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‘This is it,’ said Bogey. ‘My humble shop.’

After a breakfast of pancakes and syrup, he and Makedde had bought frozen yoghurts and walked with them from Acland Street, St Kilda, to Bogey’s groovy custom furniture shop a couple of blocks away.

Mak felt like she was on holiday. She put her conversation with Andy in the back of her mind for the moment.

‘This is cool. I like it,’ she said.

Bogey’s shop was narrow and deep, with one glass ceiling-to-floor front window, where he had an immaculate handmade table and chair displayed, both in minimalist, modern form, with no right angles. The corners were rounded and smoothed, tapering seamlessly into the legs.

‘That is constructed from just one piece of timber,’ Bogey commented when he noticed her staring at the table.

‘Wow. What is it made out of?’

‘Pine.’

She laughed.

‘I guess I’m used to working with the stuff,’ he joked.

The display area of the shop was clean and uncluttered, but not very large. He walked Mak through a doorway into the back.

‘Are you ready for this? It’s quite a mess.’

‘I think I can handle it,’ she replied.

He pulled a chain that hung from the ceiling and a bare lightbulb flickered on. She could see that it was Bogey’s working space. There were industrial-looking floor lamps pointed this way and that, so that he could adjust them to get adequate light when he was working on the finer details of shaping or sanding. In one corner a broad work table was overflowing with sketches of design ideas and various photos of inspiring pieces of furniture or architecture. Beside the cluttered desk was a tall bookshelf stacked with thick art books.

‘Wow, you have amazing books,’ Mak said, and moved towards them. She ran her fingertips along the spines, reading the titles:
Modern Art, Classic Architecture…

‘Thanks,’ Bogey said proudly. ‘I collect books on art and architecture.’

Mak picked one up.
Australian Artists.

‘My favourite is Jeffrey Smart. He makes the most desolate urban settings compelling. Would you like me to show you?’

He opened the book to one of the middle pages and showed Makedde a series of stunning,
deserted city streetscapes, painted to angular perfection. He stood close to her, and when she looked up at him there was a bolt of chemistry. They both pulled back immediately, awkward with each other.

‘Um, I enjoy architecture, too,’ Mak said, wanting to keep the conversation going. ‘My favourite is Antonio Gaudi. La Sagrada Familia and Parco Guell in Barcelona.’

Mak regarded Gaudi as the Salvador Dali of architecture, with his melting shapes and bright designs. The Sagrada Familia church Gaudi had designed, but not finished before his death in 1926—when he was hit by a tram—looked as if it was made of melting wax.

‘Have you been?’ he asked her.

She nodded.

‘I’m jealous,’ he said.

‘How much does something like this go for, if it’s not too rude to ask?’ Mak said, pointing to the sixties-style armchair Bogey had only finished staining the night before.

‘Well, it’s custom-made and handmade. It’s pretty expensive because it takes so many hours to create. It’s not Ikea or anything.’

‘I can see the craftsmanship,’ Mak said, admiring the piece. ‘You are very precise.’

‘Thank you. I am giving this one a flat red leather seat,’ he said, his open hands touching the air just inches from the drying wood, indicating the position of the leather.

‘I like it. And I like your coffins, too,’ she added.

Along the back wall Bogey had mounted a full-sized casket inlaid with strips of polished oak. It was very impressive. Next to it were a few smaller ones, of the type that the Coffin Cheaters might have commissioned him to make as coffee tables or Eskies. Mak had not seen anything like it before. Even in the average funeral home one was likely to see only one coffin at a time. And she’d never been coffin shopping before.

‘There’s a place here called Dracula’s that commissioned a couple of those. It’s a vampire-themed restaurant.’

Mak raised an eyebrow.

‘The tall one is the only real casket,’ Bogey explained.

‘A casket, not a coffin?’

‘Exactly. It’s a heavier weight, more detailed. The caskets cost the big bucks.’ He stopped. ‘I’m sorry. This is all probably way too morbid for you.’

Makedde smiled. ‘Not at all.’

Bogey walked to his latest piece and gently touched the surface. ‘Still a bit tacky. I’ll just go wash my hands. I’ll be back in a second. Take a look around if you like.’

Mak instead took the opportunity to reach into her purse and check her phone message, which she had thankfully managed to almost forget about in Bogey’s fascinating company. It
was probably a text from Andy, and likely one that she didn’t want to read.

But it wasn’t from Andy.

The text message was from a mobile phone number that she didn’t recognise. Mak opened it and it took a while to load up. It was large file.

