Blood Ties

by JD Nixon

  He held out his hands and pulled me to my feet. I walked around in my socks and ragged new shorts like a Frankenstein monster, my knees so stiff from the bandages that I could hardly bend them. I clumped over to the kitchen to make myself a coffee, grabbing a mug from the collection of mismatched spares that huddled on a shelf. The mug I grabbed was plastered with the logo from some conference on deviant criminology held in the city all the way back in 1988. The Sarge followed me and did the same, randomly choosing a black mug that had Sextravaganza ’04 plastered on it in gold letters and a suggestive silhouette of a man and two women copulating enthusiastically underneath. When he noticed, he hastily put it back on the shelf and took down a plain green mug instead. Smothering a laugh, I opened all the cupboards, peering inside hopefully.

  “You got any Tim Tams round here?” I yelled out to Daisy. After today, I thought I deserved one.

  “Sorry. That fathead Bum ate the last of them yesterday,” she yelled back, then groaned. “Oh shit, speak of the devil.”

  I turned around, spotted Bum and another man I hadn’t met before heading straight for us. I groaned in dismay.

  “Not you again,” I complained. “Please, please, tell me that the Inspector hasn’t given you our case to finish?”

  Bum smiled smugly and leaned against the fridge looking down at me, his gigantic muscles straining against his business shirt when he crossed his arms, blocking my access.

  “Get out of the way. I need some milk,” I said grumpily. He shifted only far enough for me to open the fridge door ten centimetres and awkwardly reach my arm in to grab the milk carton, bringing me into uncomfortably close contact with him. I could even smell his minty breath.

  “You decided to dump that loser Jake Bycraft yet and go out with me instead?” he strutted in front of everyone.

  “I’d rather die than go out with you,” I replied honestly, stirring my coffee with unnecessary vigour.

  “Tessie, Tessie, Tessie. It’s only a matter of time. You know you want me,” he chuckled to himself as if I was flirting with him. God, he was so self-deluded!

  “Bum, I want you as much as I want syphilis,” I smiled sweetly and took a sip of my coffee. “Which, incidentally, I probably would catch if I did go out with you. So thanks, but no thanks.” I indicated the man next to him who’d been watching the whole exchange in amused silence. “Who’s your new friend?”

  The man held out his hand to me and smiled disarmingly. He was real cute, in his early thirties, with warm brown eyes that crinkled attractively at the corners, wild, curling dark brown hair that was far too long for a cop and a friendly, open smile that showed nice teeth. I clasped his hand, feeling the warmth that flowed from him.

  “I’m Xavier Guylen. You must be Tess Fuller. I’ve heard a lot about you,” he said, his voice beautifully mellifluent. I could have listened to it all day long.

  “All the good things you’ve heard about me are understated and all the bad things are nothing but a pack of slanderous lies,” I said lightly, shaking his hand. I introduced him to the Sarge, in the process learning that he was a detective sergeant, recently transferred from a larger regional city up north.

  “I haven’t heard anything bad about you at all.” He smiled again at me.

  I smiled back. “You’re quite the charmer, aren’t you, Xavier? We don’t get many of those around here.” My eyes flicked involuntarily towards the Sarge. I hoped he hadn’t noticed.

  “Call me X. It saves time,” he said, looking at me curiously. X? Good grief, I thought. He glanced at my socks, ragged shorts and bandages, before his eyes rested on my poor damaged face again. “What happened to you? Looks like a building fell on you.”

  “I tripped over running away from Bum,” I joked.

  “Grow up, Tessie,” Bum said sourly. “Are you going to brief us or not?”

  I sighed. “All right, let’s get on with it then. Believe it or not, the Sarge and I have to be in court this afternoon.” I turned to Bum. “Hang on, don’t you have to be in court too, as one of the investigating detectives?”

  “Yes. X is going to do the initial interview with this suspect by himself while I’m in court with the Inspector.”

