Perhaps files or notes or some type of evidence to help them move forwards in the case. There were a variety of things he’d anticipated. But not once had he considered the possibility of what they’d just found.
43
No way!
The words battered round Jayda’s brain as she stared at what was supposed to have been a break in the case.
She stepped inside, turning full circle as she surveyed the area, looking for something that was clearly not there. All she got was a dull thump against her skull and a faint whiff that made her think of nail polish.
Pressure rumbled inside her chest. ‘You’ve got to be frigging kidding!’ No matter the angle, the outcome was the same. The room was empty.
Back against the whitewashed wall, she slid to the ground, sinking her head into her hands.
Think.
‘This can’t be it.’
She shook her head, the beat of her heart a listless thud against her ribs. There had to be more. The key’s concealment, the cloak-and-dagger mystery of it all. Why send her halfway across Melbourne unless there was a reason? There had to be a reason.
Pressing the tips of her fingers into her skull, she tried to massage action into her brainpower.
A light sparked, faint and brief. But a light, nevertheless. Her heart hammered. She pushed herself up, renewed energy waking her limbs as she relocked the roller door and headed back in the direction they’d come. ‘This way.’
‘What are you doing?’
‘Following a hunch.’
It cost nothing to follow, and more often than not her hunches reaped dividends. With luck, this was one of those times.
Up another flight of stairs, then turn right. The path was embedded in her memory. As she walked, she fumbled with her key ring, hoping it was still there. It was. The little black key she’d been meaning to take off and return to her father.
The security boxes here were smaller, the size of an average desk drawer, and they spanned floor to ceiling. A lot like the inside of a bank vault.
One hundred metres or so and then she was there.
Number 2018. Her age along with Bec’s, back when her father was undercover.
‘Surely the key won’t open two security boxes.’
‘No, but another key will open this one.’
Seth’s expression cleared. ‘Your father’s?’
‘Uh huh.’
‘What makes you think something’s inside this one?’
‘Because I’m out of ideas. We were led here for a reason, and perhaps to find that reason we need to improvise.’ She waved her key. ‘This is me improvising. Maybe whoever planted the other key meant to lead us to this building so I could access Dad’s old security box.’
‘And find something of your father’s, or something else?’
‘Won’t know until we open it.’ She inserted the key and twisted. This time the lock turned easily.
‘This is getting creepier by the minute.’
She shot him a grin. ‘Ahh, but it’ll make a good story.’
He returned her grin without comment. Breath clogged in her lungs as she tugged the door open and peered inside.
Seth leaned in, and lush meadows and pine filled her nostrils as they both stared at yet another empty interior.
Seth tried to imagine the force of Jayda’s disappointment when weighed against his own. It was like being thrown one end of a rope and hanging on only to discover the person at the other end had just let go.
‘It was a good deduction.’
‘But wrong.’
‘For the lack of an alternative, it was better than nothing.’
‘And still wrong.’ She slammed the door.
It bounced back, hitting her knuckles with a loud crack. He winced. She clutched her hand and stared at the slow ooze of blood, her temper a rumbling volcano one quake short of an eruption.
He closed the door and turned the key, giving her the time and space she needed to calm down. Last thing he wanted was to be a stand-in for that locker door.
‘We should go.’ Her voice low, her jaw tight and clamped, she grabbed a tissue from her pocket and wrapped it over the cut.
He fell into step beside her. ‘We should dig deeper into Madden and his mystery progeny.’
‘I couldn’t agree more. We also need to check who rented the space and whether that,’ she waved towards a security camera, ‘is functional or just for show.’
This time they took the goods elevator down and there was none of their light banter and anticipation as they pushed through the double glass doors and headed for the car.
She stopped just shy of the Beetle, fists clenched.
‘Damn the sick bastard to hell!’ Eyes blazing, she turned to him. ‘He’s playing some twisted power game and I refuse to be his bitch!’
‘We’re closing in and this is his way of claiming back control. But we’ll get him.’
‘Oh, I know we’ll get him. I’m going to mop the floor with his ass until he rues the day he was ever born.’
He dropped the keys into her outstretched palm. She stalked the short distance to the car, jammed the key into the lock and yanked the car door open before dropping into her seat.
The ugly grey expanse loomed beside him. Something didn’t sit right. Why lead them here if there was nothing to find? There were far less complex—and risky—ways of wasting their time than this uncover-a-key-in-a-dead-man’s-apartment scenario. So, if time-wasting wasn’t his motive, what was?
He dug his cold fingers into his jacket pocket. Nothing in this damned case made sense.
Neither did standing there, waiting for Jayda to unlock the door. He ducked and peered through the glass.
Jayda sat slumped, deathly still. Wide eyes stared at the contents of a large manila folder, her knuckles jutting stark and white, clutching fast at the cream-coloured cardboard.
He knocked.
Slowly she dragged her eyes towards him and what he saw there froze his blood. Her hand shook as she released the lock on his door so he could join her in the car.
‘What’s wrong?’
