by Sarah Bailey
‘Nothing,’ says de Luca. ‘But I did notice something strange about the records. Until a month ago Rick barely used his phone on Tuesdays.’
‘What do you mean?’
She shrugs. ‘It’s like he just goes off the grid. Sometimes he would text Abbey in the morning and tell her he’d come pick her up, but that was pretty much it.’
‘Maybe he was just at work? Or maybe he was using another phone during those times. Find out what shifts he used to work at the pub.’
De Luca leans back in her chair with an arrogant tilt to her mouth. ‘Sure, but it won’t be relevant. He obviously worked more than one shift a week, and there are no other black spots in his usage like this.’
‘Well,’ I say with exaggerated patience, ‘it must be linked to his job at the pub if you say it was happening until a month ago. That’s the only thing that changed in his life at that time, right? Let’s workshop some other theories.’
‘Guys!’ Lane calls out from the other room. ‘Come look at this.’
The three of us crowd around his computer screen, which shows a recording paused on the same stretch of the main street as the footage we watched earlier. The time stamp is 12.31 am.
Lane presses play and the trees start to move in the wind. After a few seconds a man dressed in dark jeans and a white T-shirt appears. His hands in his pockets, he walks briskly along the edge of the road from the direction we just saw Abbey come from. The footage is grainy and his facial features aren’t clear, but he looks over his shoulder several times as if he’s agitated. After a moment he begins to run.
‘Go back,’ I say, and Lane does.
We watch again as the man walks along the street then runs off screen.
‘Zoom in,’ I bark.
We all stare at the blurry profile. I scan his bare arms for tattoos but see nothing.
‘Anyone know who he is?’
They shake their heads.
‘Well, find out. Send it off for analysis. See if they can work on the file so we can get a proper shot of his face. I don’t care if we have to crossmatch him with every person in town—we need to find out who that guy is.’
I grab my bag and shove my water bottle inside, spilling it all over the desk in the process.
‘I have to go. Can you send me the screen grabs before you head off?’
I’m halfway across the room when I hear the front door swing open.
Georgina and Ian Fletcher are back.
‘There’s something we need to tell you,’ says Ian.
Wednesday, 13 April
5.49 pm
The Fletchers have quite the set-up. Moving to the larger property last year meant they could scale up their marijuana production and make about five times as much.
‘We’d been growing plants in the bush for years,’ says Ian quietly. ‘It was easy when the kids were little but it got harder to manage as they grew older. We figured if we bought some land we could run it from home, do it properly and keep it completely separate from the kids.’ He looks up at me, desperate. ‘They have no idea about any of it. We monitor it all very carefully. That’s why we moved and let the boys stay in the house. Belinda was already living with her boyfriend. We didn’t want them involved, and it was the best chance we had at making a good living.’
‘We want a better life for them than we had,’ says Georgina, tears dripping into her hands. ‘Neither of us finished school, that’s why we were so disappointed when Rick dropped out and was working at the pub. That’s what we didn’t want for him, a life of struggle and odd jobs.’
‘If people don’t buy it from us, they’ll just buy it from someone else,’ adds Ian. ‘We can barely keep up with the demand.’
‘Please,’ says Georgina, ‘we would never hurt anybody. We never sell to anyone underage. And it’s only pot, we’ve never been involved in anything else.’
Feeling weary, I question the Fletchers for another forty-five minutes. I leave them in the meeting room, holding hands like schoolkids, while I fill Lane in so he can upgrade the search of their property to involve the drug squad.
‘Well, you said you wanted to shake something out,’ he says. ‘This is definitely something.’
‘Yeah.’
In the meeting room I explain to the Fletchers what will happen next. Then I stand in the doorway and watch them leave. They pause at the end of the driveway; Ian takes his wife in his arms, and she sobs into his chest.
I swallow past the lump in my throat and head out to get into my own car.
The universe is clearly messing with me because Mac calls just as I pull up outside the chemist. I let it ring out; the panic I felt this morning roaring back. I know I’m being immature but I just can’t talk to him right now. I have no idea what to say.
