by G. M. Hague
‘You’re joking,’ Lukas said. ‘I’ve hardly had time to scratch myself. She can’t expect me to have found out anything yet.’
‘Just get in,’ Max rumbled.
‘Christ, she can’t be that hard up for sex with a body like that,’ Lukas muttered.
*****
Back in the same chair, tied up again and with the same light swinging overhead, Lukas was feeling understandably annoyed. At least the blindfold had been taken off.
‘Is this really necessary now?’ he asked the darkness.
A man’s voice answered him. ‘I’ll decide what’s necessary and what isn’t. You’re lucky to be still in one piece.’
Lukas instantly re-evaluated his situation. He knew that voice and didn’t like the projected outcomes. Psychologically, Raymond Monroe was about as stable as a one-legged rocking horse.
‘Raymond, is that you? Come one, man – what’s this all about? This won’t help anything.’
Raymond emerged from the shadows. He shared his twin sister’s good looks in a male sort of way, meaning Lukas couldn’t say that Raymond had Julie’s fantastic breasts, awesome legs, tight arse and full, pouting lips – but the similarities were there. If you squinted your eyes.
Raymond said smoothly, ‘What do you think it’s all about, Lukas?’
It probably won’t be that thing your sister does with her tongue on your–
Lukas reined his imagination in. It wasn’t a constructive line of thought. He said, ‘Let me guess, you think I can find your old man’s lost treasure of fizzy sherbert?’
‘There you go,’ Raymond spread his arms. ‘Would there be even a grain of truth in the rumours that you’ve learned something new, if you hadn’t volunteered that answer first up?’
‘Who told you I’ve got anything new?’
‘I’m more interested in who told you anything new,’ Raymond said, leaning close. Lukas thought, He even does the gangster moves like his sister, except without the breasts and legs, and that arse and...
Again, he stopped himself. Lukas needed to concentrate on the problem at hand.
Lukas said carefully, ‘Maybe we could save a lot of time if we bring your sister in here, too?’
Raymond’s reaction was revealing — a rapid blink of annoyance and an expression of confusion and outrage. He snapped, ‘What the fuck for? Do you need your nails done? Your hair styled? Some lipstick perhaps? Otherwise, why should we need her?’
Lukas hid a frown. ‘Aren’t you... in this together?’
Raymond scowled. ‘This business is mine! My dad is in the ground and it’s all mine understand? And no concern of my sister! And if you think there’s any doubt about that, there won’t be after I prove it to everyone by finding that stolen shipment. I’m going to do what no one else has been able to do and you are going to help me.’
He stopped, glaring at Lukas, breathing hard.
‘Why would I do that?’ Lukas asked, thinking furiously. He doesn’t know I’ve been here before. Doesn’t know Julie’s demanded the same thing. And all these goons surrounding them must be quietly taking sides and keeping their mouths shut until they see who comes out on top.
‘Because I’ll pay you a shitload of money, that’s why.’
Criminal minds thought alike, apparently. While it wasn’t a secret that Lukas didn’t need anyone’s money, people like Raymond would never believe someone wouldn’t be tempted by a pile of cash.
‘You know I can’t do that. Okay, I’m only an ex-policeman these days, but I still have morals.’
Raymond put a fatherly hand on Lukas’ shoulder and smiled humorlessly. ‘I don’t expect you to do anything illegal, just tell me what you find out first, that’s all.’
‘Ah, so you can recover the drugs? That would make me an accessory to trafficking. I don’t think so.’
‘I don’t want the drugs. Only the person who took them.’
‘Oh, sorry. So you mean an accessory to murder?’
‘No, I merely want to have a serious chat with who’s responsible. You’d be an accessory to a robust exchange of differing opinions. How much jail time would you get for that?’ Raymond asked pleasantly.
‘I think it’s eighteen months for a serious chat. Then it’s three years for a spirited debate, and five-to-seven with early parole for good behaviour if you’re caught shouting angrily at someone. After that–’ Lukas grunted as Raymond punched him in the stomach.
Something about the chair seemed to encourage stomach punches. At least it saved on dental fees.
