Heller's Regret (40 page)

I braked too late at the traffic lights at
the end of the road, coming within a couple of centimetres of
crashing into the car in front of us. My vision was so blurred, I
had to concentrate on the white lines in the middle of the road to
ensure I didn’t drive headlong into another vehicle.

You shouldn’t be driving
, I warned
myself.
You’re going to kill everyone
.

I had no choice but to ignore my own warning,
weaving around the road worse than a drunk driver double the limit.
At the next set of lights, I played it safe, this time stopping
three car lengths from the car in front. That safety bubble earned
me angry honks from the motorists behind me who missed catching the
green light because of me.

I drove on aimlessly, not knowing where I was
or remembering the location of the conference centre.

I suppose it was inevitable that I’d
eventually come to the attention of a couple of cops cruising in
their patrol car. When I saw the blue and red flashing lights
behind me and heard the siren, I celebrated. I obediently pulled
the van over to the side of the road, unfortunately hitting the
guardrail, scraping the entire side of the van along it.

I waited patiently for the cops to approach
me, though they took their time about it. Feeling dizzy, I
collapsed back on the seat, closing my eyes and giving in to the
delicious lure of sleep.

A loud tapping at the window roused me to
groggy consciousness again. I turned my head with great effort to
find the muzzles of two guns pointed at me.

“Hands flat on the steering wheel where we
can see them,” shouted one of the cops, loud enough to be distinct
through the glass. I placed my hands on top of the steering wheel,
flat-palmed as instructed.

“Don’t move,” yelled the other. I remained as
still as a statue, though perhaps slowly listing to the right –
something completely out of my control.

“Unlock the door,” shouted the first cop. I
moved my hand an infinitesimal amount.

“Don’t move,” hollered the second cop. I
froze.

“Unlock the door,” instructed the first cop.
I stared at them, confused. I moved my hand again.

“I said, don’t move,” bellowed the second
cop, his face now red.

The first cop held up his hand at him.
“Unlock the door and then put both hands back on the steering
wheel.”

That made more sense, so I did precisely as
he ordered, concentrating really hard and taking an eon to
move.

The second cop yanked the door open, his gun
disturbingly close to my face. “Get out.”

“Seatbelt,” I managed to say, my voice
shaking.

“Slowly,” said the first cop. “Do it slowly
and keep the other hand on the wheel the whole time.”

That suited me as I couldn’t do anything
quickly if I tried. I slowly reached my hand down and unclicked my
seatbelt from its fastener.

The second cop, who I was gathered was rather
a gung-ho kind of man, hauled me from the seat, almost causing me
to fall to my knees. He pushed me roughly forward.

“Both hands on the bonnet, legs apart.”

I suffered the indignity of a pat down
search, all the belongings in my pockets placed on the bonnet in
front of me. It was a boring haul and the second cop could barely
hide his disappointment at not finding a crack pipe or a couple of
rocks of ice. Hell, he would have settled for a solitary cone or
even a badly rolled self-made cigarette. Guess he was having a bad
day and was looking for someone to take it out on.

The first cop rifled through my wallet,
pulling out my driver’s licence. “Name and address?”

Words came out of my mouth, but even I
couldn’t recognise them as resembling English. My lips felt
disconnected to the rest of my body, my tongue three times its
normal size. My brain was too slow forming and transmitting words
to my mouth, so my vocal cords decided to improvise with an
interesting assortment of noises that didn’t come close to any
language recognised on Earth.

“She’s fried,” declared the second cop in
disgust. “Let’s take her down to the station and run the drug
tests.”

“She’s got nothing on her. You saw that. And
besides, we have to search the van. It’s the one reported as
abducting those teens from the convention centre. For all we know
they’re locked in the back.”

“She doesn’t match the description of the
people allegedly involved in the abduction.”

“So? They delivered the girls to her. Maybe
she’s a courier or something.”

“Terrible choice for a courier. Driving
conspicuously bad on a main road and fried out of her brain.”

