Читать книгу Thicker Than Water - Lindy Cameron - Страница 7

"Yo, Kit."

Kit jammed her phone in her pocket and turned to the yo-ing Rabbit MacArthur, who was heading her way with Del and Brigit in tow. It took her a moment to realise that Carrie had escaped her remonstrating by nicking back to the relative safety of the press pack.

"If I can help your investigation into this mess, you just call me. Okay?" Rabbit offered, giving Kit a one-armed, around-the-shoulders hug that nearly folded her in half length-ways."

"Thanks, Rabbit," Kit squeaked, aiming a questioning squint at her sidekicks. "But what makes you think I'm investigating anything?"

"D and B said you were after Scooter. I figured that, you know... Aren't you?"

"No," Kit fibbed. "It's the cops who want to talk to Scooter, not me. They need a witness statement like the one you gave. I said I'd help find her that's all."

"Rabbit reckons she'd be at work now," Brigit said.

"That's where she was supposed to be yesterday too." Kit turned to Rabbit. "Any ideas why Scooter didn't turn up for work, even though she left here to go there?"

Rabbit performed some serious-thinking callisthenics with her bottom lip. "Nope. She was pretty cactus, but."

But what, Kit wanted to ask; instead she said, "with a hangover, right?"

"Yeah, but it wasn't a hangover hangover, Kit. It was more your lubed-up, slip-sliding, long late night kind of hangover - if you catch my drift."

Kit narrowed her eyes. "I hate to appear dense, Rabbit, but your drift escaped me."

"Sex," Rabbit shrugged. "Lots of it."

"Oh. I didn't know she had a girlfriend," Kit admitted. Like you'd notice, O'Malley.

"It's all new pasho and fairy moans," Rabbit explained. "You know, ringing out for pizza coz they don't want to leave the hotel. But," she whispered, "it's also a hush-hush secret."

"Well, the secret's hush-hush anyway," Kit said, raising her eyebrows.

"And why is it?" Brigit the Curious asked.

No one, it seemed, was going to ask Rabbit to elaborate on the moaning fairies.

"Actually, it's not a secret," Rabbit stated. "I mean everybody - except you lot apparently - knows about it. But the girlfriend herself, by which I mean her identity," Rabbit squinted meaningfully, "is a huge secret." She shoved her hands into the pockets of her overalls, which apparently indicated the end of her statement until she eventually realised that everyone was expecting more detail. "Oh," she continued, "and the reason for the secret-sea would be because she's married. The other woman I mean, not Scooter."

"Scooter Farrell is having an affair with a married woman?" Brigie seemed impressed.

"I take it this woman is not out anywhere then."

"Kit," Rabbit shook her head dejectedly, "I don't even know who she is."

"That's some secret affair then," Del noted.

"It's a right bitch, lemme tell ya," Rabbit winked.

Kit ran her hands through her hair. This was all nicely juicy but not useful for anything except slaking Brigie's thirst for goss. She gave Del a time-to-leave nod and the Big R's arm a gentle farewell slap. "Gotta go Rabbit mate, but if you see Scooter, please tell her she has to call Detective Martin at the Homicide Squad. If that's too scary for her for any reason, then tell her to call me and I'll explain why she has to."

"Sure thing Kit. Have I got your number?"

Kit smiled. "I don't know Rabbit, have you?" She pulled her wallet out of her back pocket and extracted two of her business cards. "One for you and one for Scooter."

Kit was half way to her car before she checked that Del and Brigit had Scooter's address.

"Yes," Del nodded, "but we don't need it Kit. It really is the police who want to talk to Scooter, remember, not us."

"But we could interrogate her," Brigit suggested cheerily.

"About what?" Del asked.

"About who her married woman is."

"Why?"

"Because I want to know."

"And your reason?" Del asked Kit, as they all got into her RAV.

"I thought if she was local we could swing by on the way to wherever we're going and tell her to front up before the cops get suspicious about her for no valid reason."

"Where are we going?" Brigit asked.

Kit shrugged and looked at Del who said, "Scooter lives in Williamstown."

"Oh. Wrong direction. So we're not going there," Kit said, taking St Georges Road.

"Thank goodness," Del commented. "Because as charming as Williamstown is, it's not on the way to anywhere I want to go today."