I slam the car door shut and step into the warm evening. Despite a slow start, the temperature ended up hitting thirty degrees.
A noisy bell announces my arrival in the chemist. I tentatively make my way up the aisle closest to the door, trying to work out how the products are arranged. Half the shelves seem to house various types of sunscreen.
‘Hello!’ The shop assistant singsongs at me. She moves her head from side to side, peering at me past all the signage. ‘Do you need a hand?’
‘Hi,’ I call out as I duck behind one of the displays. ‘No, thanks.’ My pulse starts to fly and I am sixteen again, working out how to buy condoms without Dad’s friend Mary Curtis noticing. I apply the same strategy now as I did back then, grabbing a basket and plucking random things I don’t need from the shelves. Hopefully the offending item will be lost in the jumble.
Finally I am standing in front of the row of pregnancy tests. I grab the most expensive one.
I don’t even know why I’m bothering with the test—I already know what the result will be. I’ve been pregnant twice before, so I recognise the sluggishness, the certain flavour of all-consuming tiredness. But the sickness, the sickness is new.
‘Just these?’ The lady beams at me as she begins to scan my collection of items. ‘You have lots of goodies in here. How long are you staying in Fairhaven?’
‘I’m not sure yet.’
‘Lovely. It’s nice this time of year. Not as crowded as the summer. You must get out on one of the boats.’
She scans the pregnancy test but continues a steady stream of babble about a sea adventure she has booked later in the year.
‘Thanks, thanks,’ I mumble when she hands me my bag.
I virtually run out of the shop, fishing around in my handbag for my keys. Head down, I push my hand further into its depths, feeling around all the old receipts and business cards until my hand closes on the keys and I beep open the car. Straightening, I almost crash into someone who is standing next to my driver’s-side door, partly hidden by the giant four-wheel drive next to it. ‘Oh!’
‘Whoa, steady on.’ Simon Charleston takes me gently by the elbows, his grey eyes on my chemist bag.
I wrench myself out of his grasp and swing the bag behind my legs, hoping like hell he can’t see the pregnancy test through the flimsy white plastic.
‘You scared me,’ I say angrily.
He looks apologetic. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to. I actually wanted to know if you have time for a quick drink? We need to talk.’
I message Vanessa, explaining I’ll be late, as Simon grabs us a table.
Cam flashes me a big smile when I make my way to the bar. ‘What can I get you, Gemma Woodstock?’
‘A pint and a lemon squash, thanks.’
His expression drops and he scans the room, trying to identify my drinking partner.
‘How are you?’ he asks sincerely. ‘You doing okay?’
I brush away his concern with a question. ‘Hey, this is a long shot, but do you know this guy? You must see pretty much everyone who comes in and out of town.’ I hold out my phone and show him a grab from the security footage.
He squints at the screen. ‘It’s pretty hard to tell . . . I can’t reall
y make out his face, but I recognise those shoes.’ He points to the mystery man’s runners. ‘They’re limited-edition Adidas. We had a chat about them one night—I kind of have a thing for shoes, and I commented on them. If it’s the same guy then he’s English. His mate worked on the bar for a few weeks. I think they were staying at the caravan park.’
‘You can’t remember his name?’
‘Sorry,’ Cam says with a shrug, ‘I couldn’t say.’
‘Could it have been Robert?’
Cam places the drinks in front of me and leans forward, resting his muscular arms on the bar. Dark auburn hair curls from the top of his shirt. ‘Maybe. I think it was something boring like that. Why, what’s he done?’
‘Sorry, I really can’t go into it.’ I hand him my credit card, which he waves away.
‘These are on the house, Gemma.’
‘Thanks, Cam.’
‘No worries. Enjoy your drink.’
I feel his eyes follow me as I carry the drinks over to Simon and I find myself adding a slight sway to my hips.
‘Hang on,’ I say, sliding the beer toward him and pulling out my phone. ‘I need to make a quick call.’
‘I’m not going anywhere.’
I fire off a message letting the team know the guy on the tape might be Robert Weston. We need to confirm it and issue an alert for him. Glancing over at Simon, I quickly call Candy.