  We carried our coffees into one of the interview rooms and the three men sat and I remained standing while I told them everything that had happened since Miss G had first called me to report a peeping tom. I hadn’t even met the Sarge at that point I remembered with surprise, glancing at him. I felt as though I’d known him much longer than just a week, so much had happened since he’d arrived in Little Town. I continued on with my story, the Sarge interrupting if I forgot something along the way.

  The two detectives jotted down notes busily, Xavier asking intelligent questions as he did, picking up quickly on the salient points. Bum, as usual, was soon lost by the details, as smart as a pet rock. He spent most of his time doodling on his notepad.

  “Sounds as though there’s plenty to charge him with,” said Xavier, leaning back on his chair, chewing thoughtfully on the end of his pen as he scanned over his notes. He glanced up at me. “Did you really shoot out his tyres? That’s not easy to do when a car’s on the move.”

  “She’s a crack shot,” commented the Sarge. “I’ve heard she even shoots her own dinner.” I giggled at that hint of a sense of humour and he smiled over at me nicely.

  “Our Tessie’s the toughest chick you’ll ever meet,” said Bum proudly. “Besides the Inspector, of course. Oh, and probably the Senior Sarge too.”

  “I’m the third toughest woman in the district,” I summarised for Xavier’s benefit.

  “I can see that I’ll have to behave myself here with all these tough women around,” Xavier laughed. “They must breed them strong in these parts. Were you born and bred around here, Tess?”

  “I certainly was, Mr X. I’m just a simple country girl.”

  The Sarge snorted quietly and rolled his eyes. “Take my advice and don’t fall for that line,” he recommended. I scrunched my nose at him.

  The three men stood up. The Sarge looked at his watch. “There’s just enough time for us to grab some lunch before court, Tess. We’ll have to leave Miss Greville until afterwards.”

  “Don’t worry about her,” said Xavier, walking us to the door. “I’ll get some uniforms to bring her in for you.” He looked over at me and winked. “Good luck, Tess. Knock ‘em dead today.” I smiled back at him, deciding that he was a nice guy. “Hey, how about I buy you a coffee next time you’re in Wattling Bay? Or maybe we could even have lunch?” he added.

  “She’s got a boyfriend,” the Sarge and Bum chorused.

  “I’m not surprised, but that’s a shame all the same,” he said and smiled at me again. “But the offer still stands.”

  “That would be great. I’d love to, Mr X,” I replied, surprised anyone would want to be seen in public with me looking the way I did.

  “I like how you call me Mr X. It’s cute.”

  “Come on, Tess, we have to go,” the Sarge said impatiently, pushing me out the door, his hand pressing between my shoulder blades.

  I detoured to the ladies room to hurriedly dress in the fresh cargo pants Daisy had found for me, gingerly pulling them over my knees. I spent a few minutes tidying my hair and brushing the road dust off my shirt. But I found myself unable to bend enough to lace my freshly-cleaned boots, so had to pad out to the watch house entrance in my socks to ask the Sarge to do it for me. How mortifying, I thought, as he kneeled down before me in front of everyone and did up my laces like I was four-years-old. The probationary cop had done his best to make my boots more respectable and I thanked him sweetly, making him blush, but I would definitely need a new pair. Mine were badly worn from dragging on the road for so long.

  That done, the Sarge and I looked at each other.

  “Ready?” he asked.

  “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

  Chapter 29

  “I don’t like him,” judged the Sarge as we drove off. “What
kind of name is ‘X’ anyway?”

  “Lighten up, Sarge. It’s just a nickname. I liked him. I thought he was really nice. He’s warm and friendly.” Unlike you, I thought.

  “Not like me is what you’re thinking, aren’t you?” he accused, scaring me again with his uncanny ability to read my mind.

  “Of course I wasn’t. You’re paranoid,” I lied and stared out the window to avoid any giveaway facial expressions, wishing fervently that Mr X had come to Little Town instead of him.

  “You’re probably wishing he’d come to Little Town instead of me.”

  God! Would he stop doing that? It was freaking me out. “Don’t be silly. Of course I’m not.” I deliberately made my mind go blank for a while.

