The Dark Series

by Catherine Lee

  48

  "Let him do it himself, Michael," Cooper called out to his young son.

  "But, Dad, he keeps picking it up. You said we're supposed to kick the ball."

  "Well then show him how to kick it."

  Michael put his hands on his hips as Patrick yet again picked up the soccer ball Cooper had brought home for them Friday night. It was now lunch time on Sunday, and Patrick was still not playing ball to Michael's liking. "Fine," Michael said, after a short staring competition with his dad.

  Cooper went back to lighting the barbecue. He saw Quinn enter the house and stop to talk to Liz, handing her a bottle of white wine, before she pointed him out to the backyard.

  "I thought you were bringing a date?" Cooper asked as his partner joined him by the barbecue.

  "And have you scrutinise her all afternoon? No, thanks." Quinn helped himself to a beer from the esky Cooper had set up. He'd been meaning to get a small fridge out here, but then that was just another appliance to run.

  "Boys, did you say hi to Uncle Joey?"

  "Hi Uncle Joey," said Michael. He grabbed his brother and pointed to Quinn, who waved. Patrick beamed, and ran over to give Quinn a hug.

  "That's the greeting I love. What's this? You got a new soccer ball?"

  "Dad got it for us," said Michael. "But Patrick keeps picking it up instead of kicking it."

  "Oh. He'll get the hang of it. Here, let me help you." Quinn put his beer on the table and spent five minutes playing ball with the boys. By the time he was done, Patrick was kicking the ball like a little pro.

  "Thanks," said Cooper. "They've been fighting over it all weekend. Was beginning to think it'd been a bad idea."

  Quinn smiled. "How was the look on Saunders's face when Rochford came to congratulate us?"

  "Yep, that was pretty good." Cooper couldn't help but grin himself at the memory. Once Superintendent Rochford found out Saunders had told them not to pursue Simon Longhurst, he'd personally confronted the senior sergeant. It put both Cooper and Quinn well and truly on Saunders's shit list, but neither of them cared. They accepted the thanks and congratulations handed to them, and Cooper had politely asked when Frank Munro was coming back. Soon, was Rochford's answer, prompting Cooper to call Munro yesterday.

  "Frank should be back in a couple of weeks," he now told Quinn.

  "Yeah? That's good news. He cancer free?"

  "Sounds like they got it pretty early, so he's doing well. Thank goodness, I couldn't stand much more of Saunders."

  "Wonder where they'll ship him off to next?"

  "Somewhere far, far away, if we're lucky," said Cooper. "Which could happen, going on how pissed off with him Rochford was." Cooper took a swig of his beer and turned the barbecue down. He opened the sliding door and called out to Liz that he was ready for the meat.

  "Come and get it, then," came the reply. He shrugged, put down his beer, and trudged inside. As he walked into the kitchen, Liz pulled him into an embrace and kissed him.

  "What was that for?"

  "Why does there have to be a reason?"

  "There doesn't." Cooper kissed her back.

  "I'm just enjoying all of us being able to spend the weekend together, as a family. It's too rare these days, Coop."

  "It is nice, isn't it?" He looked out the back and saw Quinn kicking the ball with the boys again. "You want me to send Joe home?"

  "Of course not. He's part of the family." She handed him the plate of steak and sausages. "Here, go cook so we can feed your kids."

  Cooper arranged the sausages in lines on the barbecue plate. "I think Uncle Joey needs a rest now Michael. Why don't you and Patrick go inside and see if you can help Mum out."

  "Okay, Dad."

  "Thanks," said Quinn, going back to his beer. "So what's happening with the sniper case?" he asked, once the boys were inside the house.

  "Nothing, far as I know. Anderson and Baxter have no more leads. They'll turn it over to cold cases soon, I expect."

  "You think Longhurst was involved?"

  "Nah. He was on a pretty fixed mission, that one. No way he would have got someone else to take Morris out, he'd want to do it himself. I don't doubt he would have waited the ten years until Morris got out, then he would have gone after him, one way or another."

  "Yeah, you're probably right. Now he doesn't have to, though. Someone did it for him."

  "Someone, yes. Want to know what I think?"

