Batteries Not Included

by Tony McFadden

  “Give it a few days and I’ll let you know what I find.”

  She rested her hand on his shoulder. “You have my full support. I want to get this behind me as quickly as possible.”

  12

  Wallace pulled open the door for Lin. A waft of strongly disinfected air billowed out of the autopsy rooms.

  “I hate that smell.”

  Wallace walked in behind her. “How many years you been doing this?”

  “Doesn’t matter. I’ll never get used to it. Why don’t we just read the report?”

  “Because Cuttey won’t get it to us until tomorrow, if we’re lucky. More likely the day after. And I’ll have questions. Better face to face.”

  Lin grimaced. “You unfortunately make sense.” She pushed open the door at the end of the hall. A tall, gangly looking woman with her frizzy red hair in a pony-tail and frameless glasses on the end of her nose looked up from her desk.

  “Dr Gail Cuttey. Have you met my partner?” Wallace reached out to shake Cuttey’s hand.

  She stood and smiled at Lin. “Haven’t seen you around here before.”

  “Detective Constable Lin. Nice to meet you Doc. We’re here - ”

  “Andy Goh. I know. Highest profile case I’ve had in years.” She nodded at the table on the far end of the room. “I’ve prepped for you.”

  Wallace and Lin followed Cuttey to the table. Goh’s head was balanced on a rubber support, elevating it. The standard autopsy Y-incision had been stitched up. Goh’s body had been washed, and the bruising around his face and upper body was still very evident. The scalp had been peeled back from the top of his head and the top portion of the skull removed.

  Wallace leaned close to Goh’s head. “Removed his skull cap?”

  “Of course.” Cuttey picked up a folder. “Two blows to his head. The first one was a very hard blow from a right handed person at the base of his skull. Goh is — was — only 160 cm tall. Whoever did this wasn’t much taller based on the angle of impact.”

  “And that killed him?” asked Wallace

  “No. I said there were two blows to the head. The first one, near the base of the skull, didn’t kill him but surely rendered him unconscious. The second one shattered his skull. Drove large shards into his brain. He bled into his cranial cavity. That one killed him almost instantly.”

  Lin pointed at his face and chest. “The bruises? He’d have to be alive for the bruises to show.”

  “Yeah. It was a rage-induced frenzy. Probably more than one. Kicked the tripe out of him as he died. Multiple broken ribs, broken right radius and ulna, bruised spleen, left kidney and liver, fractures to his nose, right orbital socket and both patellae shattered.”

  They stood in silence for a moment. “Knock him down with one whack to the head, kick the shit out of him, then finish him off with a second crack to the noggin?” asked Lin, scribbling in her notebook.

  Cuttey nodded. “It’ll all be in my report.”

  Wallace cleared his throat. “Tox screen?”

  “Waiting for the results but I’d bet money it’ll be clean. No processed food in his stomach contents. Lots of media about his healthy lifestyle, too.”

  He snorted. “PR is not truth.”

  Cuttey continued. “Skin tone was good and musculature advanced for someone his age. But I’ll let you know when the toxicology report comes in.”

  “When will that be?”

  “Lin, is it? Late today, early tomorrow. Lab is running with it now. High priority.”

  Wallace tilted his head and looked at the bruising on Goh’s chest. “You said more than one. Could you tell anything from the bruising?”

  “This isn’t that TV show, CSI. Some speculative work here. It looks like maybe two people. Different sized boot. Lots of overlapping strikes. Ribs three through eight on both sides are at the very least fractured. Most are completely broken.” She shook her head. “That would have killed him eventually if the blow to the head didn’t. He would have bled out.” She looked at Lin, writing furiously in her notepad. “You don’t need to take notes. It’ll all be in the report.”

  Lin looked up while she kept writing. “All good. What hit him on the head?”

  “That’s for you lot to figure out.” Cuttey picked a plaster mould off her desk. “Looks like the edge of a cricket bat, or a crowbar. My bet is on the crowbar. There were no signs of wood in his hair. A hit that hard I’d have expected a couple of splinters at least.”

