‘I did try to point out that those things were well in place years before he joined, but he wouldn’t listen. Went on about the days when it was just men and they just got on and did the job. The way he talked you’d think he’d been in since the fifties.’
‘But he was okay with you doing the work?’ Carly said.
‘Initially, yes. He suggested I resign when I was pregnant, said the part-time rosters I’d be working when I came off maternity leave were a pain for the bosses, but I told him not to be an idiot. So I don’t know whether he was never really fine with women in the job, deep down, or whether he got that way because of the injury.’
‘How did he react when you and Cody left?’
‘His exact words were “what took you so long?”. But I think it was just a front. I think he was pretty lost. He rang to talk to Cody a few times, and on her birthday three months later, when we were already in Perth. They ended up having an argument – she said he talked about coming to visit, then got angry when she didn’t sound delighted by the idea. He rang the first Christmas too, but since then he just texts on her birthday and Christmas Day. When I came back for the divorce proceedings, he didn’t speak to me at the court, didn’t even look at me. Since the settlement was finalised last year and he had to sell our house and move in with his mother in Ryde, he hasn’t been in touch at all.’
‘Uh-huh,’ Carly said. ‘How’s that arrangement going?’
‘Not well, I imagine, but I don’t know for sure. I haven’t spoken to either of them in months.’
‘Did he ever get in a big argument with Mark?’
‘Not that I remember.’
‘He ever tell you that Mark was having an affair?’
‘No. Are you serious? Mark and Anne are practically the perfect couple.’
‘Do you remember the name of the woman he was working with the first time he got injured, on the stairs?’
‘No, I don’t,’ Erin said. ‘Why are you asking me about the names?’
‘Because I’m worried about Mark,’ Carly said, catching herself pinching her wrist.
‘It doesn’t sound like that.’
Carly hesitated. The truth still sounded crazy, but Erin had seen Andrew’s angry side. She might understand, and help. ‘I was talking to him about my friend’s murder and he knew what kind of injuries she’d suffered.’
‘What do you mean, knew?’
‘In the news they’d only ever said assaulted or beaten,’ Carly said. ‘He used the word punched.’
‘And?’ Erin said. ‘What, that’s it?’
‘You just told me how he turned nasty after the –’
‘Nasty’s one thing, but you’re talking murder,’ Erin said. ‘Andrew can be a bastard, and he can be mean, but I can’t believe he could hurt anyone like that.’
‘Did he and Mark ever fight about anything?’
‘I told you, no,’ Erin said. ‘I have to go.’ She hung up.
Carly exhaled, and dialled the HR office.
‘Claire Johnson, HR,’ a woman answered.
‘Is Shonta there?’ Carly asked.
‘She’s just gone into a meeting. Can I help you with something?’
‘Do you know when she’ll be free?’
‘I don’t, sorry. Did you want to leave a message?’
‘No, that’s fine. Thank you.’
She called Shonta’s mobile.
‘
This is Shonta Reid. You know the drill
.’
‘Meeting schmeeting,’ Carly said. ‘I can’t believe you won’t take my call. I’m after the names of the women Andrew Janssen was working with when he got hurt. The first time was eight years ago, the second around six. They were worker’s comp claims. One of them might be Maxine Hardwick. Or not. I could be delusional. Call me back, thanks.’
Now what?
She pondered for a moment, then called up Google on her phone, clicked to the White Pages and searched for a Ryde address in the name of Janssen.
Bingo.
If anyone knew whether Andrew was at home the night of Alicia’s murder, it’d surely be his mother.
Just as she reached for her keys there was a knock at the door. She checked the peephole then opened it.
‘I couldn’t do it,’ Linsey said. ‘I’m so sorry. I tried, but I just couldn’t.’
Carly pulled her inside, shut the door and hugged her.
‘I’m glad you’re here. I need to talk to you, but first I’ve got something to give you.’
‘I don’t deserve anything. I chickened out again.’
‘It’s okay,’ Carly said. ‘Close your eyes.’
