by Emma Viskic
—I was unable to gain any official information about the informant or police officers. Please exercise extreme caution. Work under the assumption all the deaths are suspicious and linked.
Tedesco had helpfully attached copies of the relevant news reports: nothing they hadn’t already found. Shit. There just didn’t seem to be a way into any of it. Caleb sent his thanks and opened Alberto’s message.
—Police come see. Help not.
The stress was palpable in each terse sentence. English was Alberto’s second language, one he preferred not to use, but his grammar was usually a lot clearer. Difficult to know what to do next. Before going to bed, Caleb had sent a spray of emails enquiring about Ilaria’s ex, paying the motel clerk a hefty bribe for the use of the office computer. Not that he held out much hope – even if he found Tony, it’d be hard to prove he was involved without catching him in the act. If he was involved. According to Sammi’s security report, whoever had accessed Alberto’s ordering system had done it from within Australia.
Caleb rewrapped the phone and put his aids in, caught a faint, rhythmic thudding: Frankie either moving furniture or banging on the bathroom door. He opened it and she shoved a takeaway cup at him. ‘Took you long enough.’
He examined the drink as he headed for the couch. Murky grey liquid with a boggy odour, a little like a swamp at midmorning. Drink it or send it for analysis? ‘What is it?’
‘Some superfood shit from a yoga place, the only shop open. They swear it’s got caffeine.’
He tried it. Flavours that should never be combined: milk and something plant-like, with overtones of dirt. He picked a fleck of green from his lips. Broccoli. He was drinking a broccoli latte. Or not drinking it, as the case was.
He set the cup on the coffee table. ‘OK, why the sudden enthusiasm for Jacklin? You said he wouldn’t know anything about Maggie’s work.’
She perched next to him on the couch. ‘That’s when I thought he was a client. He’s not, he’s an employee. And not casual-hire like Quinn – someone in the know.’ She grabbed the laptop from the table. ‘Had a poke around. Jacklin set up his company with Daddy’s money a decade ago. It limped along for ages, then suddenly became very successful two years ago. Inexplicably successful.’
‘We already know he was laundering money.’
‘You have to have money to launder it. It’s coming from other people. Look.’ She flicked through a dizzying series of tabs. ‘He’s charged with faking invoices and employees, land sales. It’s got to be fifteen, twenty mil.’
She was right, that was a lot more money than a not-very-successful developer could have generated on his own – the land sales alone would be. But she hadn’t woken him at five a.m. to talk about money laundering.
‘So you want to snoop around his apartment before we talk to him?’
‘Thought you’d never ask.’ She passed him the laptop, page open to an image of a towering metal and glass apartment block. ‘He’s one of three on the top floor.’
‘The cops will’ve gone through everything.’
‘We’re not looking to convict the guy, just for connections. He’s single, so the place’ll be empty. And my lock picking’s pretty good these days.’ She paused. ‘Though we should probably bring a pry bar just in case.’
He zoomed in on the photo. Sheer glass walls and a security desk, external cameras. Lots of cameras. No idea why Hollywood had let him and Frankie go last night, but it wouldn’t happen a second time. If they were found sniffing around Jacklin, they’d be dead. And all for an apartment that had been gone over by the cops.
‘Too many cameras,’ he said.
‘Cameras are fine. Security won’t stop us if we look like we belong.’
‘It’s not security I’m worried about.’
‘Christ. A few months ago you were poking sticks at bikies, daring them to gut you. Now you’re having vapours over a bit of B and E. When did you get so fucking soft?’
Nineteen weeks ago.
No idea what his expression showed, but the fierceness left her face. ‘Maybe I should go alone,’ she said slowly. ‘One person’s less noticeable than two.’
‘Haven’t found her yet.’ How could you live with yourself, knowing what you hadn’t done? Knowing what you had.
He got to his feet. ‘We haven’t got a pry bar. You’ll have to kick it in, if you can’t open it.’
