The Twisted Knot

by J. M. Peace

  She didn’t feel like a murderer. In her mind, she put herself into the same category as women who were abused by their husbands and found the courage, and the means, to kill them. It was self-defence for every defenceless child. It wasn’t revenge or even punishment. It was doing the job the legal system should be doing.

  It was justice.

  63

  Sammi was pleased to pull into her driveway that day. It had been a busy shift, and she was still not completely comfortable back out on the road. She had chosen the jobs carefully, where she was unlikely to get into any sort of physical confrontation. But after the mob at the front counter, it wasn’t like the station was a safe bet either. She was still turning the events of the day over in her mind as she parked her car in the carport. Whoever got home first got the carport, the other one parked on the front lawn. Because of the eight to four shifts, Sammi’s car pretty much hogged the covered spot. She heard the dog bark twice, acknowledging her arrival as she wandered out to check the letterbox.

  There was a large white envelope folded in half to fit in the slot. Sammi unfolded it and the police service emblem in the corner immediately caught her eye. Her chest tightened slightly. She regarded official mail with apprehension. She wriggled her finger behind the envelope’s flap, but as she started to tear it open, the name on the front caught her eye. This wasn’t her mail. This was Gavin’s. Official police mail for Gavin. Could only be one thing.

  She unlocked the house and went inside. She put the half-opened envelope on the kitchen bench. When Gavin came home soon after, that’s where it still was, at the edge of Sammi’s field of vision as she prepared their dinner. It made her uneasy, not only the idea of Gavin applying for the police, but the conversations they were going to have before the matter was decided one way or another.

  He saw the mail, immediately grabbed it and ran his finger across the ripped flap.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I saw the QPS emblem and thought it was for me. I didn’t mean to pry.’ She sounded so prissy, as if they were flatmates, not a couple of five years.

  ‘Doesn’t matter. You could have looked. You’ve probably guessed anyway. It’s the recruit application package. I’m going to apply. I think I’ve got a good chance of getting in and I think it’s a job I’d really enjoy.’

  Sammi didn’t know how to reply, didn’t even understand how she felt about it. Her silence lengthened like a shadow at dusk. Gavin rustled the papers out of the envelope. Made a show of flicking through them. Still no one spoke. The silence was heavy. Suffocating.

  With an inaudible pop, something tightly knotted came undone inside Sammi. She raised the wooden spoon she was using to stir the gravy and smacked it down on the kitchen, splattering a circle of hot brown spots.

  ‘Fuck, Gav. I just can’t do this anymore,’ she said, the words splattering like the gravy. The months of restraint and readjustment and re-evaluation crumpled into raw emotion.

  ‘Well, fuck, Sammi. Neither can I. I don’t even know where I friggin’ stand anymore.’ Anger suppressed for too long.

  ‘I’m in the dark too. Give me a fucken hint so we can sort this out.’ Her rising volume gave him permission to reply in kind.

  ‘You don’t know? Let me explain. This . . .’ he said, smacking the application papers on the edge of the counter, ‘. . . this isn’t about you. The last year and a half might have been about you. But this bloody well isn’t.’ He slammed the ream of papers onto the kitchen counter. They fanned out, some floating to the floor. ‘I need to do something for me. I want to be someone too. I want to take back something I’ve been fucken losing all these years.’

  Sammy’s anger flared, fanned by inferences. ‘You act like this is some sort of solution to everything. You’re applying for the cops not the friggin’ Avengers. It’s just a fucken job.’ She was shouting now. ‘It’s not a free pass to anything.’

  ‘It’s a damn sight better than being up to your elbows in oil every day. You don’t know what a fucken job is.’

  ‘How dare you!’ She let the indignation sweep her along. ‘You think I sit around all day reading the newspaper? You have no idea how hard being a copper is. You think it’s all car chases and beers after work.’

  ‘You don’t think I’m smart enough, do you? I’m some dumb mechanic you can push around. Because you’re a cop.’ He had squared his shoulders against her and she could see his biceps flexing as he leant on the counter to yell at her.

