Chapter Three
The sky was growing lighter and he could hear bird call in the trees, he was freezing in his t-shirt. He rubbed his arms with his hands, his skin rough to the touch with goose pimples. It had gotten colder as the night neared the dawn, the adrenalin in his system had slowly abated and he had long since run out of the vodka he was drinking.
Martin had been walking all night, aimless at first, sipping from the bottle, the mouthfuls getting bigger the more he drank. He had ended up in the wharf area at one point, searching for the ship he had seen earlier. Stumbling onto the waterfront he realised that it had already sailed, slipping into the inky blackness of the harbour channel without fanfare, taking with it his drunken fantasy of escaping his life. The area left in darkness; the only sound was the gentle lapping of the water against the wooden piles, which had emphasised the emptiness inside him.
He had continued to walk, hour after hour, until the sky had grown lighter. He did not want to go home, but he did not want to stay in the cold. He was at a loss; the image of the man with the ugly red hole in his back kept running through his mind, the girl looking at him, accusing him with her eyes. He could not shake the feeling of shame he felt when he saw those eyes in his head.
He had bought the Vodka in an attempt to numb his senses, but all it did was make him feel even more depressed. Why did he let Tama talk him into this? He knew Joseph was an arsehole. It was always going to go bad.
He wondered for a second how Tama was feeling, he could just about see the corner of Tama's house from where he was standing, it looked cold and uninviting in the early morning greyness. He could not quite see his own house, but the need for sleep drew him closer. He would have to suck it up and go indoors.
Opening the door as quietly as possible, he walked into the hallway, the smell of stale cooking fat invading his senses. He could hear him snoring in the lounge room but he knew he would not wake. He would still be out of his head, high on whatever he had managed to get his hands on the night before. If he were in the lounge then his mother would still be at work, doing the night shift in the nursing home, it was always the same.
It had been a few years now since he had felt afraid to be in the house on his own with him, but he always felt the shame. He had never told anyone what happened, especially not his mother. It was something he had learnt to live with, but it was always there between them.
He saw the way he looked at him, a sort of guilty challenge in his eyes. They did not talk anymore, not that he had ever said much to him in the first place. Martin patted the money in his pocket.
It's a start; he knew this was his ticket out of the shithole he lived in.
Closing the door of his bedroom, he lifted the corner of the frayed carpet. Underneath he prised a loose board up with his fingernails. It revealed a small cavity in which he put the money before replacing the board and covering it back up with the carpet. 'It's enough to get me started' he said to himself as he lay down on his bed, not bothering to undress he closed his eyes, dreaming of the new world he would inhabit.
"Martin, wake up man, we're in the paper bro". Martin opened his eyes with a start to see Tama standing at the foot of his bed moving from side to side. "We're in the fucking paper, have a look, how fucking cool is that man, we're gonna be legends".
"Tama shut the fuck up, he might hear you. You dumb shit".
"Who will? Your stepfather? That deviant prick is still passed out on the couch in the lounge, he ain't hearing shit". Tama carried on moving from side to side.
Tama looked wired, as if he had not slept. His eyes were bloodshot and his pupils dilated. The way he was fidgeting Martin could tell he was on something.
He looked out the window and saw a bright cloudless sky, the sort of spring day you look forward to when you were young, full of promise.
Not today though, he thought.
"Forget about him, have a look at this", Tama shoved the paper in his face.
He thought he could see the headline screaming, 'We know who you are and we're coming to get you'. However, it was only a small quarter at the bottom of the front-page reading, ‘North end dairy robbed at gunpoint'. It went on to say the male proprietor was in a critical condition at Dunedin Hospital. It went on to say, the Police had only a few lines of inquiry to follow up in relation to the shooting. The image of the old man came back to him; he did not bother to read any more.
"What are you so happy about Tama; you shot a man last night. He might die".
