Feeding the Demons (17 page)

With Angie out of the room for a moment, Gemma picked up a phone. She pulled the piece of paper she’d found at the bottom of Steve’s rubbish out of her pocket, smoothing it until it lay flat on the desk. Deliberately, she dialled the numbers. It rang and rang and she was about to hang up when he answered. Gemma felt a painful, excited sensation about her heart and throat.

‘Hullo?’ he said. For a second, she couldn’t speak.

‘Who is this?’ His voice was harder now, suspicious.

‘It’s me,’ she said, feeling foolish.

‘How did you get this number?’ Typical Steve, she thought, her heart rate soaring. Thinks about security before anything else.

‘I found it,’ she said. Now she saw where this line of questioning might go and felt ashamed of her automatic confiscation of the contents of his wheelie bin.

‘How did you find it?’

‘Aren’t you even going to say hello?’ she asked in a way that she regretted the minute the words were out.

‘Hullo,’ he said flatly. ‘How did you find this number?’

She could hear Angie returning, her footsteps in the hall. Then her friend reappeared, carrying a picture. Gemma slumped, ashamed. There was no way she could answer with her friend in earshot.

‘Steve, I—’

But he interrupted her. ‘Gemma, this number is supposed to be secure. I don’t know who you’ve used to get it. But don’t ever ring here again. You should know that I had to leave some of my gear behind with some personal items in it when the drug squad busted my operation. If someone in the Raiders gets hold of that and works out who you are—that you’ve been an associate of mine—you could end up gang-raped by a bunch of outlaw bikies. Not to mention also very dead. For your own safety as well as mine, don’t contact me again.’

‘What sort of personal items? How would they know about me?’ Gemma asked, but the line was already beeping.

Angie held out the FACE computer image and Gemma took it from her, replacing the handset, trying not to show the pain and anger she felt. Associate of mine, he’d said. As if she were some sort of business acquaintance. She stared at the picture Angie passed her, the thin face of the man who’d pulled the knife on platinum-fringed Bo Bayliss as she lay naked on the floor with her clothes neatly laid out like the effigy of a woman. Gemma stared at the man’s blank eyes, lipless mouth, highboned cheeks. There was something familiar about him.

‘God,’ she said, ‘he looks like Spinner!’

‘What personal items?’ Angie queried. ‘And who the hell is Spinner?’

Gemma couldn’t answer; it was too much. Everything just overflowed in her and she felt tears fill her eyes as she put the computer image down on the table and told Angie what had happened that night at her place when Steve found the video. ‘And then he goes and warns me about being traced by the bikies and murdered. He called me “an associate”.’ She wiped her nose and sniffed.

‘But he’s away so much,’ said Angie, her loyal friend. ‘What does he expect you to do? Meditate?’

Gemma blew her nose. ‘I don’t know what he expects me to do, Angie. But he doesn’t want me to go out and pick up men, that’s for sure.’

Angie considered. ‘He’s got a point though, Gemma. About you being in danger. Outlaw bikie gangs are not known for their forgiving natures. If they can’t get at him, it is just possible that they might strike at someone close to him. Or they’ll do you both. Execution for betrayal is part of their law.’

‘But I’m not close to him now,’ said Gemma, as a wave of sadness brought more tears to her eyes.

‘Any more men following you?’ asked Angie.

Gemma shook her head. ‘No, no,’ she said to Angie, understanding the implication. ‘Bikies don’t go to gyms. He was just a pest.’ But now she wasn’t so sure. ‘And someone was prowling round Kit’s place the other night. I saw where he’d torn the vines away from the fence.’

‘What is it,’ said Angie, ‘about you two sisters that you both have men following you?’

Two sisters, Imelda Moresby had said. Two killers. Two mistresses. Two stalkers. Two deaths. Thirty years ago, her father’s mistress had suicided and her mother had been murdered. Now two more women had been murdered: Marcia Harding and Bianca Perrault. Was there some link? Gemma felt haunted by these pairings.

‘Bloody men,’ Angie was saying. ‘Bloody mongrel deadshit arsehole bastard dickhead
men.
’

With an effort, Gemma brought her attention back to the investigation she was involved in, whether she liked it or not. She blew her nose, cursing when her finger poked through the tissue. She recalled Kit’s words and picked up the last poignant photo of Bianca while Angie studied the photos that Gemma had already passed to her. ‘Behaviour changes when reality changes, Kit said,’ Gemma stated, throwing the tissue into a wastepaper bin.