‘Candy, what do you know about Simon Charleston? The journo.’
‘Hello, Gemma,’ she says drily. ‘I’m fine, thanks for asking.’
‘Sorry, but I’m kind of in a rush. I’m about to meet with him.’
‘For a date?’
‘Candy.’
‘Simon is a good guy. He’s a great writer and he’s done some decent investigative stuff. He’s not entirely by the book, a bit of a maverick. You guys would make a good pair actually.’
‘I’ll keep it in mind.’
‘You should. I hear he’s worked his way through most of the women at Channel 7 and moved on to 9. He may very well be keen to add a detective to his list.’
‘But you rate him?’ I confirm.
‘I rate him,’ she agrees, snapping her gum. ‘Just keep your legs crossed.’
We hang up and I head back to the table. ‘Right,’ I say, ‘this needs to be quick.’
‘Well, cheers to you too,’ says Simon, tapping his beer against my lemon squash glass. ‘Don’t worry, I know you have to get home to your kid. I won’t keep you long.’
‘You can leave my kid out of it, thanks.’
‘I was just trying to be friendly, you know, build rapport.’
I roll my eyes. ‘Okay, well, I’m here, so spit it out.’
Simon sits up straight. ‘You’re staying at Tommy Gordon’s now, right?’
My eyes wander to the bar. Cam is mixing drinks but I catch him looking over at us.
‘I can’t see how that’s your business.’
‘Did you know him before you came here?’
‘Not at all. An old colleague of mine knows Chief Inspector Gordon, but I’d never met him before.’
Simon seems to relax at this. ‘Why are you staying there? Surely the force could have picked up the tab for a mediocre hotel. You were here on Monday night—why did you move?’
‘At the risk of repeating myself, that’s none of your business.’
‘It seems odd.’
‘I know you stayed here on Monday night.’
He opens his mouth to reply then pauses, looking puzzled. ‘I always stay here. But, Gemma, come on, tell me why you ended up at the Gordons.’
‘Next question.’
He holds up his hands. A fuzz of beer froth lines his top lip. ‘I’m not trying to pry, honestly.’
I give him a withering look. ‘Oh, come on.’
When he smiles, I can’t help smiling back. ‘Okay, I always pry, but that’s not what this is about.’
‘Fine. What is this about?’
‘I think there’s something weird about Tommy Gordon’s car accident.’
I put my glass down, surprised. ‘What do you mean?’
‘A few things just don’t add up.’
‘Like?’
‘Well, for starters it wasn’t investigated properly. By the time it was called in, Abbey Clark had already been reported missing so all the resources were allocated to that. Tommy called his wife from the crash scene, and she drove out and got him.’
‘Vanessa took him to the hospital?’
‘Vanessa took him home. And the car didn’t get towed until Monday arvo.’ Simon takes a nervous sip of beer and looks at me expectantly.
‘Okay. So there was a delay in clearing the scene, which isn’t ideal, but it was a non-fatal single vehicle accident so there was no need to gather witness statements. Tommy probably just called Vanessa because he’s a stubborn old man who hates to ask for help.’
‘Maybe. But I went out to the scene myself.’
I cross my arms. ‘Doing some detective work, were you?’
He shrugs. ‘No one else was.’
‘And what did you find, Sherlock?’
‘Not much,’ he admits, ‘but from what I heard, Tommy said the sun was in his eyes and a kangaroo jumped out in front of the car, making him swerve off the road. But I went back there the following day at the exact time he said he crashed. There’s no way the sun would have been in his eyes.’
In spite of myself I feel a prickle of unease. ‘Sometimes people remember accidents differently to how they happened. Maybe he just meant it was sunny.’
‘Maybe. But I’ve also never known roos to be there before, and I drive that road all the time.’ A slightly sullen note creeps into his voice. ‘I’m telling you, something is off.’
I take a deep breath and study him. He’s good-looking in a rumpled way. There’s a coffee stain on his shirt collar, and his fingers are tinged with ink. The soft skin under his right eye pulses with a tic. In spite of my misgivings about him, he seems genuine.
