Bloodborn (25 page)

Outside the courtroom. Fiorelli tried to
calm Anya down.

“This is about Harbourn’s insanity plea. Savannah was never going to help us prove he was competent the night of Rachel Goodwin’s murder.”

“Not now she’s dead.”

Kate Farrer approached. “Brody’s just doing everything he can to goad you. Don’t get suckered. He’s a slimeball and that’s what he does for a living. Either that, or you’ve pissed him off big time.”

Anya looked at her friend, never the epitome of tact. Even so, she had said exactly what Anya had been thinking. Maybe he was doing what Pascoe ordered and making sure there was no reason for Harbourn to appeal at a future date. Or he wanted to discredit her, in order to show Pascoe his dirty secret was safe and there was no nexus between him and Anya.

Either way, she didn’t want to go back on the stand.

“Here,” Kate said, offering her a black coffee. “Take a few minutes. You’ve got that rash on your neck again.”

Anya took the coffee and walked outside for some fresh air.

Brody crossed the road outside the courts and ignored her. How could he be doing this? Surely he couldn’t be trying to impress the man who had raped his mother? Bevan Hart’s pleas about the victims and their families obviously made no difference. He didn’t care about anyone but himself and his moneymaking career.

Her phone rang and she checked the number. Martin. She quickly answered.

“Everything okay?” she asked.

“Yeah, just letting you know that Ben came third in his first race in the athletics carnival. Not bad, given he’s half the size of some of the kids in his class.”

For a moment nothing else mattered. “That’s so great, but winning isn’t everything.”

“Can you just be happy for him—he did his best and ran his little heart out. Even if he did look like he was stirring a pudding the way his legs go all over the place.”

She knew exactly what her ex-husband was describing. Ben wasn’t blessed with the athletics genes, but she adored watching the joy on his face as he ran.

“Sorry, I’m about to go back into court. Please tell Ben I’m really proud, and thanks for letting me know. I wish I could be there to have seen him.”

“So do we.” There was slight hesitation before he said, “Anyway, you can talk to him later, but just act like you didn’t hear it from me first.”

“Hear what? Gotta go, but thanks, Martin. I mean it.”

She sipped the coffee and felt the heat dissipate from her neck and upper chest. A few minutes later, she was back on the stand.

Gary’s shaking seemed more evident than before the break.

“Doctor Crichton,” Brody began, “in your experience, which I concede is not in the specialty of psychiatry, is insanity, or what I’ll describe as psychosis, a constant state?”

“Not necessarily. People who describe hearing voices often say they come and go.”

“Is this dependent on the type and dose of medication?”

“No.”

“You say that the defendant appeared lucid during your time with him. Does that mean he cannot possibly have been in a state of psychosis the night of the assaults on Sophie and Rachel Goodwin?”

“No.”

“So is it still possible that he was in psychosis that night, and that you saw him on one of his better days?”

“Yes.”

“And is it possible the medication at the psychiatric hospital and care he was receiving was beginning to improve his condition?”

“That is possible,
if
he were actually psychotic that night and not faking. He was quite capable of using a computer keyboard just before debilitating tremors became apparent, coincidentally, when I was present. Then he regained complete coordination when he smashed a picture when I angered him with a question about his sister’s suspicious death.”

Gary grunted and glared at Anya.

Brody did a double-take but didn’t refute the comments.

He half turned, as if deliberating.

In that instant Gary Harbourn grabbed the carafe of water, smashed it and leaped over the table toward the stand, jagged weapon raised.

Someone screamed “Look out!,” and Anya saw the crazed look in his eye as he came.

For her.

Dan Brody dropped his shoulder into Harbourn’s chest and deflected his path. Harbourn bounced off the railing in front of the jury as they scattered toward the back of their box.

Dan grabbed Harbourn’s arm, holding the glass away from himself, and a court officer and Fiorelli wrestled Harbourn to the ground. Brody kept his knee in Harbourn’s back until the man could be handcuffed and restrained.

Harbourn ranted, “I’ll kill you. You and that Ryder bitch have been after me for years,” in full view of the jury while bucking to free himself.

Noelene Harbourn shouted, “Don’t hurt him, he’s ill.”

Anya looked up for the judge, who had retreated to the door near his chambers. Once it was clear that Harbourn was no longer a threat, he returned to the bench.

“Silence!” he ordered. “Everyone return to your seat. Mr. Brody, is your client under control?”

Dan was puffing and sweating, but he nodded.

With that, two uniformed police officers relieved Dan of his quarry. They lifted Harbourn from the ground and stood him upright, one with a leg between his from behind. He had no way of moving again.

Pascoe addressed them. “Take him to the cells until he sees his psychiatrist and cools off. Jurors, please take your seats.”

“That bitch is out to get me!” he could be heard yelling as he left the court.

Anya took a staccato breath and looked at Dan to make sure he was all right; she noticed some blood on his right hand.