Tama's face was incapable of emotion in his heightened state. "The gun just went off..., but I don't care anyway. I stopped J man from getting the bash. You could see he was impressed, that fucking little piece of shit came out of nowhere man, but I took care of it".
He could almost hear a sense of pride in Tama's voice when he spoke, Joseph bloody Kingi must have been bigging him up all night, making him feel like a real star. Martin did not bother to mention to Tama that he had run out and left him at the store. It was not Tama's fault; not really, he would kill for attention from the gang. He just about did. Nevertheless, Joseph had put him in that position.
"Where's the gun now?” He asked.
"It's in this bag", Tama said, picking up a blue sports bag off the floor. "J man said to hide it someplace safe then come and get you. He wants to see you Martin; he didn't say what it was about".
Tama opened the bag slightly revealing the ugly presence of tarnished grey metal sitting side by side on top of a mottled and splintered wooden stock. The ends of the shortened barrels showing the silver of recently cut steel still rough around the edges; there was obviously no care taken when modifying the benign but evil object.
He started to get an uneasy feeling in his stomach, a summons from Joseph Kingi usually did not end to well, and it looked like he was going to distance himself from last night by making Tama dispose of his gun. He got himself off the bed and looked at Tama who was still hopping from side to side, an excited but serious look on his face. The boy had no idea what he had done. He and Tama were the same age but he saw Tama as a boy; his mental age had never progressed past his first year at high school. He lived in a world where respect came from the wrong type of actions and the people whose respect he craved would never give a shit about Tama. He was always going to be expendable.
"Well we had better get that bag hidden then T, and get round to your mate J man's house". He tried for a smile, only half managing it. There was no way he wanted to panic Tama in his state; and he did not want to let him take them both down by doing something stupid. "We'll dump it over in the Golf Course, I know a good place".
"You're a fucking legend, Star".
Martin never understood Golf as a sport, old men and their little trolleys, and their little balls. Rugby League, now that was a sport for men. They were warriors, hard men that played hard. Nobody gave any quarter and none expected in a sport like that.
As it was though they saw no one on the golf course this morning except for someone driving a tractor mower over in the opposite corner, although it was too far away to bother them where they were going. He looked around at the green space; it was so vast and empty. They were nearing a stand of pine trees, turning his head back behind him to check for anyone following, he could see the view over the city and all the way to the Pacific Ocean. It's funny he thought, the view seems so perfect out here in the rich man’s domain, but step off the green of the golf course back into the estate that surrounded it, the place they called home, and the view changed. It was the same view but seen from the wrong perspective. Instead of being something to admire, it was something he could never hope to be part of, stuck in the shithole he lived in, trapped in a life of poverty.
They reached the right place and stopped. Crouching down he pushed the pine needles away from the base of the tree revealing a small cavity beneath. Grabbing the bag from Tama, he shoved it as far as he could into the hole before covering it with the pine needles. Standing, he looked over towards the roa
d, less than a few hundred metres away, obscured by the trees, was 'The Pad'. Joseph Kingi junior’s domain, his seat of power, barricaded from view by a high fence.
He preyed on the weak to feed his lifestyle, backed by a crew of thugs who were loyal to the patch. Joseph’s coveted patch came to him as a birthright. He did not need to earn it, but it did not stop him leading by example. When Joseph's father had been in charge, the patch had stood for something in the community. They did not offend against their own, but they made sure people knew who were in charge; they commanded respect with a fear in people that they did not see themselves.
That had all changed just before Joseph senior had gone to prison; he had lost his way in life. The drugs he was using made his leadership untenable. A violent man by nature with a quick temper he would lash out without provocation and for any reason. The drugs intensified this behaviour and a spiralling habit led to more and more risk taking to feed the habit. Eventually Kingi Senior had lost control and everything had to come to a head. The Police caught up with his behaviour and arrested Kingi and jail was the obvious outcome. He went away for various offences leaving his then eighteen-year-old son in charge. The fear remained in the community but for a different reason. The new blood had started to rise up through the gang, bringing with them the horrors of their upbringing, the effects intensified by Methamphetamines and heavy Cannabis use passed on by the elders. These were a new breed of gang member, young men not in control of their emotions, living for today and not caring who they hurt in the process. They were all high on the power that fear and intimidation gave them, and right at the top of that pile was Joseph junior.
