Frantic (9 page)

Mick peered in. ‘Handbag’s gone though.’

‘Looks like it.’

‘There’s your caller then. No wonder they didn’t want to hang around and show us where she is. Lowlife.’

The bracelet and rings were probably too tight to get off quickly. Sophie felt protective towards the girl, sorry that she was dead and that someone had robbed her as she’d lain there. ‘I guess we should be grateful they took the time to call at all.’ She flicked the torch off to give the girl some peace.

‘I bet the cops will be ages.’ Mick leaned an elbow on the ambulance bonnet. ‘Wish I had some coffee.’

Sophie rested her folded arms on the bonnet beside him. The clouds were bright with the city’s glow. Somewhere out there somebody was worried about this girl who hadn’t come home. Sophie wondered why she was here. If you were trying the drug for the first time, wouldn’t you be with friends? And even if it wasn’t your first time, why choose this lonely spot?

Bats flew overhead. There was a breeze and she could smell damp earth and leaves. Insects flew at the spotlights directed at the sculpture and the small fountain. Despite their glow it was dark under the shrubbery.

‘Hey,’ she said. ‘How did she see to inject herself? It’s pitch-black in that shrub.’

‘Maybe she did it in the daylight.’

‘She’s not that cold.’

Mick looked again towards the body. ‘Hm.’ He took the torch and moved closer.

‘Don’t. It could be a crime scene.’

He squatted and shone the torch about. The light glinted off something in the undergrowth.

‘Don’t touch it.’

‘I’m not touching it,’ he said. ‘It’s one of those keyrings with a torch built in.’ He stood up again. ‘Hold that in your mouth, angle down at your arm, and voila.’

Sophie didn’t like to think about it.

‘Wow. This is what I call service,’ Mick said.

Sophie turned to see two police cars crossing the dark lawns, their beacons going. ‘Why two? And why the lights?’

Mick’s mobile rang. ‘Mick Schultz,’ he answered. ‘Yes… God, really? Are you sure?… Of course. Yes, they’re here now. Okay, yes.’ He hung up.

Sophie’s stomach lurched at the look on his face. ‘What is it?’

Mick took a moment to clip his phone on his belt. The police cars drew closer. Their lights threw alternating red and blue beams across Mick’s pale face.

‘Mick?’ Sophie said.

‘You should prepare yourself.’

She thought she’d never heard such a stupid statement from him. ‘What are you–’

‘It’s Chris. He’s been shot.’

‘That’s not funny.’

‘Sophie, I wish I was joking.’

The police cars pulled up beside them. The whole world was now blue and red. Sophie stared at Mick then heard the car doors open. ‘Mrs Phillips?’

She turned to face them. The looks on their faces told her it was true. Her mind teemed with questions – where, how, why – but two stood out. ‘Is Chris alive? Is Lachlan okay?’

A sergeant came closer. It was Hugh Green from Wynyard. He took her hand. His palm was clammy. ‘Chris is alive. He’s in Royal North Shore.’

She waited but he didn’t say any more. ‘Is he okay? Is he conscious?’

Hugh’s gaze was steady but he hesitated before lowering and softening his voice. ‘He was shot in the head.’

Sophie couldn’t breathe. ‘Is – is Lachlan hurt?’

His hand tightened on hers. ‘We can’t find him.’

‘No,’ she said.

‘We’re so sorry,’ he said, a crack in his voice.

‘No,’ she said again.

Another officer came forward. ‘We’ll take you to see Chris.’

‘Where did it happen?’

‘At your home.’

‘Then take me there,’ she said. ‘I have to find Lachlan.’

‘We’ve searched the house.’

‘I’ll search it again.’ She hurried to the back of the police car. Hugh climbed in the front and the other officer got in the driver’s seat. The crew from the second car stood with Mick, who looked stricken. Behind him was the shrub where the dead girl lay. Sophie had no room for pity now, only the tight grip of her own fear. ‘What happened?’

‘We don’t know.’ The police radio crackled and Hugh turned it down. ‘Your neighbour found Chris lying in the doorway. Paramedics came and took him. Everybody searched – we’re still searching – but so far there’s no sign of Lachlan.’

The officer at the wheel turned on the lights and siren as they came out of Hyde Park over the kerb opposite Market Street and pushed into traffic on Elizabeth Street.