‘Kit should know,’ said Angie, taking the last picture from her. The FACE image on the table staring sightlessly at the ceiling from its vacant eyes brought her full attention back to the job. ‘Consider all the different factors in this picture. We’re being told something here by evidence that doesn’t lie. Only our failure to read it will mislead us.’

The two women sat in silence. The sense of foreboding became acute. ‘I’ve got a terrible feeling,’ said Gemma, staring at the computer-generated face, ‘that there’s something huge about this case staring straight at me. And I can’t see it.’

Kit was making coffee in the kitchen when the phone rang.

‘Kit?’

‘Gerald. Hullo.’

There was a pause. ‘I was hoping to come round. There are still a few of my things with your things. It’s Saturday. I hoped I wouldn’t be interrupting your work.’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘There are. And I don’t work today.’

A long silence between them reminded her of how their marriage had been for a long time. ‘You could drop round tonight,’ she said. ‘I hope by then to have the last of the unpacking finished.’

•

‘I’ve asked Gemma Lincoln to be here today,’ said Angie in the Strike Force room, ‘because not only was she the killer’s first target to come to light, she was also a policewoman for ten years and has a good reputation among the people who knew her.’ Garry Copeland looked at her, raising his eyebrows. ‘Some of you here may remember her,’ Angie added.

Gemma made sure her eyes didn’t connect with Bruno’s, who seemed intent on doodling on a small notepad. Beside him, Colin, the intelligence officer, Ian Bloor and Sandy Mac sat opposite Angie. Garry turned to Gemma. ‘Gemma here also made a video recording of what the offender had done to her clothes and that has proved most helpful,’ he said. ‘It was her action that got us the first DNA sample.’ He looked around. ‘We need to pull in anyone and anything that can help us with this fellow.’ Even me, Gemma thought.

Tacked onto the whiteboard behind him, the FACE printout stared out over the table. Some of the eyes around the table were checking Gemma, while others peered at the FACE image of the man Bo Bayliss had described. ‘Right,’ said Dr Copeland, remembering to defer to Angie who was in charge. ‘Over to you, Angie.’

‘Take a good look at that face,’ she said. ‘And remember to keep in mind that just because it
looks
like a photograph, it’s not. There probably isn’t anyone in the world that looks exactly like this. We’ve created this picture. So don’t lock on to that face. It’s just to give you an idea. I wonder sometimes if the old Penri’s weren’t better, because they gave you the idea but not a perfected fixed image like this.’ She paused. ‘Anyway, that’s by the way. The other thing I want to draw to your attention is that there’s been a distinct change in the MO as you can see from these photographs. I know most of you have been to the crime scenes. But looking at these pictures is helpful for revision. I’ve asked Garry to talk to us this morning so that he can brief us on anything he thinks is important from the psychological point of view.’ She nodded at Dr Copeland, who took over. His sweaty forehead shone in the fluorescent lights as he opened a notebook in front of him and glanced down at the handwritten points.

‘I’ve just come from the morgue,’ he said. ‘The initial examination suggests that the same knife’s been used as was used to kill the woman at Maroubra.’ He tossed a close-up photograph of the knife wounds onto the table. ‘And the attack on the clothing. Of course that won’t be confirmed until all the tests and measurements are in from the analysts.’ He looked around the table and nodded to Gemma. ‘We’re naturally going through Bianca’s relatives and friends—and Marcia Harding’s, too. Just in case there’s anything helpful there. This image behind me here .
 
.
 
.’ he indicated the FACE printout, ‘might well be the man we’re looking for.’

Angie briefly outlined Bo Bayliss’s story of the man with the knife, then showed them the computer image of a wicked-looking knife. ‘This is the sort of knife we’re looking for,’ she said. ‘Once we’ve got the exact size of the blade and the serrations from the PM doctor, I’ll get copies out to all of you. And to the media section. There’s a distinctive curve to the tip of the blade.’

Dr Copeland pointed to it with a bitten fingernail. ‘We’re not telling the media this, and the doc only just told me, but that hooked blade actually drew sections of the viscera back out with it through the skin.’ There were no reactions from the group; such horrific detail was an everyday affair here. ‘So that makes it a bit different from the usual run of the mill weapons. And it gives us that something extra.’ Angie and Gemma looked at each other. ‘We’ve got classic organised and disorganised aspects to this case together here,’ he continued. ‘For those of you who still don’t know what that means .
 