As the place Del most wanted to go was back to work, Kit dropped her friends off at their office then tossed an imaginary coin to choose between going to see Erin Carmody at the St Kilda Star or Jon Marek at police HQ. The coin pointed out she'd get more of relevance by visiting Marek's office because that would increase the likelihood of bumping into the hopefully helpful Detective Cathy again. Also, seeing Erin in person for what she needed wasn't really necessary, except that actual visits to her office usually resulted in cake, which was always good. But not today, Josephine, she thought as she pulled up three cars back from the Punt Road intersection.

While waiting the usual two weeks for the left-turning drivers ahead of her on Swan Street to get their cars into go-forward mode, Kit jammed her phone's earpiece into her ear hole and called the St Kilda Star because, in person or not, she did need a favour. She had no idea whether it was possible, but hoped that Erin might be able to apply something in the right place to ensure that a certain northern-suburbs journo didn't end up in the Maribyrnong River wearing concrete runners because she was too intrepid for her own good.

The phone rang and rang and rang. Kit rotated her shoulders and growled, as a vaguely-felt hysteria, that nothing was happening anywhere, fuelled the impatience caused by her still waiting-waiting for the last car ahead of her to get a bloody move on. Ring. Ring.

"Oh and shit, shit!" she swore as she realised that now she wasn't going to St Kilda, she didn't even need to be in the no-choice but to turn left lane. "Life would be simpler, Katherine O'Malley, if you'd decide before you drive. Ah, finally!" She made the now unnecessary turn and headed south on Punt Road. Ring, ring...

"St Kilda Star, Simon Veducci speaking."

Oh no, not Mr Loopy.

"Hi Simon. This is Kit O'Malley. Remember me?"

"Do I?"

"Um, I don't know, Simon. Is Erin there?" she asked.

"In a word, no," said the guy she'd last seen crouching on top of the office storage shelves - out of reach of the nogglers and scary rats. Erin had suggested he take a long holiday, which he did, but from which he now seemed to have returned.

"Do you know where she is?"

"That's Kit the PI, yeah?"

"Yes Simon."

"Okay. I can tell you that Erin has gone to a meeting, and is incommunicado."

"Inco...really? Would you tell her I rang then, please Simon."

"Of course. I don't suppose I can help?" he asked hopefully.

"Maybe," she replied. "Are the St Kilda Star and the North Star related?

"Yes Kit. Both newspapers are owned by the same quartet of stinking capitalist bastards. They also own the Eastern Echo and the Westerly."

"Thank you Simon."

"My pleasure entirely. I believe." He hung up.

"Bye then," Kit said, lifting the sun visor to take a squiz at the Nylex silo clock. "Two-fifteen and, and," she said, "come on, ah - twelve degrees. That explains the temperature."

Fool! came the afterthought, as she crossed the Yarra Yarra by the negligible Hoddle Bridge and made a right turn onto Alexandra Avenue to follow the river's course beside the Royal Botanic Gardens. The Yarra wasn't looking its best this arvo, she noted, but then it really had nothing to reflect today but gloomy gloom and an overcast sky.

Kit tried Erin's mobile number, just in case her friend was only unreachable when it came to Simon Veducci, but as the call went straight to voicemail she had no way of knowing whether that was the case, or not. She left a message asking Erin to call back.

The Homicide Squad when it was in, worked out of the Police Complex on St Kilda Road, along with the Arson, Drug and Organised Crime squads. It took Kit such a ridiculously long time to travel the very few kilometres to its thereabouts opposite Melbourne Grammar, that the flying crows who'd set out at the same time had died of old age by the time she got there.

She signed in, waited for her escort, took the lift to the ninth floor and stepped out into the familiar chaos of a busy squad room. Most of the Ds she passed on her way to Marek's office ignored her, one glared suspiciously and another hailed her warmly. She couldn't see Cathy Martin anywhere but she could see that Marek was pacing his office like a man with only two directions in life - back and forth - until he saw her; and that stopped him in his tracks.

He beckoned her inside where, surprise-surprise, she found the not-really-missing Erin Carmody lounging on his overstuffed couch, drinking coffee.

"I'd love one of them," she said to Marek, as she plopped herself down next to Erin and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "Hi honey."

"Hello cherub," Erin smiled.

Marek handed Kit a coffee. "For the record, this is not a café. What are you doing here?"

"I was just walking by," Kit frowned, "you're the one who invited me in."

"Oh good, it's smart arse day," Marek huffed, collapsing into his own chair with an air of such resignation that it would have worried Kit, had she not seen this act a hundred times.

"Really, I was just passing," she insisted, offering up one of her best no ulterior motive, butter-wouldn't-melt kind of smiles, knowing he wouldn't buy it - not even for a second.

