Hush Hush Page 2

  Infirmary, 457.

  Cleaning store, 333. No, 334.

  Bernadette Goldman, a short and plump woman with wavy auburn hair, came back into the room, tearing rubber gloves from her fingers. The inmate in the other room had caught a shoe in the face during the chow-hall fight. I’d been escorted to the medical rooms behind her, following a trail of blood that dripped from a cut above her eye. Frida and Mell Briggs had been transported from the prison to a local hospital.

  ‘You can leave us,’ Goldman told the guard. ‘Harry’s a regular here. I’m fine.’ The guard shrugged and left. There were two panic buttons in the room with us, and Goldman wore a sensor on her hip that, if tilted too far, would bring a swarm of guards down upon us. But she and I had spent hours together in this small room. She knew I was no threat.

  ‘What’s this?’ I said. ‘No hello? How are you? How was your morning?’

  ‘Oh, jeez, Harry, I’m sorry.’ She snorted. ‘I guess you’re just in here so often I forget sometimes that you actually leave.’

  She gestured to my bloody clothes, hands and face.

  ‘Who was it this time?’ she said, tilting my head and feeling in my scalp for abrasions or bumps.

  ‘I didn’t see nuthin’,’ I said in my best criminal scumbag voice.

  ‘Seriously, though. You need to cut this bullshit and let them put you in ad seg. You’re going to run out of luck one of these days.’ She started wiping my nose and cheeks of blood like a mother cleaning gunk off a kid’s face. ‘You take the wrong kind of blow and you could be killed. Or you could get permanent brain damage. All it takes is one good hit.’

  ‘Who says I don’t have permanent brain damage already?’ I asked.

  ‘True. You’re definitely crazy, no doubt about that. Maybe I should send you for a psych assessment. That’ll get you into ad seg.’

  As an incarcerated cop, I should have been put into protection or ‘administrative segregation’, a section of the remand centre where inmates likely to be targeted by other prisoners were held for their own safety. Most of the inmates there were women who had killed children, who would be prize targets for beatings. Money and fame could also put a person in ad seg. But I hadn’t been put into protection when I first arrived at Stillwater, probably because of a paperwork bungle, and that had carried over to Johnsonborough. I didn’t argue. I knew that the ad seg ladies were locked up alone twenty-three hours a day in featureless glass cells. Those women were twitchy, wild-eyed creatures deprived of sensory stimuli and hungry for attention. Ad seg was a step above solitary. Solitary was in the bowels of the prison, where the shit and vomit on the walls escaped the eyes of inspectors from the Justice department and prisoner advocates. I’d always submitted to solitary, but whenever the prison had tried to stick me in ad seg I’d had a ‘fainting spell’ and been taken to the medical office.

  Goldman took my face gently in her hands and felt my cheekbones and the bones around my eye sockets with her thumbs. I closed my eyes and let the weight of my head rest in her hands just for an instant – a second or two of trust, safety, relishing the kindness and care of another human being. For a moment she stopped feeling the bones and simply held my face. Confused, I opened my eyes and found her looking at me with an expression I couldn’t read. She let me go.

  ‘If they put me in ad seg I won’t get my jelly snakes,’ I said. I reached for another.

  ‘Cute.’ Goldman smiled. ‘Well, I’ve felt your nose and it doesn’t seem broken this time. I’m worried about this, though.’ She poked me in the swollen flesh beside my nose. ‘I wonder if we should get an X-ray.’

  ‘Which bit are you talking about?’ I felt my face. ‘The zygomatic bone or the maxilla?’

  ‘Goodness.’ Goldman’s red lips spread wide. ‘You’re a doctor now?’

  ‘I know the names of the bones I break the most,’ I said. ‘If I ever have a kid I’m calling it Metacarpal. Regardless of gender.’

  ‘Metacarpal Blue. Sounds like a rapper. I’m talking about both the maxilla and the zygomatic,’ she continued. ‘Any pain in your upper jaw?’

  ‘I really think it’s fine, Goldie. Gimme some ice. I’ll lie down for the rest of the day.’

  ‘If only all my patients were as medically trained as you, Harry.’