‘But I –’
Carly silenced her with a kiss. ‘Close your eyes.’
Linsey did, and Carly took her hand and led her through the living room towards the bedroom. Instead of turning right, she steered her to the left. ‘Ta da.’
Linsey opened her eyes. Carly watched as she took it in: the single bed, the bright yellow quilt and pillowcase still creased with the packaging fold lines. The new yellow curtains at the window and the yellow lamp by the bedhead. The doors of the built-in standing open, the newly cleared space waiting.
‘All ready to go,’ Carly said. ‘And all in your favourite colour, just as if you picked it out yourself.’
‘Where’s all your stuff?’ Linsey said.
‘Under our bed.’ A breeze blew the curtains and the room filled with the smell of fresh fabric dye. ‘Lift up the pillow.’
Linsey didn’t move.
Carly picked it up for her, revealing a tiny pink cardboard box. ‘Open it.’
Linsey took the lid off.
‘It’s your key. Now it’s official.’ She spread her arms. ‘Mi casa, su casa.’
Linsey said, ‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘Say “Let’s go and get my things now”,’ Carly said.
‘I mean about this,’ Linsey said. ‘You did all this because you thought I wouldn’t be able to come out.’
‘I did it in case,’ Carly said.
Linsey pulled away from her. ‘Nobody buys so much new stuff “in case”.’
‘Why are you angry?’
‘Because you assumed I wouldn’t do it,’ Linsey said. ‘You didn’t even give me the benefit of the doubt.’
‘I felt like there was too much pressure on you. You said so yourself, that I was making you feel pressured. I thought this’d make it easier.’
‘Why should it be easy?’ Linsey said. ‘You set all this up, and say I can move in and pretend to be your flatmate and not have to tell my family who I really am, and I know it was something I suggested myself once, but now it’s like you decided I was too much of a coward to ever do it.’
‘Linsey.’ Carly tried to take her hand.
‘You’re supposed to believe in me no matter what,’ Linsey said.
‘I do.’
‘Then why did you get all this stuff without telling me?’
‘Because I wanted to help you. I wanted to surprise you and show you that it’s okay to not tell them, that we can work around it, because it seemed like it was getting too hard for you.’
‘You think I’m not capable.’
‘That’s not what I meant at all,’ Carly said. ‘I was trying to tell you that there’s no rush. That you can take your time.’ Now she did grab her hand. ‘And that I love you no matter what.’
‘Right now it doesn’t feel like it.’ Linsey walked out.
Carly followed. ‘Wait a minute. I’m sorry. I had no idea you’d feel it was an insult. I was trying to help you.’
‘You said that already.’ Linsey opened the front door.
‘Please come and sit down and talk.’ Carly felt the tears starting. ‘Don’t go like this. I’m so sorry. I love you and I just wanted to show you that it would all be okay. I need you. Please come back in and let’s talk.’
‘I need some time to think about this.’
‘Please,’ Carly said.
Linsey went out and closed the door, leaving Carly stunned and disbelieving.
*
The killer could hardly believe how well things were going. The DNA match was an added bonus that made the possibilities even brighter. He hadn’t been sure the police would be able to charge Mark, and he thought he’d be satisfied with the doubt that would follow the man for the rest of his career, but now anything seemed possible.
The pleasure made him want to do more. He’d grown so much between Maxine and Alicia. Where might a third take him? He imagined being bold. His mother had always said men were. He looked at his computer monitor and imagined watching. Eye contact.
But it had to be somebody who deserved it.
Twenty-five
C
arly drove slowly past Andrew Janssen’s mother’s place in the leafy Ryde street. Linsey hadn’t called her back, and neither had Shonta, and she’d had to get out of the flat with its fancy new bedroom (she was such an idiot), so here she was, trying to see if anyone was home.