"What can I say, Jonno? Obviously I'm on a digging expedition. I was hoping to get some stuff from Detective Martin and I was looking for Erin."

"What made you think she'd be here?" Marek asked.

"If you're talking about Erin - I didn't; if you're talking about Cathy - she works here."

"And what stuff could Martin possibly have for you?"

"I don't know yet," Kit said thoughtfully.

"Everything in this office is classified," Marek stated.

"Since when?"

"Since you walked in. I'm warning you right now Kitty, I do not want you out there finding any more dead bodies while you're not investigating the one you found yesterday."

"You found another one?" Erin exclaimed.

"Where have you been?" Kit frowned.

"At home, on holiday, since Tuesday."

"Simon the Mad said you'd gone incommunicado to a meeting."

"That was last Friday," Erin rolled her eyes. "So, spill. What have I missed?"

Kit took a breath to begin the lowdown, but...

"Did you not hear me say this isn't a café?" Marek swivelled his chair, massaged his hand on his spiky-short hair, and let go a serious long-suffering sigh.

Oh dear, Kit thought, there is something wrong. "How about you and I go somewhere for something," she suggested to Erin, as she stood up. "Unless you've only just got here, in which case I'll go and look for Cathy."

"What? Why?" Erin frowned at Kit, then glanced at Marek and, by the looks of things, saw something there she didn't recognise. She reached up to make use of Kit's offered hand. "Let's go get cake. I only dropped in to invite Jon to dinner and I've done that."

As she stood, Erin's soft black velvet skirt dropped in waves like, well, soft black velvet from her previously semi-revealed knee down to her well-turned ankles. This, combined with the flick of her wild red hair over her shoulder, produced an interesting - and never-before-seen-by-Kit - effect on Detective Inspector Jon Marek.

Kit noticed that while his eyes softened in a smile, his chest expanded suddenly as if he'd been caught unawares by something truly worth noticing.

Ooh, love stuff, Kit thought, pleased that two of her dearest friends had found it together.

"Sorry guys," Marek apologised. "This just isn't the best time for socialising."

"Or the right place either, Jon," Erin said. "We understand. Come O'Malley."

Marek walked them to his door, lightly touching Erin in the small of her back as he ushered them out. He then caught hold of Kit's elbow, "Cathy is in interview room four, for the peace and quiet, if you really want to talk to her about any 'stuff' that isn't classified. My advice - which, of course, you won't take - is not to get caught up in this one, Kitty. Nothing the Rileys have done is worth you getting in their crosshairs."

"Of that, I am aware," Kit smiled. "But thank you, Jonno."

"The Rileys?" Erin whispered as she following Kit, closely.

"Yeah, the Rileys," Kit said, stopping outside the interview room. "Erin honey, would you mind waiting out here. I'll fill you in, I promise, but I doubt the nice Detective in Charge of Dead Gerry will tell the private eye very much at all if she comes armed with a reporter."

Erin scowled and pouted, but sat down on the bench seat opposite the closed door on which Kit was knocking. When it opened, Detective Senior Constable Cathy Martin, who didn't look quite surprised enough to see her, stepped back casually and waved her in.

Kit noticed the phone on the desk. "He rang ahead."

"He did," Cathy shrugged. "Have a seat and tell me how we can help each other."

"We can?" Kit sat.

"Play your cards right, O'Malley, and this could be the start of a beautiful relationship," Cathy said, trying not to laugh. "What do you need?"

"Nothing specific," Kit grinned. "Angie Nichols has hired me just in case she needs a forward scout in the ruck."

"A scout in the ruck?" Now she was laughing.

"Sorry, my sporting analogies are woeful," Kit said. "I'm not even sure what a ruck is. I am, however, worried that Chucky - sorry, Detective Senior Sergeant Parker will make Angie your public prime suspect by either deliberate or accidental implication."

Cathy ran a finger through her blonde hair. "I am the lead investigator," she reassured her.

"I know, Cathy. But I also know Chucky. We go way back, sadly. Anyway, that's why Angie hired me. I assure you, however, I am not investigating the murder of Gerry Anders."

"Good. Coz you're not allowed to."

Kit grinned. "I'm also not investigating anything else that's not allowed or foolhardy."

"What are you doing then?"

"I'm looking into how a certain Mr Anders came to be where he was found."

Cathy offered Kit half a smile. "What do you want, O'Malley?"

