Blood Feud (12 page)

“Who is it?” I asked through the door.

“It’s me.”

Even more surprised, I opened the door to find Kevin on my doorstop. “Kevin?”

“Please, Senior Constable Fuller. At Sergeant Maguire’s house it’s . . .”

“Ah, I see. Come in.” I opened the door wider and stood aside to let him enter. “Is it that bad?”

He sighed in despair, even as his eyes widened at the sight of my knife. “It’s . . . it’s even worse than that.”

“Do you want to stay here tonight?”

His face lit up with hope. “Really? You wouldn’t mind?”

“Nah. You’re welcome, but only on one condition.”

“Anything.”

“You have to call me Tess, please. We’re not at work anymore.”

He smiled shyly, reddening yet again. “Okay . . . Tess.”

I smiled back. “You let the Sarge know where you are while I make up the guest bed.”

“Thank you so much, Senior . . . um, Tess.”

While I made up the spare bed, he came into the room with his bag. I raised my eyebrows. “You came prepared?”

“If you turned me down, I was going to drive home tonight.”

“Oh geez, it must be bad. Poor Sarge. He’s had a long, hard day too.”

“She’s quite . . .”

“I know,” I said, nodding in sympathetic agreement.

“I don’t know why he . . .”

“It’s a mystery to us all.” I tucked in the last corner of the sheet. “But anyway, enough gossip about the Sarge’s private life,” I said piously, though in fact I’d have loved to hear all the juicy details. “Have you had anything to eat?”

“No.”

I tutted. “I’ll make you a toastie. That’s what I had for dinner.”

And he ate his impromptu dinner as we watched TV and chatted. Afterwards he unexpectedly produced a bottle of red wine he’d picked up as a bribe from the local pub’s bottle shop on the way to my house. So I ended up having the two glasses that the Super recommended after all. Kevin relaxed after his first few sips and I coaxed him into talking about what had happened today. I really didn’t want to revisit the horrible events with him, but I sensed a desperate desire in him to unload. He was very young and today had experienced something horrific that few cops encountered so early in their career, if ever. It was important for him to talk about it and not bottle it up.

So I let him. And good grief, the kid could talk when he felt like it! He kept going until I could no longer hide my yawns, too exhausted to pretend anymore. For a young man, he proved remarkably attentive and quickly noticed, apologising for keeping me up. I brushed his apology aside as I virtually pushed him to his bedroom.

Selfishly, I used the bathroom first. After handing him a fresh towel, I tossed him a tired “goodnight” and retired to my bedroom. Before sleeping though, I rang Dad to make sure he was okay, signing off with haste when he started asking prying questions about Miss G. Then I rang the Sarge, but his phone went to voicemail even though he was on-call this weekend. I left a short message, assuring him that Kevin was safe and warm and would head off tomorrow as planned.

I hoped everything was okay for him with Melissa. I didn’t want to be the cause of any trouble between them, especially from a situation so innocent in nature. But I really needed to talk to him. We hadn’t had a chance to debrief about the events of the day, and just as Kevin needed to unload, so did I. And I couldn’t do it with anyone else except him, not even Dad or Jake.

If I was completely honest with myself, I’d have to admit that I hated it when Melissa visited because then I couldn’t count on the Sarge being there for me. When she was here, she became the main woman in his life, and for some reason that left me feeling more than a little grumpy.

Worried I’d toss and turn all night, in fact I slept deeply, grateful to surrender my tumultuous thoughts into that temporary void. That was until my phone rang. For the first few seconds I incorporated the ringing into my uneasy dream. It became Miss G phoning me in terror for help as a shadowy figure loomed over her in the darkness, the only light a gleam from his evil knife. I sat up gasping, taking some more seconds to recognise the ringing as my phone – my real phone.

I leaned over to pick it up at the last second. I listened to the panicked voice of one of Miss G’s neighbours, no spring chicken either, beside herself because she’d just seen someone creeping around Miss G’s house. Or so she thought, backtracking her story and contradicting herself, building herself up into a real frenzy of fear.