The house was a neat two-storey building of cream brick with a timber bench on the patio and wide windows under the green roof tiles. She turned around and crawled back along the kerb. A red Ford Fiesta was parked on the driveway in front of the double garage. She didn’t know what Andrew drove but she hoped he was still at work and wouldn’t be home for a while yet. She wanted to talk to his mother alone. She had her story all planned out: she’d say she used to work with Erin but had lost touch, and figured her ex-mother-in-law, the grandmother of her daughter, would have her contact details. From there she was relying on her skills as a conversationalist, honed over years of sitting in the back of ambulances with complete strangers and distracting them from their pain. If she could get a good chat going, she might be able to drop in the pertinent questions. If Andrew was there, or turned up, she’d say she wanted to talk again like they had that morning. Simple, she told herself, ignoring her own misgivings.
She parked across the road and got out. A breeze touched the trees above her, birds called, and in the distance someone was mowing, but the street was otherwise silent. The curtains in the house were motionless.
The tiled patio was shaded and almost chilly. She pressed the doorbell but couldn’t hear any ringing so knocked on one of the yellow glass panels in the front door as well. She had a sense of the sound echoing through the house, of empty rooms with dusty parquet flooring. She peered through the glass but could see only a carpeted hall and a flight of stairs. She knocked again and waited with a growing sense of unease.
Don’t be a dingbat. Maybe there’s just nobody home.
She looked across the empty street at her own car, then at the Fiesta. From here she could see cobwebs spanning the gap between the wing mirror and window. She took a few steps closer and saw dead leaves and twigs lying along the base of the windscreen and on the wiper blades. Small piles of leaves had collected around the wheels as well, and as she walked around the front of the car she saw that the front driver’s side tyre was half-flat.
She looked up at the house’s windows, wondering if Andrew’s mother was sick and stuck in bed, like Tessa’s. Sort of like Tessa’s. The sheer curtains all hung still.
Back to the front door. Another knock. Listen. Nothing.
She looked at the car again.
Erin hadn’t said anything about her mother-in-law being sick. She would’ve known, surely? But there’d be no reason to mention it to Carly. She might’ve, though, when she said about Andrew having to move in. She could easily have added ‘and it’s a good thing too cos she’s dying of cancer’ or some such thing.
Carly went along the front of the house and down a path to the side gate. Four foot, timber, with a sliding bolt on the other side. She glanced around the street. Nobody in sight. The bolt was stiff and took some wiggling, then the gate swung open and she was in the backyard.
A somewhat shaggy lawn, a Hills hoist with faded plastic pegs dotted about the lines, a six-foot-tall line of shrubbery around the fences, and a small Colorbond garden shed. Curtains had been pulled across French doors at the back of the house and she stepped up nervously and knocked on the glass. She’d thought she’d feel calmer – she was often in people’s yards for concern-for-welfare calls; she was even pretty used to prising open windows and climbing in to find the dead or half-so – but this place was unnerving.
Because you shouldn’t be here, moron.
No sound from the house. Carly knocked again.
‘Excuse me.’
The voice startled her and she stumbled off the step. A woman with curly grey hair was peering suspiciously over the side fence. ‘Can I help you?’
‘Hi,’ Carly said, trying to get her heart to slow. ‘Do you know if Andrew’s home? I’m a friend of his.’
The woman’s frown relaxed. ‘I don’t think so. I haven’t seen him or his car since this morning.’
‘What about his mum?’ Carly said. ‘I’m supposed to pick something up.’
‘She’s away visiting family.’
Carly took a leap. ‘In Perth? With Cody and Erin?’
‘That’s what Andrew said,’ the woman said. ‘There was a special on the flight, apparently, and he bought it as a surprise one night and took her to the airport the very next morning.’
‘So you didn’t see her go,’ Carly said.
‘No, but I can imagine how excited she was. She hadn’t seen or even spoken to Cody for I don’t know how long,’ the older woman said. ‘Andrew told me she’s having a marvellous time. I thought she might’ve sent a postcard, but I expect she’s just too busy. That girl’s the apple of her eye.’
Carly looked at the woman’s smile, the pleasure in her face at the thought of her friend’s happiness. ‘When did she leave?’