***
John Jacklin lived in the Docklands, a shiny new suburb built on the ruins of the old city wharfs. A place of expensive landscaping and patron-less shops, all overlooked by a sluggishly turning observation wheel. Not many people around at this hour; possibly blown away by the icy blasts whipping through the wind-tunnel streets. They’d been waiting fifteen minutes for someone to trigger the apartment building’s carpark doors, and Caleb’s hands had gone numb. His cotton shirt and jacket weren’t going to cut it today. At some stage he’d have to go back to his flat for a change of clothes; a toothbrush and handful of headache pills, too.
‘It’s taking too long,’ he said. ‘Let’s do the courier trick.’
‘As my mum used to say, “It won’t work, so don’t bother.”’
That was twice now she’d volunteered information about her family; unprecedented behaviour. He chanced a question. ‘Any uplifting sayings from your father?’
‘Nothing as uplifting as your father’s. How’d it go? “If your best isn’t good enough, try harder”?’
Why did he tell her these things?
‘It was supposed to be encouraging,’ he said.
‘Encouraging? Jesus. No wonder you’re such an over-achiever and your brother’s such a fuck-up.’
Hardly an over-achiever: a tenuous marriage, a one-man business and a therapist.
Frankie straightened as a Range Rover swung around the corner and into the driveway.
A hairy-knuckled hand appeared from the driver’s window, waved a card at a sensor. The roller doors lifted. When the car was through, they ran inside. The driver was already striding towards the lift. Another wave of the security pass, and the doors opened. Caleb headed for them, loose jog, neighbourly smile, nothing to alarm the locals. The driver managed to avoid seeing him as the doors closed in his face.
Frankie reached his side. ‘Servant’s entrance for you, mate.’
He nodded towards the card reader. ‘That’d be the stairs.’
Her smile faded.
It took Frankie an impressive forty seconds to pick the stairwell lock, but she pulled up short in front of the electronic one on Jacklin’s apartment. ‘Ah, shit.’ She was flushed from the eighteen-flight climb, but not seriously out of breath. A strong suspicion she’d had a little lie-down while he’d waited for her on the top landing.
‘It’s fine,’ he said, unwrapping his phone.
The building was all style over substance, and the fancy-looking biometric lock was exactly what he’d expected. He found a close-up photo of Jacklin – studio shot with high resolution and good lighting, the young man’s trademark smirk – and held it up to the scanner. The lock flashed green.
He rewrapped the phone. ‘There you go, no need for lock picks.’
‘No need for smug pricks, either.’ She swung the door open to reveal a darkened room. Deep and wide, with a wall of glass at the far end overlooking the bay, dawn bleeding into the murky horizon.
On a console to the left, a small red light was winking.
Caleb put out a hand to stop Frankie entering. ‘How long before the cops get here?’
‘Twenty, thirty. Bit less if we want to play it safe.’
‘We’re out of here in ten.’ He flipped on the lights, and Jacklin’s flat lit up like a luxury morgue; black floor and white walls, stainless-steel fittings. No knick-knacks on the few shelves. Damn. They weren’t going to find anything here except hospital-strength disinfectant.
‘Worth a try,’ Frankie said, not looking convinced.
‘You take the bedrooms and ensuite, I’ll do the study and bathroom. Look for Maggie’s client list, too.’
‘She wouldn’t have given that to an underling.’
‘Worth a try.’
The study had the same forensic ambience as the rest of the flat, along with a layer of chaos: desk drawers upended, spilling papers and pens across the floor. No computer, but a gaping wall safe and filing cabinet. Not the work of the police – someone had done a rapid and thorough clear-out. Caleb ran his hands along the walls and floor, checking for a second safe; no loose panels or carpet. No secret compartments in the desk, the sheets of paper all blank. Into the bathroom. Nothing except matt black tiles and a worrying quantity of nozzles. A room designed for very clean people. Or very dirty ones.
Frankie was in the grim kitchen, upending drawers. ‘Nothing,’ she said. ‘Place has been turned over.’