  ‘Like I’ve ever pushed you around,’ Sammi said. ‘You’re behaving like a child.’

  ‘A child? And, what? I need to grow up before I can join the police? Fuck! What the hell do you think of me?’ There was a look of absolute outrage on his face.

  ‘I think you need to piss off out of my sight for a bit.’ As she spoke these words, she swung abruptly away from Gavin back towards the stove. Her elbow clipped the handle of the colander where the pasta had been draining, knocking it off the hotplate and tipping it sideways onto the counter. She jumped backwards quickly as the spaghetti cascaded to the floor.

  ‘And dinner’s off now too!’ she yelled. She stared angrily at the mess on the floor. Before the tears sprang to her eyes, she pushed past Gavin and dashed into their bedroom, slamming the door behind her. The air vibrated with their anger.

  She threw herself on the bed, hot tears soaking into the pillow. She didn’t even know what she wanted anymore. She breathed deeply, pushing up against the shapeless black mass looming over her.

  The psychiatrist had said this was still normal, even after what Sammi considered to be a long time since the incident. The offender had only recently been sentenced after all. What was ‘normal’ though? How many people had been through anything close to what she had endured at the hands of a psychopath? How could they come up with a benchmark of what was and wasn’t acceptable?

  All she wanted was a normal life. Days at work, maybe frustrating and disappointing days, but normal days. A relationship where the balance of power was equal and transparent. An average boring life, where she knew where she stood.

  ‘Hey.’ Gavin was standing at the door. He held the application in his hand.

  ‘Say the word and I’ll put these in the bin. Our relationship means more to me than this.’ He waved the papers dismissively.

  Sammi shook her head slowly.

  ‘Sorry. I’m confused. I guess I want everything to go back to the way it was.’

  Gavin sighed. ‘That’s never going to happen. Neither one of us will ever be the same person we were before your abduction.’

  ‘It didn’t only change me. It changed everything. It changed my job. It changed you. It changed us.’

  ‘But that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. There’s no reason we can’t come out of this stronger. As people, as well as a couple. We can work it out if we still love and respect each other.’ He hesitated and lowered his voice. ‘Do you still . . . love me?’

  ‘Yes.’ Her answer was spontaneous and wholehearted.

  Gavin smiled. ‘Then the rest is minor details,’ he said.

  Sammi drew herself up from the bed and walked across to Gavin. He opened his arms wide to embrace her. They pressed against each other and the tension ebbed away. Completely. Till it was better than it had been for a long time. They kissed like they meant it.

  ‘There’s still one problem,’ Sammi said.

  ‘What’s that,’ Gavin asked softly.

  ‘What are we having for dinner now? And who’s cleaning up the mess?’

  Gavin went to the back door. He threw it open. ‘Jess!’ he called. ‘Grub’s on!’ The dog galloped up the back steps and skidded into the kitchen, delighted to see the food on the floor.

  ‘How’s pizza sound?’ Gavin asked Sammi.

  Sammi moved across to Gavin to embrace him again, to the sound of the dog gobbling spaghetti.

  Gavin squeezed her. �
��That’s the first fight since . . .’

  Sammi cut him off. ‘I know. How could I forget?’

  ‘You’re not going anywhere this time.’

  They kissed again.

  ‘I’ve kind of missed it. The fighting,’ she said.

  He nodded. ‘There’s nothing quite like getting it off your chest.’

  She smiled and ran her hand over his pec. ‘You don’t need to get anything off your chest. Except this shirt.’

  He laughed, the deep throaty chuckle she loved so much. He slid his hand against the small of her back under her T-shirt and pulled her against him.

  He’d make a good copper.

  64

  Later, even once she was safe at her mother’s house, Belinda still couldn’t rest. Her mum had taken Nicola out to a playground so it was quiet in the house. She needed to sleep but there was no chance of that.