‘Five weeks ago,’ the woman said.
The skin on the back of Carly’s neck crawled. She looked up at the first floor windows, at the sheer white curtains.
‘Andrew usually gets home around six,’ the woman was saying. ‘You might need to come back then.’
‘I’ll do that,’ Carly said. ‘Thanks for your help.’
The woman smiled, and Carly hurried to the side gate. She bolted it behind her, then ran to her car, pulling out her phone as she unlocked the door.
‘
This is Marconi. Please leave a message
.’
‘You wanted more than a word,’ Carly said. ‘Janssen’s mother hasn’t been seen for five weeks. He told a neighbour she’s staying with his ex-wife, but the ex-wife told me she hasn’t spoken to her mother-in-law for months.’
She wanted to say more, but couldn’t think of what, so hung up. She felt like someone was watching her from one of those curtained first floor windows. She stole a look at the house from the corner of her eye. Nothing moved, but she felt no better. She couldn’t stay here. She couldn’t go and talk to Janssen either – he’d see the suspicion all over her face.
Linsey hadn’t called her back, and neither had Shonta.
Home with its cringe-inducing room was the only place to go. She drew a deep breath and started the car.
*
Linsey had dragged herself mostly together by the time she neared her parents’ place in Dover Heights. Carly had called her four times, and she’d let her go to voicemail then parked to listen. She was sorry, she didn’t mean anything by it, she loved her, please could they talk. After the last call there’d also been a text.
She keeps me warm.
Linsey had blinked away tears and pulled back onto the road.
She couldn’t decide if her reaction was justified. On the one hand, they had talked about doing it that way, with her pretending to live in one room when really she shared Carly’s. She herself had been all for it a while back. On the other hand, it really did feel like a lack of belief on Carly’s part. She’d been so supportive until then.
She still is.
Linsey stared at the tail-lights of the car in front. During her years of social work, and especially when working with kids from all kinds of crappy backgrounds, she’d seen how people reacted when they read a slight in somebody’s actions. They felt hurt, angry, betrayed, and if there was some truth in the perceived accusation the response was even stronger. So perhaps her emotions came from a feeling that Carly was right about her inability to ever tell her family, and that she was furious about having that recognised and pointed out.
The car behind her beeped. The traffic was moving away. She accelerated with a start.
She’d come to no decision when she turned into her parents’ driveway. Part of her was determined to tell them, but another part hoped they wouldn’t be home, that there was some drama at the office and everyone had rushed in there, and she could just go on home herself and ignore all of this for another night. But not only were both her parents’ cars in the garage, Zoe’s was in the driveway too.
She parked behind it and turned off the engine, then glanced at the crumpled pink box in the passenger footwell. Her phone sat on the passenger seat, the lock screen showing a photo of Maya.
If I was straight there’d be a picture of my boyfriend there and nobody would blink.
She let herself imagine for a moment that her family knew and were fine with it. Carly would be here with her in the car, the two of them about to go in and have dinner. They’d be greeted with hugs when they walked in, and her father would ask how Carly’s shifts had been, and as she held Carly’s hand her mother would smile at them with pride and love. They’d all play with Maya on the floor, and photos would be taken and printed and hung on the wall for everyone to see.
Could it ever be like that? There was only one way to know for sure.
‘Linny’s here!’ she heard Maya shout from inside the house, and she drew a deep breath and got out of the car.
*
Ella and Murray had gone through the phone records and found no matches. She’d kept thinking about Andrew Janssen, and in a quiet moment in the office had called ambulance HR and asked for a little inter-service cooperation in having his work records faxed over. They said it wouldn’t be an issue but would take a little while, so she told Murray they should go back to Tessa’s place to pressure her about Robbie and John Morris.
When she directed Murray to head north over the Parramatta River, he said, ‘Where are we really going?’
‘Carly has this idea.’ She explained the ‘punch’ theory. ‘It sounds idiotic, I know, but he drives a car like the one seen by Bayliss’s neighbour. There’s no harm in going past his house. He lives in Ryde.’