The older members, still loyal to Joseph senior had distanced themselves from the day-to-day activities of the gang and hardly ever came to the pad. The young Turks had control, and like a twisted sequel to 'Lord of the Flies' they were all jostling for position amongst their peers, a hierarchy in an anarchic world of chaos.
He could see the bottom dwellers on the fence now, the lowest ranking members always found themselves on sentry duty and their heads were constantly popping up over the high fence, wired looking eyes scanning for potential threats. To Martin they were no more than glorified doorman. They were only there to vet, and then let any potential visitors through the barricades. Hardly worth having in Dunedin, the only real threat they faced was from the Police, and then they were hardly likely to ask nicely to come in.
As they neared the fence line, he could tell Tama was getting more and more excited.
"J man was really pumped last night, he couldn't stop talking about it," he was saying, his voice slightly higher in pitch than usual."Man, he told me he might get me a patch for what I did, how fucking cool would that be".
He looked at Tama; he was smiling through wired eyes, it was one of his biggest dreams. He had been going on about it ever since he had known him. At one time, it would have been his dream as well, getting a patch in his world meant you had made it, that you were someone that people could look up to, and that was everything.
Unlike Tama, he no longer wanted to be a big man in his world; he wanted to be any man in a new world, somewhere his memories would be free of where he came from and what he had experienced.
The sentries must have seen them coming as the large wooden gate swung open in front of them without having to knock. Inside, the two young men on sentry duty said nothing as they walked through. They were looking at Tama with jealous expressions, eyes that betrayed envy and awe in the same instance. Tama's posture had taken on a confident swagger as he walked through the yard, parading his newfound status to those that cared. One of the two sentries recognised Martin and flicked his chin in the air as a greeting. Martin returned the gesture; he knew the face, but he had forgotten his name.
"What were you doing over in the trees Star?” The sentry asked.
The question was innocent enough but he was not about to let on the truth. "T needed to take a leak didn't you T". He looked at Tama hoping he would realise what he was doing.
"Yeah... that's right, hope you didn't see too much bro, don't want you getting jealous or something". Tama grabbed his crotch with his left hand and grinned.
"Yeah right", the sentry replied, then pointed to the main building "J mans in there".
Entering the dark musty hallway of the building Martin saw Tama's shoulders drop again, confidence seeping out of him.
The smell of stale beer and Cannabis had permeated into the carpets and walls giving the place a distinctive smell. He had only been in the place once before but it was the same smell he remembered.
Tama seemed to know where he was going so he followed closely behind, conscious of the doors he passed, partially open, glimpses of a twisted humanity inside them.
He saw a dreadlocked male with a belt around his bicep, in one room, needle in his hand. There was a partially naked girl with dead eyes in the next; a fat hairy man was taking her from behind on a bed with no sheets, while another male had passed out in a chair beside them, oblivious. Two women were in another, crying onto each other’s shoulders. Music was pumping out of the room at the end of the hallway. He could feel the heavy beat and heard crass lyrics that spat out of the speakers with the angst of the oppressed. The party from last night had not stopped.
"Star…, good of you to come". Joseph said looking up from the floor as they entered the darkened room. His voice was only just audible over the loud music.
He could not see his face clearly in the smoky gloom to read his expression, but his tone was unnaturally chirpy. The wounds Joseph got from his beating in the store were not visible, and his matted dreadlocks were shining as if he had just washed, which he knew was improbable. It was common knowledge that Joseph preferred the old way of creating and maintaining his dreadlocks and that was to wash them as little as possible, if at all.
Joseph indicated that he and Tama sit on the ground next to him.