  It was done. But she kept turning it over in her mind. All in all, it had gone to plan. Except for the police turning up. She allowed herself a small smile as she thought about the cutaway off the road. More had gone right than wrong.

  She had parked her car away from the house in Moffatdale, as described by Faye in her letter, and walked up, dressed all in black. She had bought some cheap black joggers from Kmart especially for this foray. She had decided against a balaclava, but wore a jumper with a hood to pull over her hair. If possible, she wanted him to see her, to recognise her. Preferably when he was staring down the barrel of Barry’s rifle.

  And that’s what had happened. She had experienced a small sense of satisfaction when she had seen the flash of recognition on his face after the first shot and before the second. She thought she had seen regret. But she had wanted to see it, or something like it. He had said nothing though. If he had even breathed the word ‘sorry’, it would have made it harder. It wouldn’t have changed the outcome, but maybe twanged a chord of guilt which had yet to surface. But he didn’t. She had to shoot him again regardless.

  That was the other part that didn’t go the way she wanted. He was supposed to die immediately after the first shot. She had wanted him to die instantly. Not as a point of mercy. Just so he didn’t leave a puddle of blood for her to clean up. The longer he lingered, the more blood would leak out of him. She had googled it on the free internet at the library. She had searched in relation to shooting animals and all the sites talked about bleeding the animal out for the meat. So she had attempted to apply common sense. Aim for the heart. If the heart stopped beating, there would be no more blood pumping around the body.

  Then she had googled how to break into a house. Faye had been kind enough to describe the shed and Belinda had a rough guess as to what sort of lock it had on it. She had taped a small LED torch to the top of the rifle, and acquired a sledgehammer, a tarp and a large carry bag. She had stolen number plates to put on her mother’s car. She had made a list of the things she needed to do before she left. She did not want to rely on her memory in such a stressful situation. So she had written a list: clean up, find the empty bullet casing, find his wallet and any paperwork that might identify him. If no one knew he was there, then no one would know he was missing. She did not allow herself enough time to completely wipe out every trace that he had been there. It would be enough that there was nothing to identify who it was. She had got out in the nick of time as it was. She was grateful for taking all the little precautions.

  Before the murder, she had lain awake night after night, precisely as she was doing now. But now she was re-hashing the scene, looking for mistakes. One had leapt out at her immediately. She had only found the casing for one of the two bullets she had fired. Her list had said to find the bullet casing – and she had ticked that off. She had found a bullet casing. But she had shot twice. She had forgotten the second casing. It certainly wasn’t anywhere obvious – she would have seen it and remembered.

  There was also the matter of Pete’s car. She had no idea where it was. He had done his own part in the disappearing act and hidden his car. Who knew what the police would make of it if it turned up somewhere? There was absolutely nothing to connect her to it though. She pushed the matter out of her mind. There were enough other things to worry about.

  One of the things that had gone right was that he was sleeping in a swag. A waterproof bedroll. She had hardly needed the tarp. He had been sleeping on the open swag and it had been a simple matter to zip it up, right over the top of his blank eyes. When she rolled the whole package onto the tarp, there was no blood underneath it. The bullet had not gone right through him. The bedding had stayed intact and had absorbed everything. It had been a simple matter to drag him out to the car on the tarp. It had been slightly harder to hoist him into the boot, but she had persevered because there was no other option.

  The boot had been prepared for its grisly cargo. It had been meticulously lined with plastic sheeting, purchased in bulk from the hardware store. After Peter had been hauled into his shallow grave, with the layers of plastic wrapped around him, there was absolutely no sign that a corpse had taken its final ride in the back of her mother’s Mazda.

  The plastic lining had served a dual purpose. Belinda had folded the plastic around him as best as she could. She had twisted off the ends like a giant lolly wrapper. When Wendy had come to help lift the corpse out of the boot, it didn’t look like a dead body. There were no draping limbs or glazed eyes. They could pretend it was anything. A Turkish rug, a bag of manure. They had each grabbed an end and dumped him into the hole they’d dug. He wasn’t even that heavy between two of them. And then it was done. The earth smoothed over. A shallow grave for a shallow man.