  "I'm all ears, boss."

  "I think we've got a vigilante on our hands."

  The Dark Series

  Novels:

  Dark Heart

  Dark Past

  Dark Secrets

  Dark Chemistry

  Dark Edges

  * * *

  Novellas:

  Dark City

  Dark Paradise

  * * *

  Keep reading for a sample of DARK CHEMISTRY.

  For more information on the Dark Series, check out my website:

  www.catherineleeauthor.com

  Thank You!

  Thanks again for reading this box set, I hope you enjoyed it.

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  If you can’t wait for the next instalment, you don’t have to! Read on for a sample of book four of the series, DARK CHEMISTRY.

  And finally, if you have any questions or comments, or just want to say hi, I’d love to hear from you. My email address is:

  catherine@catherineleeauthor.com

  Dark Chemistry Chapter 1

  It was a cool day for early February in Sydney, but Charlie Cooper didn't mind a bit. He was done with summer, really. All that heat and sweat, not to mention the flies. He liked summer when it first arrived, but by this time of year he was always ready for it to cool down.

  "There's Martin, Dad!" said Michael, pointing to one of his friends. "And Emily! Can I go now Dad, pleeeease?" It was Michael Cooper's first day at school, and Cooper and his wife, Liz, had taken the morning off to witness the event. Cooper felt the need to say something profound before sending his eldest son off through the school gates for the first time in his young life, but Michael was far too keen to get going.

  Cooper looked at Liz, who grinned back at him. She was well aware of his need to impart some fatherly wisdom, but she was also obviously keen for him to get on with it. They'd decided on a late breakfast at a local cafe, some much-needed just-the-two-of-them time, and Liz had been looking forward to that more than anything.

  "Please, Daddy!" Michael tugged on Cooper's arm.

  "All right, little man." Cooper bent so he was face-to-face with his son. "But just remember to try your best, okay? We're proud of you."

  "Okay, Dad." Michael pulled his hand free and raced off to join his friends.

  "He'll be home in six hours, you know," said Liz, replacing Michael's hand in Cooper's with her own.

  "I know. I just… it's a special occasion, Liz. He's going to school. Our first kid is off to school."

  "Yes, he is. And we're off to breakfast. Come on, husband." They turned and almost ran straight into Cooper's partner, Detective Senior Constable Joe Quinn.

  "Sorry, boss," said Quinn, stopping short of a full-on collision.

  "What are you doing here, Joe?"

  Quinn looked at Liz, then back at Cooper, raising one eyebrow in that way he did when he was nervous. "Um, we've got a case. Body found in Queens Park, Macquarie Fields."

  "I've got the morning off," Cooper protested.

  "I know, boss. You've turned your phone off. Munro hates it when you do that."

  Cooper pulled his mobile phone out of his pocket and turned it on. "Yeah, well, I hate it when he does this." He looked at Liz, shoulders slum
ped.

  "I'm having breakfast on my own, aren't I?" she said.

  Cooper nodded. "I'll make it up to you," he said, knowing he probably wouldn't.

  Liz nodded and walked away, her look saying she knew he probably wouldn't either.

  * * *

  Half an hour later they pulled up next to Queens Park. Macquarie Fields was a low socio-economic suburb on the south-western outskirts of Sydney, made famous over ten years ago by what many police and Sydney-siders termed a series of riots. The trouble had started when a police pursuit went wrong and two passengers in a stolen vehicle were killed. Four days of violence and unrest followed until police were finally able to get a handle on the situation, but the tension between police and locals remained. They'd get little help with a murder investigation out here.

  Cooper quickly identified the local detective in charge and approached her. "Detective Sergeant Charlie Cooper, this is my partner, Detective Senior Constable Quinn."

  "Deandra Cordell," replied the local, shaking hands with Cooper. "The victim's a white male, late thirties or early forties. Garrett's with him." She nodded in the direction of an alleyway at the end of the park, and Cooper could just make out the slender figure of Doctor Garrett Byrnes, one of the city's leading forensic pathologists, bending over the body.

  "No ID?" asked Quinn.

  "No wallet, no phone. Looks like a mugging."

  "Who found him?"

