Deadly Deeds (13 page)

‘
Out.’

‘
Where?’

‘
I don’t know. Christ, what’s come over you? I only rang to find out how you were, and I’m getting shit in return.’

‘
I’m only trying to do what’s best.’

‘
This is my business, you understand. My business alone.’

I shifted from one foot to the other. ‘Frank, why don’t you come over, and we’ll talk about it.’

‘I don’t want to come over, and I’ve got nothing to talk about. I’m old enough to make my own decisions.’ He sounded furious, but I was more angry than him.

‘
Frank, if you don’t come to my place within the next half hour, I’m going to come pounding on your door. And I’m sure you don’t need that right now.’

More silence.

‘All right, all right, I’m on my way.’

He hung up before I had time to add anything.

In less than half an hour, Frank turned up at my place.

‘She’s lying to you, Frank,’ I said, throwing my hands up in the air.

Frank paced up and down the kitchen floor. Hastily, he tucked his red chequered shirt into his jeans, even though it was already tucked in as far as it would go. I couldn’t figure out whether he was nervous or angry. His cranium was bathed in perspiration, and it was obvious he’d rather be home.

‘Aren’t you gonna say anything?’ I asked, locking my eyes into his.

‘
What the fuck do you want me to say?’ He snapped. ‘You’ve been carrying on like some kind of jealous girlfriend from the beginning.’

I frowned, thinking about Michael in the bedroom, and said, ‘Is that what you think?’ I was disappointed that every time we had an argument, he turned it around into some kind of sexual inadequacy towards me.

‘What do you want me to think?’ he asked.

‘
Jesus, Frank, you’re unbelievable.’

His jaw dropped. ‘What?’

I circled the room and stopped in front of him. ‘Listen to me. Something is going on, and you’re too blind to see it. I’ve checked Teresa’s statement. Her story is inconsistent with the evidence we collected at the crime scene.’

‘
How can you be sure?’

‘
I spoke to people. I checked the files again. I got a second opinion.’

He let out a heavy sigh. ‘What do you think you’re doing? I thought we were not supposed to investigate this homicide? Weren’t you listening to Trevor Mitchell the other day?’

‘You rang me to go and see her in hospital, remember? And you weren’t supposed to be there either. You know damn well this has nothing to do with rules and regulations. This case is about to be filed away for good, and I’m telling you, things are not what they seem.’

‘
What about fingerprints? Did we get the results yet?’

‘
How would I know? Go ask the CIB. They’ve taken over the damn investigation. No one is telling me shit. I have to unveil the truth by myself.’ I looked down at my feet, and back at him, trying hard to soften the expression on my face. ‘We were a team once, Frank. We worked well together. I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know why we can’t even stand the sight of each other. I’m hurting.’

I could feel emotions building up, but I held my tears back.

I went on, ‘I’m hurting to see us end everything this way. I need you to get through this. I need you to help me. I’ve got no one else, and I’m so scared of losing control right now.’

He stared at me for a few seconds. The look on his face told me he thought I was pathetic.

But I was dead serious.

Suddenly Michael appeared from his room. ‘Is everything all right?’ he asked solemnly.

Frank and I turned towards him, unable to say a word.

Finally, I muttered, ‘Everything’s okay, Michael. Just go back to your room. It’s grown-up stuff.’

He glanced at both of us and said, ‘Sure, whatever you say,’ and left.

‘
All right, all right,’ Frank finally said, dropping his shoulders. ‘So, what’s your version of events?’

‘
I don’t think Walter Dunn killed Jeremy Wilson.’

‘
Who did?’

‘
I don’t know. That’s what I’m trying to figure out.’

‘
And you have no idea whatsoever?’

‘
All I know is that the killer is still out there. In fact, the truth is probably staring us in the face.’

He puzzled over my response, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. He glared at me and said, ‘Are you suggesting Teresa killed her husband?’

‘That’s not what I said.’

‘
But you’re getting there.’

‘
It’s always a possibility.’

