Getting Warmer

by Alan Carter

  ‘Who?’ said Jimmy Tran, voice muffled because his face was pushed into the gravel by a TRG boot.

  ‘Christos Papadakis. He runs Zorba’s restaurant in Northbridge.’ Colin Graham was crouched down beside him, sweat beading his forehead.

  It was just past nine in the morning and already the temperature had hit thirty-five. Another fire had been lit about two kilometres east of them and the wind was sending it their way. There were media warnings of the need for evacuations in the face of a catastrophic fire risk. They didn’t have time to mess about. ‘You need to tell us where he is, Jimmy.’

  ‘Can’t help you,’ came the squashed reply. ‘Haven’t a clue.’

  Lara looked at the other prone men on the ground. One was conspicuously absent. ‘Where’s Mickey?’ Mickey Nguyen, the man whose ankle she’d stomped on.

  A shrug from Jimmy Tran, not easy face down under a ninja boot.

  Colin Graham had his gun out, the muzzle prodding the corner of Tran’s eye. ‘Jimmy, if any harm comes to that old man, I’m coming after you.’

  ‘So, am I under arrest or not?’ Tran giggled. He already knew the answer.

  Lara left Colin Graham to his devices: there was an alert out on Mickey Nguyen, and Jimmy and friends had been dusted off and released. Colin Graham’s superiors in Organised Crime had listened to the previous night’s recording and they had concurred: firstly the wire was unauthorised, secondly there was no explicit threat. The old man was simply a missing person, they concluded, one who had only been gone for a few hours. In the absence of compelling evidence of foul play, there was nothing to link his absence to the Trans. Graham had been predictably outraged but Lara just added it to the growing weight of her guilt. The only consolation for her now was that the Tran compound was directly in the line of the bushfire. She hoped the whole place would be razed to the ground. She drove up the freeway to see Mrs Papadakis. Colin Graham had given Lara a funny look as she pulled away: three parts hurt, two parts suspicious. Or was it the other way around?

  Zorba’s had a handwritten sign on the door, ‘Closed – private family matter’. Lara knocked and tried to peer into the gloom beyond. The door was opened by a bulky, bearded man in his forties, maybe one of the sons. She showed him her ID.

  ‘Yes. What do you want?’ A blink of watery eyes. ‘Have you found him?’

  ‘No. Sorry. Can I come in?’

  He opened the door wider and walked away. Lara closed it behind her. Mrs Papadakis was seated at a table at the back of the restaurant, surrounded by her middle-aged children and their spouses and offspring. Some looked fearful that Lara was the bringer of bad news; others glared or ignored her.

  ‘Why are you here?’ said Mrs Papadakis.

  Lara wasn’t sure. She brought no news, had no advice or solace, she had nothing to offer. ‘I came to see how you are.’

  Mrs Papadakis fluttered her hands at her children. ‘We want him back. We want you to bring Christos Papadakis back to his family. Do you understand that?’

  Lara nodded.

  ‘My husband brought us here for a better life. He made this restaurant. He worked hard. He paid those animals to leave us alone.’ A despairing shake of the head. ‘And he stood up to them.’ There was a choked male sob in the background.

  Lara listened to the words in their past tense. Already it was a eulogy. ‘I’ll bring him back to you.’

  She could see they didn’t believe her, or if they did they feared the double meaning.

  Cato was upstairs in the State Library scanning microfiche editions of The West for any traces of Kevin Wellard during the 1990s. It was a long haul. Allowing for Andy Crouch’s memory, Cato added a few years leeway either side of the timeframe. By the time he’d skated his way through the late 1980s and early 1990s he was an expert on the unfolding disaster of WA Inc. On he went, eyes blurring at the small print, a dull ache radiating from the back of his head. Then he found it: November 1996, a Saturday in the middle of the month.

  In memoriam. Kevin Paul Wellard 1959–1996. Beloved son of the late John and Mary. Brother of Gordon. We’ll meet again. Miss you mate. Gordon.