.
 
.’ He pushed over a pile of collated booklets. Angie slid one over towards herself and Gemma. ‘A Psychological Assessment of Crime—Profiling’ was printed in large letters across the top above the New South Wales Police insignia. Gemma glanced over while Angie flicked through the pages. Others passed copies around the table.

‘The bottom line of profiling is this,’ said Garry. ‘A crime—like any other activity—quite naturally reflects the personality of the offender. If a person in their everyday life tends to be organised, any crime he commits will also tend to be like that. This fellow,’ he pointed to the stills from the crime scene at Maroubra, ‘is not organised. He climbs through a window that’s left open. He hangs around waiting for opportunity to knock. He goes into a motel room because the door isn’t properly closed.’ He stared hard at Gemma as he spoke. ‘There’s no reason to assume that he was going to do anything different at Maroubra than he did at the Tusculum Hotel. But something happened. He was taken off guard when the woman went to investigate the noise. That event changed his MO. In one night he changes from pervert to murderer.’ Garry looked around the group. Some were listening to him, others were hunched over the booklets, reading. ‘That first murder wasn’t planned. He killed because he was interrupted.’

‘But he’s organised in the sense that he carries his own knife around with him,’ said Gemma. ‘He doesn’t just grab one from the crime scene.’

‘That’s true,’ said Garry. ‘He’s also organised in the way he cases his area, looking for a chance. He doesn’t just randomly hit out. He’s always looking, always hoping he’ll find some chink he can slip through. He probably lives local to the crime scene areas.’

So he organises his own personal necessities, Gemma thought, but waits for a random opportunity to use them. He doesn’t plan the crime; just always goes prepared. Gemma thought of her own work, of Spinner and Noel cruising the streets, following vehicles, waiting for the right moment to take a still photograph or operate the hidden video camera as their unsuspecting quarry went about his business. We’re all watchers, Spinner once said. We’re all voyeurs. Waiting for the right moment to strike. The thought made her hair follicles prick.

‘So what you’re saying,’ said Angie, ‘is that he has organised and disorganised traits.’ She paused. ‘Sounds like me.’ Laughter broke the tension in the room.

‘It certainly does, ma’am,’ said Bruno, and there was no avoiding the hostility in his tone.

‘Up until the Bianca Perrault abduction and murder, his traits were consistent,’ Copeland continued, ignoring the undercurrents around the table. ‘Then something happened.’

‘Something’s changed,’ said Gemma. ‘In his life.’

Garry Copeland raised an eyebrow at her, wrinkling his polished forehead. ‘It was a dark day for the New South Wales Police Service when you left us,’ he said. He looked around the group to see if his irony was properly appreciated before he continued. ‘We’ve also had the results back from the Scan expert who looked over the statements we took earlier from the people who knew Bianca. I’m told there are two individuals we should talk to again. That’s being done now.’ His mobile rang and he snatched it up.

‘Copeland speaking,’ he said. He wrinkled his domed forehead even more. ‘Okay. Right. I’ll come down straight away.’ He rang off, closed his notebook and stood up. ‘I’ve got to go. I’ll get copies of the results of the tests back to you all as soon as possible.’

‘Thanks, Garry,’ said Angie. ‘Can we all meet back here tomorrow morning and see how things are going? Say ten o’clock?’ She put the lid on her pen and clipped it into the pocket of her suit coat as she stood up. ‘Everything you get, give to Colin the intelligence officer. So let’s get out there, people, and give him plenty to do.’

As the two women left the room, Gemma turned to Angie. ‘Can you meet me tonight? I’ve got an appointment with Dr Firestone. I’d like you to come with me.’ Angie looked at her watch. ‘Please,’ said Gemma. ‘I hate asking.’

‘As long as it’s not late,’ Angie said. ‘I’ve got a heavy date with Dreamboat.’

At ten past seven there was a knock on the front door. Kit walked through the house, switched on the front room light and opened the door. Gerald walked in and looked around. Kit studied him closely, looking for the effects of Alexander’s work on her ex-husband’s body. There was something different there already, she thought. Gerald was straighter, taller somehow. The familiar collapsed hunch of the shoulders and the poked out neck had already subtly changed. His dark hair and eyes seemed more alive, his colouring less sallow. If she were seeing him for the first time, instead of through the resentment-coloured lenses of years of misunderstandings and arguments, she conceded, she might even think he was a good-looking man.

