Blood Sunset

by Unknown

  ‘What colour did Sparks say Vitazul’s Beamer was?’

  ‘Dark blue,’ Cassie said. ‘And Finetti confirmed that, right?’

  I nodded, a sudden realisation dawning on me. Tammy York had been strangled by an overweight man in a navy blue BMW. She’d even said he’d spoken with a European accent. He kept patting my head and telling me I’d been a good girl but now I was bad.

  ‘Son of a bitch,’ I said. ‘He was trying to kill her too.’

  ‘What?’ said Cassie.

  I told her about Tammy York and how her attacker might very well have been Vitazul.

  ‘Maybe she was in on the scam too. Like Dallas and Justin,’ she said. ‘All three of them are on that disk. That would explain why she never mentioned anything about it when you questioned her.’

  I was thinking the same thing and was about to suggest we question her again when my mobile rang. The caller ID read private number.

  ‘McCauley.’

  ‘Rubes, is that you?’

  ‘Andy?’ I said, unsure because of all the noise of the crowd.

  Covering my other ear, I heard my brother mention something about a gym membership, so I turned down an alley to hear him better.

  ‘Say again?’

  ‘I said, you wanted me to check the names on our client list at the gym, see if those kids you were looking for had membership, right?’

  Cassie came around the corner, her face curious, and I mouthed the word ‘Anthony’.

  ‘No Derek Jardine on our current client list,’ Anthony said. ‘His membership expired last June. No continuance. As I said, not surprising. Not many stick with it.’

  ‘Never mind him. I think he’s in Queensland anyhow.’

  ‘This other bloke, Dallas Boyd, his membership’s still current, though we haven’t seen him for a while either. Maybe he’s in Queensland too. Wish I was. Maybe if I start using heroin every day the government’ll pay for me to go on a holiday. That how it works?’

  ‘Something like that. Listen, I’m on to something here. Gotta fly. Thanks, Andy.’

  ‘No worries. Thanks for going to see Mum this morning, by the way. I’ve just got back myself.’

  I winced and turned away from Cassie. ‘Ah, how is she?’

  ‘Still knocked out on painkillers. Dad’s going to stay overnight and take her back to the nursing home tomorrow, if the fires don’t get too close.’

  ‘Anything I can do?’

  ‘Just speak to Chloe. I’ll deal with Mum and Dad for now.’

  ‘All right, mate. You take care.’

  ‘Thanks. Ciao.’

  ‘Everything okay?’ Cassie asked when I hung up.

  ‘Family politics,’ I said, brushing her off. ‘Let’s go do this.’

  I filled her in on the YMCA dead end as we walked into Café Vit. Like everywhere else in St Kilda that day, it was crowded, hot and loud.

  ‘I don’t know a Karl Vitazul,’ a waiter named Nigel said in answer to my question. ‘Nobody by that name works here.’

  ‘Think!’ Cassie said. ‘He told us he was the owner.’

  ‘He’s overweight,’ I added. ‘Maybe five ten, thin hair, round face. Speaks with a European accent.’

  The waiter frowned. ‘You must mean Gervas.’

  ‘Who’s Gervas?’

  ‘Gervas Kirzek. He’s the owner.’

  I frowned, confused. Why had the owner given me a different name, one that matched the registration plate and home address of a ninety-three year old?

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Cassie stepped closer, lowering her voice. ‘Don’t lie to us, Nigel. We’ve got a job to do, just like you. Just tell us where he is and we’ll be out of here.’ She nodded towards the seating area. ‘If not, we’ll make a real scene.’

  Nigel ran a hand through oily hair. ‘Look, I don’t know where he is. He hasn’t been in since that dead kid was found out back. Freaked him out.’

  ‘Did you know Dallas Boyd?’ Cassie prodded.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The kid your boss found outside.’