Frank was clearly unimpressed. He threw his head back and forth, and gave me his best performance in five years. ‘For Christ’s sake, Malina, listen to what you’re saying. Teresa trashed her apartment, decapitated her husband, killed Walter Dunn and made it look like a suicide. But wait. To make it even more convincing, she beat and scratched herself in every possible place, and even managed to insert Walter Dunn’s semen in her vagina. But, if that’s not convincing enough, why not go the extra mile and add a finishing touch? Why not insert a squash ball up her arse? Hell, why not?’

For the first time since he came through the door, I felt at a loss.

‘
But...’ I muttered, stepping back a couple of metres. I knew he would never do it, but it felt as if he was going to hit me.

‘
But
what? Don’t you think if Teresa had wanted to kill her husband, she would have simply shot him or run over him with a car? Or at least try to make it look like an accident? Or hire a hitman? Does this strike you as a common way to get rid of a spouse? Come on, Malina, give me a break!’

I felt heat on my cheeks. Being made into a fool wasn’t my favourite pastime. Frank’s logic was hard to deny. His argument stood ten feet tall, while mine could hardly reach my ankles. But I didn’t tell him Teresa had been seeing Walter for nearly a year. For now, I thought the information would better be kept to myself.

I wiped the perspiration from my forehead with the back of my hand. ‘I don’t know any more,’ I said, now truly confused and overworked. ‘I’m only trying to do what’s right.’ I let tears, which I’d held back for the last five minutes, stream down my face.

He froze for a few seconds, not knowing how to react. He seemed embarrassed by my crying. But it wasn’t what he said which made me cry. I’d felt extremely sensitive in the past few days, and his timing was bad. It would only have been a matter of time before something would have triggered my outburst.

After watching me for half a minute, he stepped forward and placed one hand on my cheek. ‘Let it go, Malina,’ he said tenderly, ‘just let it go. It’s all over.’

I looked up at him and forced a smile.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

A
t around 8.30 p.m. on Friday night, on my way back from Parkmore Shopping Centre, I got caught in torrential rain somewhere between Clayton South and East Bentleigh. With the rain and the darkness, visibility was virtually zero, so I pulled over to the side of the road, heading straight into a large pool of water. The engine flooded, and when I tried to start it over and over, I flattened the battery.

Because my car was standing on a forty-five degree angle in the middle of the left lane, other cars had to diverge slightly to the on-coming lane to get around me. I didn’t want to stay in the car. As much as I loved my Lancer, with poor road visibility someone might have run up its back, sending me flying through the windscreen and into the wet bitumen. Thank God, I had my mobile phone with me. I managed to call the Royal Automotive Club of Victoria (RACV) to my rescue. It took me a while to explain where the hell I was.

‘It won’t take long, Ms Malina,’ the RACV operator said at the end of the line. ‘One of our service vans will be there within the next hour.’

I must have got the extended version of one hour because I stood in the pouring rain for well over an hour and a half on Old Dandenong Road, in the middle of nowhere. The area was creepy and dark, sending shivers rippling down my back.

The battery on my mobile phone was low, and I was scared to damage it under the pouring rain. I tucked it under my jacket but couldn’t protect it fully from the raging torrent.

My hair and clothes were stuck to my cold skin, and I swore that if I came out of this alive, I was going to catch the worst double-pneumonia ever. I dreaded having to spend the next few days in bed because, frankly, I hadn’t the time, nor the desire. My life was currently switched to high gear, and any distractions would only confuse me more than I already was. And since I could feel myself slowly sinking into a depression, like someone trapped in quicksand, getting sick would assure a fast way to the bottom of the pit.

Now and then, a vehicle drove carefully around my car, avoiding the pool of water which trapped me in this purgatory in the first place. I wondered if anyone was going to stop and ask me if they could help.

But car after car drove past as if I was nothing more than a tree, perfectly happy to be soaking in all the water from heaven above.

What has the world come to?

On the other hand, maybe it was a good thing no one bothered with me. My mind had nothing better to do than imagine thousands of scenarios of how a lunatic out there would finally pull over, ask me if I was okay, pull a knife and cut me open like a pig.

But to my relief, the yellow RACV patrol car arrived at the top of the hill. By then, the rain had eased, and I could even see stars in the sky.