“It’s okay, Mrs Perkins,” I soothed. “I’ll come over now. Did you ring Sergeant Maguire? He’s on-call this weekend.”

“He’s not answering his phone,” she half-sobbed. “I rang him five times. Officer Tess, I can’t sleep knowing that monster is still out there preying on defenceless women like me. And I know it’s not Greg Bycraft. Those Bycrafts are horrible people, but they don’t do things like that . . . oh, except to your family that is . . .” Her voice trailed away with embarrassment, before becoming impassioned again. “Please hurry!”

It was probably
just a shadow from a branch moving in the wind
, I reassured myself, even as I dressed hurriedly in jeans, t-shirt and a hoodie, strapping on both my knife and my utility belt and donning runners. You never knew when you needed to run. Or needed your gun.

I tried the Sarge’s number and was directed straight to voicemail again. I left him a terse message, annoyed he wasn’t answering his phone. I didn’t care if they were still throwing plates at each other or having sensational after-fight sex, I needed him more than she did. I briefly considered swinging past his house to pick him up, but reluctantly decided against it. I would just have to manage this by myself.

I crept from my bedroom, making a prudent bathroom call first. Stupid. That woke Kevin who emerged from the guestroom as I tried to sneak to the front door.

“Senior . . . Tess, what’s happening?” he asked, yawning and rubbing his eyes.

“Nothing to concern you, Kevin. Go back to sleep.”

“I heard your phone. Is it a call-out?”

I checked my watch. “Kevin, it’s past midnight so technically you’re not on work experience anymore. Please go back to sleep.”

“I’m coming with you. You shouldn’t do a night call-out by yourself.”

“I shouldn’t take a recruit on a night call-out. The Super’s already mad enough with me. I don’t need another reaming from her. Stay here, please.”

“I might be able to help.”

“Kevin . . .”

“Give me a second to change.”

“Kevin . . .”

Sighing with exasperation, I headed to the door. I wasn’t waiting for him. Normally I kept the patrol car at my place those weekends I was on-call, but I had no choice tonight but to drive my own vehicle. It would be difficult if I was forced to arrest or chase someone, because it was old and slow and the back doors no longer locked properly.

I had to give Kevin points for being fast when he burst from the house three minutes later, fully dressed, just as I was trying to get our old beast to fire up. And as it finally decided to cooperate, he climbed up and flung his bony body onto the passenger seat.

“You’re starting to become a problem,” I noted mildly as I reversed down the drive onto the highway. I didn’t hear what he said in response because I had to suddenly accelerate to prevent us being mown down by a speeding tanker finally finding some flat ground after a steep climb up the southern Coastal Range Highway.

“It’s a sixty speed limit through town, you idiot!” I yelled pointlessly out the window, adjusting the rear view mirror to avoid the high beam headlights the truckie flashed in annoyance at me slowing him down to eighty. When I turned off into Gum Street, he blew his airhorn, probably waking up the whole town. I flipped him the finger out of my window and shouted some futile obscenity that he’d never hear.

My eyes slid guiltily towards Kevin, aware once again I wasn’t setting a very good example. “Sorry about that. I guess he just flicked my switches.”

“He deserved it, but doesn’t it bother you to see people blatantly breaking the law like that and you’re not in a position to do anything about it?”

“Of course it bothers me! But even if by some miracle I was able to catch up to him in this old bomb, without the flashing lights and siren I’d have bugger all chance of persuading him to pull over. And besides, Mrs Perkins is alone and afraid with a murderer probably still on the loose. I think she’s more of a priority than that jerk.” I glanced at him. “Sometimes that’s the way policing is, Kevin. You have to make choices. Our resources only stretch so far.” We turned into Pine Street. “And it’s not just in rural areas that applies either. Say for example in the city, you’re on your way to an armed robbery in progress when you notice a motorist pull an illegal u-turn. You’re not going stop to book them, are you?”

