Missing (The Cass Lehman Series Book 3) (21 page)

‘I don’t think I need a doctor.’

‘I don’t really care what you think. You’re seeing a doctor. I would never forgive myself if something happened later. Besides, you need to be strong for your mum and gran and you can’t do that if you’re sick. Fix yourself so you can be there for them.’

Phil threw a look in my direction.

‘What?’

‘Hospitals are a bit of a problem for me.’

‘Why? Oh … right.’ The realisation dawned on her. ‘I’ll get them to see you in the maternity ward. No deaths there.’

I managed a half-smile. It was a good idea but I wasn’t sure how she was going to explain my presence, or convince an emergency doctor to visit me in the birthing suites. I also didn’t have the heart to remind her that women and babies still died in childbirth occasionally. That wasn’t something I was keen to experience. And I’d still have to navigate the hospital to see Mum and Gran. I closed my eyes again.

CHAPTER
21

‘Jesus Christ, Dyson, don’t you check your messages?’ Crackers half spat, half yelled the words at Ed the minute he spotted him back in the office.

‘I was just going to see Janice now,’ Ed said. ‘We were on our way back and I thought it could wait fifteen minutes.’ The very act of having to explain himself sent his blood pressure up a few notches.

‘Don’t bother. My office, now!’

Ed looked at Dave and rolled his eyes before turning on his heel and following in Crackers’ wake.

‘Shut the door and sit down,’ Crackers said.

Ed did as he was told, then looked at his boss.

‘There’s been a problem down at Jewel Bay.’

Ed’s annoyance evaporated. ‘What’s happened? Is Cass OK?’ He gripped the arms of his chair so tightly that the plastic on one of them cracked.

‘Sorenson rang me. Steiner is on the scene. It seems Jenson had Cass and her family bailed up in their house. Cass shot him.’

‘Is she all right?’ The words came out strangled.

‘I don’t know.’

Ed’s phone buzzed into life. Crackers nodded at him.

‘Take it.’

With fingers that felt like sausages Ed fumbled for his phone. It was Phil. ‘Is she all right?’ he said.

‘Physically fine, a bit of a bump to the head. Anita’s been shot, but she’s stable.’

‘Gwen?’

‘Not so great, Ed. She’s in a coma.’

‘Oh, no.’

‘Get your butt down here. Cass needs you. She killed Jenson. That’s gonna mess with her head.’

Ed hung up and stared into space. The Cass he knew didn’t shoot people. As far as he knew, she’d never even used a gun before.

‘Dyson? What’s going on?’

Ed’s attention snapped back to the present as he remembered the man in front of him. ‘I need to get down there.’

‘I figured that bit out for myself. Go. You can work the case out of Fairfield if you have to. Is Cass all right?’

Ed tried to ignore the fact that Crackers had talked about the case first and asked about Cass second. His DCI was never going
to win any awards for compassion. ‘Cass is OK, her mother and grandmother aren’t. Jenson is dead.’

‘Thank Christ for that. That’ll save us a lot of fucking around in court and spare a few taxpayer dollars. What was it? Death by copper?’

‘No, Cass shot him.’

‘Well, fuck me! I didn’t think she had it in her.’

‘Me neither,’ Ed said.

Dave refused to let Ed drive himself. They’d argued about it, but Ed was more interested in getting on the road than wasting time.

‘If you drive in your frame of mind you’ll end up a road statistic,’ Dave said.

‘That’s bullshit.’

‘You’re telling me you’d be concentrating on the road and not speeding to get there faster?’

Ed had given up. He tried ringing Cass the minute they were in the car but her phone went straight through to her voicemail. He shoved his phone back in his pocket and tried to focus on the passing scenery.

‘Unless you want to spend a fortune on dental work you might want to stop grinding your teeth,’ Dave said ten minutes later.

‘I should never have left her by herself when I knew that sick fuck was on the loose,’ Ed said.

‘Everyone thought he was headed for Victoria.’

‘They were wrong.’

‘Sounds to me like Cass is capable of looking after herself.’

Ed shook his head. Cass had saved his arse once, but it had taken a terrible toll. This was going to do the same.

Every second of the ninety-minute trip to Fairfield Hospital dragged. Dave tried to make conversation, but even his good humour failed eventually, and they lapsed into silence. Dave turned on the radio, but turned it off again when the news came on. The shooting in Jewel Bay was the lead story.

They’d barely come to a stop outside the hospital when Ed flew out of the car and made a beeline for Emergency.

‘Cassandra Lehman?’ he barked at the receptionist, flashing his badge.

The woman blinked a few times, startled by his abruptness, and then turned to her computer.

‘She’s in Maternity.’

‘Maternity?’ It was Ed’s turn to look surprised. A rush of confused emotions hit him.

‘Yes, something to do with a phobia about hospitals …’

‘Thank you.’ Ed was off. He followed the signs pointing to Maternity, only noticing halfway there that Dave had caught up.

The nurses on the maternity desk were much less surprised to have an anxious man barking a name at them. They pointed him towards a room down the hall. He covered the final twenty
metres at something approaching the speed of light and barged into the room.

Cass was in bed, a nurse taking her blood pressure. They both looked up at the sudden intrusion.

‘Ed!’ Cass took one look at him and burst into tears.

He crossed the small space between them. The nurse stepped back and he swept Cass into his arms.

‘Shhh, it’s going to be all right,’ he said.

CHAPTER
22

‘Dave tells me it was like something out of a Mills and Boon when you saw Cass,’ Phil said.

He was back at Fairfield Police Station with Phil and Dave. It was past 5pm and the place was practically empty.

‘Fuck off,’ Ed said, but he managed a half-smile.