The two girls who were fondling him in various places, modesty protected by the dim light, got up and scuttled away into the darkness. Martin's eyes adjusted to the smoke and darkness of the room, he could make out more people sitting around the periphery. These would be the chosen, his most trusted thugs. The hierarchy of the twisted world he presided over.
"What's up J man?" He queried.
Joseph smiled a black and gold encrusted smile; he took a deep lungful of smoke out of the butt end of a cigarette, before stubbing it out on the carpet beside him. He regarded Martin for a moment before answering.
"Where did you get to last night Star? We waited for you to come out of the shop but you did not show up. Did you have a go with that tasty piece of arse?”
Martin remained silent and watched as Joseph shook his head in amusement.
"Anyway I just wanted to thank you for last night, is all", Joseph said, looking directly at him now. "We all showed what we were made of..., we certainly showed that little fuck what we were made of as well". Low voices came out of the darkness, grunts of congratulations towards Joseph and Tama.
"Pity we only got away with that synthetic shit and a few chocolate bars. All that effort… still we made the paper this morning, at least that is something though. Did you see that Star?" Joseph held up a paper in front of him.
"Tama showed me", he said, unsure of where this was going.
"Useful thing is the paper, you find out what's going on. Its funny isn’t it; you do not know what to believe. See it says here that over one thousand dollars was taken from the cash drawer", Joseph pointed to a piece of the article in the paper that Martin was unable to see. "Do you believe that Star...?"
Martin's heart skipped a beat; he had not thought about this, he did not quite know what to say. He really did not want to give up any of the money to this piece of garbage. Nevertheless, if Joseph found out he was holding out on him, he would kill him.
"We didn't get time to get any money J man, what with Tama shooting that guy after he attacked you". Martin could feel Joseph's
questioning gaze upon him.
"That's right Star..., they must be lying. It also says here that the pigs have no clue about who done it. Do you think they are lying about that to Star?”
Martin shrugged his shoulders, "Maybe it's the truth" he said, "Maybe the shopkeeper is just making a false claim, you know..., to get insurance or something". Holding his breath, he waited nervously for Joseph to show any signs that he believed what he was saying.
More grunts of agreement came out of the darkness.
Joseph stayed silent for a few moments as if digesting what Martin had said. "So if the pigs don't have a clue and you two retards keep mouths shut then we are home free". Joseph said, quietly. "Pity we didn't get any of that money though isn't it Star". He added giving him a hard stare.
Martin did not reply he just sat there in the gloom, glad of the darkness that was hiding his fear.
The office was buzzing with talk of the robbery the previous evening. Grant had given an initial rundown of the incident followed by Bridger who, after suffering a ribbing about having to return to work a night early, had followed up with a full briefing of actions completed and then a preliminary plan of attack. Although there had been a full turnout of staff last night, they been spread around Dunedin completing different tasks, so it was good to get together to make sure everyone was singing from the same page of the investigation prayer book.
He had been slightly nervous coming in this morning, but now it seemed like he had never been away. It was good to be back in the fold. Looking around him at the people in the room, nothing had changed, except that Jo had certainly made herself at home in the office. Her desk had a few personal items on it, pictures of a dog, two people whom he took to be her parents smiling in the background. A fresh bunch of flowers was also sitting near the windowsill. "Whose idea was the flowers?” he queried the room.
"Believe it or not, one of John's many love interests", Becky said, looking at them with a slight distaste. “I felt sorry for the girl, she turned up at the front counter with them and was let up to the office, John didn't say a lot to her and she left after a few short awkward silences".
Bridger looked at John's empty desk; he had sent him downstairs to attend the weekly crime meeting in place of himself. "Does anyone know what time he got in last night after I left him to recover that stolen car?, he didn't say this morning".
"He hasn't said, but he was in a foul mood when he came in", Grant said.
