“I can’t call the cops. There are cops in the pay of the people who are holding him. If I tell them, the bad guys might find out and then they’ll just move him.” I brooded for a moment on the mess Ronnie was in. Then a thought occurred to me. “Can the cops do what you just did? Hack his history?”
“Of course, but they won’t. To do anything like that they need a warrant. Finding out where his phone is would be easy and they’d get the warrant without any problem but the SIM card is out, so they either need to do what I did – which is illegal and involves hacking a foreign corporation, so no warrant unless they can persuade the US to cooperate – or they get a warrant to review his phone’s metadata. That would give them all they need but it will take time. Do they know he’s missing?”
“Since early this morning.”
“So it’s probably still grinding around in the bureaucracy. It could be a long time before they find out what they need.”
“So you should tell me and I should get going, hey?”
She put down her fork and sat back, her salad barely touched. She picked up her drink, crossed her legs and studied me. I realised, a little late, that her looks were deceptive. She looked like a teenage girl and she acted so sweet and deferential, that I could forgive myself for being fooled. She wasn’t at all like that, really. Beneath the meek appearance was a quiet strength, a self-confidence that only revealed itself in the occasional glance or gesture. I found myself wondering about her family. She had the self-assuredness of a young woman who came from money. Lots of it.
She asked, “Aren’t there any cops you trust?”
I dragged my thoughts back to the problem at hand. Bertolissio was clearly sympathetic but, while it was one thing passing information to us, it was another running a raid on a bikie stronghold. She would need to get other people involved, probably get permission from Reid. Once other cops were involved, Opperman’s people would be all over it and Ronnie would be dead. I shook my head.
With a start, I noticed the sandwich in my hand with at least two bites out of it. I hadn’t even been aware I’d picked it up. Jeez, I was losing it. I took another bite. I might as well finish it now.
“There’s one,” I said after a while, realising that Karen had the trick of sitting quietly and letting me take my time. “She’s a bit brighter than the rest and kinda cool, but I don’t know if she’d be willing to risk her life and keep the rest of them in the dark.”
“You could ask her.”
“I don’t know how, not without putting her job at risk.” I had no idea if the police monitored their officers’ phones but, if they did, and there were recordings, or records of text messages, an enquiry afterwards would find that I’d asked her and she’d be an accomplice to whatever shit went down. As much as I could use her help, I didn’t want to do that to her.
“You like her,”
I smiled, remembering Ronnie’s teasing on the subject. “I do. So would you, I think.”
“Send her a coded message,” she said.
“Yeah.” I was dismissive but it wouldn’t have been a bad idea for us to have arranged a few secret signals beforehand. It would certainly be handy about now. “Look, it’s just me. Can I have that address now.”
She read it off her phone for me. I looked it up and it turned out to be a place in a strip of shops in Chermside. It was a suburb I knew only because of the huge shopping complex there and because I’d passed through it a few times driving north on vacations. It wasn’t an up-market area and I imagined any shops in the shadow of that mega-mall would be doing it tough. I called up a street view of the address and it all made sense. The building was a two-storey shop, with its windows bricked up and the front painted black. The two dozen motorbikes parked in front of the building would have given it away even without the red devil logo stencilled above the door.
“What’s wrong?” Karen asked.
“Nothing,” I said, putting my phone away. “I should get you back to work now, if you’ve finished.”
“You saw something.”
“Yes, I did. But that’s not your problem.” I stood up. We exchanged phone numbers – just in case. “Thank you for… helping out. And for...” She stood up, too, moving with a natural elegance. Or was it something she’d learned at a fancy private school? “You may not believe this but this chat we’ve just had, is probably the nicest time I’ve spent in the past three weeks.”
She gave me a sad look. “I believe it.”
I had Dicko drive her back to the office while I finished my sandwich and had another lemon, lime and bitters by the pool. The phrase lull before the storm came into my head and wouldn’t go away. When Dicko got back I got into his hideous car and we headed north in heavy traffic. We stopped at a Hungry Jack’s burger place in Lutwych, just short of where we were headed, and sat in the car park. The windows were all down but it was stinking hot inside the car. Dicko apologised for his useless aircon.
“You should go in,” I told him. “Grab some food, enjoy the cool. I need a few minutes.”
“Was that your girlfriend then, the Asian chick?”
“Nah. My girlfriend is dead.” His grin turned into a frown, as if he couldn’t tell if I was joking. “Karen is my employee.” That seemed to resolve his doubts. The grin came back.
“Right-o, mate. No need to explain. I’ll be off then. Catch you later.”
I watched him go. He walked with a carefree swagger that made me feel old.
I got out my phone. I was going to send a message to Bertolissio. When she’d visited me at my unit, I’d noticed a newspaper in her handbag, folded back so she could do the crossword. I distinctly remember the word “Cryptic” in black letters above the grid. I wasn’t a cryptic crossword puzzler myself but I’d struggled with enough of them to have a fair idea how to construct a cryptic clue. So this would be the code I could use to communicate with her. And my guess was that none of the DI Reid types she worked with would have any idea what the solution would be, even if they saw it. All the way out here, I’d been working on it in my head. Now I just needed to get the wording right.