Raymond told him, ‘I’ve had enough of the comedy act. It’s straightforward, Lukas. You tell me first anything you find out and I’ll pay you good money. If you don’t, I’ll have Max and the boys pick you up again and we’ll torture everything out of you – slowly, of course. Which do you prefer?’
Lukas gasped, ‘Well, since we’re on first-name terms...’
‘Good decision.’
Raymond went behind Lukas and the cable ties broke away. Lukas brought his hands in front of him and rubbed at the painful, deep creases in his wrists.
Raymond said, abruptly genial, ‘Now, should we seal our deal with something less formal?’
It made Lukas choke a moment, hoping this was one area where Raymond departed from his sister’s best business practices. ‘Like... how?’
There was scraping sound and a can of beer flew towards him. Lukas nearly dropped it. At a loss, he popped the top and foam flew everywhere. Lukas hurriedly covered it with his mouth.
It was a bizarre moment. First Raymond had forcibly brought him here, tied Lukas up, punched him the stomach and threatened him with torture – and now he was supposed to share a friendly beer. Lukas couldn’t think what to say or do, except that upsetting Raymond with a lack of gratitude wasn’t wise.
He tried, ‘I quite like these imported beers, you know. Ah... do you?’
‘They’re imported all right. We get them straight off the docks, if you know what I mean.’
‘Oh, right...’ Lukas nodded appreciatively. This was good. Great, even. He’d been co-erced into his second criminal association in two days and now he got to drink black-market, stolen beer to celebrate. ‘No chance of it being over the use-by date, then? Can’t get better than that, I suppose.’
‘Fresh as you get,’ Raymond nodded in the gloom.
A silence stretched out. Lukas lit a cigarette and no one complained. He drank the beer as fast as he could without appearing like he wanted to finish it in a hurry.
‘Fancy anything tomorrow?’ Raymond asked.
Fancy what? Who – and where? Lukas’ mind panicked again. ‘I’m sorry?’
‘At the races.’
‘Oh! Sorry... no, I don’t punt.’
‘Smart move,’ Raymond said. ‘They’re all corrupt, thieving bastards, those bloody bookmakers.’
Lukas’ phone rang. Glad of the diversion he answered it without checking the number, scrambling it out of his pocket. ‘Lukas Boston.’
Barbara’s voice trumpeted into his ear. ‘Lukas! Thank God you’ve answered! I’m worried sick about what I should do, if I get a ransom note.’
Lukas mustered up patience from somewhere very deep. ‘If you get a ransom note? Are you saying you have gotten one?’
‘No, but what if I do? I need to be prepared, don’t I?’
‘Well, that’s when you should call me, Barbara. Not now.’
‘But they always say, “Don’t contact the police or we’ll kill your cat”. Calling you then is the last thing I can do.’
‘I’m not the police, remember?’
‘You know what I mean, Lukas. You’re not allowed to tell anyone or they do... terrible things.’
Like calling me. ‘You’re getting yourself all upset about nothing, Barbara. Wait until you get a ransom note, then we’ll worry about it.’
Her voice turned to a frantic shriek. ‘You really think I’m going to get one?’
‘No! No, no... not at all! That’s not w
hat I was saying.’ Lukas hung his head for a moment and took a breath. ‘You need to calm down.’
‘I really don’t know if I can cope with this... alone, Lukas. Tonight, I mean. I feel so helpless and vulnerable by myself.’
Lukas rolled his eyes at Raymond before he realised what he was doing. Raymond pulled a sympathetic face, even though he had no idea what was going on.
Lukas said, ‘Don’t you have someone to come over? A friend or family?’
‘No, no one. Lukas, I don’t suppose you could–’
‘No, I can’t Barbara. Definitely not,’ Lukas cut her off. ‘I’m afraid my... my girlfriend is coming over.’
‘Oh,’ Barbara sounded confused and suspicious at the same time. ‘I didn’t know you had a girlfriend, Lukas. You haven’t mentioned her before.’
‘We just met.’
‘Oh, well you can bring her around, too.’