  I wanted comforting junk food for lunch but he forced me to eat at an organic sandwich bar where I sullenly munched on the multigrain tuna and salad sandwich and plain mineral water that he bought me. I let him pay because, embarrassingly, I had less than a dollar to my name today.

  “I need sugar,” I moaned afterwards, thinking about Tim Tams again.

  “Great idea. You need to keep your energy up for this afternoon. I’ll get us something,” he agreed and I happily returned to the car, dreaming of chocolate bars, ice-creams, lollies.

  But instead, he brought back two tubs of fresh-cut fruit salad. I stared at mine gloomily. The day was getting worse and worse. I cursed him silently as I forked rockmelon, strawberries and kiwifruit into my mouth. We ate the fruit salad in silence, both of us thinking that it didn’t taste half as nice as the farm-fresh produce we’d sampled recently. He threw the containers into the bin on the footpath when we were done before driving to the courthouse.

  My nerves were making themselves known as we parked in one of the ‘police only’ bays, pulling up next to the unmarked car that Fiona favoured.

  “The Inspector’s already here,” I advised him, taking a deep breath.

  “Tess, are you okay?” he asked.

  I gave a half-laugh. “I wish I had some money for every time you asked me that, Sarge. I’d be rich by now. And no, I’m not okay this time. I’m very nervous.”

  “You’ve been in court before, haven’t you?”

  “Of course I have! But I don’t want to see those men again.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry. I should have realised. That was thoughtless of me. I forgot how personal this case is for you.”

  As soon as we entered the courthouse, I clomped in a detour straight to the ladies restroom where I didn’t come out again until I felt more composed. Rosie Bycraft sauntered in the door just as I reached for it. We glared at each other with open hostility the entire time we crossed paths as she entered the bathroom and I exited. She was one of the smarter Bycrafts though and knew better than to pick a fight with me in a courthouse where her brothers and cousins were about to be committed to trial for the serious assault of a police officer. But gee, I could tell that she wanted to.

  I could afford a bit of needling though. “How’s Red enjoying being back behind bars? Must be like home sweet home for him? Hope his boyfriend was faithful while he was on the outside,” I said sweetly.

  “Fuck off, piglet. He should have killed you when he had the chance,” she returned viciously.

  “I should have killed him when I had the chance. I will next time. And I’ll get away with it too.” I winked at her and left the bathroom smiling, my good spirits renewed. I always loved to psych out a Bycraft whenever I found the opportunity.

  A loud voice assailed me. “Fuck me sideways! Look at you, Tessie! Still managing to smile after everything that’s happened to you. You must have been tasting more of Jake Bycraft’s hot sausage,” yelled out Fiona from the other side of the courthouse foyer, startling everyone nearby. I blushed as I straight-legged my way closer to the small group of law enforcement folk that had gathered in anticipation of the various hearings being churned through the court today. They were all staring at me with speculation, some of them snickering into their hands. Nobody was brave enough to laugh out loud at me though. Not in front of the Inspector anyway.

  “No, ma’am,” I answered in a calm, discreet voice when I was close enough. “Jakey’s on duty for two weeks. No hot sausage in my life at the moment.”

  She laughed and thumped me painfully on the back. “That’s a fucking shame. A woman needs all the hot sausage she can get, especially in stressful times like today.”

  “Thanks, ma’am,” I said, wishing desperately she’d stop talking about it. “I’ll remember that.”

  She quietened down and stood abutting me, examining my face closely. “Not bad. Good bruising on your nose and around your eye. Love the stitches on your forehead and those swollen lips make you look even more fuckable than usual. That’s good – we’ve got a male judge today.” She tilted her head and considered me critically. “But I don’t much care for the way you’re walking. You look as though you’ve got three dicks jammed up your arse and you’re not enjoying any of them.”

  More sniggering from the other cops. I sighed, silently dying of embarrassment. “Well, who would, ma’am? And I’m sorry, but I don’t seem to be able to walk any other way at the moment. My knees are bandaged.”