  "Group of teenagers on their way to school, unfortunately."

  Cooper winced. Kids shouldn't be exposed to this kind of sight. "They still here?"

  Cordell threw a thumb over her shoulder. "In the park. My partner's with them, their parents are on the way."

  Cooper turned back to the body. "Any obvious trauma?"

  "There's a lot of blood. Check with Garrett, obviously, but my conclusion is the guy was stabbed. We're combing the park and surrounds for a murder weapon. I've got teams going door-to-door, but I'm not holding out much hope. No-one sees anything around here."

  Cooper nodded. "Good work. We'll go have a word with Doctor Byrnes."

  Cooper approached the body, Quinn by his side. "What do you see, Joe?"

  Quinn looked around. "The park's pretty open, but not once you get here, in the alleyway. There's a house across the road, could have seen something from there. Not many other possibilities, though, unless someone happened to walk down here. Killer must have followed this guy until he was isolated, then pounced."

  Cooper had already come to the same conclusion. This was a great place for an ambush. He stopped short of the body.

  "Morning, Garrett."

  "Detective Cooper," Garrett replied, not looking up. Cooper studied him for a moment. He'd always had great respect for Garrett and the way he worked. He was a tall, imposing man, but he had a humble quality to him that always made Cooper relieved this was the doctor who looked after the dead.

  "Anything you can tell us yet?" Cooper asked.

  Garrett straightened up. "He's been stabbed. One wound, left abdomen, into the intestines. Would have been painful and disabling, but not immediately fatal." Garrett pointed to the victim's neck. "Then this one, which was fatal."

  Cooper took a closer look, but couldn't see much for all the blood.

  "Hit the left carotid artery, he would have died within seconds," said Garrett.

  "Any idea on the murder weapon?"

  "The wounds appear more rounded than I'd expect from a knife, so you could be looking at something like a large screwdriver. I'll know more when I get him cleaned up back at the morgue."

  "One disabling hit, then a second one to finish him. Are we looking for an experienced killer?" Cooper asked.

  "Not my position to speculate, Coop. But I haven't found any other wounds, so the killer showed no hesitation. There're no defensive wounds, either. I'd say your killer has at least done their research, if they haven't killed before."

  Cooper sighed. They were going to have to take this case. Homicides were handled in the first instance by detectives from the Local Area Command, which was why Detective Cordell and her partner were already on the case. But Homicide Squad were always notified, and unless the case was straight-forward they almost always took it over. This wasn't going to be any different.

  "Thanks, Garrett. You have a time-of-death window yet?"

  "Somewhere between four and eight pm yesterday."

  "Will you do the autopsy today?"

  "This afternoon, probably around one. You'll be there?"

  "As always." Cooper turned back to Quinn, and the two of them walked a short distance away from the body.

  "The B team's just arrived," said Quinn, pointing across the park to where fellow homicide detectives Flynn Anderson and Meg Baxter were approaching.

  "Good. They can interview the kids who found him. We need to start working on an identification. Someone's got to be missing this guy."

  Cooper got Anderson and Baxter up to speed before sending them off to speak to the unfortunate teenagers and their parents. He then went back to where Garrett was finishing up with the victim.

  "Who checked his pockets?" Cooper asked.

  "First on scene, I expect," Garrett replied. "Uniform team, I don't know where they are now. You'll have to ask Detective Cordell."

  "Right. See you this afternoon, then."

  Garrett nodded then signalled to the waiting paramedics. Cooper, Quinn, and Garrett stood solemnly while the body was removed from the site, then Cooper sought out Detective Cordell and got the information he needed.

  "Like I said, no wallet or phone, but we did find this." She handed him a clear plastic evidence bag, inside of which was a receipt. "It's from a local jewellery store, and based on the time of the sale it may have been not long before he was killed yesterday."

  Cooper checked the receipt. It was for a silver bracelet, and whoever he was this guy had parted with over two hundred dollars for it. "You find the bracelet on him?"

  "No sign of it."

  "4:35pm yesterday," Cooper read off the receipt. "Paid by credit card. That ought to give us an ID. You know where this shop is?"

  "Sure," said Cordell. "I'll take you there now."

  * * *

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