‘Didn’t anyone hear it?’

‘Nobody we’ve talked to.’

The driver ignored the no-right-turn sign at Park Street and raced down onto Druitt. The beacons flashed off the shopfronts.

Sophie felt along her uniform belt for her phone and dialled a number. ‘Gloria, is Lachlan with you?’

‘No, he isn’t,’ she said. ‘Why–’

‘Something bad’s happened. You’d better come over.’

Gloria started to say something but Sophie hung up on her. She needed to think. She sat with her phone in her hands as the car shot across Anzac Bridge and into Rozelle.

This could not be true. She was dreaming, or unconscious in a car crash, and she would wake up from this nightmare soon.

Or if it was true they’d get there and somebody would come running forward with Lachlan howling in their arms.

She pressed trembling into the corner of the seat.

Lachlan could not really be gone.

Wednesday 7 May, 10.59 pm

S
ophie couldn’t get warm, even after Sergeant Hugh Green lent her his leather jacket and turned the car heater up high. She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered inside the creaking leather as the car sped into Gladesville.

At her house a man and a woman waited on the driveway. Sophie was out before the car fully stopped. The woman came forward. ‘Sophie Phillips? I’m Detective Ella Marconi. This is Detective Dennis Orchard.’

Sophie shook the woman’s hand. She was on the short side, about forty, with dark hair and dark eyes. The male detective was taller, older, and skinny. Behind them all the lights were on in her house. ‘Did you find him?’

‘Not yet, I’m sorry.’

Police with torches searched neighbouring gardens and talked to residents on their doorsteps. Sophie drew a long hitching breath. ‘I want to check the house.’

‘Mrs Phillips, we’ve been over the entire place,’ the female detective said. ‘The best thing you can do for now is talk with us. As your house is a crime scene we’ve arranged to use your neighbour’s, and when we’re finished you can go to see Chris.’

Sophie tried to swallow. ‘Have you heard any news about him?’

‘I spoke to the hospital not long ago,’ said the male detective. ‘The doctors are looking after him. As soon as we’re done here we’ll have someone drive you over there.’

Sophie walked with them reluctantly. She fought the urge to get down on the ground and sniff the grass for a trace of Lachlan. She wanted to scream and grunt and moan. She wanted to roar through the shrubs and undergrowth on her hands and knees, scrabbling after her beautiful innocent son.

She squeezed her arms to her chest as they went next door to Fergus Patrick’s house. When Sophie saw the retired cop his face crumpled.

‘I can’t believe I heard the shot and didn’t realise what it was,’ he said as they followed him inside. ‘I was watching TV and I thought the sound was on the show. It wasn’t until I went to the bathroom that I saw light coming from your place, because your front door was open.’ He started to cry. ‘I should know a silenced gun when I hear one. That little pop sound… Sophie, I’m so sorry. If I’d gone straightaway I might have stopped them. I might have saved Lachlan.’

They sat in Fergus’s living room. The smell of warm dust rose from the heater in the corner but the room felt as icy as the air outside. Fergus put a tray of coffee things on the table then went out with his head down.

Sophie took short shallow breaths. She looked at the detectives. These were the people in charge of finding her son. She’d already forgotten their names. The woman put her notebook on the table and flipped the cover open. Sophie examined her face, her direct gaze, and wondered if a case like this was like a code nine for a paramedic – the ultimate bringing of order to chaos. She half expected platitudes like paramedics often used, like she’d used herself, saying to dying patients that they were doing really well, that everything would be okay, because to say otherwise was inviting panic. She looked at the male detective, who dropped his gaze to the coffee cups. ‘Take sugar?’ he said.

Sophie could hear her watch ticking on her wrist. ‘We should be out looking.’ Her voice didn’t sound like her own.

‘We’ll do this as quickly as we can, Mrs Phillips,’ the female detective said.

Sophie fought against the growing terror in her mind. She put her hands by her sides and clutched the frame of the chair.

‘Mrs Phillips, is there any chance that Lachlan might be with a babysitter?’

‘Chris’s mother, Gloria, minds him when we’re both at work.’ Sophie let go of the chair with one hand long enough to wipe her eyes. ‘When Chris has days off he takes Lachlan everywhere he goes.’

‘Where does she live?’