  ‘Just some junkie, wasn’t he? Shame they can’t all go that way, I reckon. You should see what some of them do around here. Just last week we had one guy –’

  ‘Your boss,’ I interrupted. ‘Where can we find him?’ ‘At home, I suppose. I hope he hasn’t done something stupid.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Shit, I don’t know. As I said, he was pretty freaked out after finding that kid. And they say it’s victimless to use drugs. Tell that to Gervas. He had to wait outside with the body. He was a mess afterwards. People feel sorry for junkies, but I don’t. They come in here all the time, thieving and harassing everyone. Last week one of them even vomited in the –’

  ‘Save it,’ I hissed.

  ‘Kitchen,’ he finished.

  ‘Just tell us where he lives.’

  ‘All right! I’ll get you the address. I’m just saying that thing last week had him real wired, man. Maybe you could check on him, make sure he’s all right,’ he said, leading us past the kitchen to an office at the rear.

  At the back door, I looked out at the loading bay where Dallas Boyd had died and thought about how far we’d come in just a few days. There were cops who said that all cases had a rush point: the moment you knew you were face to face with evil, when all your instincts and gut feelings were proven. With it came an immense rush of adrenaline that surpassed anything else on the planet. Before Nigel even wrote down the address, I knew it would be the same house we’d just been to in Elwood, and I felt that familiar sensation build in my stomach. I looked at Cassie and knew she felt it too. Rush point. We were closing in.

  27

  IT TOOK SOME PERSUADING, but Cassie agreed to keep the Dallas Boyd murder and the laptop separate, even though we knew the two were linked. My rationale was that it would be premature to inform the Homicide Squad of our suspicions since we didn’t know yet who Gervas Kirzek or Karl Vitazul were.

  I left her at the station to run record checks and she soon rang back to confirm that the name Vitazul matched the BMW Sparks had stolen, which in turn matched the address the waiter had said Gervas Kirzek, the owner of the café, lived at.

  Meantime, I drove north towards the city, trying to fit it all together. Why had Kirzek, or whoever the hell he was, given me a false name when I first spoke to him at the crime scene? It wasn’t unusual for crooks to adopt an alias, especially when questioned by police. Usually they did it to protect a past they didn’t want exposed. That would fit with having a driver’s licence and the BMW’s rego being under a bogus identity. The more I thought about it, the more I agreed with Finetti that Kirzek had killed Boyd, staged the scene and called police with a concocted story and phoney name.

  The traffic freed up as I got onto Punt Road and passed by the Nylex clock in Richmond, but it was past eight by the time I pulled into the visitors lot outside Ella’s apartment building in Carlton. I hurried to the intercom, pressed her apartment number, grinned at the camera and listened to her voice crackle through the speaker.

  ‘Hey there, hunksta. You’re a little late. Our booking’s for eight.’

  ‘Right, ah, that’s why I’m here. I’ve got a problem. Can I come up?’

  The door clicked and I stepped into the elevator. Ella greeted me at her door with a cautious peck on the cheek. I followed her to the kitchen where a bag of groceries was on the bench, waiting to be put away.

  ‘You’re here to cancel, aren’t you?’ she said, swigging from a Powerade bottle.

  ‘Not cancel. Reschedule.’

  ‘You’ve had a better offer from a twenty-year-old bikini model?’

  I smiled even though the cynicism was obvious. ‘No, something’s come up with the Boyd case. A lead.’

  She waited, silent.

  ‘We may have ID’d the killer. I’ve left Cassie at the watch-house to do some backgrounding on the guy. If it looks good, we’ll probably mak
e a move tonight.’

  ‘Hang on, aren’t you supposed to be on carer’s leave?’ she said, frowning.

  ‘Well, sort of. I’m just . . . I just don’t want to let this go, that’s all. A lot has happened today and I’ve made good progress.’

  ‘What do you mean, sort of? Are you on leave or not?’

  ‘Well, technically I still am.’

  ‘Okay, so . . . ?’

  ‘So I’m moonlighting.’

  ‘Fine. Why did you bother coming over?’ she said, carrying the groceries to the fridge.

  ‘I just wanted to see you. And I wanted to tell you about Mum. She had a fall today, landed on her hip.’

  ‘Oh.’

  She put the bag back on the bench as I explained my trip this morning, the ambulance and the hospital.

  ‘Just bruising they say, this time anyway,’ I concluded.