She didn’t react, her eyes still on the folder, both wild and trapped at once.
‘Jayda?’
‘How do I get Will to stop his DNA search now?’
He shook his head, sifting for sense in her words. ‘Why would you want to do that?’
‘We don’t need to keep looking.’ She waved the papers in her hand. ‘We’ve found Madden’s child.’
His heart leaped. ‘But, that’s great! We find the kid, we find the killer.’
‘Not quite.’ It was only then she turned and the lacklustre of her eyes hit him square in the gut. ‘You’ve already found her. It’s me.’
44
My life is a lie.
The blurred landscape whizzed past Jayda’s window. Somewhere in the recesses of her mind she acknowledged that Seth handled a stick-shift a helluva sight better than she had. If she’d known, she would have let him behind the wheel of Bec’s car sooner. Or perhaps not. Her father always said she was a control freak.
Her father.
Over-long nails cut into her palms. Her knuckle would probably start bleeding again, not that it mattered. The blood would wash out.
Her jaw jammed tight. Her parents were in on it. Had Bec been in on it, too? The lies, the deceit. The entire cover-up that was her life. She didn’t think so, but how could she be sure?
Tom and Mary Clarke may have died in a house fire twenty-five years ago, but they weren’t her parents. Roan Madden was, along with some unknown entity even her real birth certificate couldn’t name.
The genuine article lay in the folder on her lap, along with other documents and a smattering of newspaper articles that filled part of the ‘black hole’ that was Madden’s missing years.
She had a serial killer as a parent, and once her squad found out, what little involvement she had in this case would be gone. If they’d believed she was too close before, now th
ey’d consider her swamped. There was even the possibility she’d become a suspect in the recent murders. Her time of freedom to work the case was limited. Once Will checked Madden’s DNA against the police database her secret would be out. That left her with a matter of days, a week at best.
‘Turn the car around!’
Seth glanced her way, her skin burning beneath his gaze. It was nothing to the burn razing her entrails.
His eyes returned to the road. ‘We’re on the motorway. I can’t just chuck a U-ey.’
She faced him then. ‘Turn around, Seth. I don’t care if you can’t do a U-turn. Take the next exit, ram through the crash barrier if you have to, whatever it takes. I need to get to that prison.’
‘You need to go home and process this first.’
‘I know what I need, and right now it’s answers.’
He glanced at her again and she averted her gaze. The grassland outside offered no judgement.
The car accelerated, and her elbow hit the door as they swerved into the left lane. A large green service station loomed ahead, and her tensed muscles almost sighed when Seth took the exit and re-entered the Princes Highway to go back the way they had come.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him glance her way again. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’
‘No.’
‘What do you plan to do?’
‘See Madden.’
‘And . . .?’
‘Find out how that sick sonofabitch could possibly be my flesh and blood.’ They exited the motorway, Seth’s hand braced on the gearshift as they slowed. ‘They might not let you in.’
‘I won’t give them a choice.’
She clamped her lips and glared out her side window. Seth seemed to take the hint, or maybe it was simply that he had nothing else to say.
Whatever the case, his reporter instincts must be churning overtime. It’d almost kill him not to print this one, not that the media wouldn’t find out soon enough anyway.
That had to be his plan—drag her down into his squalor.
They turned onto Koo Wee Rup Road, the landscape as stark as their destination. Ironic how the morning’s sun seemed to have fled, looming black clouds now rolling across the sky. Cliché had finally won out.
The road was smooth until they turned into the prison entrance and hit the gravel of the car park. Damp slathered her palms. She never sweated.
‘Sure you want to do this?’ He slid into a parking spot and her hand was already reaching for the door before he’d engaged the handbrake.
‘No. But let’s do it anyway.’ She didn’t wait until he’d locked the car, because if she stopped she wasn’t sure she’d be able to keep going.
She was about to meet a man who had brutally killed and maimed more women than she could bear to count. And as if that wasn’t enough to make her chuck her guts, another, even larger gem screamed for attention—this man had once been her mother.
This is a bad idea.
Seth scrubbed his fingers through his hair for the third time in as many minutes as he followed Jayda towards the cluster of grubby white buildings. Barging into a meeting with Madden without taking time to process what she’d discovered seemed like the worst thing Jayda could do.
She needed to talk about it. Purge.
Something he did ad nauseum, or so his parents said. After Callum had died, he’d wanted to talk—needed to talk—but they hadn’t. They’d just moved on, worked harder than before and buried their emotions beneath a thick mass of steel.
Jayda braced before pushing against the heavy outer door. He followed her into the tiny antechamber and waited as she buzzed to be let into the gatehouse. He got why she didn’t follow normal visitor protocol and enter through the ion scanner. From what he’d read, the machine was super sensitive, and any trace of gunpowder could trigger the alarm.
Not something she would risk today.
The iron door shuddered as it was yanked inwards. A young prison officer dressed in Pakenham Prison’s signature blue uniform stepped aside to allow them to enter. She pushed back a wisp of blonde that had escaped from a blue hair tie and her formidable features softened. ‘Jayda.’