“Cuff her and make her sit on the side of the
road.”

The second cop was unnecessarily rough with
me, snapping the handcuffs too tight and dragging me by them next
to the guardrail.

“Sit there and cross your ankles,” he said,
shoving me down. “I don’t want to hear a peep from you.”

I protested my rough treatment with a couple
of incomprehensible babbles that embarrassed me.
Hurry up and
clear, brain
, I yelled at myself. If I couldn’t start talking
soon, I’d be spending the night in jail. I leaned my head back
against the guardrail and closed my eyes. My stomach churned
unpleasantly.

A second patrol car pulled up in front of the
van and another two male cops got out.

“This the van they’ve been making a fuss
about?” asked one.

“Yep,” said the first cop. “And this person
was driving. Problem is she’s so wasted she can’t even tell us her
name.” He handed the new cop my driver’s licence. “Matilda
Chalmers. Run a check on her. She’s got a current staff ID as a
security officer for a business called
Heller’s Security and
Surveillance.
That seems to be a uniform she’s wearing. Give
them a ring and see what they can tell us about her.”

“
Heller’s
has a good reputation
amongst the security businesses in the city.”

“Yeah? Well, there’s always a rotten apple in
every barrel, isn’t there? Looks like our madam was doing some
illicit side business as a runner for young abducted girls. She’ll
probably be the key to unlocking the whole operation.”

“Holy shit!” called a cop from the rear of
the van and you didn’t need to be a genius to work out what he’d
found.

“Jesus, get them out of there. They’re ready
to faint with the heat.”

“Come on, darling, one big step down. That’s
it. Go and sit over there next to the guardrail. We’ll get you some
water as soon as we can.”

“Call HQ and tell them we’re secured the
abductees. Their parents must be going insane. Some of these girls
look spaced out, so call an ambulance too, will you?”

Good luck with that
, I thought
sarcastically, wondering if one had turned up at the conference
centre yet.

Feeling unwell, and because I wasn’t in
enough disgrace as it was, I vomited all over myself.

“Aw, gross,” said the young cop who’d been
assigned to look after me.

“Water,” I managed to say coherently.

“We haven’t got any. You’ll have to wait
until we get to the station.”

“So thirsty.”

“Too bad. Any water we dig up will be going
to those poor girls you kidnapped.”

“Didn’t. The guy . . .” My voice petered out
weakly and I toppled over onto my side, unable to right myself with
my hands cuffed behind me.

“Leave her, but make sure she doesn’t choke
on her own spew. God, people like her make me sick. You got any
daughters?”

“Nah, not even married yet.”

The older cop shook his grizzled head. “Scum
like her do your head in. Forever worrying your daughter’s going to
be okay out there in a world with predators like her trying to bite
them.”

“No . . .” I tried again to defend myself
before giving up. I resented being lumped in with someone like
Malefic.

I fell asleep with the rough bitumen as a
pillow, imprinting dents in one side of my face for hours
afterwards. When I managed to prise open my eyes, unfortunately
nothing had changed and my situation hadn’t improved.

One of the cops hauled me upright on to legs
unwilling to cooperate. I was half marched, half dragged back to
the first patrol car and shoved into the back seat. The second cop
on the scene did up my seatbelt.

“You smell revolting,” he commented, screwing
up his nose. I felt the only response to that was to maintain a
dignified silence – although that was difficult to achieve wearing
handcuffs, with dents on my face and covered in my own vomit.

I felt a bit more lucid by the time we drove
off, but the cops seemed to have prejudged me, not interested in
anything I attempted to tell them.

At the watch house, I kept quiet through the
check in, talking only when I had to. The whole process of being
assigned a magistrates court hearing date for tomorrow afternoon
and being shown to a holding cell was painfully humiliating. The
police were rushed off their feet, busily processing people in and
out, but not sending many to the holding cells. I had one to
myself. I fell on the bed and faced the solid reinforced cement
wall, feeling majorly sorry for myself. Nobody came near me.