Kit widened her eyes, waited for the other half of the detective's smile, then said, "Anything you can tell me, between now and when you do solve his murder, that relates to or affects Angie, our friends or the bar, in return for everything I discover in my quest to find out what, if any, connection Gerry boy had to the Terpsichore and/or all who sail in her."

Cathy leant back on her chair and considered Kit's offer thoughtfully; or checked her out from head to foot, depending on whether subtext was playing any part in the future of this beautiful new relationship or not. Kit waited politely.

"The Boss, as in Marek not Chuck," Cathy raised a brow as she threw-up her superior's name "said I could use my judgement in what I give you because you won't go blabbing anything I ask you to keep to yourself to the wrong people; like your reporter mate out there."

You mean Marek's reporter mate, Kit thought. "That sounds like a perfect relationship."

"Good. First things first then. Have you managed to find Karen Farrell? And if not, should I be worried about that?"

"No and no," Kit said. "She allegedly has a new lover and therefore probably has no idea you want to speak to her. But I'm still looking. Do you have any clues or ideas as to why the body of Gerry Anders was left in The Terpsichore?"

"No clues and no ideas, yet. But Charlie..." Cathy stopped herself for a moment, perhaps to reconsider how much she really should tell Kit. She obviously got the go-ahead from herself, because she continued, "um, Charlie was organising for the Doggies to keep an eye, or rather continue to keep watch on a couple of Gerry's known accomplices and a foe or two. While he has been - I think jokingly - mouthing-off that 'those women' did it, Charlie does agree with the rest of us that it's more likely the murder has something to do with Gerry's hit on the Sherwoods."

"Chucky's not joking," Kit snorted. "He would just love for one, nay all of us women to be responsible. But if Gerry's demise is related to those nicely now-dead drug dealers, why would his killer leave what was left of him at Angie's?"

"I really don't know the answer to that," Cathy said. "But if I discover there's a reason that makes any sense I'll let you know - if I can. What about you?"

"Yeah sure," Kit agreed. "I've got feelers out to see if any of the regulars have connections to the Rileys or, more importantly, to anyone who hates the Rileys."

"Or just Gerry," Cathy suggested. "He did a lot of shit on his own, O'Malley. I've heard Queenie was forever threatening to squeeze his favourite bits in the nutcracker she allegedly keeps for exactly that purpose. His arson stuff, for instance, was apparently not a Riley deal. The word is that it was either a scam, or business competition over his nightclub."

"Yeah, well you can't believe every word," Kit reminded her. "That idiot reporter Carrie McDermid from the North Star claims Gerry had a financial interest in The Terpsichore."

"Yeah, I read that too," Cathy laughed. "Don't you think we should regard that as fact, given it came from the woman who also called Gerry a crime lord?"

Kit smiled. "Well, aside from the not true aspect of it, have you heard anything similar? Or, do you happen to know who McDermid's source is?"

"No idea about the source, but we have heard rumours that Anders had an interest. Not an actual financial stake, an interest," Cathy qualified. "Already, however, it seems that no one is sure whether they know this because they read it in the paper or because they know it for a fact. I've got someone working that angle just in case; the same officer who's investigating any possible links between Gerry and your mate Angie, and/or her business partners."

Kit scratched the back of her head and frowned.

"You know I have to," Cathy added.

"Of course," Kit acknowledged. "It's just that it's all too ridiculous for words. If Angie had any connection with Gerry, the Rileys or their enemies why..." Kit turned her palms up.

"Why would she kill him somewhere else, then take his body back to her own bar and call the police? You're right, it's crazy," Cathy agreed.

"So, you're sure he was done elsewhere?" Kit asked.

"Oh yeah. There were no blood splatters to indicate that someone had their most important veins sliced open on the premises, at any time, and there were zero signs of a struggle. In fact, if not for Gerry himself, there'd be almost no hint of a crime happening there at all."

"Do you know how the perp got in, post-murder?" Kit asked.

"The pantry window from the side lane. One louvre was removed and one was broken. Then he or they opened the fire door in the disco and just wheeled poor Gerry inside."

Kit foraged around in her mind for any details that could generate more questions. "What about Alan Shipper?" she suddenly asked.

Cathy looked puzzled. "He's dead, isn't he?"

"Yeah, I know he's dead. But who killed him? That could be the question, Cathy," Kit proposed. "If it was his alleged kidnapper, Gerry Anders, who did him in then the late Mr Shipper - a previously-ordinary, apart from being filthy rich, family man - may now have some understandably-angry relatives roaming the mean streets looking for payback."