  Kevin was dead, at the age of 37. If he was an accomplice to his brother’s misdeeds then his role was over by 1996 – around the same time as his little brother dropped off the criminal records. Kevin couldn’t be the one sending the FINDERS KEEPERS letters to Shellie.

  Cato had the page printed and left the library. He made for the railway station and a homeward bound train. The CBD was a forest of high cranes and the skeletons of new buildings. Cato spotted the outline of at least one skyscraper he knew to be funded by drug money and several others where the builders and security firms were fronts for bikie and other criminal enterprise. The Perth city motto was ‘Floreat’, Latin for ‘flourish’ or ‘prosper’. It figured. Even some of the more legitimate dwellings were the results of wealth laundered over two centuries from stolen land, wages and minerals. Perth’s skyline might be constantly shifting but underneath the city remained the same: a grubby little fiefdom of robber barons.

  Cato bought his train ticket and took the escalator down to the Fremantle Line. His phone beeped: a text from Jake.

  can i come over this weekend?

  Texting his father, midway through a school day? Cato wondered what was wrong. He texted back:

  sure, will talk to mum

  and then he rang Jane.

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Hi.’

  ‘Just had a text from Jake. Wanting to come over this weekend.’

  A moment of silence. ‘Really? Are you well enough?’

  ‘Yeah, fine. Might not be up to shooting any hoops but we’ll work something out.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Everything okay?’ said Cato.

  ‘Yep.’ When she said it like that it meant no.

  ‘Okay, so when do we do it?’

  ‘I’ll drop him over on Saturday morning and pick him up same time Sunday?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Jake was upset about something and Cato had been blind to it. Instead he had become obsessed with the twisted world of Gordon friggin’ Wellard. He needed to get his bloody priorities straight.

  Senior Fire Officer Bevan Foley still had occasional nightmares about his experiences during the Black Saturday inferno in Victoria. He’d seen enough horror to last a lifetime. This wasn’t as big but it was still a potential killer. It had swept through three Baldivis properties, destroying one and badly damaging another. This third was lucky just to lose a couple of outlying sheds. They’d been at it since daybreak and he was stuffed. All because of some little fuckwit with a box of matches. The wind had finally shifted and the helicopter water-bombers had punched a big enough hole to allow them to get the bastard back on a leash. Foley and his team just needed to damp down these sheds and then another crew would relieve them. Then he could have a shower, a beer, and a sleep. The main shed had partly collapsed inwards: the Colorbond walls buckled and blackened. Through the gaps, thick oily chemical smoke indicated something none too healthy still burning inside. Probably tyres.

  Another few minutes and they were able to pull the door back to get a better sense of what they were dealing with. He’d hoped the burning tyre smell was from a pile of old spares but it looked like there was a vehicle in there, a 4WD, probably once worth a bob or two. As the acrid smoke cleared further, he realised there was another smell: like a barbecue left unattended. And there was somebody in the driver’s seat.

  17

  Lara watched as her boss dispatched orders and lesser mortals with obvious relish. By contrast, DS Colin Graham looked like he would rather be somewhere else.

  As soon as the body had been spotted, the firemen had called it in. In the wait for permissions and protocols the fire had come to life again briefly but now, properly extinguished, they were able to extricate the charred corpse from the driver’s seat.

  ‘Aw fuck.’ A fireman stepped back from the rear of the blistered Prado.

&nb
sp; Lara exchanged glances with Graham.

  DI Hutchens lifted his chin. ‘What?’

  ‘There’s another one in the boot,’ said the fireman.

  Hutchens fixed a beady on Graham. ‘Any ideas, Col?’

  Graham shrugged. ‘All of the Trans and associates are accounted for, except Mickey.’

  ‘And at this stage we’re guessing he’s the chauffeur. So we have a spare body. Curiouser and curiouser. What do you reckon, Lara?’

  This was her chance to come clean, distance herself from DS Graham and his dangerous games. Do the right thing by the Papadakis family. ‘No idea, sir.’

  The fireman leaned in closer to the body in the boot. ‘Jesus. You might want to check this out.’