‘She’s got a unit in High Street in Epping. She’s coming over.’

‘Is there anyone else who could have him? Your parents?’

‘Both dead.’

‘Chris’s dad?’

‘He hasn’t been around since Chris was little.’

‘Does Lachlan have any aunts and uncles?’

She shook her head.

‘Friends, neighbours?’

‘None that would just take him.’

‘Maybe Chris asked them, maybe he had something to do, somewhere to go.’

‘No,’ Sophie said flatly. ‘Like I said, they go everywhere together.’

There were cries outside. Sophie started, then sagged back. ‘It’s Gloria.’

The male detective got up. ‘I’ll talk to her.’

The woman leaned forward across her notebook. ‘I’m sorry to have to ask this, but have you or Chris ever had an affair?’

‘No.’ The thing with Angus was far from an affair. ‘No affairs.’

It had occurred to her already that maybe this was a kind of karmic payback for cheating and lying.
Okay, I’ll do anything
, she offered up.
I’ll confess to Chris. I’ll pay with my life. Just bring him back
.

A cup of coffee sat before her. She wrapped her hands around it. The heat from the coffee didn’t spread beyond her palms, and she was afraid to take even a sip because she was sure she’d immediately vomit it up. She tried to relax her clenched jaw but her teeth started to chatter.

‘What time did you leave for work this evening?’

‘At four-thirty,’ Sophie said. ‘I caught the four-forty bus up Victoria Road to West Ryde Station, then the train to Circular Quay.’

‘How was Chris when you left?’

‘We weren’t really speaking. We’d had an argument. He was probably over it ten minutes after I left. He would’ve been playing with Lachlan and they would’ve been happy as clams.’

‘How was he earlier in the day?’

‘He was out for most of it. He got up about six, when Lachlan woke up, and I stayed in bed. I didn’t see him again until the afternoon. He said they went to the zoo,’ Sophie said. ‘That was when we argued. There’s been stuff on his mind but he’ll never say what it is. I think it’s to do with being assaulted a couple of months ago. Though the robberies really bother him too.’

The detective studied her. ‘Why’s that?’

‘He went to the last one and tried to save the guard, but the man died,’ Sophie said. ‘Then the guard’s wife turned up and was screaming and sobbing. And he’s hurt by the stuff the media says, about how the cops are slack because they can’t catch them. That sort of stuff weighs on his mind.’

The detective tapped her pen on the table. ‘You asked him specifically what was wrong and he wouldn’t say?’

Sophie nodded. ‘He’s always saying some things can’t be helped by talking about them.’

The detective made a note.

‘But it’s always about work. See, he wants morale to be good and police to be enthusiastic and the community to respect you all,’ Sophie said. ‘He hates being abused on the street, hates being hated. He’s doing his diploma in Adult Ed because he wants to work in the Academy, where everyone’s still keen and enthusiastic.’

‘So Mr Patrick told me,’ the detective said. ‘Okay. Can you think of anyone with any reason to attack Chris or your family?’

‘Like I said, Chris was bashed a couple of months back, while on duty–’ Sophie started up out of her chair. ‘There was this man, at my work. Oh my God. How could I have forgotten? His name’s Boyd Sawyer. His wife was in labour. We were called to his house but there were complications. The mother and baby both died.’

‘When was this?’

‘Yesterday morning. And then in the afternoon he tracked us down in the ambulance and punched my partner.’ Sophie shivered. ‘He told me I killed his family.’

‘Can you remember his address or his car rego?’

‘He drives a blue BMW, I don’t know the plates. He’s a plastic surgeon,’ Sophie said. ‘They live in Glebe Point Road, right down the end by the water. And yesterday Senior Constable Allan Denning from Wynyard arrested him for DUI.’

Sophie watched the detective go to the door and call her partner over. They had a brief conversation, then he handed her what looked like a sheet of paper in a plastic sleeve before he hurried off.

Sophie heard car engines outside roar to life and tyres squeal away. ‘I keep wondering whether he’s hungry now. Whether he’s warm enough. He’s going through a clingy stage and he’ll really be screaming. They won’t know how to comfort him. He needs us and he won’t understand why we don’t come when he cries.’ Sophie wiped her eyes. The skin around them was sore. ‘He’s so little and so helpless.’