“I suppose not.”

“You have to make a judgement call sometimes. That’s partly why the Bycrafts get away with so much here. It’s just not possible for us to pull them up for everything they do. And both the Sarge and I will readily admit that’s regrettable, but unfortunately it’s our reality.” I’d clearly given him something to think about and he remained quiet for the rest of the short drive.

At Mrs Perkins’ house, light blazed from every room. She’d lived in the town her whole life, marrying a local boy and raising three children. She stood waiting for us, peering out her front window anxiously. She flung open the door at my first rap, almost throwing herself on me in relief. “Thank you! Thank you so much for coming, Officer Tess.”

“That’s okay, Mrs Perkins,” I said, patting her back and guiding her inside. “That’s what I’m here for.”

“Why isn’t Sergeant Maguire answering his phone?”

“Well, um, his fiancee turned up without any warning this evening. I guess he’s busy.”

“Oh, her,” she scorned. “Mark my words, that girl is not going to make him a good wife. He chose unwisely with her. He should call it off before it’s too late.”

Hmm,
Melissa had obviously made quite an impression on the townsfolk the few times she’d visited
, I thought.

“We shouldn’t gossip about the Sarge’s relationship,” I said briskly. “How about you tell me exactly what you saw earlier.”

Fear crept back into her face again. “After the terrible things that happened today, I haven’t been able to sleep. I was in the kitchen, making myself a cup of tea when I looked out of my window. There was someone sneaking around Mabel’s back stairs. I think they might have gone inside.”

“Did you see any lights on in the house or any torchlight?”

“No, the house remained in darkness the whole time.”

“Are you sure it was a person, not just a shadow?”

My scepticism must have shown in my voice or face because she drew herself up with quiet dignity. “I may be nothing but a doddery old fool to you, Officer Tess, but I know what I saw.”

Suitably chastened and after a hasty apology, I assuaged her fears by telling her Kevin and I would take a look around Miss G’s house. I made a quick detour to my Land Rover to retrieve a flashlight and we set off up the driveway, ducking under the crime tape.

The house was grimly dark and silent. And somehow forlorn. It seemed fanciful, and I chided myself for the thought, but it was as if the house grieved the loss of the last member of a family that had built it and lived in it for generations. A lot had happened within its walls in those years – love, hate, births, deaths, laughter, tears, celebrations and commiserations. I wondered what would become of the house. Maybe someone would move here from the city and knock it down to build some modern marvel, like Teddy and Lee were doing. Maybe it would sit here and rot until vandals (Bycrafts) finally destroyed every integral part of it. Both options depressed me.

Pushing aside those inconsequential thoughts, I played the weak beam of the flashlight over the front veranda, but to reach into the darkest corners, I had to mount the stairs. I wished I had my sturdy and powerful police torch which I kept in the patrol car. Not only was its beam strong and wide, it also made a good weapon in a pinch. There was nothing like a conk on the head with a heavy torch to encourage someone to behave.

I strode over to test the front door handle, finding it still securely locked.

“All clear here,” I advised Kevin, whom I’d ordered to stay at the bottom of the staircase for his own safety. “Let’s check around the back.” I paused, eyeballing him. “Though you
could
just wait in the car like an obedient recruit.”

He blasted me with a ‘look’, the first hint of attitude I’d ever caught in him. My estimation of him rose substantially.

“After you, Tess,” he offered courteously.

I smiled to myself – maybe I’d taught him something after all. And with Kevin bunched so closely behind me I could feel his breath on my neck, we picked our way through the unruly garden around to the back of the house.

It was as still and dark at the back as it was at the front. Just as I told myself Mrs Perkins had imagined the intruder, a sudden movement on the back porch froze us in our tracks.

I fumbled for my gun. “Police! Don’t move.”

It was silent again, nothing stirring. With my Glock in my right hand and the torch in my left, I surveyed the surroundings. Cursing the light, which was not strong enough to fully illuminate the area, I reluctantly stepped closer.