“We will take a short recess. I must say to you, jurors, that the event you just witnessed should be disregarded in terms of this trial. We will return in one hour.”

The journalists were the first to leave after Pascoe exited the courtroom, eager to file the story of the crazed defendant’s attack.

With the press out of sight, Noelene Harbourn stood proud.

Anya stepped down and approached Dan, who was sitting, stunned.

Fiorelli and his assistant hadn’t moved either. It was as if no one could believe what had just taken place.

Anya asked to look at Dan’s hand, which he raised. There was a superficial cut to his palm, but it wouldn’t need stitches. “You’ll need to clean that and put a sterile bandage on it.”

The lawyer nodded.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “He really was after you.”

“I know. Thanks for stopping him, and you, too, Benito.”

The prosecutor shrugged. “After what just happened, it’ll be tough to convince the jury that Gary Harbourn is anything but insane. He can’t be responsible for murder if he has diminished responsibility. Hell, even I could believe it after that.”

Noelene Harbourn approached them. “You little slut, you think you were clever just then, but the joke’s on you.”

Dan and Benito moved closer to Anya, despite Noelene being alone and out of arm’s reach. Anya appreciated the gesture.

“I know your type, you act like the Virgin Mary, all sweet and brainy, but you’d root anything if it helped your career. That little stunt you pulled, all innocent-like on the stand? Well, you’ve just done us a bloody great favor.”

She turned to Dan, and her voice took on a softer tone. “Well done, Danny Boy. You’ve just scored yourself a bonus.”

The woman pulled on oversized sunglasses as if bracing to meet her fans, and turned on her heel to leave.

Dan Brody suddenly looked very pleased with himself.

That night Anya went home. Following
Bevan Hart’s death and confession to the killing of Natasha Ryder, Kate and Hayden thought it safe for her to return home.

She opened the front door and nearly tripped on the pile of papers and mail on the floor. She disarmed the alarm and switched on the lights. Everything was as she had left it.

Nevertheless, the fact that the Harbourns had her name and address still had her spooked. Especially after Gary’s outburst in court.

She kicked off her shoes in the hallway and bent down to retrieve her mail. With Elaine still away, a pile of junk mail had accumulated inside the door. Sorting through the papers, something caught her attention. A letter from Ben.

She grabbed a letter opener from her office and sat on the calico lounge opposite Elaine’s desk. The answering machine could wait.

Ripping the envelope open revealed a brightly colored painting of a rainbow. Ben had drawn what looked like a man, woman and boy in the picture. On the back was his name and class name.

This has to go on the fridge,
she thought, and stood up. A number of bills fell to the floor. Among them was a book-sized envelope with an immature handwriting.

There was no post mark. It had been hand-delivered.

She opened it tentatively in case it was from the Harbourns.

Inside was a diary, the kind to be found in any newsagent. On the inside flap was a name, Savannah Harbourn, and the words:

Anya sat and flicked through various entries about lonely days, isolation and how much fun her sisters could be.

The diary contained a list of dates, names and attacks. Some of them were unfamiliar to Anya, like Choko, Lizard, Rastis.

It also included a crumbled piece of note in a different hand. It said,
111 Rosemont Place.

Anya moved to her desk and looked up the Goodwins’ address. 111 Rosemount Place.

She switched on her laptop and Googled a map of the locality. Within minutes she had discovered that Rosemount Place was a suburb away from Rosemont Place.

Had the Harbourns gone to the wrong house that night looking for drug money? The notion made the tragedy of what had happened to the girls so much worse.

She slipped Savannah’s diary into her bag, slid into her shoes and armed the alarm before heading out.

Kate searched the database. “Got it. It’s been reported by neighbors as being suspicious. Darkened windows, unmowed lawns, same car always parked there. No one comes or goes in the daytime. Uniforms went around but no one answered.”

“Did they follow it up?”

“Without a warrant, there wasn’t much they could do. Don’t you love the way the system protects the innocent?”

Kate made a couple of calls to the drug squad. “Now we wait,” she said. “And I still can’t figure out where Bevan Hart got the gun from. The serial number matched the one that was supposed to be destroyed. No barrel changes, same gun exactly. Where that came from there’ll be others and that’s a real concern. If men like Hart can get hold of one, who the hell else can and already has?”

Benito Fiorelli entered the Homicide office at about 9
P.M,
in a dinner suit with black bow tie. He kept a busier social schedule than Dan Brody, it seemed.

“This better be good. It’s opening night of
La Bohème
at the Opera House,” he said as Kate handed him photocopied excerpts from the diary.

Sitting on Shaun Wheeler’s empty desk, Fiorelli read Savannah’s confession, then listened while Anya explained why the Goodwin address might have been a mistake.

“God, how can we tell Mr. Goodwin that his daughter’s murder was the result of a mistaken spelling?”