‘You look well,’ she said as she let him in, leading him through the house to the kitchen at the back. Halfway down the hall Gerald said to her, ‘I wish I’d started going to Alexander years ago.’ So do I, Kit said to herself, but thought better of saying it out loud.

‘I’ve just put some coffee on to brew. Would you like one?’

He nodded and looked around. ‘This is a nice place, Kit. You’ve really landed on your feet.’ She raised an eyebrow and started getting cups and the sugar bowl out of the cupboard. ‘I’ve got a little place in Newtown. I’m thinking of buying it. But the price they’re asking is ridiculous.’

‘I’ve got your things together,’ she said. ‘The little watercolour and those china fire dogs you always loved. I’ve wrapped them up so they should be all right in that.’ She indicated a box on the floor near the kitchen door stuffed with paper. She poured coffee, and was about to stir in the two teaspoons of sugar Gerald had liked.

‘No, no,’ he said. ‘No sugar these days.’ Then he asked, ‘Can I look outside?’

Kit took him out into the garden and they stood a moment in silence, holding their cups of coffee, listening to the swing of the sea.

‘What a great spot,’ he said again after a while.

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’ve always dreamed of a place like this.’

Suddenly, Gerald was crying; the terrible rasping sounds a man makes because the machinery is so rusty and unused. Kit stood near him, not touching him, not saying anything. She had never known her husband to cry. Her professional mind knew this was a sign of growth; her woman’s heart went out to him.

‘I’m sorry,’ he was saying. ‘I’m sorry I buggered everything up. I’m sorry I hurt you so much.’

Kit waited while he put his coffee cup down, blew his nose, wiped it and put his large handkerchief back in his pocket.

‘I’m sorry too,’ she said. ‘That I didn’t know what to do until it was too late. Neither of us intended to hurt the other.’ She thought of the years she’d wasted trying to make him better, wasting the energy she needed, neglecting her own life, her son, assuming a responsibility that had never been hers, thereby only delaying his eventual collapse into despair and his final search for a therapy that would work for him.

‘We only have one soul to save,’ she said. ‘That’s something I know. And that is a lifetime’s work.’

‘I should never have married,’ he said, not hearing her. ‘I’m just beginning to realise how much hostility I have in me. Towards women. Towards everyone, really.’

Join the club, she thought. ‘We’re all full of it, Gerald. Somehow, it’s so much easier to hate than to love.’

He was defensive again and eager to be gone. ‘But then,’ he said, ‘we’d never have had Will.’ He looked hard at her. ‘That might have been a better thing all round.’ Kit decided to remain silent. Gerald finished his coffee and there was an awkward silence between them.

On the way out of the house, he turned to her. ‘I think of Will a lot lately. I’m starting to see that my depression had profound effects on him. I’ve been going over the events of my childhood with Alexander and I’m quite astonished at the similarities. There are connections I’m seeing now that I didn’t realise were there at the time.’

‘I’ve asked Gemma to help me contact him,’ Kit said. ‘We both must be thinking along similar lines.’

Gerald’s face became animated. ‘Will you let me know if you find him?’ he asked. ‘I’d love to see him. Just talk to him. Addict or not, he is my son. Our son.’

Kit nodded, biting back a tear.

They said goodbye on the doorstep of the lounge room and Gerald went to kiss her but Kit turned her head slightly so that the kiss landed on her cheek, to the right of her mouth.

‘Would you like to have a coffee with me sometime?’ he asked, lowering his gaze.

‘I’ll ring you,’ she said. ‘I’ve got rather a lot on at the moment.’

‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Goodnight.’ He looked into her eyes a second too long and Kit thought she saw something hostile as he turned and walked away.

After a moment she heard his car start up in the street, and she listened to it fade away as it turned the corner past the ringtail possum print on the road. She recalled the time seven-year-old Will had climbed up into a tree and wouldn’t come down while his father railed and threatened below. Kit had run outside, wondering what the fuss was about. And then a perfect thing had happened as Gerald realised the absurdity of the situation and was suddenly overcome by laughter. The three of them had laughed together and Will’s face had been radiant.