  ‘I don’t want to go to the hospital,’ I said. I allowed a small whine to enter my voice. In truth, I wasn’t concerned by how long the trip would take or how boring the wait in Emergency would be. I wanted the prison population to hear that Frida and her friend had been hospitalised, and I hadn’t. Everything in prison is about image.

  ‘You know …’ Goldman said. Her voice was low. ‘I’m willing to help you out here.’

  ‘Oh?’ I glanced at the window to the hall, where two guards were walking past. ‘What’s the plan? You stick one of the guards with a syringe full of fentanyl and I steal his gun, we blast our way out?’

  ‘No threats to the prison staff, Harry, please.’ Goldman rolled her eyes. ‘I have to report those. I’m talking about diagnosing you with a mystery illness and putting you in the infirmary for a week of observation. Unexplained low platelet count. I do it all the time. They have books in the infirmary. There’s a TV.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I told her. ‘But no thanks. I need to walk out of here, head high and eyes bright. You know how it works.’

  She nodded. The guard who had escorted me to the surgery room leaned in the doorway.

  ‘You’ve got a visitor, Blue. Let’s go,’ she said.

  Goldman and I looked at each other.

  ‘It’s not visiting hours,’ the doctor said.

  ‘Yeah,’ the guard said, smirking. ‘But this guy doesn’t need to wait for the schedule.’

  Chapter 6

  I WAS BROUGHT to the door of the interview room, but when I saw who was inside I turned and tried to walk away.

  ‘Nope!’

  ‘Harriet.’ Deputy Police Commissioner Joe Woods stood up from behind the table. ‘I really need to speak to you.’

  ‘I don’t have time for this.’ I struggled with the guard. ‘I have more enjoyable and important things to do than waste my morning sitting here while this idiot gloats at me. I’ve got a ten o’clock appointment to have my eyes scratched out with a fork. Excuse me.’

  I tried to get away but knew it was no use. The guard dragged me into the room by my cuffs and I let her, tired from the morning’s dramatics. I noticed the red light on the camera in the corner of the room was out. My head was throbbing as the guard took my wrist and started chaining me to a purpose-built handle on the tabletop.

  ‘I’m not here to gloat,’ Woods said. ‘And you don’t need to lock her down, officer. She’s fine as she is.’

  ‘What’s the matter with you?’ I said. ‘Are you having short-term memory problems? You called me a dangerous, violent criminal in the press. You’re not worried I’ll leap across the table and bite your face off, Hannibal Lecter style? Because I’d sure like to. I didn’t eat any breakfast.’

  ‘Inmate Blue!’ the guard barked, having finally grown weary of my antics. ‘I’ve just witnessed you threaten a visitor, the Deputy Commissioner of Police no less. I’m going to have to write you up for –’

  ‘Please, please – just leave us.’ Woods put a hand up to settle the guard. ‘I don’t want her cuffed. I don’t want her written up. I don’t want us observed. We’ll be fine. I promise.’

  The guard left in a huff. A coldness came over me. This wasn’t the Woods I knew. The Woods I knew was snide, resentful and underhanded. He had done everything in his power to put me behind bars for taking out Regan Banks, and he had stepped on, betrayed or used the people I loved at every turn to do it. I knew immediately that something was wrong, and thought of my old boss, Chief Trevor Morris. He’d suffered a heart attack on the night that I was arrested for killing Banks.

  ‘What’s happened? Is it Pops? Is he OK?’

  ‘Harry, I’ve come because I have an offer for you,’ Woods said. ‘I wan
t to get you out of here.’

  Chapter 7

  WOODS PUT HIS arms on the table and edged closer, conspiratorial. I noticed for the first time that he had lost weight. His neck was leaner than it had been when I last saw him, and stubble trailed into the collar of his uniform shirt. I sat back in my chair, would have pushed the chair away from the table if it wasn’t bolted to the floor. This man was not my friend. He was a vindictive narcissist with a badge.

  ‘Look, you deserve to be where you are. We both know that.’

  ‘Great start,’ I said.

  ‘You went after Regan Banks, deliberately and with calculation,’ Woods reasoned. ‘In your pursuit of him you committed a multitude of criminal offences, including evading police, breaking and entering, vehicular theft and assaulting multiple officers and civilians. Then you murdered Banks, just as you said you would.’

