Assassin

by Tara Moss

  ‘You impressed me in Sydney. I’ll be recommending you in my report,’ he told her honestly, but her eyes continued to search him.

  ‘Are you okay?’ she asked.

  ‘Do I not seem okay?’

  She narrowed her warm brown eyes at him. Tilted her head. ‘Not that it’s any of my business, but no.’

  Andy looked away and leaned back in his chair.

  Mak is alive. But I can’t reach her.

  And Dayle …

  ‘Sorry. You’re right. I just heard that the surveillance has been pulled off John Dayle, so …’

  ‘What?’ She straightened suddenly and gripped the folder until it creased.

  ‘Dayle is still the prime suspect, however the surveillance team was needed elsewhere,’ he told her. He cast his gaze over his desk and finding nothing there to comfort him, he said, ‘And the warrant was knocked back.’

  ‘What do you mean? I don’t understand.’

  Andy took a deep breath. ‘Welcome to policing, Agent Harrison. We don’t always get what we want.’

  Harrison flinched, apparently taken aback. ‘But Dayle is dangerous. He’s the guy. You said so yourself,’ she argued, her brow pinched sharply and those chocolate eyes blazing. She was usually so measured, so cerebral about the work. He hadn’t seen her angry like this before.

  ‘Well, yes, I do believe he is guilty,’ he explained. ‘But the bottom line is we have yet to prove it … They have yet to prove it.’

  Andy had to stop thinking in terms of ‘we’, he reminded himself. He and his team had consulted for the NSW homicide squad, and now their involvement was over. When Andy had agreed to leave state homicide to start this unit, he’d known he would no longer be closing cases and making arrests. The Hempsey case wasn’t his case any more. And it wasn’t Harrison’s either.

  ‘How can we prove it if there is no one watching him?’

  ‘Perhaps forensics can come up with something,’ he muttered.

  ‘But he hasn’t submitted to a DNA test. He hasn’t been fingerprinted,’ she complained.

  ‘Dayle has never been charged with anything and the request for a search warrant was knocked back, as we worried it would be. This sort of thing is slow going.’

  ‘But it can’t be slow going. Not if he’s out there, looking for fresh victims.’

  Harrison had been with the ACT police for barely three years before being nabbed by the AFP for this project. She wasn’t experienced enough to have seen first hand how justice could sometimes go wrong, how officers could have their hands tied by a well-intentioned system built on the protection of important civil liberties. This was not the first time something like this had happened, nor would it be the last.

  ‘Harrison, you have to let it go. It’s out of our hands.’

  She stared at him, fuming.

  ‘Don’t you have a couple days off coming up?’ he asked her. She’d been doing long hours.

  ‘Yeah, from tomorrow,’ she said quietly.

  ‘Good. You’ve done some excellent work. Come back after the weekend with fresh eyes. There are plenty of other cases we are needed on.’

  ‘Do you promise you’ll let me know if there are any developments with Dayle?’

  He sighed. ‘There won’t be, Harrison.’

  ‘But if there are?’

  ‘I’ve got your mobile. Of course I’ll let you know. See you next week,’ he said and leaned forwards on his desk again.

  She turned and he watched her walk away, feeling deeply uneasy about the situation with Dayle, with Mak, with the Cavanaghs.

  CHAPTER 29

  Detective Jimmy Cassimatis, trapped in a persistent bored malaise, looked up from the stack of overdue paperwork on his cluttered desk at HQ only to find Detective Inspector Bradley Hunt looming over him like a dark cloud. They had barely exchanged words since Jimmy’s visit to Inspector Kelley’s office and this development did not improve Jimmy’s outlook in the least.

  ‘Cassimatis, you’re needed,’ Hunt said bluntly. He did not even try to disguise his contempt for the officer in his command.

  Jimmy sat up and squinted at him, wondering how to play things. ‘What’s up?’ he said, trying to sound casual.

  ‘Someone is wanted for questioning,’ Hunt explained. ‘About additional information on the Thai girl.’

  Dumpster Girl. So the case wasn’t quite closed, after all?