I was soaked from head to toe, convinced this incident was going to send my chest cold into a new level of complication.

‘What’s up,’ he said as he come out of the car and moved towards me.

‘
Jesus, am I glad to see you.’

He was in his mid-thirties and well-built. His drenched, blue shirt stuck to his front and back. ‘You wouldn’t guess how many people have being telling me this for the past hour,’ he said, wiping the excess water from his face.

He explained how many vehicles broke down in this weather. He’d been standing under the pouring rain longer than I had, his head buried under various bonnets, rescuing people from their misery, and in return, feeling miserable himself.

‘
I thought you guys were issued raincoats,’ I commented, realising how cold he must have been with only his shirt on.

‘
They’re part of our winter wardrobe. We haven’t received them yet.’

I guessed it was bad luck during those spring and summer downpours.

Half an hour later, I was home, feeling unusually warm but exhausted.

When I stepped out of the shower and headed for the kitchen, I noticed the red light flashing on my answering machine.

One message, it told me.

John Darcy had some news.

‘I’ve got a copy of the autopsy report you wanted on Walter Dunn. Give me a call when you can so we can make a time to discuss it, preferably after hours.’

I checked my watch; 11.04 p.m. I found it inappropriate to call him so late. Unlike Frank Moore, John Darcy had a family. I’d hated his wife to think I was the other woman.

I called him at 8.00 a.m. on Saturday instead.

We agreed to meet at his place for lunch.

Frank Moore and I had already performed a preliminary examination on Walter Dunn at the crime scene. The formal examination of the dead body took place during the autopsy at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, home of the city mortuary.

The autopsy of Walter Dunn involved not only an external examination, which we had partly conducted at the crime scene, but also an internal examination by means of a dissection. A DNA test had also been conducted for further reference if required.

As far as Frank and I had initially concluded, Walter Dunn did commit suicide. But further forensic examination and laboratory analysis might have showed otherwise.

I sat behind John Darcy’s home office desk, a mug of black coffee in my right hand, waiting for him to flick through the autopsy report, a bunch of documents and photographs neatly packaged in a large yellow envelope.

Across the window of the study, the sky was covered in clouds, and John’s kids were playing tag in the backyard. They seemed happy and full of life. It made me wonder what happened as we got older, how everything suddenly became so serious, how we forgot to enjoy simple things, like running around, playing ball, and taking everything one day at a time. It also brought to mind flashes of my childhood. I had never been happy as a child.

I turned back to John.

He nodded to himself, as if he was having an internal conversation between the right and left side of his brain, while curling his blond beard with his thumb and forefinger.

‘So,’ I said impatiently, ‘you’re going to let me in on this?’

He jolted on his chair as if he had forgotten I was in the room.

‘You were right,’ he said, his voice dead-pan. ‘Something is wrong with this case.’

I wanted to smile, but I saved it for myself. About time something went my way.

He handed me, over the desk, a few pages from the report and added, ‘The gun shot wound to his temple is not typical of a suicide.’

That was what I had hoped for.

I read through the section describing the gun shot wound.

The wound on Walter’s temple was from a distant shot, probably more than fifteen inches, making it virtually impossible for the victim to have killed himself. If Walter had shot himself, he would have done it at close range and therefore leave traces of gunpowder on his skin. The absence of gunpowder from the full metal jacketed bullet, designed to penetrate its target without expansion, and the angle of the wound indicated he was shot by someone standing a couple of meters to his side, at an angle of approximately thirty-five to forty-five degrees.

At the crime scene, I concluded the absence of gunpowder around the gun shot wound was due to the putrid skin condition, which had been ravaged by maggots, insects and rot.

On the other hand, Dr Charles W. Main, the pathologist who performed the autopsy at the mortuary, was convinced the reason I never recovered gunpowder on the skin was because there was none there in the first place.

The other evidence, which supported the non-suicide theory, was the lack of gunpowder on Walter’s hand. This clearly indicated Walter did not fire the gun, even though he held it tightly in his hand when we found the body. And even if he did, his arm would have had to be made of rubber to be able to twist it at such an angle to match the gun shot wound.