A photo of a white and brown blur—what? No, wait…

It wasn’t a photo at all. It was a video. Mak’s eyes narrowed. She pressed OK and it began to play.

The white and brown blur shifted and moved, the poor-quality recording gradually focusing on what looked like a room. She brought the phone closer to her ear and she could hear static and faint voices. The white was a light in the centre of a ceiling, and as the moving image became sharper Mak could make out two men talking, apparently unaware that they were being observed. One man was Caucasian and tall, the other Asian and shorter. The Caucasian one was without a shirt. With the poor quality of the recording there was no way Mak could make out what was being said between them, but their body language gave the impression of an argument, one of the men clearly angry or distraught, the other trying to placate him. The footage panned down to what the men were standing over—no doubt the source of the taller man’s anguish: a young woman lying on a bed, partially clothed.

Mak felt her stomach tighten.

No, it wasn’t a woman—it was a girl of perhaps eleven or twelve years of age. She wasn’t moving. Her eyes were staring as if she was dead. The footage zoomed in close enough to make the face reasonably clear before panning up again and focussing for a few frames on the men’s faces. Then there was a noise, and the image jumped and blurred again, cutting off. It was the end. The entire video was perhaps eight seconds in length.

‘Oh my God,’ Mak said under her breath just as Bogey was returning.

‘What is it? What happened?’

Mak was speechless.

What is this?

‘Mak, what is it?’ he repeated. ‘Are you okay?’

She gripped her phone. ‘Nothing. Excuse me for a minute.’ She got up, shaken, and walked out to the street. Bogey watched her through the glass window of his shop, clearly concerned.

Heart pounding, Mak stood on the street and returned a call to the sender of the strange and horrible video. She gripped the phone nervously as it rang and rang. Finally there was a beep. No voice message. No name.

Amy? Was that from you?

‘Shit.’

Is that Damien Cavanagh? With a dead girl?

If Damien Cavanagh was knowingly using trafficked, underage girls for sex—as Amy had
suggested and this video appeared to show—it would be a very serious, damning and embarrassing fact to uncover publicly. Not to mention a criminal offence. His whole family would be tarred by the sins of the son.

Mak tried the number again.
I know it’s you…come on, pick up.
But there was no answer.

Disappointed, Mak walked back inside. She knew she could hand the video over to the police and they would be able to do something. They might be able to identify the people in the video, and they could run a check on the mobile number to find out who it belonged to.

‘Are you okay?’

‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ Mak lied.

‘Is it about your investigation?’ Bogey asked.

She nodded. ‘I am going to show you something, and I want you to tell me what you see. Tell me if you recognise anyone or anything, okay?’

‘Okay,’ Bogey replied.

She hesitated. Should she show him?

‘And you are sworn to secrecy about this. I need to trust you,’ she said.

She took a deep breath and played him the video. Bogey watched, his brow pinched. When it was over, he looked at Mak with alarm.

‘Where did you get this?’

‘Never mind that. Tell me what you saw.’

‘Well, um,’ he began, struggling. ‘I saw a pretty girl without many clothes on lying on a bed
passed out, and a couple of men talking. There was something a bit familiar about one of them. I think I’ve seen him somewhere before. I saw a bed, a girl, two men and a Whiteley.’

‘A what?’

‘A Whiteley painting on the wall,’ Bogey said.

‘A Whiteley? Show me.’

She replayed the video.

‘There, behind them,’ said Bogey. ‘It’s a Brett Whiteley. Not one of his best-known works, but definitely done by him. I remember this one because the woman is pictured rubbing red lipstick on herself. I think it’s from the eighties.’

Mak raised an eyebrow. ‘You can see all that?’

‘I think so, yes,’ he told her.

She dug around in her purse and pulled out the crinkled news article that Amy had left on the table at Leo’s Spaghetti Bar. ‘What about this? Could this be the man in that video?’ She pointed at Damien, just as Amy had done.

‘Damien Cavanagh, the heir? Let me see again.’

They watched the video once more. Mak was mesmerised. She could hardly think straight. What on earth would make a young man like Damien Cavanagh, with everything going for him, risk so much? It brought to mind the story of the heir to the Max Factor fortune, the young and attractive Andrew Luster, who, despite his wealth and status, chose to drug at least three different women with GHB, a so-called date rape
drug, and videotape himself raping them while they were unconscious. He was currently serving a 124-year sentence in the US for his crimes.

A jail sentence was probably not something Damien Cavanagh would want to live with. So why would a high flier like him get involved in all of that mess? Why would he choose the services of illegal and unregulated sex workers, when legal sex workers—Asian, Caucasian or any ethnicity he liked—were readily available? Was the experience with these women different? Did they allow unprotected sex—extreme sex?