I started composing a text message. “DS Bertolissio, as a fellow crossword enthusiast, I wonder if you could help with a couple of clues that have been bugging me? The first goes: Beat with pipe and sounds like you inside a gathering place (9). The second goes: Di and schemer all tangled up in the suburb (9). You alone are my best hope for a very quick solution.”
I read it over half-a-dozen times, each time feeling more stupid. I should just call her. I was probably being paranoid about the cops recoding calls. Yet how could I know, in these days of total state surveillance? I didn’t trust the government not to be spying on its own cops. The clues were probably awful and really easy for someone who did lots of crosswords. But that was a good thing, right? I didn’t want her not to solve them, just not anyone else.
I hit the send button.
Agitated, I got out of the car and went into the burger joint. Dicko was at a table with a trayful of debris flicking and clicking at his phone. It was blissfully cool and I stood for a moment appreciating it. Dicko spotted me and waved me over.
“Hey man. You gonna get something?” I shook my head. He picked up a giant beaker, half full of dark, fizzy liquid and waved it at me. “Sit down. I’ve nearly finished.”
I nodded towards the phone. “You haven’t told anyone what you’re doing, or where you are, have you?”
He looked a bit shifty or, should I say, a bit more shifty. “Nah, mate. Just, you know, chatting.”
“Only, if things go badly today, there are some real heavy types who might think that you driving me around is a good enough reason to break your legs. Do you know what I’m saying?”
He nodded. “Yeah.” Then shook his head. “Nah. Hey, no-one told me this would be, like, dangerous or something. Maybe I should be getting paid more, hey?”
“You’re getting paid plenty. There’s no danger for you as long as you don’t go telling the wor
ld who you’re with and what you’re doing. I did ask you not to.”
“Yeah, well...” He looked at his phone doubtfully. “Just a sec.” He spent the next two minutes scrolling up and down his Facebook timeline, deleting posts. When he’d finished, he looked up and grinned at me. “No harm, no foul, hey?”
“I need to get going.”
“Yeah, right-o.” He gulped down his drink and we set off. We got in the garish car and he drove us on up Gympie Road. I navigated to the address Karen had given me using my phone. When we reached the strip of shops, I got Dicko to drive slowly past the Devils’ clubhouse. There were a few bikies in the street outside, between the crowd of gleaming motorbikes and the black shopfront: big, bearded men in denim jeans and black boots with tattooed arms and necks. My stomach clenched at the sight of them. The door was closed, which seemed ominous but probably meant nothing more than that they had the air on inside. I’d have liked to have lingered or gone round again but Dicko’s car was so distinctive any odd behaviour would be noticed.
We took the first turning past the clubhouse and then the next. According to the map on my phone, we were directly behind the repurposed shop. It was a quiet suburban street filled with smart-looking houses all crammed together on tiny blocks. I told Dicko to stop. The clubhouse had a concrete drive at the side of it. I had no idea what went on in a bikie’s clubhouse but in my mind it was like a gentleman’s club for degenerates – with a bar and maybe even food. My guess was that it took deliveries round the back. If I could sneak through one of these houses, I’d come to some kind of a yard behind the building – probably with a fence, probably also with a dog. If I wanted to get in there to take a look, it would not be easy. I identified the house that backed onto the clubhouse, the one I needed to get through, and checked it out for fences, gates and dogs. It didn’t seem to have any of these.
“OK, Dicko, let’s go. Take me to the Westfield mall.”
When he parked, we walked together into the massive shopping complex.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“Just getting a few things. Fancy a coffee?”
“Sure. But what are you doing? I saw you scoping out the bikie place. Then we went round back like you was casing the joint.”
“Just taking a look.”
“Only those blokes is nasty fuckers, so, if you’re thinking of robbing ’em or something, you’d probably want to rethink that.”
I stopped walking. I didn’t want to tell Dicko anything but it was looking like I’d have to. We were close to a coffee shop – when are you not, in a shopping mall? – so I went in and ordered a cappuccino for me and a flat white for Dicko. We tool our drinks to a quiet spot.
“Look, mate,” I said, leaning in. “It’s best you don’t know anything about what’s going on. It’s safer for you. Do you see?”
He shook his head. “I don’t want to do nothing illegal.”
“I won’t do anything bad. A bit of trespass, maybe. A friend of mine is in trouble and I need to help him. You know what I mean?”
He nodded, unconvinced. “Yeah but, like, that’s the Devil’s Playthings, hey? You don’t want to fuck with them.”
“I’ll be all right.”
“Maybe you should get a few blokes, hey? I know someone I could call. Even the odds, like.”
I noticed he didn’t suggest the cops. “Thanks but I’m not thinking of starting a war. I’m just going to take a bit of a look, see where he is and try to work out how to get him out of there with no fuss.” From the sour face he pulled, I reckoned he was still unconvinced. I took another tack. “You’ll be OK. You can park well away from the clubhouse. I’ll go in alone. If anything happens to me, you can just drive away. No-one will know you were even there.”
He squinted at me. “I’m not worried about me. No offence, mate, but you don’t look like you could win a fight with a girl guide if she was feeling a bit crook and had one arm in a cast.”
