying a kite with her older sister, and at some point ran off. When her sister went looking for her, Louisa was gone." Swanson's voice quieted at the end of the sentence. I wondered if this job ate at her like Jessica Holmes’ case did with me. I wanted to talk to Swanson, ask if her case gnawed away at her like that, but couldn't get the words out past my sore, strangled throat.
"Which park did she disappear from?” I said.
"Fontane Park in Knoxfield,” said Rae. Knoxfield was about a twenty-minute drive from Sherbrooke Forest, and ten minutes from Jessica’s home in Croydon. The wind whipped Rae’s hair back off her face, and I saw the angles and hollows. I wondered if she'd sleep tonight, after today's visit to the crime scene of another murdered child.
"Jessica Holmes disappeared from a park in Croydon, directly opposite her home,” I said, watching Rae carefully. In the harsh reflection from the spotlights, her face looked hollowed out, with deep rivets and valleys holding lines of shadows, more so than someone in her late thirties at a guess.
She acknowledged my statement with a nod then turned to face me. "So, you think our jobs are all related? The two other girls, Taylor and Bianca?” she said, eyes widening.
"Yes. Jessica and Louisa, especially. They’re all part of Project Beacon now. The park the bodies were found in, and their ages are similar. Suspects don't abuse, abduct and murder children on a whim. Jessica disappeared four days before her body was dumped in this national park. But it sounds like, if it's the same scumbag, he took and maybe killed Jessica first, then Louisa,” I said, scuffing my boot on the dried leaves.
"Yeah, these murders are rough,” she said, not elaborating further. Rae Swanson’s hands were still shoved in her pockets.
"Jessica was sexually assaulted, but I wonder if he took Louisa first; you say she went missing weeks ago. I wonder if he killed her first, but she died quickly, so to satisfy his sick twisted mind, he drew Jessica's killing out and tortured her before he finally raped and killed her."
"It's...Louisa's body. Her dark hair… and she looked just like an angel. The suspect left her body naked, with her hair still in a ribbon, you know? Her hands were crossed and placed over her chest, covering an open, bloodied stab wound…” Her voice faltered like an officer’s voice shouldn’t, but sometimes did. Swanson paused. "I can't forget, it's imprinted in my mind. I mean, how? How can anyone—"
She looked away at the creek, probably so I didn’t see how close she was to cracking up. I carried on as if I hadn’t noticed; she wouldn’t be grateful for sympathy.
"Yeah, child murders do that, Rae. We probably won't forget. Imagine how the families are doing. Yeah, try to focus on the families; that’s what I do," I said. It sounded lame. Swanson didn’t know about my own tortured state of mind, the dreams, the tears, the fall-outs. I was being the big man. And it was working… except inside myself.
Swanson didn't reply.
"This is a serial killer, I'm sure of it. I had a suspect but can't pin him down yet. Can you let me know what you come up with?"
"Yeah,” she said quietly. "I'll wait for the autopsy and let you know. I want to find the killer too, Jack, badly."
"Okay. We’re agreed on that,” I said, softly. “Night, Rae.” I flicked on my torch and turned away to walk back into the forest towards the car park.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Shards of light pierced the curtains and stung my gluey eyes. It was Autumn, but my clothes clung to me, and sweat ran through my hair. My left arm had gone to sleep, hung over the side of the chair, grazing the wooden floor. I shifted in my seat, grimacing. My head pounded.
Another fucking hangover. I checked my watch. 5:10 a.m. I wondered if the images during sleep, of Jessica running away from an orange van had woken me, or the light.
It was a toss-up between another bottle of whiskey, the job, or broken sleep as to the cause of the shitty situation. Might as well go to work, than sit stewing in my own juice.
I showered, changed and threw back a mug of steaming black coffee. I arrived at my desk around 7 a.m. Daylight had only just broken about forty minutes earlier.
I threw my keys on the desk, booted up the computer and wandered towards the kitchen to make coffee. As I slotted a filter in the coffee machine, the sound of a flushing toilet and a rushing tap filtered out from the men's bathroom.
I heard a light sound of padding on carpet, then Garrett appeared in the kitchen.