‘It’s hardly on the way.’
‘But it’s not far.’ It still bothered her that Janssen never mentioned he’d been a paramedic in their conversation in the CCTV room, and she realised that anyone she’d ever spoken to who’d been in the emergency services managed to tell her, whether it was strictly relevant or not. She doubted Murray would be impressed though, and kept it to herself.
Her mobile rang.
‘I just got a call from ambulance HR,’ Dennis said.
‘Are they sending the records?’
‘Yes and no. The woman said she’d already received a message from a colleague asking about Andrew Janssen, and was looking up some specifics for her when she got your request.’
Ella’s phone beeped with an incoming call but she let it go to voicemail. ‘And?’
‘Janssen got injured working at a fatal traffic accident with Maxine Hardwick,’ Dennis said. ‘In his compensation claim he blamed her for what happened. In an earlier claim he blamed another female officer for an injury he suffered when they fell down some stairs with a patient.’
The hair stood up on the back of Ella’s neck. ‘Alicia Bayliss?’
‘No, a woman named Amanda Depasquale who resigned four years ago and apparently moved overseas. The HR woman couldn’t find anything about Alicia, but she did say that in Janssen’s exit interview he complained that the HR department should’ve done more for him and he felt the service should’ve paid him out properly.’
‘Did he mention any names?’ Ella asked. ‘Mark Vardy worked in HR for a while, but said all he did was process entry applications.’ This could be it, this could really be it.
‘No names,’ Dennis said.
They were approaching Ryde. Murray gave her a questioning look. She pointed straight, then next left.
‘We’re almost at his house,’ she said.
‘Keep me posted,’ Dennis said.
She hung up and saw that the missed call was from Carly. She’d left a message. ‘Janssen blamed Maxine Hardwick for his work injury,’ she said to Murray while the call connected.
‘And Bayliss?’
She didn’t answer, instead listening to Carly’s message.
Janssen’s mother . . . gone for five weeks . . . Janssen’s lying about where she is.
The adrenaline hit. ‘Floor it,’ she said to Murray.
*
Linsey tickled Maya on the floor while her mother and Zoe drank tea and talked on the lounge and her father read the paper at the dining room table. Her phone was in her pocket but Carly hadn’t called or texted again. She didn’t want to answer, but she wanted to feel the buzz of a message arriving. She wanted to know that Carly was thinking about her as much as she was thinking about Carly.
‘More,’ Maya gasped, pushing away her hands.
‘Like this? And like this?’
‘No shrieking,’ her mother said over the noise.
Linsey blew raspberries on Maya’s belly. Carly would love this. She adored little kids, was always pulling faces at them in the street and starting nonsense conversations when they sat nearby in cafes. Linsey could just imagine the endless games of horsey and chasings if Carly ever came here.
When she came here.
She had to tell them. She was a grown woman who knew her own mind. She’d known for years she was gay, known before she kissed her first girlfriend in first year at uni, known before she’d gone out with boys in high school and they put their tongue in her mouth at the movies and she’d looked past them at girls instead. She had to believe that her family loved her no matter what. Her parents hadn’t particularly liked Benjamin when Zoe had first brought him home, but look at them now. What did it matter that Carly was a woman and not a man? She and Linsey loved each other and were happy. Wasn’t that what every parent wanted for their child?
Zoe was talking about a troublesome tenant and their mother was nodding. Their father frowned and muttered over something in the paper.
Linsey hugged Maya then put her down. She got to her feet and placed one hand on the phone in her pocket.
Give me strength.
‘Can I talk to you all?’ The voice didn’t sound like her own. Her heart thudded so hard she could feel it in her throat.
Her mother and Zoe stopped talking and looked up. Her father turned another page.
‘Dad,’ she said.
‘Huh?’
‘I’ve got something to tell you.’
Three pairs of eyes on hers. Expectant. Maya tugged at her jeans. ‘Pick me up.’