Bridger made a mental note to be less hard on him in the future, the team seemed more relaxed than they had been for a while, and he did not want to cause any issues by singling someone out. He was about to say something when the phone rang on his desk, He looked at it with slight hesitation, a feeling of foreboding in the pit of his stomach. Picking up the receiver, he answered on the fourth ring.
The news was exactly what he had been dreading.
'Johnny Chen, 54yr old widowed father of one, proprietor of Chen's food store, died at 0722hrs in the intensive care unit at Dunedin Public Hospital.'
Bridger put the phone down slowly and took a deep breath. The office was quiet. All eyes were on him. "He died...,” he said quietly, looking around at each one of them."This is now a murder inquiry".
The next couple of hours went in a blur, Becky and Grant had been dispatched to the hospital to deal with Mr Chen's body, which had now just become evidence, and as such had to be treated the same as anything else in the investigation. The chain of evidence had to be intact. Any evidence they located on the body while the pathologist processed Mr Chen through the indignities of a sudden death was important, so they needed to be there to catalogue and collect it. It was not something that Bridger particularly enjoyed; he had seen his fair share of autopsy procedures in the past. He was glad that he was now able to delegate the job to someone else; a shotgun injury at close range was not ever going to be pretty. Brian was delegated the task of re-interviewing the daughter as the only witness. John and Jo had a reprieve from death and were on their way to carry out door-to-door enquiries both at the scene and at where they had found the car dumped, not that John seemed to mind teaming up with Jo.
Bridger found himself in Detective Inspector Matthews’s office on the third floor. His immediate boss was a big bullish man who called a spade a spade. His man management skills were legendary throughout the Dunedin police station. You did as he told you or you found out what mood he was in that day, and it would not usually be good. Bridger had not seen Matthews since he pushed him out on leave the previous month.
"I won't say it’s good to see you back on your feet or anything like that but we do need to get a few things straight".
Bridger just looked at his boss and kept his mouth shut, sitting there with his arms crossed he knew he was being belligerent but could not help it. He wanted to hear what he had to say.
Matthews had called Bridger on his drinking which he was within his rights to do, he knew that, but Matthew's powder was not as dry as he liked to make out. Marion Watson's abduction, the last job he had worked on, had taken a few people with it when it ended. It exposed a sick culture that had manifested itself in a few people within the police a long time ago. Those people found themselves subject to scrutiny and all of them had been punished, one-way or another; Matthews had actually instigated the investigation into those people after Bridger uncovered enough facts to warrant it. However, what bugged Bridger was the fact that Matthews had a part to play in the completely twisted scenario that never saw the light of day.
"I don't know what you think you know Bridger, but whatever it is it’s in the past and that is where it stays...” Matthews paused, looking down at his desk, “I have done things in the past to get the job done. Some people, even you, may think that those actions were wrong, but they worked then and they still do now, and you know what, I still sleep like a baby.” Matthews looked back up from his desk and met Bridger’s eye, “Someone tried to prove otherwise once, as you well know, but for all his bluster, it came to nothing in the end. If you have a problem with that I suggest you look for somewhere else to work."
"I'm happy where I am.... Sir." Bridger put emphasis on the word 'Sir' in a childish attempt to show his contempt.
"Good…, well we have to draw a line under this and get on with some work; unfortunately we have a murder on our hands. Not the best time for me to be looking for a new Detective Sergeant". Matthews leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. "Now, tell me where we are at".
Bridger looked at his boss; he had skin as thick as a rhinoceros. It did not even faze him; he was living a life in which you could deal with any issue by ignoring it. He had even taken on a chummy stance as if they were old friends discussing past conquests. Bridger knew he would gain nothing by pushing the matter. It would have to keep.
He took a deep breath and then laid out the enquiry so far. It all boiled down to two things, a grainy black and white image of the side of someone's head in the store, as well as the DNA and fingerprints from the cans recovered from the area around the stolen car.
"Not a hell of a lot then is it Bridger, looks like you have an uphill climb on this one. He said, with a neutral tone. "I'll take care of the press release, and get someone to liaise with the family...I’m going to promise them the world Bridger, don't make me a liar".