  “Crowbar, I’d expect metal fragments.”

  Cuttey shrugged. “Possibly. Not as likely.” She held up the plaster cast. “But if you find a murder weapon it’ll match this.”

  Lin flipped her notebook closed. “Great. Get that report to us soonest.” She took the cast, wrinkled her nose and turned to Wallace. “Let’s go.”

  13

  Nick placed his computer bag on the table by Kirra’s pool and sat back in the chair. Davie was head down in his laptop, barely acknowledging Nick’s arrival while his fingers skated across the keyboard.

  “What are you finding?” asked Nick.

  Nothing. His friend kept clattering at the keyboard.

  Nick snapped his fingers. “Yo, Davie. You find something?”

  Davie held up an index finger for a second, then continued at the keyboard, ending with a flourish. He turned in his chair, looked at Nick and smiled.

  “Well?”

  Davie shook his head. “Nada. Diddly-squat. Clean as the proverbial whistle.”

  Nick sighed and rubbed his shiny scalp. “Why are you smiling, mate?”

  “A whistle,” smiled Davie. “Not a single bit out of place.”

  “Too clean?”

  “Way too clean,” nodded Davie. “If he’s doing anything nefarious it’s on a different machine.”

  “What about Jenna Mason?”

  “I went through the quarterly audit work that she did. There’s absolutely no indication that she was doing anything other than normal audit committee work. Have you talked to her?”

  Nick nodded. “Seems like one of those workhorse types, saving money for expensive ski trips.”

  “We’ll focus on Slokow for now.”

  “How deep did you dig?” Nick opened his bag and pulled out his laptop. “The key logger has only been in place for a couple of hours.” He lifted the lid and logged on to the machine. “He can’t have done much in two hours.”

  “Nah, mate. I didn’t look at his key logging once he unlocked his laptop. I used his credentials and cracked his box. I’ve been wading through his emails, browser history, most of what is on his local and cloud drives.”

  “Too much to hope for him doing it that blatantly, I guess.” Nick crossed his arms. “What were you actually looking for?”

  “The usual. Emails with specific keywords, local copies of financial files which don’t match official, encrypted messaging apps. You know.” He scratched the scruff he called a beard. “We should be doing the same on the wife’s machine.”

  “Kirra’s?”

  Davie grimaced. “Yeah.” He looked around. “Can’t say I’m entirely comfortable with that.”

  “Don’t worry about it. It’ll most likely be a waste of our time.”

  “You’re getting paid by the day. Invoice a couple of days checking her out. Where’s the harm?”

  Nick raised his eyebrows and grunted. “She’s paying the bill. I’d say there’s tons of potential harm.” He sighed and closed his lid. “But I guess she doesn’t have to know. Can you get into her laptop remotely?”

  “If she has a work laptop. I get the impression she hasn’t been that dialled in. The exploit Sam set up on this finance guy’s machine is pretty basic. And flawed. I can get into anyone’s machine connected to the company network now.”

  Nick closed his eyes in thought.

  “It’s a big step, mate.”

  Nick nodded. “It is. Do it anyway. And see if Andy’s machine is still connected somewhere. It could be used to bypass anything we’re l
ooking at.” He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly through his nose. “What do you have that can monitor their personal machines?”

  Davie rummaged through his laptop bag, extracting half a dozen thumb drives. He examined a couple before holding one up. “Plug this into any Windows laptop for ten seconds and I have complete remote control of it.” He held another one up. “Same for Mac machines.” He looked at it and grimaced. “Takes almost five minutes to set it up on the Mac, though. We going to ask?”

  “That would defeat the purpose, Davie.” He placed his hands on the table and pushed himself back. “We need to sort out the logistics of this.”

  His friend looked at the time on his laptop. “She’s gone to the police station to give her statement. We’ve probably got a little time.”

  * * *

  Kirra folded herself onto the metal chair in the interrogation room. Wallace waited until she was settled, then sat across from her.