‘Yeah.’ He checked the microwave clock: they’d been inside ten minutes. ‘Time’s up.’
‘Living room first. Two minutes.’
He hesitated, then followed her. Not much to search: a black leather couch and sculptural chairs, a lone wall cabinet. The only decorations were an artistically mounted moose head on one wall, and an electric guitar and shovel on another. He felt along the floors and furniture while Frankie hunted through the cabinet. The moose head gave him the evil eye as he looked behind it; a small plaque on its mount read ‘Ontario’. So Jacklin was a hunter. What was the shovel a memento of, a good day in the garden? No, breaking ground for the Connoy Hotel. He checked the scrawled signature on the guitar: a Telecaster once owned by Keith Richards. A man of simple tastes.
He turned to Frankie. ‘Time to go.’
‘Hang on, I’ll just do the –’
He walked out.
She caught up to him at the stairwell door. They took the stairs at a fair clip and slipped out of the garage in the wake of a cream Mercedes. A police car was pulling up in front of the building as they strode past.
‘See,’ Frankie said. ‘Plenty of time.’
27.
They arrived at the remand centre half an hour before visiting hours. A modern building on the outskirts of town that looked like a regional art gallery. Large stone urns instead of bollards at the entrance, filled with swaying native grasses. Not quite the glamorous surroundings Jacklin was used to, but almost hospitable if you ignored the razor wire and cameras.
‘Classy,’ Frankie said as they walked up the path. ‘You reckon they’d let me live here?’
Spoken like someone who didn’t own a redbrick Edwardian in Brunswick. So she’d sold her house – that must have been a wrench after twenty years. Smart, though, if she had debts; the place would have gone for a packet.
‘Sold your house?’
‘Wasn’t mine to sell.’ She headed through the automatic doors.
The centre was less welcoming inside, with metal detectors and bullet-proof glass, double security doors. A sign by the front desk warned of firearm and drug scanning. Frankie had made a show of stowing the gun in the boot, but he hadn’t thought to remind her about drugs. She was pretty distracted, could easily have forgotten a stray baggie of smack. Risk her anger, or risk her getting arrested? Hard decision. As they approached the counter, he tapped her arm and pointed discreetly to the sign.
She turned a stony face towards him. ‘Do I look like a fuckwit?’
He waited a beat. ‘Rhetorical?’
He retreated at her glare, leaving her to deal with the first wave of bureaucracy.
It took forty minutes to go through the paperwork and scans, but they were finally shown into a cafeteria-like room, metal tables bolted to the floor, floating stools emerging from their central poles like strange white lily pads. A lot of people already seated, prisoners in olive-green overalls, visitors in jeans and tracksuits. The familiar smell of close-held bodies, sweat and anxiety. The old stress rose unexpectedly in him. Ant had only been nineteen when he’d done a stint for possession; six endless months, every visit leaving Ant only slightly less distraught, Caleb shattered.
Frankie led the way to an empty table near the internal door where the prisoners appeared. Some of the frenzied energy had left her, but she was still on edge, shifting on the stool and rubbing her hands on her jeans, eyes never leaving the door. A strong temptation to ask more about her living arrangements. She’d been in the same house for two decades; not just unusual in Melbourne’s vicious rental market – extraordinary. That kind of long-term lease only happened between relatives. Which had to mean Maggie.
She spoke without looking at him. ‘I can feel you thinking from here. Just ask the damn question.’
‘What exactly is the deal between you and Maggie?’
Her eyes met his. ‘She gives me the odd job and occasionally lets me mind Tilda. That exact enough for you?’
Lets her mind Tilda: a lot of history held in that one small word. Maggie was the one with all the power in their relationship, and Frankie resented them both for it. Glimpses of his own sibling fuck-ups there. He’d done more to harm Ant than just dragging him into a case; he’d been too controlling, too judgemental. Never giving him money or encouragement, greeting every happy period with distrust.