  DI Hutchens sauntered over for a look. ‘Aw fuck.’

  ‘Nails?’ said Lara Sumich.

  ‘About forty of them,’ confirmed Hutchens, reading from an email. He closed his laptop and switched his attention to DS Colin Graham. The door to the DI’s office was closed and the blinds were drawn. It was well after home time but nobody was going anywhere soon. ‘So Col, we have a problem.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Running side errands with your Gangs mates and poor old Mr Papadakis.’ He flicked his hand at his computer, where the email had been. ‘What do you reckon we should say to the family?’

  Colin Graham folded his arms and slumped back into his chair. ‘Sorry?’

  If Lara had had a gun in her hand she probably would have shot him. ‘I’ll go and see the family, sir.’

  ‘Both of you will.’ Hutchens levelled his gaze back at Graham. ‘Then you’ll come back here, write a full report of your activities over the last seventy-two hours and have it in my inbox before you finish for the day.’ They stood to leave. Hutchens had his eyes down studying a desk diary but his finger was pointed at Graham. ‘Sergeant, I am initiating disciplinary proceedings against you. You’re off this investigation. Once you’ve notified the family you are to return to your usual duties with Gangs and await further instructions.’ He raised his head and looked at Graham. ‘You’re a disgrace. Get out of my sight.’

  Lara turned to follow Graham.

  ‘Not you,’ said Hutchens.

  She stayed.

  ‘Can you give me a good reason why I shouldn’t be disciplining you too?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you help set it up or were you just along for the ride?’

  ‘The latter. Sir.’

  ‘It showed poor judgement.’

  ‘Yes sir.’

  ‘He’s a prick and he’s sloppy and he’ll take you down with him when he goes. You want that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then be warned.’

  Heading north on the freeway, she couldn’t bear to look at Colin Graham. Lara was driving: the passing traffic a blur, the tension in the car a thick choking presence. She cracked open a window to a warm breeze scented with fuel and bush smoke. ‘So what do we say to Mrs Papadakis?’

  ‘The usual. We’re very sorry for your loss.’

  ‘Prick.’

  ‘Grow up, Lara. You’re a cop. Shit happens. Deal with it.’

  ‘We made this shit happen.’

  ‘We. That’s right. And we still have a long way to go to get to the other side of this. You got that?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘United we stand, divided we fall.’ Graham reclined his seat, yawned, and closed his eyes. ‘Give me a hoy when we get to the Greek.’

  ‘Cato?’ It was DI Hutchens.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘How you feeling?’

  Hutchens attentive, again: twice in as many days. What was he after?

  ‘All the better for hearing you, sir.’

  ‘No need for the sarcasm, mate, I only asked.’ There was hurt in Hutchens’ voice. Genuine.

  ‘Sorry, yeah, on the mend, thanks.’

  A pause. ‘Remember that day we were out bush with Wellard and Shellie?’

  Cato tensed. ‘What about it?’

  ‘Remember the pig with the nails in it?’

  18

  Thursday, February 4th.

  Lara woke up late. She’d ignored the alarm set for her morning run. Her limbs felt heavy and it was an effort to even open her eyes. She crawled out from under the sheet.

  The encounter with Mrs Papadakis had been predictably ghastly. While the woman had anticipated the worst, that wasn’t the same as having it confirmed. The wailing and keening had seemed primeval to Lara whose upbringing had been essentially emotion-free. Colin Graham, to her surprise, had risen to the occasion: he’d oozed sympathy. It had been so effective that the family seemed to forget it was actually his machinations that had killed their patriarch. Their dark wet eyes seemed instead to probe Lara for coming around all shiftless and guilty and making promises she couldn’t keep. Was that why she felt like shit?

  Or was it the fear that the affair with Colin Graham was dead? In the last few days her fascination for him had lurched over to revulsion at what he seemed capable of: yet still there was this longing for what she felt only a week ago. It went beyond the sex; inventive as he was, he wasn’t irreplaceable. Flushing Colin out of her life also meant flushing away her immediate hopes of a ticket into Gangs. But it was more than that too. Lately people kept getting the better of her. She’d misread Santo, and now Graham too. Was she losing it? It. Control over her life and her destiny.