  “Do we need to do this in here?” she asked.

  Wallace adjusted himself awkwardly. “We’re jammed up this morning. Better in here than in the bullpen with some of the dregs the boys have dragged in.” He held up his hands. “This isn’t an interrogation. Really. We just want you to tell us everything you remember from the morning.”

  “We?”

  Wallace looked at the empty chair beside him. “My partner is chasing a lead. If she gets back before we finish I’ll introduce you.” He flipped open his notepad. “Where were you when your husband was killed?”

  Kirra narrowed her eyes. “A bit blunt, mate.”

  He shrugged. “Not here to make friends. I’m here to find out who killed your husband, make sure he is brought to justice, bringing peace to you and your family.”

  “Or she.”

  “Whazzat?”

  “Make sure he or she is brought to justice.”

  “It was a pretty comprehensive beating. The autopsy showed severe blunt trauma to the back of the head and a host of peri-mortem injuries before the killing shot to the top of his head.” He opened the case folder and read from the top sheet. “Multiple broken ribs, broken right radius and ulna, bruised spleen, left kidney and liver, fractures to his nose, right orbital socket and both patellae shattered.”

  He closed the folder and looked up at her. “A lot of fury from a strong person.”

  Kirra’s eyes were closed and her head was in her hands. “Oh, my god.”

  He grimaced and flipped the folder over. “Sorry for that. Can we continue? Who was this angry with your husband?”

  A tear rolled down her cheek. She lifted her head and stared daggers at him. Sniffed and rubbed the tear away with the heel of her hand. She slowly placed her hands on the table and clenched both fists.

  “Anybody?” he prompted.

  Her voice was strained through her clench jaw. “Nobody. Though that really describes how I feel about you right now.”

  “I’m really sorry, but I tend to be blunt and to the point. Occupational hazard. Nobody?”

  She shook her head. “Not a single person I know who knew him felt this way about Andy. He wasn’t loved by all. Nobody is. But the disagreements he had were never at the ‘kill him’ level.”

  Wallace nodded. “Where were you?”

  “When?”

  He rested his hand on the case folder and tapped it with his fingers.

  “Ah. In bed. Had a late return from LA. Flight QF 41.”

  “What were you doing in Los Angeles?”

  “Nothing.” She gave a half smile at the look on Wallace’s face. “I was in New York at a show in my gallery. The flight back routes through LA.”

  Wallace wrote in his pad. “Qantas QF 41?”

  She nodded.

  “You have proof of that?”

  “I’ve got the boarding pass stub, and my accountant has the invoice for the ticket.”

  “What time did it land?”

  “Scheduled for 12:30 am, but landed an hour late, just after 1:30 in the morning. I have an Uber receipt on my phone if you need that, too.” She held up her phone. “I was dead. I can’t sleep on airplanes.”

  The interrogation room door opened and Lin sat beside Wallace. “Where are we?”

  “Finished. Ms Roach is of little value to our investigation.” Wallace held a hand up toward Kirra and smiled. “That’s a good thing.”

  He turned back to his partner. “No known enemies and she was asleep after a sleepless inbound flight from LA when the incident happened. I was just about to cut her loose.”

  Kirra stood. “Sounds like my cue.”

  Lin waved her had at Kirra. “Not quite. Please have a seat. I’ve got a question about finances.” Lin smiled. “Okay, Ms Roach - ”

  “Kirra. Please.”

  “Kirra, as I’m sure you’re aware, if you’ve watched any police procedurals, the spouse is the most likely suspect.”

  Kirra slowly sat. “I was asleep. He just told you that.”

  Lin flipped through the sheets of paper until she found what she was looking for. “You husband’s net worth was recently valued at, conservatively, 3.4 billion dollars.”

  Kirra sighed and sat back, crossing her arms.

  Lin glanced at her and returned to the documents. “The art press places your net worth at slightly over fifteen million.” She raised her eyebrows. “Not shabby, but certainly not in your husband’s neighbourhood. That’s one hell of a motive.”