  She grew serious and clasped me to her tightly. “I’m so glad you’re okay, sweetheart,” she whispered quickly in my ear before pushing me away, turning to yell at Bum for bringing her the wrong coffee. She’d asked for a flat white with three sugars, not a fucking decaf cappuccino with no sugar, and was he so brain dead from all the steroids he gobbled to make his dick bigger that he couldn’t remember a simple fucking coffee order? And without minding being rebuked in front of colleagues, he placidly trotted off again to the court cafe to get the right coffee for her.

  The door to the courthouse flung open and Pinky Kowalski burst in wearing one of her blindingly neon pink skirt suits and dangerously high pink heels that had earned her that nickname. The suit hurt my eyes to look at, it was so bright, and I wondered again if she had them made to order. Surely you couldn’t buy something that hideous off the rack in a shop? As usual, she had her bright pink briefcase with her, her hand firmly clasping its fluffy pink handles – but there had never been a cow alive that would have naturally produced such a glaring leather colour.

  Despite her penchant for pink clothes, accessories and high heels, Pinky was the least feminine woman I’d ever met. Her undyed gray hair was clipped close to her scalp and she wore no makeup and no jewellery at all. Not even a light dust of face powder. Not even a watch or a tiny pair of earrings. She was in her early fifties, was brusque, businesslike and the one lawyer I’d trust with my life because she was ferocious in defence of police officers. Although a police prosecutor, she was not a sworn officer, but a civilian employee and almost exclusively spent her time on cases that involved the assault of officers. And that kept her flat out, especially with a family like the Bycrafts living nearby. She’d gone into bat for me on numerous occasions, so we had a comfortably friendly relationship. She ran me through her planned argument, although she assured me it was cut and dried. The four Bycrafts would be committed to trial at a later date for their assault on me and ordered to be held on remand until then.

  “It’ll all be over in five minutes,” she promised.

  Joanna turned up not long afterwards as the other witness to my assault, dressed for the occasion in an alarmingly tight short-sleeved flowered mauve dress that showcased her bulging biceps and high heels that only drew attention to her lumbering gait and rock-hard calf muscles. She must have recently waxed her upper lip hair and the resulting red mark on her skin made her appear as though she’d just been sipping on a cough syrup milkshake. She was accompanied by her lovely husband, Mark, both of them even more nervous than me. I gave them a quick hug in greeting and answered their curious questions about my strange walk, before Pinky cornered them to explain what would happen today. Neither had ever previously been in court.

  The Sarge hovered at my side the whole time we waited and
whenever I turned around, he was there in front of me, in my way. But instead of finding his constant presence smothering as I should have, I found it strangely reassuring. I paced up and down anxiously, biting my nails down to a ragged edge. Finally they were ready to start and everyone was allowed to enter the courtroom, leaving Joanna and me outside. I waited nervously until I was called by the bailiff to enter the court.

  It was a magistrate’s court, with the gallery open to the public and as I’d feared, a crowd of Bycrafts had gathered in force to show support for their four kinsmen. The hostility radiating from them towards me was intimidating, concentrated as it was in such a small room. You would have thought that I’d be used to it after a lifetime of their abuse, but I was particularly tense today and it needled me. They hissed threatening and obscene things to me as I made my awkward way down the aisle to the front of the courtroom to be sworn in by the bailiff in the witness box. I looked over at the public gallery then and appreciated the support of Fiona and the Sarge. And yes, even Bum’s hulking presence gave me some comfort because despite being an obnoxious meathead, ultimately he was on my side.

  The Sarge later told me that when the court officials brought in the four men through the main doors, the Bycrafts cheered and shouted, encouraging them to strut and grin cockily in response. They were all dressed neatly in suits for the occasion, freshly shaven and hair combed. Jake’s aunt, Valerie Bycraft, in court to support her two monsters, Al and Grae, started weeping uncontrollably before anything had even happened. A dry-eyed, hard-faced Lola Bycraft had rushed down to hug Red tightly, clinging to his arms and whispering in his ear, before being pulled away from him by the court security. He’d always been her favourite, being her firstborn.