Phil pulled open the bottom drawer of her filing cabinet and fished around. With a grunt of satisfaction she pulled out a bottle of scotch and some glasses. She poured them each a shot, hesitating over Ed’s glass until he gave her the nod. Alcohol had been a big problem for him after his wife had gone missing. It had started off as a crutch and turned into the only thing that numbed the pain. He rarely touched a drop these days, but today wasn’t a day to be teetotalling. Now the panic was over, he felt completely spent.

The hospital was keeping Cass overnight for observation. After Ed’s dramatic entrance, the nurse had given them some time together before shooing him out. He’d hunted down the doctor who’d examined Cass and quizzed him at length, but there wasn’t much to report. She had a mild concussion, nothing more.

‘So did they tell you anything about Gwen or Anita?’ Dave asked.

‘No more than they told Phil. I went over to Emergency after seeing Cass. They wouldn’t let me see either of them. The nurses wouldn’t have given me any information at all if I hadn’t waved my badge around and told them I was Cass’ partner. Anita has lost a lot of blood but she’ll be OK. Apart from stitches, they didn’t need to operate on her. The bullet went straight through and missed the important stuff,’ Ed said.

‘Gwen?’ Dave asked.

He shook his head, not trusting himself to speak.

‘It’s touch and go?’ Phil said.

He nodded.

‘How old is she?’ Dave asked.

‘She’d have to be eighty-odd,’ Ed said.

‘I hope to God she makes it. It would be horrible if she died after helping that scum.’

‘What’s the story with him anyway?’

‘Sonya’s got him downstairs. It looks pretty straightforward. Gunshot wound to the chest,’ Phil said.

‘Any idea how close Cass was when she shot him?’ Ed asked.

‘Don’t even go there, man. It was self-defence. He hijacked them, threatened them with a gun and shot her mother. No one’s going to charge Cass with anything.’ Phil fired the words out like bullets. ‘I spoke to Sorenson. She’s got a meeting with someone from the attorney general’s department tomorrow to sort it. Which reminds me, I’ve got notes to write up. What are you doing tonight? Are you staying in town or heading back to Adelaide? We can put you up for the night. It might be a bit cosy though.’

‘Thanks, but we’ll head back tonight. I’ll drive back here early in the morning.’ Ed was grateful for the offer, but the cottage Phil shared with Grace was tiny. It only had two bedrooms, and one was used as Grace’s art studio. The only other option was to stay at the Lehmans’ house. He was sure they wouldn’t mind, but he felt funny about staying there without any of them around. He’d come back in the morning and clean the kitchen up for them before Cass got out of hospital.

‘So I’ll see you tomorrow?’ Phil said.

‘Yep, but we need to fill you in on the dump case before we go,’ Ed said.

‘Can’t it wait?’ Phil said.

‘No, I’d rather debrief now. That way if I’m tied up with Cass and her family tomorrow it won’t matter, and Dave can stay in the city.’

Phil rolled her eyes. ‘All right, if it’ll make you happy. What’s happening with the missing persons you were looking at?’

Dave began filling her in on their morning. When he got to the bit about Mrs Jacobs locking her son under the stairs, Phil asked, ‘Did you charge her?’

‘We wanted to, but he said he went in voluntarily. Pretty fucked up when you consider he was yelling when we arrived and there was a big fucking padlock on the door,’ Dave said.

‘That is fucked up,’ Phil said.

‘That’s not the best bit. The son has form. He murdered his father with a knife.’

‘So you think he’s a contender?’

‘Worth looking at, right?’ Ed said.

‘And what about the one without DNA?’

‘That was another weird situation. A daughter who resented the hell out of having to look after her father, who had dementia. She kept him under lock and key until he figured out where the spare key was and did a runner.’

‘Shit. What’s with the locking people up thing? Any sightings?’

‘None,’ Ed said.

‘Might be worth getting his picture on Crime Stoppers,’ Phil said.

‘Good idea. I’ll get Janice to tee it up tomorrow,’ Dave agreed.

‘I think we should also have a look at the daughter,’ Ed said.

Phil shook her head. ‘A female murderer who dismembers her vics and dumps the remains? Unlikely. Even more unlikely now we have a second vic.’

‘Yeah but she bothered me. She didn’t show any sorrow or regret that her father was missing, maybe dead. I got the
impression the whole thing was an inconvenience. Plus, she’s an orthopaedic surgeon.’ Ed shivered. She’d left him feeling chilled to the bone. How did someone end up like that?

‘And she’d already packed up all his things. Had to go hunting for his toothbrush,’ Dave said.

‘After only a month?’ Phil shook her head. ‘Sounds like she knows he’s not coming back.’

‘Dave reckons he might have died of natural causes and she decided to chop him up rather than pay for a funeral. It’s a bit far-fetched, but it’d explain why Cass didn’t get a reading when she touched the remains. She only gets visions if the person died suddenly or violently,’ Ed said.

‘Jesus, surely no one could be fucked up enough to dismember their own father to avoid paying for a funeral?’ Phil said. ‘And it still doesn’t explain the second set of remains. But give me her details and I’ll get Steve to look into her background. He can get some more info about your knife-wielding guy as well. He’s good at that stuff.’

‘Of course, he is,’ Ed said.

Phil clicked her tongue.

‘What about the missing person with the DNA sample?’

‘He walked out on his rental. The neighbours reported him missing,’ Dave said. ‘Probably not worth following up unless the DNA comes back as a match.’

‘How long?’ Phil asked.

‘I spoke to the lab while Ed was in with Crackers this morning.

This case got priority after the second set of remains turned up.
Both samples were couriered to the lab today. They should be able to give us something tomorrow if the gods are smiling,’ Dave said.