My phone, as well as all personal items had
been taken away from me, and my bootlaces, socks and belt were
removed on entry.

I fell asleep again, not sure of the time
when I woke or how long I’d been out. I didn’t want to front a
magistrate in the state I was in, with a dirty, soiled uniform,
messy hair, unbathed and my teeth unbrushed. Nobody was going to
make a good impression in those circumstances.

An officer rattled my door. “Visitors for
you, Chalmers.”

I won’t deny it – when Corby and Clive
appeared at the door to my cell I started crying, so happy to see
them, though embarrassed by my appearance. The officer led me to an
interview room, where he stood outside watching through the glass
panel.

I sat on one side of the desk, Clive and
Corby on the other.

“Tilly, you look disgusting,” Corby wrinkled
his nose. “What happened?”

My speech had improved and my clarity had
returned in the time I’d slept. “Malefic.”

“Malefic?” asked Corby. Clive sat back, his
grey eyes steady on me. “Is that the magician guy?”

“Not a magician. I don’t really know what he
is. I’m so thirsty. Do you think I could have some water? I think
Malefic drugged me.”

Corby stood up and opened the door, speaking
quietly to the officer. A bottle of warm water soon arrived. Corby
opened it for me. I drank half without a breath.

“Thank you. I don’t know why I’m here. I
didn’t do anything wrong.”

He patted my hand. “Has anyone interviewed
you yet?”

“No.”

He rose again and spoke to the officer for a
few minutes.

“They’re having a very busy day,” Corby
informed us afterwards. “There aren’t any detective teams available
at the moment.”

I put my head in my hands, wishing I could
wake up and find myself safely in my bed, all this just a terrible
nightmare.

“It’ll be okay, Tilly. We know you’ve done
nothing wrong,” soothed Clive in an unfamiliar, but not unwelcome,
tone.

“Thank you,” I said. “If only the police had
listened to me, I might have been able to explain.”

“Well, I’m listening,” Corby assured, pulling
a legal pad out of his briefcase. “Tell me the whole story.”

Half an hour later, after Corby had patiently
extracted my version of the events from me, one of the desk
officers came into the room.

“Your client is free to go,” she told Corby.
“She won’t be charged with anything.”

“What? Just like that? Can we at least have
an explanation?”

“Several of the girls, now well enough to be
interviewed, have basically told us the same story. We also spoke
to your client’s work partner, who was able to show us her text
message sent from inside the van. We have the security camera
footage clearly showing your client following the group of girls
down into the carpark. Also the station received a report from . .
.” She checked her hastily scrawled notes. “. . . someone called
Delia at The Grateful Gourmet who received a strange phone call she
dismissed as a hoax until the news of the girls’ abduction was
broadcast.”

Good old Delia
, I thought, sipping
some more water.

The desk officer kept talking. “This Malefic
man appears to have drugged all the girls with the same substance.
That’s now being tested as it’s not one of the usual drugs of
disempowerment we run across. Unfortunately, none of the girls was
able to give us any description of where they were taken, so we’re
hoping your client will be able to help us with this.”

“My client will now be going home for a
shower, some hydration, and to be checked by her doctor. She may be
available for interviewing tomorrow. Give me the contact details of
the assigned investigating detectives when they’re known and I’ll
contact them directly. I don’t want anyone in the police service to
contact my client. All queries must come through me.”

“We’ll let you know,” she snapped, no longer
able to mask her dislike of pushy lawyers.

At the front desk, Clive collected my
personal belongings, painstakingly checking off each of them
against the list, much to the annoyance of the duty officer and the
hundred other people waiting to be processed.

On the way out, we passed the two cops who’d
initially pulled me over, staring back at them as much as they
stared at me.

“Where are you going?” the second cop
demanded.

“She’s going home where she belongs, a free
woman,” informed Corby.

Clive swept us on our way, but it was
impossible not to hear the muttered, “Lawyers. They can get any
snake off the hook,” from one of the cops.

“It’s not hard when they’re innocent,” Corby
said loudly over his shoulder at them.