Kate argued, “But it gives us motive for why the Harbourns were at the house in the first place. If it was a planned revenge attack for a drug deal gone bad, then Gary’s claims of temporary insanity are out the window.”

Benito rubbed the dark circles under his eyes. It occurred to Anya that he had come into the trial midway, after the murder of his colleague and friend. It can’t have been easy for him and it looked like the pressure was wearing him down.

“After today’s performance, it may be too late. The looks on the jury’s faces pretty much said it all. While they listened to the gruesome details of Rachel’s murder, a few feet away Harbourn was demure and controlled, no sign of the earlier outburst. I could see some of them were thinking that anyone who did that would have to be mad. Today just reinforced the Jekyl and Hyde insanity impression.”

Anya saw Violet Yardley outside the
food co-op. Dressed in dark purple that could have passed for black, she hugged herself with one arm while smoking with the other.

“Thanks for agreeing to see me,” Violet said. “I can’t believe that bloke killed Savannah. Jesus, she hated her brothers as much as he must of.”

She drew back and blew out through her nose.

Anya watched a woman with a shopping cart down the road dig through rubbish bins. “Hatred can blind you to a lot of things.”

“Tell me about it.” Violet stubbed out the remains of the cigarette and lit another.

“Would you like to go somewhere comfortable to talk?”

“This is where I’m most comfortable. Out here, with people who never want anything from you. They’re grateful for just a smile, and they have less than anyone else I know.” She gestured with the cigarette hand. “You know, most people are scared of Esther, because she’s dirty and rifles through garbage. Truth is, it’s the bastards they know and live with who are far more likely to hurt them.”

Esther meandered along toward them, singing to herself, in perfect pitch.

“You know, she used to be a concert pianist. Sometimes she sneaks into the music shop and plays the keyboard. If anyone asks her to play something, she just leaves. Guess she can’t stand the pressure.”

Anya leaned against the wall and reached into her purse, pulling out a five-dollar note.

Violet covered it. “She doesn’t take money, but you can buy her a sandwich. Call it a donation to the co-op. That way she won’t piss it up against a wall.” She called to the homeless woman. “Hey, Esther, you hungry?”

The woman looked up, removed her hands from the rubbish and pulled the trolley along. Anya followed them inside the shelter as a half-smoked cigarette was extinguished again.

Violet handed Esther some antibacterial hand-wipes. “Here, my lady, these are from Persia. Notice the exotic essence?”

The pack said aloe vera.

“Did the Maharaja leave it?”

“Just for you.” Violet led them into a small kitchen and pulled down a breadboard.

“We get leftovers from the restaurants on a good night,” she said. “The Maharaja asked that you try a salad and pork sandwich this morning.”

Esther was busy scrubbing every inch of her hands with the scented wipe, then she started on her neck and face, as though this was luxurious and had to be relished.

“Don’t worry, she’s not mad, are you, Ez, it’s just a game we play. And you can say anything in front of our Ez, she’s very good at keeping secrets.”

Anya sat at a stool near the bench. “I wanted to talk to you about Savannah. Last night I opened my mail. Her diary had been pushed through my letterbox.”

Violet buttered a third slice of white bread and put the knife down.

“What’d it say?”

“That she was sorry for everything her brothers had done and wanted to tell the police everything she knew.”

She pulled out some lettuce leaves from a plastic container and added some slices of roast pork from another. A slice of cheese, then a piece of bread. “I knew that.”

“Violet,” Anya tried to break the news gently, “she mentioned your attack, your name and when it happened. The police are going to be asking you questions.”

The double-decker sandwich completed, Esther dropped the wipe and took it from Violet’s shaking hands. The ravenous visitor retreated to a bench as if protecting a precious find.

Violet headed outside again, lighting a cigarette as she went. “You told me no one had to find out. What’s in her diary is just ramblings to help make sense of stuff. I’ll just deny it.”

“If the police have copies of the diary contents, then the Harbourns’ lawyers will see it before too long.”

Violet shook her head. “Shit. I didn’t think of that.”

Anya knew then who had delivered the diary.

“I already got a call from Ricky on my mobile but I just let it go to voicemail. No bloody prizes for guessing why he wants to meet up.”

Anya thought for a moment. “If there was a way to make them pay for what they did to you without you having to go through a rape trial, would you help?”

Violet thought for a moment. “Savannah wasn’t afraid of them except when Gary was around. He’s the violent one of the lot.”

“He’s under police guard in a psychiatric hospital. It looks as if he won’t be going anywhere for a long time.”

Esther wandered out, crumbs clinging to her tattered waistcoat. “Give my compliments to the Maharaja. I wonder what the poor people are eating today.” She chortled through a toothless mouth and continued on her way.

“I’ll see Rick,” Violet said nervously, “but only on my terms. You don’t know him like I do. He wouldn’t hurt anyone—ever. If he could have stopped them that night with me, he would have. Gary is the evil one who controlled the others. And I’ll prove it.”

Anya immediately regretted making the suggestion.