What is his motivation? Would he risk all that just for a feeling of power?

The video finished playing.

Bogey shook his head. ‘Yeah, I think that could be him. Or someone who looks like him. But that is definitely a Whiteley.’

Wow.

The Cavanagh family had status indeed, and like most in their position they would do anything in their power to avoid going from the top of the status food chain to the bottom—social A-list to common criminal.

If that video had come from Amy, then Mak had to get hold of her, and fast.

Luther Hand knelt down and examined the girl on the floor of the delivery van.

Amy Camilleri was attractive.

Luther wasn’t often close to attractive women. Even the ones who were paid to keep men company baulked at the sight of his face and imposing build. Only the roughest, most desperate prostitutes in Mumbai had ever willingly agreed to visit him in all his years living there, especially since the cosmetic surgery to correct the scarring of his face had failed. He struck fear into women, and he could see it in their faces. Luther looked scary; he knew it. This girl had thought so, too. He’d noticed the fear in her eyes when she had seen him, and had quickly looked away.

She felt no fear now.

The target, Miss Camilleri, was on the floor of the rented van, mouth slack, eyes wide open and moving rhythmically from side to side, an involuntary response to the drugs he had administered to her. Beside her, the confused pup
nuzzled against her hand, wanting to be patted. She was unresponsive. He could hear her deep, slow breaths. Luther had jabbed her with an intramuscular dose of the anaesthetic drug ketamine, enough to knock her out for about thirty minutes, relatively unharmed. He could leave her there for a while if he had to. She wasn’t going anywhere.

Luther reached down and closed the target’s softly painted eyelids, his calloused hands seeming oversized next to her smooth features.

Now she looked peaceful.

He returned to the driver’s seat and drove the van several blocks away to an inconspicuous lane lined by high fencing and garbage bins, behind a series of residences; a spot he had chosen for its privacy during his planning. Within minutes he had taken off his cap and changed out of his delivery shirt and into a black T-shirt. He put a baseball cap on his head, and dark sunglasses, and went to the side of the van to take off the adhesive signage, looking both ways as he did so. The signage came off easily with a bit of muscle, and he balled it up and put it in a garbage bin in the lane. He returned to the target and closed the double doors of the van behind him. She still looked like she was sleeping, though beneath her closed eyelids her eyeballs continued to move rapidly, twitching. The pup had wandered back to its basket, where it sat with its head on its paws, staring at the girl.

Luther took a moment to observe her as she lay unconscious on the black rubber sheeting he’d spread out across the floor of the truck. She was wearing small denim shorts and a singlet that said
HUSTLER
on it. His eyes followed her form, the shape of her slim, bare legs; the tiny, straight scar on her left kneecap; the mole on her chest; her breasts that rose and fell with her heavy, drug-induced breathing. Her bleached hair spread out luxuriously from a messy ponytail. One knee lay open at an angle. Between her legs a glimpse of white panties showed under her brief shorts.

Back to work
, Luther told himself.

He took his eyes away from the target to check through her purse. If the contents he needed were inside, he would be able to avoid returning to Mr Moon’s house and disabling the elaborate surveillance equipment to get inside. Luther was adept at electronic surveillance—both enabling and disabling it—but with most systems he would run some small risk of setting off an undetected internal alarm. Furthermore, the pretext of the absence of Mr Moon’s girlfriend would evaporate if it seemed that a professional was involved. It had been better to get her out of the house willingly—that was why Luther had risked letting the target back inside to get her purse. His client wanted that mobile phone, and Luther would much rather the target get it for him than have to go in and get it himself.

He had learned that the hard way on an early job on the Gold Coast that had seen him surprised by a returning spouse while he rummaged hopelessly through the house in search of the item he needed—an item, in hindsight, that he could have talked the target into retrieving for him at an earlier stage. It was best to avoid such unnecessary risks.

Luther had been watching carefully. He knew full well that the target, Miss Camilleri, was alone in Mr Moon’s house. If she had gone back inside and not come out again, he would have gone in and got her.

Good.

The target’s mobile phone was in her purse, as was her wallet, some make-up and a set of keys. The phone was all he had been briefed to collect and bring back. The mission had been a success. He only had one more instruction left to carry out before returning to Sydney.

Luther drove the truck into position in the narrow laneway behind Amy Camilleri’s one-level Richmond home. He parked it just behind her back door, and returned to the van to check on her. The target looked cold, her lips slightly bluish and her skin paler than it had been on the street thirty minutes before. The rubber sheeting was not warm; there was no heating in the truck. She still breathed slowly, eyes darting back and forth beneath the lids.

