Vodka Doesn't Freeze (28 page)

S
COTTY WAS RIGHT
. There was shitloads of paperwork.

It had been a week since she'd been released from hospital and Jill sat opposite her partner, whose desk was also covered in files. Forensics were still sending in their reports, but the urgency had diminished given that Sebastian was dead and it looked like he'd done all the killing. Finding Mahmoud was certainly a priority. They had him for the kidnapping after Jerome had picked him from several photos, but whether they could implicate him in any of the murders remained to be seen. Regardless, the whole country was on alert for him now.

Jill was supposed to take another week off, but she knew Scotty needed her help and, despite her fatigue, she couldn't handle any more bed rest. Andreessen hadn't seemed to care either way when she'd shown up in her casual clothes that morning.

When they'd finished big-noting themselves about the bust at Hunters Hill, Harris, Jardine and Elvis had managed to get out of all the wrap-up work on the case. Jardine had taken compassionate leave: trying to get his marriage back together, they said. Harris caught another case back at Central and his boss could no longer spare him for the task-force. With them gone, it made sense to move the wind-up work back to Maroubra, but yesterday they'd been told that Elvis was on sick report – hurt on duty.

'What for?' Scotty had asked Inspector Andreessen.

'Back injury. Remember when he fell down those stairs chasing a druggie in Darlinghurst? It's playing up again.' The Inspector dismissed them.

Back at their desks, Scotty stared morosely at the reams of paper on his desk. 'Fat fuck. Hurt on duty, my arse. Gibson reckons he hurt his back after a pub crawl when he fell off the platform at Central station.'

Jill laughed. 'Hope it hurt.'

They worked quietly for a while, but Jill couldn't settle into it. 'Scotty,' she said.

'Mmm.'

'I'm gonna go out for a while.'

'Not you too, Jackson.'

'I want to go and pick up Mercy's files from the hospital. I want to have them all here to see whether she wrote anything in them about Mahmoud or Sebastian.'

'You right to drive?'

'Yeah.'

'You're on my shit list,' he growled. 'No really, that's cool. I'll see you tomorrow then.'

On the way out to Richmond, Jill wondered whether she was holding off closing down this case because it would mean finally ending a huge chapter in her own life. That would mean changing the way she did a lot of things. Was she stalling? She'd had a couple of days in bed to think about her punishing food and exercise regime, her obsessive cleaning, her arm's-length relationships with others. None of her safe-guards felt as relevant any more. She planned to change a lot of things in her life now.

She reasoned that she really did want to see what Dr Merris could tell her in death that she had been unable to share in life. She felt she owed Mercy something. It was really Mercy who had saved Jerome. It was Mercy's actions that had forced Jill to finally confront Sebastian and end the years of fear.

She clicked the radio on in the car and watched the sunlight outside painting the trees red and gold.

'Carole Dean's off today,' the CEO of the hospital, Frank Black, told Jill as she waited in his office for someone to accompany her to Mercy's rooms.

They sat in awkward silence until Black's phone rang and, relieved, he dived upon it.

One of the nursing staff poked her head around the door, and smiled. Jill had met Kim once before when she'd come to visit Dr Merris. They walked together through the hospital towards Mercy's rooms.

'People here are pretty shook up about Mercy's death,' said Kim. 'Not just her patients either. The staff liked her, too. She used to be great. But she just went right off towards the end.'

Jill walked and listened. They left the plush foyer of the main part of the hospital and moved into a more sterile section of the building. The private psychiatric hospital had previously also offered medical-surgical procedures, but the cost of maintaining the equipment had rendered that part of the business unfeasible, given that psychiatric beds could pull in as much money for much less outlay.

'You see it a fair bit in the mental health field, but no-one wants to be told they're burning out,' Kim continued. 'I tried to talk to her, but she was just unreachable, you know?'

'Yeah. I do. I'm hoping that her files might tell me some more about what happened to her. There could also be some information that helps us with the charges against the men we caught at the house where she died.'

'Let me know if I can help. Sick bastards.'

Their footsteps echoed on the cold blue linoleum-tiled floors. Mercy's rooms lay underneath this disused part of the hospital. She had told the other staff she liked the silence, and if her patients were particularly distressed during sessions, they did not disturb anyone else. The lighting was kept to a minimum here, to save costs. Virtually new desks sat empty. Signs seemed brand new. They passed examination rooms where shiny, expensive-looking machines sat in shadows, unused.

They clattered down two bare sets of stairs. The lifts here had also been decommissioned. When Jill had been out here for sessions with Mercy, she'd parked in a bottom level carpark closer to the doctor's rooms, and had entered through a back entry Mercy had arranged to have opened for her. That way, most patients didn't have to make this gloomy trip.

They arrived at last, and Kim unlocked the big door in the shadowy corridor.

'Jill, just call if you want to ask any questions, or can't find something you need. All the numbers are programmed into the phones. Mercy's files are in the storeroom over there. These are the keys. This one opens her desk. Good luck with it.'