  ‘Thanks for the trip down memory lane.’

  ‘I have the power to quash all of the subsidiary charges against you.’ He folded his hands on the table between us. ‘I can have the charge of homicide knocked down to manslaughter. With my support, and testimony from Detective Whittacker, I’m confident we could get you diminished responsibility or provocation. You’d get time served, a good behaviour bond maybe. With such a defence, and considering how bad a trial would look for the police department, I believe that if I took this to the Director of Public Prosecutions, well … The DPP is a good friend of mine. We went to university together.’

  I said nothing.

  ‘All this would take is a couple of phone calls from me.’ Woods looked at his watch. ‘You could be out on bail by the end of the day, and could return to your job in six months or less.’

  I stared at Woods. He had practised this speech a few times. It was convincing, tempting. He didn’t need to put the icing on the cake, but he did.

  ‘You look like you’ve been in an altercation.’ He gestured to my face. ‘You could be in a safe bed by tonight. Glass of wine, hot shower, proper meal. How does that sound?’

  ‘It sounds as though you’ve lost your fucking mind,’ I said. ‘Or that you want something from me that I cannot possibly give.’

  ‘You can give me what I want. You’ve proven yourself to be one of the only people who can.’ He drew a deep breath. ‘My daughter, Tonya, is missing,’ he said. ‘So is my granddaughter, Rebel. I haven’t seen either of them in eight days. There’s been no phone contact, no activity on Tonya’s bank accounts and no sightings of the two that have turned out to be credible. The last time I saw them, Tonya was taking her daughter home. They drove away from my house, and I haven’t seen them again. I think that if –’

  ‘Don’t.’ I held a finger up. Woods had begun taking out a photograph from the breast pocket of his shirt. ‘Don’t bring your baby pictures in here and try to manipulate me with them. I’m not doing a deal with the devil because of some cute-ass happy snap of your peachy little girls.’

  He tucked the photograph away and instead lifted a briefcase from the floor, opened it and placed a very thick file on the table.

  ‘You’re not dealing with the devil here,’ Woods said. ‘I’m just a desperate father looking for his child.’

  ‘I don’t get it. What’s wrong with your own detectives? Why isn’t your little pet poodle Nigel Spader on this? Surely he’d have his nose crammed right up your butt crack, wanting to be your hero.’

  ‘Everybody who is available is on this, including Detective Spader,’ Woods said.

  ‘Are Tox and Whitt working on it? Ask them to help you.’

  ‘I approached Detective Barnes already,’ Woods said. ‘It was a mistake. While you’re in here, I believe he and Whittacker will be unwilling to help me. I’m hoping once you’re released, you could bring them on board.’

  ‘Why do you want someone you’ve never liked or agreed with working a case this important to you?’

  ‘Because you’re different, Blue. You know you are. On the Banks case you proved you’re willing to go outside the restrictions of law and procedure to get the job done. And if someone has hurt my family …’

  He rubbed his face hard, biting down on the emotion. I glanced at the camera in the corner of the room.

  ‘So what’s the catch?’ I said.

  ‘There is no catch.’ Woods cleared his throat. ‘You find my family. And if someone has hurt them, you give me my time with that person before they’re surrendered to custody. Your charges will be dropped.’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ I nodded. ‘So if I don’t achieve those things, I’ll wind up right back here.’ I stood. Woods looked up at me. ‘Nice try. But I’m not interested.’

  ‘Why the hell not?’ Woods snapped. His face flushed interesting shades of red and purple.

  ‘Because you said it yourself – I deserve to be here. I’m not some attack dog you can cage as it suits you. Putting me here because I wanted my own personal justice and then trying to release me so you can get yours just shows what a hypocritical, shallow piece of sh–’

  Suddenly the alarm bell in the corner of the room started pealing, a shocking, ear-splitting sound.

  I dropped to the floor and covered my head with my hands.

  Chapter 8

  ‘WHAT IS IT?’ Woods asked, stepping around the table to the test the locked steel door. ‘What do we do?’