  Jimmy wondered fleetingly if PIC — Police Integrity Commission — was already talking about Hunt and his handling of the case. Did they have him under surveillance? Did Kelley know something about it? Was that what he’d sensed when he was in the office? That Kelley already knew something was up? Had Hunt been pushed to do more?

  ‘Who have we got?’ he asked.

  ‘Macaylay Vanderwall.’

  Jimmy nearly spat. ‘Well, we’d all like to ask Mak a few questions, I’m sure. We planning a trip to France?’

  Hunt remained stony-faced. ‘We have a strong lead on her whereabouts. Macaylay knows you, so we need your help to talk with her,’ Hunt finished.

  He’s pronounced her name wrong, twice. It’s not Macaylay, it’s Makedde. Mak. Ay. Dee. Easy. Jimmy blinked, absorbing the bizarre news. ‘You want my help? To bring in Makedde Vanderwall? Did everyone volunteer for that job?’

  He tried chuckling, which was his usual manner of communication, but now it came out strained.

  His superior, for his part, did not crack even a smirk. ‘She is considered armed and dangerous,’ he said flatly.

  Jimmy’s overriding thought was, Mak is alive?

  Was this a fact? Or a rumour?

  And his next thought came right out of his mouth before he censored it. ‘Mak Vanderwall is dangerous? Skata. You’ve got to be fuckin’ shitting me.’

  Jimmy had seen her spread in Sports Illustrated, a magazine she’d posed for in her modelling days. Really, no disrespect to his best friend, Andy, but the idea of Mak armed and dangerous was an arousing one. If she was alive, it was good news. Great news. Andy would be enormously relieved. That he was still in love with her was as obvious as anything Jimmy could think of. But Mak was alive and dangerous? To the cops? Jimmy wasn’t about to strap on the bulletproof vest.

  ‘She allegedly entered the country on a false passport and now she’s threatening to screw up an investigation by getting the press involved and spilling the beans on what she knows,’ Hunt continued, letting his anger show. ‘It’s a mess. We’re bringing her in.’

  The press?

  Oh, Mak.

  At this, Jimmy pushed himself back from his desk and stood. ‘So you’re not shitting me. She’s really in Australia? Does Flynn know? I thought she’d disappeared in Paris?’

  ‘She contacted a journalist at the Tribune, claiming she has information. She’s arranged a rendezvous for today in Sydney.’

  Jimmy inhaled sharply. Mak was still on the Cavanaghs’ case? He’d never had the impression she was dumb — to the contrary — but she really didn’t have a great sense of self-preservation, to be sure. He’d been there when she’d traced a crime scene to a room in the Cavanaghs’ palatial waterfront mansion, after recognising a Brett Whiteley painting in the background of a grainy video showing the Dumpster Girl’s death. If finding evidence of a crime scene in their own home didn’t nail them, what could? Damien was notorious for his unsavoury activities, and now Cavanagh senior appeared to be loosely linked to a criminal ring out of Queensland, but still, they’d managed to avoid any real investigation. There’d been missing evidence; the video footage had been called into question; and it had all amounted to nothing so far. Whatever was thrown at them was easily batted away by their impressive legal team. And by Hunt. Jimmy had admitted his suspicions to Kelley, but he was no martyr. He needed his job. He had four kids to support. Mak should know by now that this obsession with bringing the Cavanaghs to justice would create nothing but ruin. It was too big for either of them. If she was alive, and wanted to stay that way, this was a poor way to go about
things.

  Spilling the beans …

  And there it was again. Something that smelled wrong.

  What could Mak know that Hunt didn’t want her to tell? Was it related to her unexplained disappearance in Europe?

  ‘Yeah, well, I thought that one was headed for the unsolved homicide team,’ Jimmy said cautiously, half joking. He searched through a drawer for a snack to take with him. If he was going to have to trawl around Sydney with Inspector Hunt, he was going to need moral support.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m just saying we don’t seem in a hurry to bring Damien or Jack Cavanagh in for questioning,’ Jimmy said quietly, opening his trap again. ‘But, you know …’

  There, a Mars Bar. He tucked in and shut the drawer with one chubby elbow.