Jill thanked her and entered the outer office as Kim's footsteps receded down the empty hallway.

Dr Merris had a self-contained suite of four rooms – a comfortable waiting area, a storeroom where the files were kept, a small kitchen, and her spacious therapy room and office. Jill walked into the storeroom first. Six white, four-drawer locked cabinets held Mercy's personal patient files. When she saw inpatients, Jill knew that Mercy also used to make notations in files held in the unit upstairs, however these were often just perfunctory notes, kept devoid of many details because they could be subpoenaed for court at any time.

Jill walked back into Mercy's main office and thought about the last time she'd seen her there, so flustered and anxious. Why couldn't you have asked me for help? she thought.

The afternoon came quickly to this part of the hospital, and Jill pensively watched a couple of finches playing in the last of the light in the courtyard outside the doors.

'We did some good work in here.'

Jill cried out. The man in the doorway put his palms forward, apologetically. The rooms beyond him had fallen into darkness.

'I'm so sorry. I thought you might have heard me walk in. I'm Dr Noah Griffen. My rooms are just down the hall.' He held out his hand.

'Sorry. Jumpy lately.' Jill felt a little embarrassed. 'Sergeant Jillian Jackson.' She shook his hand. He smiled. He was very good looking.

'I was Dr Merris' clinical supervisor. I'm afraid it will take me a good while to get over all of this.'

Jill nodded. 'I'm sorry. There must be a lot of sadness at the hospital at the moment.'

'Indeed. Are you here to take her files?' He looked around the room.

She nodded. 'There could be evidence in some of them related to the ongoing investigations.'

'I see.'

Jill knew she had sounded formal, and tried to explain a little better.

'I also thought that maybe I could understand why she behaved the way that she did towards the end.' She trailed off. There was only so much she could say while the investigation was still open.

'I tried to get her to slow down, you know,' Dr Griffen walked a little further into the room. 'She just wouldn't stop. I mean, we both knew our work was very important, but one can't keep helping others when one is not caring for oneself.'

'Did you work together a lot?'

'Very closely, yes.'

'Did she mention her cases to you?'

'Why yes. In fact, that was the nature of our work together. Mercy would bring her cases to me for supervision, and we would discuss them, her progress, how she felt towards the patient.'

'Did it seem to you, Dr Griffen, that she had become fixated on any cases in particular, or that she had developed a fascination with the offenders who had victimised her clients?'

The light in the office was fading more with each passing moment. They stood in the gloom, the room full of shadows. Jill suddenly wondered how she had first thought Dr Griffen handsome; in this light he seemed reptilian. She moved towards the door to hit the light switch.

'Have you ever thought, Sergeant Jackson, that it might be preferable to not bring some of your suspects in? To just ensure they had an accident of some description, saving everybody the trouble of a trial, all the expense of keeping them incarcerated, all the heartache they would cause when they re-offended?'

Jill wrinkled an eyebrow in annoyance. Not just because his question was a little close to the bone, given recent happenings, but because he'd shifted slightly to the right, blocking the light switch.

'It's getting a little dark in here,' she said.

'Mercy and I had worked together for many years, Sergeant Jackson, before she came to share the same level of hatred I have for paedophilia.'

Jill noticed his body also blocked the door.

'Did you discuss the offenders at any length?' she asked.

'Oh, indeed. Many of our discussions took place in here. In fact, I'd prefer that you didn't take Mercy's files today, for that reason. There are many patients we shared, and revealing all our secrets could be detrimental for everyone. Do you see?'

A snare drum started in Jill's brain. This man stood too close.

'Yes, I understand, Dr Griffen. I hadn't thought of it from that angle. If there are some of your patients involved, we shouldn't compromise confidentiality.' She moved to indicate to him that she was leaving.

'The problem, Sergeant Jackson,' he said, moving still closer, 'is that you
have
thought of it from every angle. When you were speaking to me just then, your eyes moved to the left – you were creating your response. You should never try to kid a kidder. Isn't that what they say?'

'I'm not sure exactly what you're talking about, Dr Griffen, but it's pretty bloody dark in here, and I would like to leave. Are my eyes looking in the right direction when I say that?' Jill spoke in her cop voice, no sign of the trembling she felt inside. She suddenly felt very aware that she could not see both of his hands.

'But I'd like you to stay,' his voice was low and menacing now. 'Won't you have a seat?'

Jill stayed standing, eyes on the door over his shoulder. Could she make it around him?

As though he sensed her thoughts, Griffen moved his hand from behind his back. He had a claw hammer. He held it casually, but it was balanced. He seemed well-practised, confident.

'What is this?' Jill tried to sound irritated, to keep the fear from her voice.

'You haven't guessed yet? I'm surprised at you. Aren't you a detective, Sergeant Jackson?'

'Yeah, okay,' Jill wanted to stall for time, and now she also wanted to know. 'I'm guessing that Mercy brought the names of these offenders to you, told you she'd decided to follow them, try to catch them in a crime, report them. Basically, it sounds like she wanted to do my job.'