  ‘Why didn’t you say you were going to visit today? I would’ve come with you.’

  ‘I know, just something I wanted to do on my own.’

  ‘Like talking to Chloe,’ she said. ‘Seems there are a lot of things you want to do on your own.’

  I put a hand on her arm but she stepped around me and walked to the window by the balcony.

  ‘I know what I want, Ella,’ I said, walking up behind her.

  She didn’t react.

  ‘After this is all finished, I want family time. Real time. With you. With everyone. I just need to finish this. I mean, everybody keeps calling this kid a junkie, but it’s just like Jacko. Nobody looked out for him. Now he’s dead. Somebody has to answer for that.’

  ‘You can’t blame yourself for what happened to your friend. You were just a kid and so was he. If anyone’s to blame, it’s his father.’

  ‘I’m not talking about him. I mean Dallas. I pegged it as an accidental overdose even though I knew things didn’t add up. I let my own shit stop me seeing what I should’ve seen.’

  She looked at me a long moment, conflicting emotions running across her face.

  ‘Ella, you said you wanted me to find whoever did this,’ I said.

  ‘Not if it means ruining everything we’ve worked to rebuild. Shit, I don’t want you messed up, like you were when we were together. I want a normal, stable relationship.’

  I was silent, surprised. It was the first time she’d defined what she wanted and her reference to a relationship confused me. Was she giving me an ultimatum?

  She walked to the front door, opened it and I followed her out into the hall.

  ‘Just do what you have to, Rubens. Get it out of your system. And afterwards, have a good think about what you want. About what you really want.’

  ‘I know what I want. I just told you. I want to be us again. I want what we had last night. It was special, you know. It was real.’

  She nodded quickly, looked away. ‘I hope so.’

  I went to kiss her but my mobile phone rang.

  ‘I have to take this,’ I said, seeing Cassie’s name on the screen.

  ‘Just remember what I said.’ Ella stepped back over the threshold. ‘You need to work out what you really want.’

  I winced as the door closed, then let out a long breath and answered the phone.

  ‘Gervas Kirzek is a real pearler,’ Cassie said excitedly. ‘Wait till you get a load of this guy.’

  ‘Got form, I take it?’ I asked.

  ‘Form isn’t the word. Kirzek’s docket reads like a paedophile’s guide to the galaxy. We could probably add his name to the Three Misters,’ she said, referring to the titles the media had given three of Australia’s most notorious paedophiles: Mr Baldy, Mr Stinky and Mr Cruel.

  I shared the elevator with a young couple and told Cassie to wait a minute before continuing. As the door opened, I let the couple walk ahead and listened as she explained how Kirzek had no priors in Victoria, but numerous offences in New South Wales.

  ‘Goes back almost ten years,’ she said. ‘Six separate hits on indecent exposure, a few more trespass and misconduct. All in Sydney. He even got done on a child porn racket in 2004. After that, seems he moved to Melbourne and bought the café.’

  Outside, I stared at the park across the street. It was filled with families, parents watching their children playing on the swings.

  ‘What about Vitazul?’ I asked.

  ‘Well, this is where it gets tricky. We’re working on this with the Feds. Apparently Vitazul and Kirzek are related. Both are Romanian nationals who emigrated after some government dictatorship collapsed.’

  Puzzled, I headed back to my car.

  ‘But anyway, that’s not the only reason I rang,’ Cassie said. ‘You need to get back here. Eckles has the Homicide Squad running with it. They know about Dallas Boyd.’

  ‘What? We agreed to keep the laptop separate.’

  ‘I’m not talking about the laptop. Homicide rechecked all your footsteps, so they tried to contact this Karl Vitazul character, since he’d supposedly found the body. But they hit a brick wall, just like we did. You know why?’

  ‘He’s dead, isn’t he?’

  ‘How’d you know?’ she said, surprised.

  ‘Just makes sense. If you want to adopt a bogus ID, why not find someone who’s not around to challenge it. Even better if it’s someone you’re related to.’

  ‘Right, well, they checked the registry. Like most ninety-three-year-old smokers, his lungs gave out. That was in 2004, right about the time Gervas Kirzek moved to Melbourne.’