  For fuck’s sake, Jimmy, just shut up.

  ‘This isn’t a kangaroo court,’ Hunt protested. ‘We have to do things by the book.’

  Only Hunt would throw up the term ‘kangaroo court’. Anyone else would point out that the Cavanaghs were frighteningly powerful, with an overpaid legal team. But not Hunt. No, when Hunt spoke about it, they had to be careful not to jump to conclusions.

  Interesting.

  Jimmy didn’t care to comment further. He’d already said too much. Instead, he nursed the open end of his chocolate bar. ‘Why do you need my help to bring Mak in for questioning?’ he finally asked. ‘I mean, she’s pretty cooperative, right?’

  She was the daughter of a cop, after all.

  Hunt clenched his oversized jaw and scowled. ‘Enough questions,’ he said darkly. ‘This isn’t a request.’

  CHAPTER 30

  Right on time, Makedde Vanderwall heard a car park nearby and a door slam. Richard Staples had arrived.

  She’d been rereading Stephen King, and now she closed her iBook app and watched the footage from the camera on the staircase, sitting on the mezzanine, hidden by the concrete pillar. Footsteps echoed as Staples approached the building — and then stopped when he was just out of view.

  Hmm.

  Her camera couldn’t make anyone out yet. She stood and frowned, leaning against the concrete pillar and listening. Another car could be heard. Had it parked nearby for one of the other buildings or had Staples brought someone? A photographer? She hoped not. She’d asked him to come alone. She wanted him to have the Lacie external hard drive she’d backed up with the laptop’s contents, and let him do the research himself. She didn’t want another story about her and the Cavanaghs. She’d seen her name and image in print enough. It was one of the reasons she had not wanted to meet in an open, public place. That and the small issue of having a price on her head. She flicked her eyes to the opposite side of the mezzanine, to the high concrete divider, beyond which was a corner window from which she could sneak out onto a high pile of earth outside, only a metre down — her planned escape point if she had to leave quietly. Just one more minute and then she’d go.

  As she was contemplating her next move, a figure finally appeared on her little iPhone screen. And it was not who she was expecting at all. An overweight male dressed in sloppy jeans and an oversized shirt walked out alone into the centre of the dusty floor of the building with a distinctly familiar gait and a wry smile on his face.

  ‘Mak? Mak, are you there?’

  Holy shit.

  Jimmy Cassimatis. Andy’s former police partner. He was easily recognisable, even on the tiny screen.

  What on earth …?

  Mak covered her mouth.

  ‘Maaaaaak? You here?’

  Time stretched on as Jimmy walked about, irritatingly calling her name. If Staples was coming, Jimmy would ruin everything. Was Staples coming, or had he called the police? If he had, she had seriously misjudged him. Though Jimmy didn’t look like he was on the job.

  Had Andy sent him? How would he know where she’d be? No, it couldn’t be that …

  ‘Mak? I know you are here.’ She watched on the screen as he moved towards the camera. ‘Hello, what’s this?’

  ‘Jimmy!’ Mak said, reluctantly revealing herself, one palm against the filthy pillar. So her cleverly hidden camera wasn’t so cleverly hidden. ‘Jesus. What are you doing here?’

  He looked up, smiled and waved, taking a few paces back towards the entry, so that she was looking down on him. ‘Mak, it’s good to see you!’ he shouted up to her. ‘Skata, Andy will be so fuckin’ relieved, you have no idea. He’s been worried sick.’

  Mak winced.

  ‘You look … Well, I don’t know about the hair actually. Come on down, Mak.’

  ‘How did Andy know I’d be here?’ Mak asked.

  He paused. ‘I don’t think he does, luv. I’m here to take you in for questioning.’

  ‘You what?’

  He could have been kidding, he did tend towards practical jokes, but in this setting that seemed particularly unlikely. A feeling of terror rippled through her.

  ‘Are you alone?’

  ‘Nah,’ he said casually.

  Fucking hell. She backed up, her hands out in front of her. ‘What is this?’ She tried to smile back, but looked around furtively. She couldn’t see anyone else, but she had heard a second car. ‘Jimmy, I’m just here to meet someone. I wasn’t expecting you at all. Just leave me alone and I promise I’ll contact you later. I’ll lay it all out for you if you want.’