I gave him a level stare. “Which arm?”
It took him a few seconds but he finally got it. He laughed then put up his hands in surrender. “Fair goes. It’s your funeral. Just don’t say I didn’t try to tell you.”
“Thanks, but I’ll be all right.”
He nodded as if he’d heard it all before. He leaned in closer. “I could maybe get you a gun. I know a fella might be able to arrange it.”
I pulled back. “I wouldn’t know which end to hold. Besides, my friend had a gun and it didn’t do him any good. I tell you, I’m not planning to fight anybody, just get in, get out, see how the land lies.”
With a flick of the eyebrows he dismissed me as the fool I obviously seemed. He leaned back in his seat, conversation over. When my coffee was gone, I asked him to wait and went shopping.
On my way back to collect Dicko, I felt my phone vibrate – the ambient noise was way too high to hear it ring. It was a call from DS Bertolissio.
“Interesting message,” she said.
“Did you solve the clues?”
“I did but I’m still having trouble understanding what on earth is going on in that head of yours.”
“It’s – it’s the location,” I said, confused.
“Of what? Where they’re holding Ronnie?”
“I was trying to be discreet.”
“You want me to turn up on my own and help you free Ronnie from a bikie gang?”
“Should you say that on the phone?”
“Do you have some reason to believe your phone is being tapped?”
“No. I thought, maybe, yours...”
There was a long silence.
“How do you know where Ronnie is?”
“I’d rather not say.”
“Well that makes it rather hard to get a warrant to search the place. In fact it makes it impossible. Your hunch is not probable cause.”
“I don’t want you to search the place. I don’t want you to tell anyone. Bent cops, right? They’re only keeping Ronnie alive so I don’t go to the cops. If a mob of you turns up at the clubhouse, they won’t have that reason any more.”
Again there was a silence. When she spoke again, her tone had just a hint of humouring the lunatic about it. “Look, Luke, I understand how upset you must be. They’ve burnt your unit, kidnapped your friend, the police can’t help you… You feel like you’re on your own and desperate to do something. And all this after your loss. It would make anybody behave rashly.”
It was far more irritating than soothing. “Have you ever spoken to Kurt Opperman?”
“The leader of the Devil’s Playthings? No.”
“Well I have. He called me today. He sounded...” I remembered his voice, casual and playful as he told me about Ronnie’s plight, like none of it meant anything to him. Like all that mattered was what he wanted and to hell with anyone who got in his way. “He sounded evil.”
“That’s all the more reason not to go and put yourself in his hands.”
“That’s not my plan.”
She was silent again. “I can’t help you, Luke. Even if I had enough justification to get a warrant for a raid – which I don’t – you’ve said it yourself; it wouldn’t work to get Ronnie free. It would tip them off. It would only make things worse. Your cute little crossword clues have only served to make me an accomplice.”
“Only if you managed to solve them.”
“It’s kind of you to leave me a way out but I don’t think pretending they’re too hard will convince anybody.”
She didn’t sound scornful, exactly, but my pride definitely took a hit. It made me a little bit belligerent. “So, what are you going to do?”
“Nothing. And neither are you. There’s no way to get Ronnie out that doesn’t end up in a shoot-out and a hostage situation – at the very best. The most likely scenario is Ronnie ends up dead and you with him. Look, DS Grogan and his team have got this. He’s a good officer and he knows what he’s doing. I’ve told him everything I know – including where Ronnie is being held – and they’ll
do their best to make sure he comes out of this unharmed.”
“You told them?”
“You left me no choice. I can’t sit on information like that.”
“I thought you were supposed to be on our side.”
I was getting angry but so was she. “Luke, you need to grow up. This isn’t some kind of game. Running you two as informants was one thing but the minute they snatched Ronnie, things moved to a whole new level. Do you understand?”
“Running us?”
I heard her sigh.
“You need to stay away from the clubhouse. I can’t tell you more plainly than that. If DS Grogan’s team catch you hanging around there, they will arrest you for obstructing the police.”
“They’ve got the place under observation?”
“You don’t need to know any more than I’ve told you. Do I have your promise you’ll stay away from Opperman and the clubhouse?”
“Are you going to raid the place anyway? Is Grogan? They can’t just let him get away with this, can they?”
“You’re not listening to me.”
“You’re going to – what? – call in a SWAT team, kick down the doors, shoot everyone?”
“Don’t be silly, Luke. This isn’t a TV show. Right now, the only evidence we have that Ronnie has been kidnapped is you saying so. The only evidence we have of his location is from you.”
“But it’s true. You know it is.”
“I’m talking about evidence. The stuff we need before we can do anything at all. Do you want to tell me where you got your information?” I said nothing. I couldn’t tell her about Karen. “So, it’s just your word, then?”
“What about Debra? She was supposed to be there when Ronnie was grabbed.”
“DS Grogan’s team interviewed her this afternoon. It seems she turned up to the meeting place and nobody was there. She hasn’t heard from Opperman since. My guess is that Ronnie was spotted by Opperman’s crew setting up his surveillance and they grabbed him and cleared out.”
Bright City Deep Shadows Page 24