A cold worm of an idea burrowed into his brain. Was that how his own kids would come to see him? A father incapable of giving love without criticism? It’d be an apple straight from the Zelic family tree.
Frankie straightened. ‘That him?’
A prisoner was standing in the doorway, looking around the room. Fine brown hair and a dimpled chin, the kind of superficial handsomeness that didn’t stand up well to stress or olive-green overalls. Caleb raised his hand. Jacklin looked at him but didn’t move, face wrinkled in doubt.
A fellow prisoner was trying to get past. One hand on Jacklin’s shoulder, shoving hard. Repeated movements, as though punching his back. No, not punching – stabbing.
Caleb rose from his seat.
Jacklin staggered forward and dropped to his knees, the whites of his eyes showing. Blood spilled from his gaping mouth. People standing, running, lights flashing. Guards sprinted to the door and tackled the assailant. A spattered trail of blood as one of them kicked the attacker’s shiv aside.
Jacklin toppled slowly forward and lay unmoving, his head angled as though still watching the room, eyes unblinking.
28.
Caleb drove to his flat, the need for a warm place and clothes overriding the faint worry someone might be waiting there. A small, boxy place with aluminium windows and sheet concrete walls. Charmless, but looking a lot better than when Frankie had helped him move after his split with Kat. He’d finally got rid of the last tenants’ garish colour scheme a few months ago, replaced it with off-white walls and flat-pack furniture. Solid and liveable, but instantly disposable if Kat didn’t want any of it in their new home.
A singed smell rose in the air as he turned on the heater; the dust of a long summer burning away. Frankie was clutching her backpack to her chest on an armchair, an unnatural stillness to her now the manic energy was gone. Her lack of sleep was showing in her dull skin and puffy eyes. His own eyes were aching, pain radiating from the bruise on his forehead, compressing his skull.
Neither of them had mentioned Jacklin’s murder on the way here; no need to put fears into words.
The police had taken a while to release them – just forms and questions, not suspicion. A hastily constructed story of wanting to ask Jacklin about a mutual friend had smoothed over any queries. But it wouldn’t take long for their names to flash alarms somewhere, to someone.
‘Have a nap while I change,’ he told Frankie. ‘Couch isn’t bad.’
She nodded, but didn’t move.
He washed down a handful of painkillers in the bathroom, then showe
red and changed into jeans and a warm jacket, didn’t bother shaving. A few minutes to clean his aids and put in new batteries. They weren’t beeping their low-power warning yet, but the bluetooth chewed through the batteries and he couldn’t risk them going dead in a tense moment. Better not to imagine what that tense moment might involve. Who it might involve.
Twenty-six hours now, the weight of each minute crushing his thoughts.
Frankie was at the dining-room table when he finally joined her, belongings spread across it, including the black-market laptop and Tupperware-enclosed gun. Strange to think his life once didn’t include things like that.
She started talking before she’d looked up. ‘… works for Maggie.’
Years since he’d had to tell her not to do that. ‘Say that again.’
‘Maggie only works on recommendations. There’ll probably be a link between Jacklin and the killer somewhere – a business one.’
‘You think Jacklin worked with Hollywood’s boss?’
She paused. ‘Hollywood? That’s really what you’re calling him?’
‘If the name fits, Spiky.’
The slightest of smiles. If we search Jacklin’s work history we’ll find Hollywood’s boss. ‘We can narrow it down to people with serious connections. Discreet, though, so we can ignore anyone who flashes their cash.’ She faltered. ‘What do you think?’
That it was a very weak thread to pull. ‘Great idea.’
He worked solidly for half an hour, getting bare-bones information on a handful of Jacklin’s business partners, before realising the pain in his stomach was hunger. A quick forage in the kitchen unearthed some of Alberto’s minestrone; a few days old but with enough garlic to fight any food-borne pathogens. He poured it into two bowls and chucked them in the microwave for a few minutes, checked his phone while he waited.