  ‘It’s a lockdown. The bell means it’s a level one. Probably another fight or something,’ I said from the floor. The concrete beneath me was cold on my thighs and belly. ‘I’m doing what I’m supposed to do. I don’t know about you. You just sit there, I guess.’

  I could hear guards running in the halls, doors and gates slamming closed. In a room nearby, guards were taking their places. There needed to be at least one guard watching every inmate while the incident, whatever it was, was taken care of. The voices of the guards reached us, muffled by thick walls.

  ‘Get down! Get down! Get down!’

  Woods hit the deck beside me, his hands under his chin.

  ‘I’m sure you don’t have to get down here, Mister Deputy Commissioner.’ I frowned.

  ‘Better safe than sorry,’ he said. ‘We don’t know what this is. All it takes is one panicked guard with a gun.’

  I watched him from beneath the table. It was bizarre to have him lying beside me on the cold, scuff-marked floor in his dazzling uniform. The thought hit me for an instant that, while he was the Grand Poobah of All Arseholes, he was also just a man. In this environment he was vulnerable, unaccustomed to the sounds and sights and activity around him. I tried to remember the first time I’d heard the lockdown alarm go off, the confusion that had swept over me as everyone around me dropped to the floor.

  ‘What time is it?’ I asked.

  Woods looked at his big gold watch. ‘Eleven.’

  ‘Two lockdowns before midday,’ I mused. ‘Weird.’

  ‘What was the first one?’ he asked.

  I pointed to my face.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Must be a full moon or something,’ I said. ‘Chicks in here go crazy when it’s a full moon.’

  I knew he was watching me. I kept my eyes on the concrete before me, examining the little sparkles and chips of rock in the mix.

  ‘This place is awful,’ he said. ‘I know you hate me, but surely you want to get out of here. I’m trying to give you that chance.’

  There was no time to answer. Two guards burst into the room.

  ‘Deputy Commissioner Woods, I need to escort you out of the building, sir. Please come with me.’

  ‘Think about it, Harry,’ Woods said as he got up.

  I put my hands behind my back so I could be cuffed.

  ‘I don’t know if you deserve it,’ I said over my shoulder as they led the big man away.

  Chapter 9

  TOX BARNES PULLED his car into the parking lot of the Oceanside Motel in the south-western Sydney suburb of Punchbowl and sat looking at the area around him for some minutes, smoking and tapping his ash on the windowsill of
his beaten-up Monaro. Smoking a cigarette before going into a possible crime scene was a ritual of sorts. It had saved him once from having half his face blown off by a shotgun. He’d been walking along the side of a warehouse he thought was empty, already reaching for the doorhandle, when a crew of drug runners he’d been looking for casually walked out, their guns by their sides. Tox had been in the shadows and froze as the crew appeared. They hadn’t seen him. Had he forgone the cigarette in the car before he approached, he would have been dead.

  The Oceanside Motel was, in fact, a fifty-minute drive to the nearest ocean – an hour and a half in peak-hour traffic – and the blue wave on its sign was cracked and faded beyond recognition. Two working girls were eyeing him from the door near reception, trying to decide if he was a customer or a pimp here to check on a girl. In the busy street, a homeless man was going from one bin to another, adding cans and bottles to a shopping trolley already half full of junk.

  Woods had put his daughter up in a nice apartment in Rose Bay, an affluent suburb overlooking Sydney Harbour, near where the Deputy Commissioner himself lived. But Tox had done some digging and found out where she really lived. Tonya’s history as a junkie, sometime prostitute and all-round bad girl meant that Rose Bay was too far from her friends, her sources of quick-hit cash loans and boyfriends she could sidle up to for affection or protection. When Tox had visited the Rose Bay address and talked the doorman into letting him view the apartment, he’d found it exactly as he expected it – clean, bare and unlived in. He could see right away she wasn’t staying there. The milk in the refrigerator was off and there was junk mail on the floor inside the door an inch thick. Tox had called around some pimps he knew and it wasn’t long before he was given the address of the Oceanside.

  A few questions with the motel manager, which cost Tox fifty bucks, told him that Tonya had been renting a room sporadically, sometimes paying day by day or month by month as she was flush and then strapped for cash. Loans from Daddy, criminal pursuits or prostitution binges, Tox guessed.