‘No, I’m sorry, she would...ah, look, Barbara? I’m really busy right now. Very serious stuff – top secret and all that. I have to call you back later, okay?’
Without waiting for an answer, but hearing a squawking sound Lukas killed his phone. ‘Sorry about that,’ he told Raymond. ‘A difficult client.’
‘You want me to do something about her?’ Raymond asked.
Tempting, so tempting... ‘No, I can deal with her.’
‘Let me know, if you change your mind.’ A beer can crumpled as Raymond spoke. That was enough for Lukas.
‘Hey, Raymond. Maybe I’d better make a move. Get back to work.’
‘Of course, thanks for dropping by.’ Raymond sounded as if Lukas had come over for a barbecue. ‘Max and the boys will see you home.’
‘Yes, I know.’
Lukas bit his tongue, cursing himself. Raymond didn’t make any connection, calling out as he walked away.
‘Don’t let me down, Lukas. Bodies of ex-detectives are so hard to dispose of these days. Hey, I suppose you already know that.’
*****
As Lukas walked across the front lawn towards his apartment he heard the car’s front window sliding down. He said without turning around, ‘No Max, I’m not inviting you in for a fucking beer. Forget it.’
The window closed, the noise of it managing somehow to sound offended.
*****
‘I can tell you, you’re a sight for sore eyes,’ Lukas told Elizabeth Reynolds, leaning on her desk.
She replied with a sigh, ‘Nope, that would be an optometrist you need, not a police constable. I can poke you in the eye with something, if you like? So what are you doing here?’
Lukas gave her a pleading look. ‘I don’t know what I’ve ever done to upset you. Can we start all over again? I’d just like to take you out for a quiet drink somewhere. Nothing else, really.’
Beth gave him a sweet, false smile. ‘That’s the problem with you, Lukas. You think something else is always possibly an option. Tell me what you want, because I’ve got better things to do. The sergeant wants me to clean some vomit out of one of the cells.’
‘One day you’ll appreciate me for who I really am,’ Lukas gave her a wounded look. ‘I need to see Pete.’
‘I’ll ask him if he’s free,’ she said, reaching for a phone. Lukas grabbed her hand and Beth gave him such a murderous glare he let go.
‘Please, don’t give him a chance to hide somewhere. I really need to chat with him.’
For once, his sincerity was clear. She buzzed open the door. ‘Okay, but you owe me.’
‘I’ll buy you that drink.’
‘Christ, don’t you ever take the hint?’
Goodall indeed had the look of a man who would have made himself scarce, if he’d known Lukas was coming.
‘It’s you again. Aren’t you ever happy?’ he asked Lukas, waving at him to sit down.
‘I’ve got something important, Pete. Something I needed to ask you about in person.’
‘Whatever it is, you didn’t catch it from me. Stay away from hookers like your mother told you.’
Lukas ignored that. ‘Those files you gave me. Some of the protected stuff shed new light on the whole thing for me.’
‘Like what?’
Lukas lowered his voice. ‘Like Gavin Hucknall was an informant. I reckon Meatball was running him. You remember Meatball, right?’
Despite himself, Goodall was interested, raising an eyebrow. ‘How could I forget him? Jesus, that smell... an informant? You reckon?’
‘Do you think it’s possible?’
‘We can’t ask Meatball, that’s for sure. But you know, I can tell you there was another guy in Chuckle’s company giving us some info. It wasn’t Hucknall.’
‘Really? Who?’
Goodall tapped at his computer, explaining as he typed, ‘The drugs went through five different couriers to throw anybody off the scent and somewhere during that journey the cocaine turned into ten kilos of self-raising flour, remember? Nobody knows when or how, and we only found out about the plan and what went wrong afterwards, because the informant told us weeks after it was over and done with.’ Goodall swung the monitor for Lukas to see.
Harry Upton’s face stared at him. Above the name Gus Warner.
Lukas snapped his fingers. ‘I saw him the other day. His name wasn’t Warner, though. Now I know why I thought I knew him. What’s the story, witness protection? Because he’s not exactly hiding. He’s even shagging Hucknall’s old girlfriend — in the name of God. Calls himself a pastor these days.’