  I got in the car and unwound the windows. It made no difference to the heat.

  ‘So based on all that, plus his form as a rock spider, the hommies have set up an operations room around the conference table,’ Cassie continued. ‘A KALOF has been broadcast across the air. They’re even lining up an SOG raid team. You need to get your arse back here.’

  ‘I’m on leave, remember?’

  ‘Eckles wants you back in.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Probably wants to keep an eye on you. Told me to get you back here.’

  ‘Cassie, I’m not some monkey he can make jump through hoops. Either he wants me on the team or he doesn’t. Either way, he can ring me himself, otherwise he can go and get –’

  ‘You want to get this guy, don’t you?’ she said.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Then stop being so bloody precious. This is your only chance. You can sit at home and let us do it, or forget your pride for a minute and get back here. Either way, we’re gonna get this guy, tonight.’

  I started the engine, drove out of the car park and headed back to St Kilda.

  28

  I SNEAKED INTO THE watch-house via the back and sent a text to Cassie asking her to meet me in the mess room.

  ‘Where’s the disk?’ I said when she came in.

  ‘On your desk, why?’

  I nodded, relieved, then thanked her.

  ‘Why?’ she said again.

  ‘Because I thought you might’ve given it to them.’

  ‘That’s your guilty conscience, Rubens. The disk should be with them,’ she said, checking over her shoulder and stepping closer. ‘If you want my advice, and you want to keep your job, you’ll take it in to Eckles right now.’

  ‘Look, let’s just put in a request to have the techs take a look at the laptop,’ I said. ‘That way we’re not holding out on anything and we’re not making judgements based on a few pictures.’

  ‘A few pictures?’ she hissed. ‘I saw that boy this morning. Some sicko cut his throat so deep it damn near severed his head. Don’t tell me all we’re talking about is kiddie porn, okay?’

  ‘Okay, okay!’ I said, raising my hands. ‘But either way, Computer Crime will have to analyse the laptop. If I give it to Eckles, they’ll do it for him and report back to him. But if we give it to them, we’ll stay in the loop. I mean, don’t pretend after seeing that kid this morning you don’t want to get this guy?’

  ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘Then trust me. Put in a request
for Computer Crime to check out the laptop. Do you know anyone who works over there?’

  ‘Yeah, I know someone,’ she finally said.

  ‘So give them a call and tell them it’s a hot one. Give them a few details, but not too many. Just enough to get them interested. I’m sure they won’t mind working a Sunday for this.’

  I stepped around her and crossed to the conference room adjoining Eckles’ office. Through the window, I recognised most of the people in there, except a woman in a beige suit pointing to a whiteboard. I opened the door and the woman stopped talking.

  ‘Ah, sorry,’ I said as everyone turned to look at me.

  Two large colour photographs hung on the whiteboard. One was the man I’d spoken to at Café Vit on the day of Dallas Boyd’s murder. Gervas Kirzek. The other was an elderly man I didn’t recognise. Beneath him was the name ‘Karl Vitazul’.

  ‘Sit down, McCauley,’ said Eckles, pointing to a seat opposite him. ‘This is Fiona Johns. She’s a forensic psychologist on loan from the Feds and is bringing us up to speed on the man we’re after.’

  Nik Stello sat across the table, flanked by three other detectives from the Homicide Squad. I nodded but none of them nodded back. To my left were an SOG sergeant, the divisional superintendent and two inspectors. I didn’t acknowledge any of them. Instead I looked at the woman in front of the whiteboard, who cleared her throat and used a pen to point to the elderly man on the right.

  ‘Karl Vitazul arrived in Australia in 1987, just prior to the collapse of the Ceauescu government in Romania,’ she explained. ‘The name Vitazul, by the way, means “brave man”. Not sure whether that’s relevant, but from what the Immigration Department records show, he was granted refugee status under the claim he was fleeing the Romanian dictatorship. We believe Karl Vitazul married a Romanian woman and subsequently moved to Brashov in Transylvania, where he worked for the Communist government. In effect, he lied to gain entry and residence in Australia.’

  There were groans at the table as everyone feigned surprise.