  65

  It took two bosses to sign off before the trip to Brisbane was approved. But here they were, Sammi and Terry in the CIB car driving off to mix it up in the big city. Shane had been quick to agree that Sammi could go. He seemed pleased that she was keen on heading out. And Sammi suspected he was still feeling guilty about the day he’d taken off when Kayleen and Wendy had turned up to the station. She was sure he hadn’t realised that this was her first trip back to Brisbane since the court case. She kept that tucked away, not even reminding herself. She focused on the job at hand.

  Terry had gained permission from Gympie since his direct boss was still on holidays. They had wanted to send a detective down with him, lend some experience to the case, but he had explained they were meeting up with Janine. Her name was known; her reputation had stretched that far. Sammi doubted whether Terry had mentioned that Janine was only assisting them with the warrant. If she was asked, Sammi was sure Janine would help with the interview but she had the feeling that’s not what Terry wanted.

  ‘I don’t need a friggin’ babysitter,’ he said to Sammi. ‘Do you?’

  She laughed. ‘No, the meds are working, I’m good.’ It was only half a joke.

  ‘They’ll want to take the pinch off me,’ he said. ‘Some detective with twenty years experience will snaffle it out from underneath me. Not many murder pinches floating around. Well, it’s not happening. I’ve done the work. I didn’t see them out there, contending with maggots and bodily fluids.’

  It was clear to Sammi that Terry was allowing her to come along because she was no threat to him. He knew that she would not be telling him what to do, would not try to take over the investigation. That was fine by her. She was happy to assist. It had been a long time since she had been so involved in an investigation and she was simply pleased to be doing something that equated to meaningful work. ‘Janine could still sit in on the interview with you,’ she said to Terry. ‘She’s got her hands full, she’s not interested in cutting your grass. She’d be good to have in the interview.’

  Terry shrugged. ‘See how we go. We have to find Belinda first.’

  Sammi left it at that. It was Terry’s job.

  ‘So how long have you been at Angel’s Crossing now?’ she asked.

  ‘About six month
s.’

  ‘Is that all? Feels like you’ve been around a lot longer.’

  ‘I have a way of endearing myself to people,’ he said with a winsome smile.

  ‘So what do you think of the town?’

  ‘I like it. My wife’s happy, she’s made some friends already. Good crew. But the last week’s been a bit of a wild ride. I’ve never lived in a small town before. I grew up on the Goldie. And I’ve really seen the downside of a small community this last week. Everybody knows everybody else’s business. Everyone seems to be somehow tied to everyone else.’

  ‘It’s been extreme this week,’ Sammi agreed. ‘Sometimes you can use it to your advantage, but other times it can be an untamed monster.’

  ‘Strange times in the strange town with a strange name.’

  ‘No one’s told you the story about how Angel’s Crossing got its name?’ Sammi asked.

  ‘No. Let me guess. Once there was an angel and it got cross. And it cursed the town.’

  ‘Not quite.’ It was a long story, but it was also a long trip. It was a yarn she loved and it was hard to find people who hadn’t heard it.

  ‘It’s a pretty neat story, I’m surprised no one’s told you yet. It used to be called Wessling’s Crossing, after a family who lived in the area when it was more farms than town. The ‘Crossing’ part of the name is because of where the railway tracks cross the highway south of town.’

  ‘Oh, yeah, I know where you mean.’

  ‘But the “Angel” part is the interesting bit of the story. Years ago, an old woman who was living with her son on one of the farms wandered off in the middle of the night. She had dementia or something similar. Anyway, she got collected by a freight train. No one knew if she sat down on the tracks because she was confused or whether she wanted to end it all because of the dementia. Her death was very quick. And very messy, I imagine.’ Sammi looked out the window. She had been to a suicide by train one time. They needed buckets instead of a body bag.