  She held out her finger, stern. “I. Was —“

  “Yeah, we know. Asleep. Not the best alibi, if you ask me. Who did you hire? How much did you pay him?”

  Kirra pushed her chair back and stood, hands flat on the table trembling with rage. She leaned close to Lin. “If you had something, you’d arrest me. Be careful what you say or I’ll be suing the police department, and you. Personally.”

  * * *

  Wallace watched the door close behind her. “Went a bit hard, didn’t you?” He took the file back from Lin and closed it. “I don’t think it’s her.”

  “Of course you don’t. She’s tall, pretty - ”

  “Beautiful.”

  “Whatever. Clear your mind. Investigate this properly.”

  Wallace stood and tucked the file under his arm. “I’ve been doing this longer than you. I’m running her financials. I should get them this afternoon. But I still don’t think she did it.”

  “The odds are in my favour. She’s a spouse. He was far wealthier. Number one suspect.”

  “Twenty bucks?”

  Lin laughed. “Make it fifty. You can afford it.”

  14

  Nick leaned over Davie’s shoulder as he hammered away at Kirra’s laptop. They were in her office, the door ajar. Her artwork adorned the walls and a gallery catalogue lay open on her desk.

  “You said five minutes. It’s been almost 20,” said Nick

  “Patience, ass.” Davie entered a command in the terminal window, closed the window and logged off. “I like the ascetics of Macs, but burrowing into a Windows machine is a hell of a lot easier. This will be like the finance guy’s laptop - same access. We probably shouldn’t access it here in case eyes see us.” He slowly lowered the lid. “This was closed when we came in, right?”

  Nick opened his mouth to answer when the heard a door slam and Kirra’s voice bellowing. “The son of a bitches, thinking I killed my husband. Mike? Where in the hell are you?”

  “Shit.” Nick grabbed Davie and dragged him from the room, pulling the office door closed behind him. They sprinted down the hall and out to the table by the pool, sitting just before Kirra entered. Nick wrenched open his laptop and willed it to life. He looked over the lid at Kirra’s approaching form.

  “Are you two having any luck?”

  Nick tapped on the non-responsive keys while the operating system came to life. “Plugging away. Setting the stage, really. Collecting data. I was about to say collecting info, but it’s not information until it’s been collected and analysed. So, collecting data.” The passwo
rd prompt appeared on his screen. He entered it and the login splash screen disappeared to reveal a terminal window. It covered most of his screen and mirrored what Slokow was doing on his machine.

  He nodded. “Collecting data.”

  “Okay.” She seemed to deflate a bit. “Have you seen Mr Murphy around?”

  “Mike? No,” said Davie. “We try not to cross his path. He’s little, but scary.”

  “Yeah. That’s why I keep him on.” She looked at her watch. “What should I tell the cook you’d like for dinner?”

  Nick looked over at Davie. His friend raised his eyebrows and glanced at Nick’s laptop.

  “I think Davie and I are going to head out and get a kabob and plan the next few days. This is all very beautiful, but it’s a bit distracting. Is there a good place around here?”

  Kirra absent-mindedly nodded. “Turn right out of the gate, cut through the alley about a hundred metres on the left. There’s a decent independent place just across from the other end of the alley. Don’t worry about the hour. I’ll be in my studio all night, I think. I have some serious stresses to release. You’ve got the code for the front gate?”

  “We do.” Nick closed his just revived laptop and slid it into his case and slung the strap over his shoulder. “If we see Murphy we’ll let him know you’re looking for him.”

  “Don’t bother. I was just going to vent at him.”

  * * *

  The gate rolled shut behind them. “Damn, that was close, man,” said Davie.

  Nick chuckled. “Nothing gets the adrenal glands working overtime like almost getting caught while hacking your boss’s MacBook. She said turn right out of the gate, right?”

  Davie oriented himself with the map on his phone, turned right and pointed. “Kabob shop that way. Probably won’t have Wi-Fi.”

  “I’ll tether my phone. Lead the way. I’m starving.”