‘I asked Tommy about you,’ I say. ‘I didn’t get the feeling there is much love lost.’
He scowls. ‘Tommy doesn’t deal well with criticism.’ Simon pauses, seemingly deciding whether to elaborate or not. ‘I wrote a piece a decade ago about the handling of a suspected homicide case. It wasn’t complimentary to the police. Tommy’s predecessor was furious about it, and so was he. I wrote another article last year criticising his ostrich approach to some issues in the area—that didn’t go down so well either.’
I poke my straw into an ice cube and try to think of what to say. In the end I attempt to avoid the whole issue. ‘Yes, I’ve read your old articles,’ I say dismissively. ‘Hard to believe you were a journo back then. I would have assumed you were still in nappies ten years ago.’
‘I’m older and uglier than I look. Same as you.’
‘I have to go,’ I say, pushing my half-finished drink toward him. ‘I appreciate your concern, but as you know we are working at least one homicide investigation, possibly two, and that is obviously my priority.’
Simon’s face softens. ‘I know. It’s awful, both of them just kids.’ He downs his beer and slides off his stool. ‘But there have been rumours about Tommy cutting corners for a while now, and this just doesn’t add up.’
I lean forward; he mirrors my action. I can see the faint freckles on his cheeks, a faint scar through his eyebrow.
‘I have to go,’ I repeat.
I wave at Cam, who watches Simon follow me to the car park. ‘Gemma,’ he says insistently, ‘at the very least, you should ask Vanessa why she didn’t take Tommy to the hospital straight away. Four hours is a long time.’
Tran rings me and I make a show of answering it, shooing Simon away with my hand.
‘Gemma,’ Tran’s voice stops me mid-gesture, and I lock eyes with Simon. ‘We’ve found a body.’
Wednesday, 13 April
8.32 pm
‘What is it?’ Simon’s eyes seem to glow in the dar
kness.
‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘I have to go.’
I tear out of the car park leaving him with his hands in the air, yelling my name.
I call Tran back using bluetooth. Just after 8 pm, a bushwalker’s blue heeler found a partially buried body about twenty k’s from Fairhaven. One of the victim’s arms was severed and the face was partly missing, blown off by a suspected shotgun injury. A forensic team is heading there now and will stay into the night.
‘I think it’s unlikely to be Abbey.’ Tran’s voice is uncharacteristically high-pitched. ‘Too decomposed, by the sounds of it, but I’ll keep you posted.’
As I drive to the Gordons’, my emotions swing wildly from wanting it to be Abbey to wanting it to be anyone but her. Finding her body will make our job easier but all hope will be gone. We’ll simply be dragging ourselves toward the booby prize of justice. No Abbey means we are still in limbo, nothing certain but a sliver of hope that things can be put right.
Vanessa offers me dinner but my appetite is non-existent, so I help her transfer the leftovers into Tupperware containers. She pours herself a fresh glass of wine. In the lounge room Ben is watching a movie with Charlie, something with talking dinosaurs.
I hear the toilet flush down the corridor and the slow shuffling of Tommy making his way to the bedroom with the walking frame. ‘Night, ladies,’ he calls and I bristle involuntarily. He’s behaved oddly since I came home, vague and distracted, grilling me about the case before seeming to lose interest. I didn’t mention the body and neither did he, even though I’m certain he’s seen the alert.
Vanessa walks to the top of the hallway and calls, ‘Do you need me to help you get settled?’
‘No,’ he says, ‘I’m fine, Ness. I need to get back to doing things for myself again.’
She crosses her arms. ‘No, you need to take it easy.’
‘Enjoy your wine, honey,’ he singsongs.
Turning back to me, she rolls her eyes but there’s a pinch of worry in her expression. ‘That man just can’t be told. Come on.’
I follow her outside. The temperature has dropped but it’s still mild. A possum makes a dash along the side fence and scrambles noisily into a tree. Vanessa ducks under the table to light a citronella candle. ‘The mozzies can be fierce this time of year,’ she says, tucking her hair behind her ears. ‘Do you want some spray?’