The Stalk Club (13 page)

 “Anything new on the slugs or cartridges?”

“No, we’ve run all the tests we could.  There’s nothing
else of interest there.  Just find us the gun and we’ll tie up a match for
you.”

“I’m working on it.  I’ll let you know if we find
anything.”   

As he hung up he noticed the red light on his phone.  He
checked his voicemail and listened to the message from his roommate asking him
if he was interested in going out for a card night at one of his mates places. 
As tempting as the invitation sounded, he decided cards would have to wait for
another night.

There were no other phone messages and he reflected that
the positive side of Crighton’s tight control over the information being
released about the case meant that he’d received no calls from journalists, although
he guessed that Marie in the Media unit was having a busy day.  Interest from other
sources however was constant.  News about the case had spread fast and wide through
the Homicide Squad and several of the Detectives who were about the office were
a regular source of interruption to his work.  Some offered Nelson their
assistance on the case and others offered opinions on how Nelson should proceed
with the case without knowing the full scope of the evidence that he was tightly
guarding.  Nelson politely accepted the advice while at the same time tried to
give the realistic impression that he was very busy.  Inspector VanMerle was
the most persistent visitor and hung around Nelson’s desk like a bad smell and
the pungent green tea that he habitually drank during work hours certainly did
emit a bad smell.  Nelson gave him a brief update on the case and thereafter
tried to limit his side of the conversation to one word answers.  Nevertheless,
it was nearly twenty minutes of Nelson’s life that was wasted, never to be
returned, before VanMerle finally got the message and returned to his office to
work on his myriad of monthly reports.  Nelson almost felt sorry for him but
the feeling quickly passed.

After he was satisfied that he was fully up to date with
the paperwork on the case - including the litany of mandatory forms
and reports that seemed to increase in numeracy and complexity each year - he
put in a call to the video technician who had been burdened with the unenviable
job of trolling through the warehouse security footage.  After discovering that
the tech had been at it all day and had only reviewed less than a third of the
video and had found little of interest, Nelson decided to offer him a hand
which was gratefully accepted.

Nelson phoned his roommate and reluctantly declined the
invitation to the cards night.  He turned off his computer, locked his three
drawer cabinet with the files inside and made the trip back into the city to
the Sydney Police Centre.  He spent the next six hours looking for the
proverbial needle in the haystack with the video tech, however, his persistence
was eventually rewarded.  

At one a.m. in the morning the winter rain came down in Sydney in sheets, turning the already dark and moonless night the colour of squid ink. 
Boots quietly splashed through small torrents in the gutters and then moved
quickly into the shadows.  No sounds above the hammer of the rain were made, no
voices could be heard, no careless clink of metal on metal, as six men moved
quietly through the night toward their target.

As the rain beat down, a man’s body moved rhythmically
back and forward, thrusting firmly and deeply into the moaning woman on her
hands and knees before him.  His skin was brown and stretched taut over his
muscled back.  The monochromatic blue tattoo of an octopus on his right shoulder
swayed with his pulsating muscles as if it were alive and swimming in the sea’s
current.

Dressed all in black to mix with the shadows of the night
the six men leapt up the twenty steps to reach their final destination.  Their assault
rifles poised, their balaclavas covering their faces, their hands making quick,
abrupt and meaningful signals to each other as they moved into position.

The woman’s body was soft, white and pliant.  Her moans
came louder as he touched deep inside her.  Her sounds were covered by the
falling rain. 

Excitement was building, the heady rush of adrenalin
coursing through the men’s veins, everyone ready and tense.  They could hear
sounds now from inside and it added to their excitement, their readiness.

He moved faster back and forward and she moved with him,
louder, faster, just a little longer, just a little more, almost there. 

Back and forth, swung the
key
- a twenty kilo
sledge hammer with handles - wielded easily, by the team’s biggest man, a man
with Vikings for ancestors named Lars.  It connected with the door’s cheap
barrel lock and exploded the door frame into a shower of splintered wood.  The
six men poured through the opening in two seconds, guns raised, shouting
verification.

Craig Thoms was watching a Foxtel repeat of Sydney versus
Essendon.  It was hardly entertaining stuff as the Swans had as usual kicked
only a handful of goals until halftime but there was little else on television
at that time of night other than mindless infomercials.  He was still having
trouble sleeping.  As his door disintegrated he jumped a nautical mile off his
couch, his beer spilling over his jeans and shirt.  It was all he could do to
hold on to the contents of his already tight bladder as the masked, black clad
men, rushed into his living room making one hell of an entrance.  He looked at
them in silent surprise, his mouth agape.  Three of them immediately closed in
on him and threw him roughly to the floor.  His faced was pushed hard into the
carpet and all he could see apart from how dirty his carpet looked, was several
pairs of black boots moving quickly through the other rooms.  Knees were none too
gently placed in his right hamstring, left kidney and head.  His wrists and
feet were zipped tightly together with plastic ties.

“Clear!” yelled the members of the Tactical Response
Group who had rapidly searched his apartment.  Their job finished, they exited
as quickly as they had arrived, giving each other high fives, followed up with
prolonged gangsta style handshakes.  Detective Robards thanked them on their
way out, entered the room and yanked the ninety-five kilogram frame of
Craig Thoms to his feet, demonstrating his considerable strength. 

“Take it easy champ.  I don’t want to hurt you, but I
will if I have to.” 

Craig regarded the small blue eyes beneath the hooded
brow that showed several scars from previous battles and believed him.  Robards
propped Craig up against the wall and patted him down roughly, removing his
wallet from his back pocket.  He checked the name on the licence and compared
it to the man who stood before him.