Luther slipped on a pair of latex gloves with a
loud snap that inadvertently turned Amy’s head in his direction.

The target is coming awake.

Her eyes looked in his direction, unfocused, eyelids heavy. She was slowly becoming conscious, but she would not be able to move quickly for a while. The target would most likely remain quiet. He was confident that he had no need to restrain or gag her. But he did not want her lucid as she was being transferred, or there might be some suspicious struggle.

‘Here, this will keep you warm,’ Luther told her, avoiding her eyes. He picked up a thick blanket from the back and unfolded it. He placed it over her body and she clung to it weakly, still not in full control of her motor functions.

‘Who are you?’ she managed.

Luther didn’t answer. He prepared the syringe and took a rubber band from his case, then knelt beside her. She was shivering.

‘It’s okay,’ he told her, pulling the blanket higher until it rested just under her soft chin. He pulled her left arm out and inspected the veins under her pale flesh. She didn’t flinch or struggle at his prodding. The target was still very sleepy, her body malleable. She would be feeling very numb.

‘Relax,’ he said in her ear, and tied the rubber band tight around her arm, just above the elbow. Luther wasn’t good with words. He didn’t often need conversation, but he did his best to calm
her. The girl was still shivering, despite the blanket.

The vein in the crook of her elbow was beginning to rise, bluish and plump. Once it became visible he wasted no time. In one jab he forced the tip of the needle in, causing her to shift at the feel of the pinprick. She barely flinched. Luther squeezed the end of the syringe until it was dry, the pure heroin flowing into her bloodstream in a lethal, irreversible dose.

‘Ahhhhhooo…’ she moaned, twisting her head. She would be feeling no pain, just a surge of pleasure and adrenaline.

Luther watched her face, gently placing her arm back under the blanket again. Almost immediately her breathing became shallow and harsh; her forehead broke out in a clammy sweat. He stroked her brow and hairline with his gloved hand, gently caressing the skin.

‘It’s okay,’ he said, stroking, stroking. His latex fingertips pushed the light sweat back. ‘It’s okay…’

The target gasped and her leg jumped. Her body was beginning to cramp. Her breathing got worse. The whole time Luther knelt at her side, whispering softly to her and gently caressing her brow, stealing occasional looks at the second hand of his watch.

Thirty seconds…sixty…ninety…

It was over in less than three minutes. When her breathing stopped he checked her pulse with two fingers.

Dead.

The target, Miss Amy Camilleri, twenty-one years of age, had died from a massive heroin overdose. It was a tragedy when drug users, particularly those who were depressed and anxious after the loss of a loved one—a friend, for instance—came across a pure form of heroin and, in their careless state, underestimated its potency. It was dangerous to experiment with a cocktail of drugs, like the anaesthetic ketamine, for instance, which could be acquired on the street by confused young women who wanted to forget the loss of their dear murdered friend for a while. It was particularly sad, and potentially lethal, to inject alone at home with no witnesses. There could be no one to help when they ran into trouble. Even someone’s protective new boyfriend was unlikely to break down the door and find them. It could be days before the neighbours complained about the objectionable and suspicious smell.

When it came time for the autopsy, the cause of death would be straightforward. Under the circumstances, it was unlikely that there would be much of an inquiry.

Luther wrapped the target’s still body in the rubber sheeting, lifted her up over his shoulder and carried her inside her house through the back door, which he unlocked with the keys from her purse. Her home was small; it did not take him long to find the right spot. He placed
her body on the square cream linoleum tiles of her kitchen floor with the syringe in her hand, careful to make a good imprint of her fingertip on it, as per his instructions. He kept the mobile phone but left her keys, the purse and its contents on the kitchen table, laid out casually next to the opened gift card.

AMY
,
I LOVE YOU MORE THAN ANYONE ELSE CAN XOX
said the card.

Luther left the gift basket by the front door and let the puppy roam the kitchen.

He then called The American to give his update.

‘Melbourne has been a success,’ he said, looking down at the target’s body. The puppy had circled the kitchen and now sat near Amy’s face, its head cocked to one side. It whimpered.

‘You have what we need?’ The American asked.

‘Yes,’ Luther assured him. ‘I have it.’

‘Very good.’

Luther left, locking the back door behind him and pulling off his latex gloves as he reached the van. He would be back in Sydney by nightfall to deliver the target’s phone to his client.

And to be briefed on his next assignment.