"I thought Shipper was killed in a car accident," Cathy frowned. Kit reacted with her seriously dubious face, so Cathy narrowed her eyes and added, "But I'm sure we're looking into that possibility." She pulled a stack of manilla folders into the space on the desk between them and changed the subject. "Would you do me a favour, O'Malley? Take a look at these surveillance pics and tell me who you think shouldn't be there."

Kit flipped through a couple of dozen photos taken outside Angie's earlier that morning, and pointed out the religious protesters, Mr and Mrs Godsimage, a few sightseers, all the reporters, three cops, and one lone and terribly unfortunate-looking bloke standing closer to the ex-church next door than The Terpsichore, so he may not have been there at all.

"Hmm," Cathy hmmed. She did a bit of shuffling, opened another folder and tapped the top photo, in which was captured for posterity what looked like a surreptitious deal going down between two more-than-likely crooks.

Bloody hell, Kit moaned silently. With bastards like these haunting the edges of my old life and, it seems, threatening to enter my current one, it's no wonder I have inexplicable creepy nightmares, instead of dreamscape adventures with gorgeous Amazon warriors.

"It's the same guy," Cathy was saying.

"So it is," Kit said, peering at Unsightly Man, who featured in both photos. "Who is he?"

Cathy shook her head. "I was hoping you'd know."

"Sorry. I know who the other bloke is. Unfortunately," Kit volunteered. "But not him."

"You know this guy?" Cathy was surprised.

"Yeah. Don't you?"

Cathy shook her head. "It's not my file. This was one of the photos that Charlie laid out for the uniforms this morning, so they'd know which of Gerry's associates to keep tabs on."

Kit was intrigued. "Really? Which of these two did he want them to follow?"

"I don't know," Cathy said, as she examined the picture more closely. "I wasn't paying attention at the time because, then, I hadn't seen these photos from The Terpsichore. Who is he? A friend of Anders, or an enemy?"

"Either, neither, both; I don't know," Kit shrugged. "I can vouch that there's no love lost between him and a good twenty percent of the current police force, one detective in particular; as well as several retired cops, including me."

"Goddamnit O'Malley, who is he?"

"Edward Paul Jackson; affectionately," Kit sneered the last word, "known as Pauly-J. Ex cop, bad ex-cop. Taken down, and right out, a few years ago by a toecutter by the name of Graham Charles Parker."

"Charlie was internal affairs?"

"Cut his teeth and earned his dubious stripes by ridding the force of Pauly Jackson and a couple of his way-bent partners in crime."

Cathy frowned. "I wonder why Charlie didn't mention his name this morning?"

"The doggies would already know Pauly-J." Kit sighed deeply. "I've got to admit, Cathy, I really don't like it that Chucky and Pauly-J are now, and concurrently, impinging on my personal landscape when I've had nothing to do with either bastard since I left the force. It's like the bad elements in society have been regurgitated into my neck of the woods just for the hell of it." She got to her feet. "It's spooky, and enough to make a girl go home and hide."

Cathy seemed amused by Kit's verbal eruption, but said, "Just like that?" when it was over.

"Yep," Kit responded. "Encountering the Chuck yesterday was bad enough but this is an unpleasant coincidental blast from my past, and I hate coincidences. So, I'm going now."

"I don't get you, O'Malley," Cathy remarked, with another half-smile that meant Kit couldn't work out whether she was disappointed or baffled or, in fact, why she was anything.

"What's to get?" Kit shrugged. She pulled out a business card and placed it on Cathy's desk. "Thank you. If you need anything, or have anything for me, please call."

Kit was at the door before Cathy reacted. "There was one thing you didn't ask, O'Malley."

"Only one?" Kit said mockingly.

"Yeah. The when did Gerry Anders die question."

"Okay. I'll bite. When did Gerry's severe loss of blood result in his no longer being alive?"

Detective Senior Constable Cathy Martin raised her eyebrows - and kept them there. "Ruth reckons last weekend - as in six or seven days ago. His body had evidently been kept on ice."

"Oh, that's charming," Kit remarked. "Who the hell would want a dead Gerry Anders lying around in their freezer?"

"He wasn't frozen, he was stored somewhere just cool enough to keep him fresh."

"Oh, now you see," Kit noted, "that is way more information than I needed."

Cathy laughed. "And it, all of it O'Malley, is for your ears only, okay?

"Oh yeah," Kit agreed, as she opened the door. "And thanks, Cathy."