  ‘Stupid bitch,’ she said aloud.

  After the visit to Christos’s family she’d dropped Graham in the city. Lara had returned to the office to file her report. Graham hadn’t attempted to coach her as to what it should say. He knew he didn’t need to. United we stand. She flicked on the kettle and chucked a teabag into a mug. Her report said Christos Papadakis, after years of paying protection money to the Trans and after forming a close personal bond with the now deceased officer Santo Rosetti, had volunteered to be wired for a meeting with Jimmy Tran in order to help gather evidence of Tran’s involvement in the murder of Rosetti.

  He came to see me that last night. He ate here. He said he was going to meet you.

  Was Santo really intending to meet Jimmy that night or was it a line fed to Christos to wind Jimmy up? If the former then she needed to know what the planned meeting was about. Her report concluded that Tran was now believed to be behind the subsequent abduction and murder of the old man after somehow becoming aware of the wiretap. It was recommended that Tran and his associates be arrested and questioned over the murder.

  Divided we fall. DI Hutchens had kicked Graham back to Gangs and was initiating disciplinary proceedings against him. Lara suspected Graham could look after himself, but what would Hutchens do with her? He’d already given her a second chance after the Hopetoun affair. She couldn’t see his goodwill stretching much further. Her phone went.

  ‘Lara?’

  ‘Boss?’

  ‘Autopsy on the old Greek. Ten o’clock.’

  ‘Will DS Graham be attending?’

  ‘No, he fucking won’t.’

  It had been a while since Hutchens had talked to her like that. Like she was just the same as everybody else.

  Cato sat in his Volvo station wagon in the car park at Casuarina. He had phoned ahead for an appointment and made it sound like official business even though he was still meant to be on sick leave.

  ‘Nasty business you had the other day. Surprised you’re up and about so quickly.’ Superintendent Scott seemed distracted, conducting two or three conversations at the same time: all the better, thought Cato.

  ‘The longer you stay down, the harder it is to get back up again,’ Cato had replied manfully.

  He was fairly confident that the Super would, sooner or later, make a crosschecking phone call to his boss DI Hutchens. In some ways that was the aim: the boy who kicked the hornets’ nest. The Wellard accomplice track was a dead end, at least for now, until Cato returned to work and had access to databases and such. In the meantime he thought he’d try shakin
g things up a bit. He checked the dashboard clock. Visiting time.

  ‘Just the two of us? Nice and intimate.’ Wellard took a seat as directed.

  Cato had persuaded Superintendent Scott to allow them some privacy. He’d hinted that he wanted Wellard to be able to open up and say things he may not be able to say in front of the guards, or the DI, he’d added enigmatically. Cato had met the Super’s look with a carefully crafted one of his own that suggested anything and said nothing. The hint that Cato might be working against DI Hutchens had no doubt tickled Scott and the wish had been granted. All’s fair in love and turf wars. There was still the backup of CCTV surveillance on the room and Scott would cover his arse by contacting the DI after a diplomatic amount of time had elapsed – enough for him to hear and record any dirt that might come in useful at some point in the future.

  ‘You, me and these four walls, mate.’

  ‘And the camera and the microphones,’ said Wellard, playing bored. ‘Found my Briony yet?’

  ‘No, any ideas?’ said Cato.

  ‘Nah, not today.’

  ‘Good, we’ve got that out the way then.’

  Wellard perked up; apparently there was a new game afoot. ‘Where’s Mr Hutchens today?’

  ‘Busy.’

  ‘I can imagine. Lot of bad people out there.’

  ‘Few in here too.’

  ‘That’s for sure. Any developments on your little Finders Keepers case?’ He’d used two fingers from each hand to do the parentheses mime. Eyes twinkling merrily as he tried to provoke Cato.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Cato. ‘Some crank probably.’