I look up at John Darcy, who now seemed as surprised as I was.

‘Murder,’ I said, perspiration dripping down the small of my back.

The sound of my voice hung in the small study like a four-letter word.

Silence took over for a full minute.

John glanced at his forensic hardcover books next to his desk. He seemed to be puzzling over a possible explanation other than murder.

I knew he was wasting time.

I took another sip from my mug as I wondered who in the world killed Walter Dunn. One thing seemed certain. If someone killed him, there had to be a motive. Homicides never occurred without motive. People who killed did so for a reason. The most common reasons I had come across during my five years as a forensic investigator were greed, love, hate and jealousy. In addition, over eighty percent of homicides were committed by people known to their victims, usually friends, neighbours or family members. It made you want to hibernate for the rest of your life. I hadn’t reached quite that point, but I was certainly selective about my friends. With friends, quality over quantity was definitely the way to go. As far as family and neighbours were concerned, unfortunately fate was largely in charge of the matter.

I emptied my mug of coffee in one go.

Whoever killed Walter tried to make it look like suicide, but it was a clumsy attempt. The scenario was right, but the forensic research non-existent. This had been a deliberate set-up to give us a different impression of what really happened. And in spite of its simplicity, it almost worked. Caught in the horror of the crime scene at the Wilson’s apartment, no-one bothered going over the evidence. And why should they? After all, the killer shot himself, and there was nothing more to it.

I turned my gaze back to John and said, ‘Do you think whoever killed Walter Dunn is the same person who killed Jeremy Wilson?’

He raised both hands above the desk and said, ‘That or there was an accomplice. More than one person could have been involved. If this whole thing was a set up, it might have taken two brains to figure it out. Your guess is as good as mine.’

‘Or one person who had plenty of time on his hands.’

He nodded, knowing absolutely anything was possible at this stage.

So far, Walter Dunn’s autopsy was the best evidence we had that foul play had taken place. We all got sucked into the suicide theory. The CIB had virtually sealed the case and filed it away forever. I wondered if they’d even bothered reading the autopsy report.

Poor communication between a pathologist and the detective in charge of a homicide usually resulted in a case not being solved, or the wrong person being sent to jail. Keeping those communication channels open was so important, and yet, over and over, I could see the same mistakes being made. Overall, people were either too busy, too lazy, or had lost genuine interest in their profession.

I placed my empty coffee mug on a corner of John’s desk and wondered how Frank would react to this finding.

‘
What I need to know now is when Walter Dunn died,’ I said, looking back at John.

‘
It’s somewhere here,’ he said, as he sifted through more pages of the autopsy report. ‘Three separate tests were conducted to estimate the time of death.’ He handed over two pages of the report. ‘According to this, Walter Dunn died between the 16th and the 17th of February, not a day more, not a day less.’

I took in the information and realised something was definitely wrong. If Jeremy and Teresa Wilson were attacked on the 20th February, how could Walter Dunn have committed the crime if he suicided forty-eight to thirty-six hours before the event?

I shifted uncomfortably in my chair.

One of the tests to determine Walter’s time of death involved forensic entomology.

The study of insect activity on a dead body provided a very accurate method of finding the time of death in a homicide. Since I took the pictures of Walter’s body at the scene of the crime, I clearly remembered insect activity had taken place, and fluid had leaked from various orifices in the body. I knew for a fact this would eventually led to establishing a time of death, but it seemed irrelevant back then since we’d caught who we thought was the killer.

The autopsy report indicated formation of gas inside the body from bacteria dissolving tissues. The gas formed various blisters, two to three inches in diameter, on various parts of the skin. Because the temperature in the room had been moderately cool when we found the body, decomposition had progressed at a slow rate. The author of the autopsy report had taken this into consideration when estimating time of death.

Walter’s body had been lying in his home for a while, therefore his body temperature had dropped to room temperature, a good indication he had been dead for at least thirty hours.

But the best indicator of Walter’s death was the stage of development of the maggots which had nested in the rotting body.

The instar, the form assumed by an insect during a particular stadium or growth-stage, of the maggots had reached third level, a clear indication Walter Dunn died seven to eight days from the moment we found him.