AC05 - Death Mask (33 page)

‘Yeah, tore some muscles. He couldn’t cope with being home and he was worried that he might not play again. Even when he went back on the field, he had a lot of pain and that lasted for months.’

Bethany interjected, ‘Ali gave up her job and moved in to care for him, and is he grateful? Hell no. The
big
man blamed her for everything. Tell her, Ali, tell her how nasty he could get.’

The younger sister’s eyes dulled. ‘I’d cook him food and if it wasn’t what he wanted, he’d tip it in the trash and I’d have to cook something else. He would fly into these rages and I didn’t know what I’d done to upset him. If he’d had more than one drink or painkillers, he would just get out of control.’

It sounded as if Ali was finding excuses for her then boyfriend’s behaviour.

‘Is that when the violence began?’

She slowly nodded, as if ashamed. ‘The first few times he said he didn’t mean to. He would always be so sorry and promise to make it up to me. I still loved him.’

‘Did you see anyone who could have helped you?’

‘I tried talking to his coach about taking some pressure off, but that got him so angry. I heard him come home and slam the door so I hid in the hall closet. He started yelling at me for interfering, looking in rooms and slamming doors, then I heard him open a beer … then another one … I hid in the closet until he fell asleep.’

The kettle whistled and Bethany wiped her hands before pouring three cups of instant black coffee and placing them on the table. She went back for a carton of milk, one spoon and a chipped sugar bowl.

Anya removed the file containing the pictures following the knife incident from her bag.

‘Did the violence get worse before that night?’

‘He was good when he started playing again. Then I saw a picture of him in the papers with another woman, having breakfast at some hotel. They were kissing.’ She touched her mouth with one hand as she spoke. ‘I thought I loved him and he loved me.’ She clutched the cup again. ‘Next time he came around, I told him it was over.’

Bethany sat down next to Anya. ‘I talked her into staying with me. He kept phoning up saying the picture was a set-up and she couldn’t leave him. I thought as long as she was here, she’d be safe.’

Ethan had said infidelity was a cause of domestic violence in some of the players’ relationships. He was wrong. Infidelity wasn’t the cause. Being caught out enraged the unfaithful partner and upset the other one. In this case, only one became violent.

Alison remained silent as Anya took out the photographs from the hospital.

‘It’s time to talk about it,’ the older sister finally said. ‘The good Lord knows we can’t keep going on like this.’

For the first time Anya could see a definite family resemblance in the women’s expressions. One had a fuller face, but the brown eyes were so similar. They both looked like women whose spirit had been broken. Anya could only imagine what they had been through.

Still, Ali remained quiet.

‘I was at work that night at the nursing home. I wasn’t gone more than ten minutes …’ Bethany’s eyes welled with tears, which she dabbed with the back of her hand.

Alison reached across for her sister’s hand. ‘I’ve never told you, but I’m glad you weren’t here that night. He was out of control and there’s nothin’ you could have done. Nothin’ I said could stop him.’ She concentrated on the cup in her other hand. ‘I’ve gone over everything I said and did that night so many
times. I even blamed myself for making him lose his temper. I would have forgiven him but he didn’t even give me a chance.’

Anya knew from the images that what came next was a horrific fight, one the diminutive woman was lucky to have survived.

‘I told him to leave and he did – for a while. Then he knocked on the door and asked if we could talk. He was all calm and gentle, telling me he loved me.’ She shook her head again, as if she’d done wrong. ‘So I let him in.’

Tears fell down Alison’s cheeks, her pain still alarmingly raw.

Anya glanced at the hallway, where the attack had taken place.

‘As soon as I opened the door and turned around he grabbed me by the hair and slammed my head into the wall. It sounded like an explosion, and I saw blood on the paint. I didn’t know it was mine until he turned me around and started punching me in the face.’ Her voice remained calm. ‘I cried and begged him to stop, but he kept telling me he’d teach me never to leave him. He was gonna make sure no man ever looked at me again. That’s when he went to the kitchen and got the knife.’

Bethany almost apologised, her voice husky. ‘I used to keep it in the drawer. He would have seen it there when he came for dinner.’