‘Mrs Phillips, I need to show you something.’ The detective slid the plastic sleeve across the table. ‘This note was found with your husband.’

Sophie read: ‘
Keep your mouth shut if you know what’s best
.’

‘Does that mean anything to you?’

‘Not a thing.’ The letters were black and sharp against the white paper. ‘If it’s Sawyer, why would he leave that?’

‘It might not be Sawyer.’

‘Then who?’

‘We don’t know yet.’ The detective took the note back and looked at it herself. ‘We’ll test this for fingerprints, and we can find out the brand of paper and hopefully what kind of computer printer it came from. Crime Scene’s examining the house for evidence too,’ she said. ‘We’ve got a big team on this case, Mrs Phillips. We’ll find him.’

Sophie shivered.

Thursday 8 May, 12.05 am

Sophie stared at Chris’s motionless face. He lay unconscious and on a ventilator in Royal North Shore Hospital’s Intensive Care Unit. The clear plastic tube was tied into his mouth with white cloth tape and his bare chest rose and fell in time with the machine’s hiss and beep. His head was swathed in bandages. He had two black eyes and his nostrils were thick with dried blood.

Gloria held Chris’s left hand to her forehead and muttered through her tears. Sophie gripped his right hand. Her fingers had automatically crept round his wrist to settle on his pulse. The smell of blood and antiseptic was so strong she could taste it. It reminded her of her training weeks spent in theatre, of the man who’d also been shot in the head, the way the surgeons sweated and swore over him. He’d died.

A doctor in surgical scrubs came into the room. ‘I’m Pete Jones.’ He held out his hand to Sophie. His eyes behind his glasses were tired.

Sophie introduced herself and Gloria.

The doctor nodded. ‘Any word on your little boy?’

‘Not yet.’

He squeezed her shoulder silently.

‘How was the surgery?’ Gloria said.

‘It went extremely well. The entry wound was just above the bridge of Chris’s nose but the bullet didn’t penetrate to his brain. It deflected through his sinuses. We were able to remove it without much trouble and so the entire surgery was much shorter than we’d envisioned.’ He hesitated. ‘We found on the CT scan that there’s a contusion to the frontal lobes. Because of this, plus our suspicion that he may have been hypoxic before the paramedics arrived, we’re concerned about neurological damage. We’d like to keep him in an induced coma for the next twenty-four hours, just to give him a chance to rest and begin recovery.’

‘But if he remembers who attacked him, it could help find Lachlan,’ Sophie said.

The doctor pursed his lips. ‘If he remains stable overnight, I’ll consider starting to reduce his sedation.’ He left the room.

Gloria smoothed the blankets over Chris’s legs. ‘I always wanted Chris to be a doctor.’

‘I know.’

‘He’s smart,’ she said, ‘he just didn’t want it enough. But maybe this is a sign. After all, doctors don’t get shot in their own homes.’

‘People get shot all the time, everywhere. No matter who they are,’ Sophie said.

Gloria carried on as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘A doctor earns enough money for his wife to stay home with his children.’

‘Chris loves his job and I love mine,’ Sophie said.

Gloria turned away, inspecting the face of the ventilator. ‘I don’t know if these figures are right.’

‘The staff know what they’re doing.’ Sophie raised Chris’s warm hand to her cheek. She’d hoped maybe now, at a time like this, she and Gloria might actually support each other, but it didn’t look like that was going to happen. A little voice in Sophie’s head suggested maybe Gloria was so anxious over Lachlan she had no choice about how she behaved. A louder voice was having none of it. She had to get out. ‘I think I’ll go.’

Gloria dragged her plastic chair closer to Chris’s bedside. ‘Yes, you go. I’ll keep an eye on things here.’

Sophie bent to her husband’s face. His lips were open around the tube and she caught the stale smell of his dry mouth. His face was pale where it wasn’t bruised. His eyes were slits in the swollen flesh. ‘Wake up and talk to me soon, honey. We have to find our boy.’ She kissed him. ‘Love you.’

In the corridor she took a moment to wash her hands. The water splashed onto the sleeves of Sergeant Green’s leather jacket. The police had let her take the car from the garage when she insisted she drive herself over, but hadn’t allowed her into the house to get any clothes. She liked the jacket – its creaking bulk and leather smell reminded her of Chris. She still couldn’t get warm though.