"Hey, Jack, couldn't sleep either, huh?” he said. He didn’t seem worried about his unshaven face and tousled hair, but then we'd known each other for years and been through some shit together. Besides, appearances were the least of our worries with the current hours we were working.
"Something like that,” I said to my mug of coffee, strong and black.
"Still on the Holmes murder? Kids’ cases are rough." Garrett moved to stand beside me. I watched as he emptied coffee grinds from the scoop into the filter and shut the lid of the machine. Light streamed in through the frosted glass window.
"Yeah.” I turned, folded my arms and leaned against the kitchen bench. Garrett ran one hand through his tousled hair and blew out a breath.
"Sometimes, I wonder why I'm still in this job.” Garrett turned towards the kitchen door, with his back to me. He paused and turned halfway back. "Pam keeps telling me to get help, or resign, but I told her my job is to find the bad guys, not moan about it. She doesn't get it."
I opened my mouth then closed it, thinking better of a sudden spontaneous rush of confession. Obviously, my lack of sleep and abundance of alcohol had contributed to my tendency to hit the accelerator before engaging the clutch. I wanted to tell Ed Garrett about the nightmares, about the drinking, and the trouble with Abbie but decided against it. It wouldn't help either of us.
We'd worked together for years, and I trusted him, but some things, they couldn't be said out loud, they were just too private. Garrett was right, the cases left a mark on us, but the victims’ families had it worse. Until I’d done my job and found the scumbag raping and killing children, there was no time for the luxury of talking about my feelings, about every damn brain fart to some counsellor more interested in taking notes than anything else.
I pushed myself forward and away from the bench and took another step toward Garrett. We were only two feet away from each other. His breath smelled of stale tobacco and too-strong coffee. "I feel like that sometimes too, mate. But someone's got to find these bastards, if only for the family’s sake. Sometimes, I wonder if the job's worth it, but somehow, I keep going. Worst thing we could do is nothing."
Garrett mumbled something under his breath, and I followed as he headed through the kitchen door back towards the arrangement of four laminated grey desks. Garrett landed heavily on his desk chair, positioned opposite mine.
I sat in my blue office swivel chair and pulled it towards the desk. I glared at the paperwork on my right, nestled up beside a bookend. I fucking hated paperwork but resi
sting never helped.
I grabbed the sheaf of papers, ready to go over them again, fresh, and in a new moment in time. Then I decided to put off the paperwork for a bit longer by opening my email program, where there were hopefully more leads from the Crimestoppers program.
"What's the plan today?" said Ed. I spun around. He had his back to me now, clicking on the computer mouse.
I spun back to my tiny screen. "Back to basics. Whenever I got nothing, back to the joy of administration. How about you?"
"Same deal,” Garrett said. "Going through the Crimestopper tips. Always an education."
I scrolled through my inbox. Ninety-eight unread emails. Where the hell did these things come from? I didn't even like to eat spam, let alone read it. I sighed, I'd left it too long between checking them. I scrolled down to the oldest ones and began opening them. A couple of callers had tips about suspicious people walking past their houses, but they ultimately gave little. One lunatic said Jessica Holmes was still alive, he'd seen her walking into school when he walked his dog that morning. I deleted the email. That and the usual memos and internal marketing emails.
Thirteen ignored, one deleted. Who the hell invented email anyway? A torturer?
The crazies and the desperate usually surfaced around Crimestoppers, especially if there'd been a plea in the media for information, but I needed to go through all of them. All I needed was one, one solid lead.
Behind me, Garrett stared at a sheaf of papers, bringing them close to his face. Probably had a night on the piss too.
I scrolled up to more recent Crimestopper emails. Scanning the email subject titles, two words stood out. 'CCTV footage.' I held my breath and sat stiffly, afraid to move. I felt frozen there. CCTV…
The email said a bank manager from a local bank about two kilometres away, at Bank East, had some information. After hearing the story in the news, security guards had found some footage that looked suspicious. A young blonde child, a girl, had been seen running directly outside the bank on the day Jessica Holmes went missing.
I licked my cracked lips and flicked a glance at the photo of Abbie and the girls on my desk. Happier times. Back then, I'd actually had time for them and almost had my shit together.