‘It’d take divine intervention to want to poke Grace Chadwick,’ Goodall said ruefully. ‘Nah, it was more a new identification in return for services rendered. You know, clean police record and decent credit rating. Not the full witness protection thing.’
‘I still can’t believe Chuckles didn’t blow his head off for telling tales.’
‘It was probably Monroe’s idea. Get Warner to have us doing his detective work, when he couldn’t find out anything himself. Warner was playing with us.’
‘Makes sense. What about Hucknall?’
Shrugging, Goodall said, ‘Maybe you’re right. Meatball wasn’t scoring any goals when it came to arrests and convictions, so he might have played that arrangement close to his chest and no one else knew about it.’
‘But Hucknall must have known about Gus Warner?’
‘Not really, Hucknall disappeared before Warner started talking to us.’
Lukas mused aloud, ‘I reckon Hucknall was a snitch and he made himself disappear before Chuckles figured it out. Wherever he went, it was somewhere deep because he didn’t come out to warn us that Harry Upton was playing games. If I can find out where that was, it all might make more sense.’
Goodall said, ‘Like one of them Tibetan monk sanctuaries on the top of Mount fucking Everest – and even then I reckon Chuckles would have found him.’
‘Somewhere like that,’ Lukas agreed, thinking that Goodall was closer to the answer than he knew.
*****
There were plenty of religious, mystical and spiritual lunatic sects in the city, but not many that went the whole nine yards with the clothes, diets and strict life styles.
In particular the shaven head look.
Lukas struck pay dirt on his fourth attempt, knocking on the door of a small compound in the outer suburbs. This used to be a private college for girls, which accounted for the high walls and solid gate. Now it was the home of Ra’s People, sun worshippers who believed in ultra-clean living, freedom of spirit and avoiding income tax.
‘I’m an investigator looking into a missing person’s case,’ Lukas told a wary face watching him through a square panel in the gate.
‘No one is missing in here,’ the answer came quietly. ‘We have all been Found and have no desire to be anywhere else.’
‘There’s a significant inheritance involved and it’ll be swallowed by legal fees and government duties, if I don’t find the rightful owner,’ Lukas said smoothly, a well-practiced lie that opened many door in the past.
Inside the compound the separate school classrooms and individual buildings had been converted into living quarters. In shady areas everywhere people sat or gathered in earnest groups apparently discussing important things. They all wore flowing robes, sandals and sported clean-shaven skulls that shone in the weak sunshine. Newer members were obvious with pale heads.
‘Very nice,’ Lukas told his guide, a small girl who walked with a bowed head. Really, he was thinking this was a bunch of freaks who were probably better off locked away, albeit voluntary.
‘We surround ourselves with beauty and peace,’ she murmured. ‘So you mustn’t stay long.’
‘Okay — and I won’t take that personally,’ Lukas said. ‘Where are we going?’
‘To meet Mother. She is the leader of Ra’s People.’
‘Like a Mother Superior?’ Lukas wasn’t a fan of nuns. In his experience nuns were far too serious and they tended to scowl at him a lot unless he offered them a cigarette.
‘No, she is simply Mother.’
‘She must make a killing on Mother’s day then? With all these folks calling her... never mind,’ Lukas gave up, suspecting that Ra’s People weren’t allowed to have a sense of humour.
She showed him inside one of the dwellings and silently left him. Lukas was in a lounge area so festooned with hanging drapes and curtains it was difficult to see the opposite wall. He picked out a lounge suite and a bed. The smell of incense hung in the air.
‘Mr Boston, welcome to our refuge,’ a woman said softly, emerging from nowhere.
‘Thank you... ah, Mother,’ Lukas said, unimpressed. Hiding among all the stuff hanging from the ceiling was hardly being Houdini. However, Mother herself was impressive. Far from some kind of matronly matriarch who ate unbaptised babies to make a point, she was a lithe young woman with a striking face.
‘Motherhood has been kind to you,’ Lukas said. ‘Considering the amount of kids you’ve got out there, I mean.’
‘Obviously, I am a spiritual mother, not the birth-mother of my followers,’ she said easily.