  ‘Can’t do that, Mak. Apparently you’ve been a very naughty girl, harassing the Cavanaghs and keen to slander them, blah blah blah, and messing up an important investigation, which is why I need you to come in for questioning.’

  The feeling of betrayal made her stomach churn. Everything was wrong now. Everything.

  Don’t panic. Think.

  ‘So you’re not kidding then. Jimmy, you know that’s crap. I haven’t done anything to them.’

  Not yet, anyway …

  ‘You have nothing on me,’ she said.

  His smile faded. ‘Come on, Mak. Don’t be like that. Don’t make this difficult.’

  ‘I wonder what Andy would make of you arresting me for nothing.’

  ‘Oh, come on. No one’s being arrested.’

  A trip to the police station would put her on the map for the very people she was trying to avoid. She didn’t doubt the Cavanaghs had connections. They’d know her whereabouts in no time. On the other hand it would look bad for them if something happened to her, and there would surely be a major investigation if anything happened to her in custody. Calmly coming to headquarters with Jimmy would put a swift end to all the sneaking around and she might even be able to plead her case, come forward about the laptop backup and the reason she was in immediate, ongoing danger. She could just be upfront about what had happened. Minus the stealing and false IDs, perhaps.

  ‘You don’t have probable cause,’ she argued.

  She thought of her father. She could call him from the station. He’d be pulling strings for her in no time. He’d be so relieved she was alive. Her hand was being forced. This wasn’t how she wanted things, but maybe, just maybe it could all work out …

  ‘Probable cause? You’ve been watching too many cop shows,’ Jimmy said. ‘Come on. It’s just —’

  His words were stopped dead by the ear-splitting sound of a gunshot. In a moment of unreal horror, Mak watched Andy’s friend stumble backwards and fall, clutching his chest and letting out an awful, strangled cry, the sound of which echoed like the gunshot that preceded it. In seconds a man rushed in to Jimmy’s side and just as Mak was set to join him on the dusty floor of the building, he called out, ‘She shot him! Officer down!’ He spotted her and ran towards the base of the staircase, gun drawn.

  It took her only a second to realise what that meant.

  Two uniformed officers appeared through the doorway. One went to Jimmy’s side and the other joined the first man in running up the stairs leading to the mezzanine floor. Adrenaline rushing through her, Mak bolted, snatching up her things as she went. If she made it to the other end of the mezzanine and jumped out
onto the dirt, she’d still end up on the building site. There could be officers waiting there. Dammit. She stopped at the nearest window — a large concrete hole where a window would one day be — and she stepped up into the ledge. It was a bigger drop from here, but it would put her on the street, closer to her motorbike. She stuffed the iPhone, purse and motorcycle helmet in the backpack and zipped it up.

  She looked down.

  Fuck.

  It was a long way. With nothing but road to catch her.

  She hesitated and looked over her shoulder. The two police officers were about halfway to her, moving steadily with their guns unholstered. Watching them, Makedde let her backpack drop out the open hole of the window. It hit the asphalt behind her with a crunch.

  ‘Freeze!’

  Without further hesitation she pulled herself over the edge, her body swinging with a sickening freedom. She hung on with both hands for a moment, body dangling from the side of the building, her toes finding no purchase.

  Protect your head, Mak. Keep your body loose and protect your head.

  She let go.

  A moment of weightlessness, eyes closed and arms crossed over her face.

  And the road rose to meet her.

  ‘What happened?’

  Agent Andy Flynn was already locking his office with one hand, the phone held to his ear with one muscular shoulder. He would drive to Sydney immediately.

  ‘It’s critical,’ Inspector Kelley told him.

  Jimmy Cassimatis was in hospital. This unexpected news topped off what had been a very bad day.

  ‘His heart? Is it his heart?’ Andy said, shaken. He grabbed his briefcase off the floor and began walking quickly down the bright hallway. Patel emerged. And Dana Harrison. They could tell by Andy’s expression that something serious had happened.