Matthews dismissed him with a wave of his meaty hand.
The Inspector had actually surprised him though, by not uttering a single expletive in his whole speech.
A first for everything, he thought.
He stood for a second in the hallway outside of Matthews’s office and shook his head, unsure of how to take Matthews new approach. He had not mentioned the assault on Jonas Crompton that had plagued the Marion Watson investigation, he was sure he would have had at least had a disciplinary hearing under the code of conduct. You cannot just assault prisoners and expect to get away with it, but it seemed that someone had swept it under the carpet. If they let him off the hook for
this assault, he was damn sure he would be on someone's hook when it came to calling in the favour. Bridger pushed the thought to the back of his mind; it was not something he wanted to dwell on.
Returning to his office, he found a message waiting for him taped to his computer monitor, Julie Downie's handwriting with her trademark smiley face at the bottom.
Julie was a civilian employee whose job description seemed to change regularly to accommodate whatever new initiative the bosses had decreed that week. She was a friendly and affable person who took each new change in her stride, happy to be involved. This week it seemed that she was taking messages.
The note read simply; 'Fingerprint result from robbery, please call ext 44467.'
That was fast, Bridger thought, a surge of adrenalin spiking in his bloodstream. A suspect at this early stage would be the magic pill to possibly solving the case. Picking up the phone, he dialled the numbers.
"The suspect is Tama Wilson, twenty year old male, lives in Corstaphine. We found his fingerprints on some empty cider cans littered around where we recovered the stolen car at Unity Park. He has an extensive history of dishonesty and he loves stealing cars so it makes sense he could be involved with this stolen car". Bridger was looking around the room as he addressed the staff. The office was full; Bridger almost found it hard to breath. His Detectives and the members of the Armed Offender Squad had squeezed into whatever space they could find.
The last time he had anything to do with the AOS he had not acquitted himself very well, beating a suspect in an irrational rage, so he felt slightly uncomfortable in their presence.
"We still don't know if the car is actually connected to the robbery just yet though do we", a police officer dressed in his black AOS jumpsuit said from the rear of the room. Ken Moore, second in command of the Armed Offender Squad, made the statement.
Everybody in the station knew that Ken was someone who had little time for him. He unconsciously rubbed the spot on his forehead that had felt the stock end of Ken's AOS rifle. Ken had apparently ‘mistaken’ him for the bad guy when in the midst of a fast moving situation; he was not so sure that was a true account.
"You’re quite right Ken, but it’s too much of a coincidence to ignore", Bridger replied, ignoring the negative inflection in Ken's voice, "That's why we are going to kick his door in and ask him what he knows".
Brian Johnson spoke up from the side of the room. "I've dealt with him a few times in the past; he has never had a propensity for violence though. It bothers me a bit that it is out of character. This would be a massive step up for him if he were involved. He hangs around with a Martin McLaren who lives next door. Martin is an unknown to me, although the name McLaren rings a bell for some reason… Anyway Martin is not in the system and I don't think he has ever come to our attention".
"I agree with Brian, this has 'The Gang' written all over it" Becky said, "Joseph Kingi would be a good fit for the build of the bigger person in the CCTV footage we have, his dreadlocks could be tucked up into that ski mask he's wearing. He has a history for using people outside of the gang for his jobs as well. Do we know if Tama is connected to him?”
"That's something to explore in the interview Becky, good point. There are two other people involved in this and Joseph Kingi could be one of them. Now... does everybody know what role that he or she is playing?” Everyone nodded “Good… Once AOS has secured the house and Tama along with the firearm the arrest team can move in", Bridger looked around the room for final questions. Seeing none, he gave the order. "We move on the house at exactly ten hundred hours", he said looking at Gary Stone who nodded his confirmation.
"Right, let’s do this".
Wasted Lives, a Detective Mike Bridger novel Page 4