‘Trace.’ Tension seemed to sigh from Jayda’s shoulders and he watched her force her lips to return the other woman’s smile.
He’d heard talk of the cold war between prison staff and police. An ‘us and them’ saga that made no sense when you considered both parties barracked for the same side.
Whatever the case, it seemed they’d struck gold in getting one of the few prison officers who didn’t view visiting detectives with disdain. The relief in Jayda’s expression said she thought the same.
Trace moved back and waved them both through.
Jayda stepped onto the blue mottled carpet. ‘How’s Howie?’
The other woman rolled her eyes and grinned. ‘Better. He slept through for the first time three days ago. We’re walking on egg shells hoping it’s not a teaser before he slips back into those ungodly 3 am feeds.’ She let the door go and it slammed heavily behind them.
‘So, who’re you here to see?’
‘Roan Madden.’
‘Your squad’s already been and gone. Left less than ten minutes ago.’
‘I know. Something’s come up and we need to speak to Madden again. Any chance there’s still time on the 464B?’
‘Let me check the paperwork.’ Trace slipped behind the counter to a large computer screen and gave a couple of clicks with a mouse. ‘Ah, here it is.’ Another click and she nodded. ‘You’re in luck. It doesn’t expire until three.’ She glanced at the clock on the far wall. ‘That leaves you half an hour.’
‘I’ll take it.’
‘I need to run it by the supervisor, although I can’t see there’ll be a problem.’ She disappeared into a room behind the desk, and he watched as Jayda’s neck stiffened again, her back so ramrod straight it was a wonder she didn’t snap.
Trace returned seconds later behind a woman with stark white features he guessed seldom smiled. She glanced at the computer screen before resting brown, almost black eyes on Jayda. ‘ID?’
A fine sheen glazed her brow as steady but taut fingers slid the leather wallet across the countertop. The supervisor flipped it open and stared first at the ID then the screen.
‘You’re not listed on the application.’
‘If you check, you’ll see it covers anyone from Pacu task force.’
The woman tutted, and hummed—a power play if he’d ever seen one. ‘I don’t see what you need to ask that you couldn’t have asked him before.’
‘New information came to light just a few minutes ago.’
She lifted a brow. ‘That was quick.’
‘It’s like that sometimes.’ He watched Jayda attempt a smile, but the twist of her lips was too forced for humour.
The woman studied Jayda through narrowed eyes, as if by doing so she could burrow holes in her story, find reason to refuse her entrance. Something she had every right to do, regardless of applications and time remaining.
And there was a part of him that wondered if that would be for the best. For Jayda to get the time she needed to think things through more clearly first.
The supervisor’s lips thinned, her eyes never leaving Jayda. ‘We’ll get the prisoner again, but only if he’s willing. You’ll have twenty minutes once he’s ready.’ She turned to Trace. ‘Officer James, make the call to ready Mr Madden.’
A brief smile in their direction and then Trace disappeared again through the far door.
‘I’ll need you to sign in your firearm and then we’ll get you through the ion scanner and X-ray.’ She looked past Jayda towards Seth. ‘ID?’
Jayda didn’t give him time to reply. ‘He’s not coming in.’
The words were unequivocal, her eyes latched on the supervisor as she reached under her jacket to unholster her gun. Regardless of his instincts, he didn’t argue. He got that she needed to do this alone. And she seemed calm. Icily so.
A sharp trill blasted from a speaker above the desk.
His body jolted. Shock passed through the room and he wasn’t the only one to flinch as the siren continued to peal. Inner and outer doors shuddered before the long grate of metal scraping against metal indicated bolts sliding into place with a resounding thud.
‘Stay here!’ The supervisor’s bark was almost lost in the din, but her glare spoke volumes. Move at your peril.
Not that there was anywhere for them to go. Every door in sight was bolted. Thick, no nonsense, lead-lined barriers, impermeable to pretty much anything. No way in, no way out.
The supervisor was the last to disappear through that back doorway, leaving the gatehouse suddenly empty but for them and the infernal ringing.
His eardrums vibrated painfully and he grabbed Jayda’s elbow, yelling to be heard. ‘What’s happening?’
Her eyes scoured the area, and he knew if she’d had a choice she’d have vaulted over the reception desk and joined in with whatever was going on over the other side.
‘Jayda?’
She finally looked his way, lips pinched, the rapid, jerky rise and fall of her chest blaring out her frustration. He could feel it like a tangible thing—real, overwhelming. All-encompassing.
‘The prison’s in lockdown.’
That much he’d guessed. His chest tightened, the high wail of the alarm like a thousand needle-points stabbing at his inner ear. ‘Why?’
He watched as she took up pacing the distance between the locked entrance and reception desk, a wild leopard caged, her empty hands clenching and unclenching tautly at her side. He knew her well enough to know she resented being stripped of her firearm, and even more, of being excluded from whatever was going on beyond reception.
Lethal in Love Page 31