Ali continued, matter of factly, ‘He raped me. When he was done, he said no one else would want me without eyes or lips. He reckoned that would make me want to kill myself, he didn’t even need to do it for me. I tried to fight, I really did, but he was too strong.’

Anya felt her stomach clench. No matter how many stories of violence she heard, the depravity of a man who claimed to love his partner, yet committed such atrocities, still horrified her. The incisions on the lids were anything but random. Liam McKenzie had tried to cut out Alison’s eyes.

It made perfect sense that she hid the knife in a different place each day.

‘After he cut my face, he grabbed my wrists and cut them too.’

Even in a rage, he had had the capacity to think clearly enough to make it look as if Alison had attempted to kill herself. This was a calculated act that had taken place metres from where they were sitting. Being in the same house had to be a constant reminder.

Bethany thumped the table. ‘Then he called 911 and said Ali had tried to kill herself. Then he called me.’ Bethany stood and moved to the kitchen bench, her back to them. ‘When the paramedics arrived, he acted like the concerned boyfriend, and told me Ali needed help. She’d tried to kill herself and he wrestled the knife from her. That’s how he explained being covered in her blood.’

‘Have you had any contact with him since?’ Anya asked. ‘If he was so supposedly concerned about you?’

Bethany blew her nose. ‘Oh, that takes the cake. Someone rang here the next day and said they was his lawyer. He said he knew how many medical bills we got and said we could get Ali all the care she needed, and more. I asked what he was talkin’ about and he said Liam wanted to help, even if his presence would upset her. He wanted to pay us $25,000 and sign some piece of paper saying we ain’t never gonna talk to no one about it again.’

‘What did you tell him?’

Bethany’s hands went back on her hips.

‘I told him where he could stick his money. Ali was on a breathing machine in intensive care.’ She turned around and pointed at the corridor. ‘Blood was still on the wall from what he’d done. The next day, I got reporters on the doorstep and people saying we were trying to get money out of McKenzie. The dang lawyer went and told them we wouldn’t take Liam’s generous offer and how it would have got her cared for in a facility designed for people who were dangerous to themselves. Like Ali wasn’t right in the head. They said us turning it down proved we were trying to blackmail him into giving us millions.
Then all the neighbours started believing what they read. That he’d tried to break up with Ali and she’d threatened to hurt herself with a knife. My sister is supposed to have wrestled with him and cut her eyes and lips during the struggle, then her wrists. All them bruises are supposed to be from him restraining a crazy woman. Hell, he even had the judge believing he was some kind of a hero who deserved an award for helping a fellow citizen and protecting the neighbourhood!

‘In this country, money buys anything. Anything but us.’

L
ater, Anya met up with Ethan in his makeshift office on the conference level while he reviewed copies of the hotel’s surveillance. He paused while she filled him in about her meeting with Alison and Bethany.

He listened intently before commenting, ‘McKenzie’s not going to crack and break ranks with the others. He’s too self-assured, and clearly used to manipulating the legal system. My money would be on him making the threats against Darla Pinkus’s daughter and Kirsten Byrne.’

Without phone records tying him to the threats, or a confession, he was never likely to be charged with threatening witnesses.

Anya considered Alldridge the odd one of the group. He hadn’t associated with the others at the seminar and had remained quiet through her remaining sessions. On face value, the only thing they had in common was football.

‘What about Lance Alldridge? Have you spoken to him yet?’

Ethan leant back in his chair. ‘Since that first day, he’s had a lawyer by his side the whole time. Even follows him to the john. Word is, Lance goes out alone at night, supposedly to see a woman, but no one else in the team has seen her yet.’

Alldridge could have been protecting her from the other
players, or was distancing himself from them after Kirsten’s assault. That meant he could be the weak link they were looking for.

‘What do you know about his background?’

‘Not much.’ Ethan picked at a bagel. ‘He flies beneath the radar. Always turns up on time for practice, does every charity obligation, has never been in trouble before.’

‘What about past girlfriends or wives?’

‘He’s had some gorgeous girlfriends but nothing long-term, it seems. I met one, she was a TV anchor, and there was never any rumour about scandal or violence.’

Maybe he was the big friendly giant when he wasn’t taking part in gang-rape. ‘So why would he participate in Kirsten’s assault?’