“It’s him.  We got him,” he called over his shoulder to
Constable Bovis who had followed him in.  Robards regarded the man in front of
him anew.

“I’m Detective Senior Constable Robards, are you Craig
John Thoms?”    

“Sure.  That’s me.  What can I do for you Detective?” 
Robards smiled grimly and wondered if he had a smart arse on his hands.

“I have a warrant for your arrest and also to search your
premises.”

“What for?”  It was a genuine question.  Craig wondered
which of his discretions with the law had caught up with him.

“The murder of Emilio Fogliani.”

Robard’s accusation came as a shock to Craig and yet in
some ways it was just confirmation and fulfillment of a growing unease that had
been plaguing him since the night before.  It had kept him awake at night and
had nagged at his consciousness throughout the day.  It was a vague but
persistent feeling that something was wrong, something didn’t make sense, that
his luck had fled from him. 

“So what happens now?” 

“We’re gonna to search your place for evidence.  Constable
Bovis here will read you your rights and then you’ll be transported to the
Parramatta Police Station where you’ll be charged with murder and held until
your bail appearance.” 

Craig’s Westmead apartment fell in the jurisdiction of
the Parramatta Local Area Command and the Parramatta Police Station was only
five minutes walk up Macquarie Street from Headquarters. 

“Once we’ve finished up here my partner and I will come
and formally interview you.  Understand?” 

“Yes.  Do I need a solicitor or something?”

“That’s up to you champ.  The Custody Sergeant who
charges you will fill you in on your options when you get there.”

Robards gave a few quiet instructions to Bovis and watched
with a grin as Craig Thoms was taken away. 

Ten minutes later, Nelson picked his way through the
debris of the smashed front door and pulled down his large golf umbrella.  His noted
with mild annoyance that his pants had still managed to get soaked as he had
made his way through the downpour.

“Sorry I’m late.  I tried to get here as fast as I
could.  Family emergency.  Trust me, you don’t want to know.  Did I miss
anything exciting?”

Robards eyed him curiously.  Nelson had phoned him just
an hour before the prescribed time for the raid and briefly told him that he
would be unavoidably delayed.  He instructed Robards to go ahead with the raid
and had hung up before Robards had a chance to protest.

“Not really.  We got him.  Bovis and Trimboli just left
to take him to the Parramatta station.

“No injuries?”

“Na, the TRG locked it down tight.  It was just him in
the apartment.”

“Good.”  Nelson looked around the small living room,
noticing the faded and torn blue couch, old wooden coffee table and small CRT television. 
“Nice place hey?”

“Yeah.  By the looks of him and his crappy apartment he’s
probably your run of the mill deadbeat loser.”

“Alright.  Let’s get on with the search,” said Nelson.
“How far have you got?”

“Not very.”

Robards showed Nelson through the one bedroom apartment. 
It had outdated seventies décor, the type of which hadn’t yet, and probably never
would, come back into style.  It was cramped and generally untidy.  Two SOCOs
had been waiting in the wings for the apartment to be secured and were now literally
picking their way through Craig Thoms’ dirty laundry.

Nelson’s phone started vibrating in his pocket.

“It’s Superintendent Crighton.  How did the raid go Detective?”

Nelson checked his watch and noted that it was one-twenty
a.m..

“Don’t you ever sleep?” asked Nelson.

“Last time I checked it was my job to know what is
happening in the Homicide Squad Detective.  Now, how did you go?”

Nelson had wanted to keep the news about the arrest of
the suspect quiet until he had a chance to interview him and hear what he had
to say, just in case it somehow turned out to be nothing more than a very
embarrassing mistake.  It had happened before.  Three years previously Nelson had
been involved in a case where the body of a young woman had been unearthed by a
bulldozer that was clearing a proposed construction site.  Nelson had worked
the case with his then mentor, Detective Senior Sergeant Mick Neale, or Mad
Mick Neale as he was referred to by some officers in the Squad.  They had
worked the case night and day and were absolutely certain that all the evidence
pointed to a well known local deviant who had harassed the young woman on a
previous occasion.  When he was finally located, they brought him in for
questioning, full of certainty in their case, only to have it spectacularly fall
apart when it was discovered that when the crime was committed, the suspect was
serving a three month sentence in another state.  They had ignored all other
leads on the case because they were so certain they had their man, but by the
time they realised their error, the case had gone cold and no arrest was ever
made on the case.  The thought of it still stung now.  Nelson sighed and
resigned himself to briefing Crighton. 

“It went well.  The suspect has been taken into custody
and we’ve just begun to search his apartment.”   

“That’s good news Detective.  Well done.”

“Let’s not get too excited yet boss.  It’s early days.”

“Of course.   But I’d like to be kept updated on this.”

“Will do boss.”

For the next two hours, Nelson, Robards and the pair of
SOCOs methodically searched the small apartment.  It was five a.m. when they
finished, by which time Nelson felt exhausted.  He had managed a few hours
sleep earlier in the night, but his body clock knew it had been badly shortchanged. 
Even the usually bullet-proof Robards was beginning to look worn around the
edges.  Dark circles had formed under his eyes and his whole body slumped from exhaustion. 
Nelson decided to go home and freshen up with a cat nap, a shower and some
fresh clothes and he told Robards to do the same.  They would let Craig Thoms stew
in lockup until they were ready to put their questions to him. 

The
rain continued to sheet down as two bodies erupted together in an apex of
pleasure.  Kylie Faulkner let out a banshee-like scream that startled awake several
of Manuel Torres’ more immediate neighbours and he interrupted his own afterglow
to laugh out loud and marvel at his obvious expertise.