‘That’s the million-dollar question,’ Ethan replied. ‘He’s eating tonight at a restaurant on West 56th Street. I’ve booked a table for two at the same place, Zeppi’s. It’s close to Carnegie Hall, and a popular spot for celebrity spotting, I’m told.’

‘Is that an invitation?’ she asked, suddenly feeling peckish.

‘If you fancy French food and fine conversation.’

She answered with another question. ‘Meet you downstairs in thirty?’

* * *

Anya quickly freshened up and changed into a midnight-blue dress. Despite the dinner being for work, she was still going out to a fashionable place in New York and wanted to feel feminine. The dress was more fitted than she normally wore but, with a nude-coloured pair of heels, she had to admit to being happy with her appearance. She decided to wear her hair down for a change.

In the lobby, Ethan grinned. ‘You look … well … I mean …’

‘Thank you,’ she said with a smile.

Unlike Lance Alldridge, Ethan and Anya did not want to be seen tonight. They were shown to the table the investigator had requested, out of direct vision from the player’s seat. The maître d’
assured them Lance would face the street. With 6 pm reservations, Alldridge was probably catching a show or movie afterwards.

A woman at the door offered to read Anya her tarot cards. The only way a psychic would gain credibility with her was if she predicted who Lance Alldridge and his friends would assault next. Or successfully locate her missing sister.

Ethan glanced around the room at each corner and the ceiling.

‘You do that everywhere we go,’ Anya said as they were escorted to their table.

‘What?’ He actually sounded self-conscious.

‘First thing you do is look around the entire room. I assume you’re checking for exits.’

He raised both eyebrows. ‘Actually, that is what I do.’

Anya smiled as he pushed her chair in behind her. ‘Must be a man habit.’

He took his own seat. ‘More of a survival tactic, in case of a fire, bomb scare or other reason to evacuate a crowded place. My father was a firefighter.’ Ethan glanced around, this time more slowly. ‘He would have loved this place. He always dreamed of visiting Paris, and now there’s a touch of it in midtown.’

The tin ceilings, wood panelling and mellow lighting gave the place a European feel, completed by the Art Nouveau posters and drawings on the walls. French accordion music played quietly over the speakers. As they perused the menu, tables began to fill.

Anya had to remind herself they were here for work, not pleasure.

‘Is your mother still alive?’

Ethan continued reading. ‘No, she died of breast cancer years ago.’

Getting any personal information from this man was like pulling a tooth.

Ten minutes later, the African-American footballer escorted his lady friend to their table.

Lance Alldridge had good taste. Not only in his sartorial choice of charcoal suit and open-necked shirt, but the woman
with him turned heads. She looked elegant, but not in the Hollywood way. Striking was the term Anya would have chosen. Tall, with auburn hair tumbling below her shoulders. Ethan leant sideways, napkin in hand, to have a better look.

She walked confidently in killer stilettos that showcased perfectly toned calf muscles. No hint of either shyness or attention-seeking. The emerald dress hugged small breasts and an even smaller waist, flattering without exposing much apart from her willowy alabaster arms.

Glancing the arm of a passing drinks waiter, she apologised without any apparent sense of embarrassment. This was a woman with class and self-assurance.

‘She could be looking for media attention, or otherwise trying to boost her profile,’ Ethan suggested. ‘The best and fastest way is to be caught in a romantic clinch with someone more famous.

‘I’ve seen her before,’ Ethan added. ‘Just can’t think where. She’s not your regular groupie.’

Without taking notice of anyone else in the room, Lance pulled out the chair for his date then took his seat, sliding the chair back to accommodate his large form, bumping the diner behind him. A quick apology, shaking of hands and promise of an autograph later, then he turned his attention back to his female companion. The minor commotion had attracted the attention of other patrons and a photographer who had followed them in off the street. Within minutes, Lance had done his public duty, posed for snaps with and without his date, and signed anything from serviettes to a chef’s hat.

It didn’t take long for Anya to see the attraction of Lance’s girlfriend for him. She was animated and had the kind of eyes that glimmered when she spoke. In the background, Piaf sang ‘Je Ne Regrette Rien’.