Blood Ties (26 page)

The prison nurse, a tall, thin man with neatly plaited waist-length brown hair, entered the room behind the doctor. “Tess, haven’t seen you here for a while. Heard you’ve been auditioning as a hood ornament,” he said.

“Ha ha, Lindsey,” I said unappreciatively. “Still as big a smartarse as ever, I see.”

He smirked in response and pulled out my thick file from the cabinet. He clapped his hands together, an anticipatory expression on his face. “Righto Tessie, get your gear off then and let the Doc and me have a squiz at you.”

I glanced around the examination room. There were five men in there with me, all of them watching me avidly. They didn’t see a lot of women out here.

“I want everyone to leave except Dr Fenn. And that means you too, Lindsey. I don’t need a nurse.” They all groaned, except the Sarge, but dutifully turned to leave. “And I’m turning that security camera off as well.” They groaned even louder, their entertainment cruelly snatched from them. I had no doubt that any footage of me in my bra and panties being examined by the doctor would have been circulated widely among the prison officers and probably even the prisoners as well.

I watched carefully while the doctor turned off the security camera, checking myself that it was off before I stripped down to my underthings.

He tutted in disapproval. “Tess, you have bruises all over you.”

“Jake’s female relatives ganged up and kicked the hell out of me yesterday,” I told him.

“Right. And then Dorrie Lebutt hit you with her car today. You’re popular in town, aren’t you?”

I shrugged. “That’s what happens when you try to bring some law and order to a bunch of thugs.”

He quickly examined my bruising and my hip. “Luckily for you it’s just soft tissue damage. It’s bruising already and you’ll be very stiff and sore for weeks, but you were lucky. She could have broken your hip or your leg. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to go through that again.”

I shook my head swiftly – I sure wouldn’t. He was referring to another hit-and-run I’d been involved in about four years ago when I’d been home visiting from the city. I’d ended up with a badly broken leg, but that had been the least traumatic consequence of that accident for me. Of course it had been a Bycraft behind the wheel and I reminded myself with grim satisfaction that he was currently serving some time for it up in the maximum-security jail near the city.

The doctor had continued speaking, unaware that I’d been daydreaming. “– and I hope you’re going to throw her in jail. People can’t get away with doing that to law enforcement officers.” He handed me some strong painkillers.

“We’re going to go and arrest her now. Can you take some photos of me for evidence please?” I indicated the old film-based camera we kept in the patrol car that I’d brought in with me and placed on his desk.

He turned his nose up as he picked it up and examined it unenthusiastically. “Why don’t you just let me use the digital camera we’ve got here? This thing must be a hundred years old,” he complained.

“It probably is that old. But if I let you take photos of me with a digital camera, then I just know that those photos are going to end up in everybody’s email inbox about two minutes after they’re taken, and I’m
not
having photos of me in my underwear circulating around town.”

He grumbled some more but finished off the reel of film. Then he promised to write up his report on my injuries and email it to me also for evidential purposes. I speedily dressed and thanked him before collecting the Sarge from the waiting room and limping off back to the car.

“Hey, don’t let Jake forget he’s back on duty tomorrow,” one of his workmates yelled after us.

“He knows,” I shouted over my shoulder. “He’ll be back tomorrow morning. I want to keep him for one more night though. I have some things I need him to do for me.”

“Things you need him to do
to
you, more likely,” yelled one wit in response, and I smiled cheekily at the hoots and catcalls that comment provoked, winking back at them.
Poor Jake
, I thought cheerfully. He was going to cop it from his workmates tomorrow.

Chapter 13

“What did the doctor say?” asked the Sarge, nosing the patrol car out onto the highway again.

“Exactly what I thought. Lots of bruising and pain, but nothing’s broken. I asked him to take some photos for evidence, but this camera’s so old and he didn’t look very confident taking them. I’m worried they won’t turn out.”

“I have an excellent digital camera. I could take some for you,” he suggested.

I was torn. I did want to have photos for evidence, but I didn’t want the Sarge to see me in my undies.

“Maybe,” I replied, noncommittally. I wasn’t a prude and acknowledged with self-mockery that I’d probably parade around in front of him at the beach in my bikini without thinking twice, but it was my
undies
for heaven’s sake, up close and personal. It was all about the context, I convinced myself. I decided then that I wouldn’t take up his offer, no matter how much goodwill he’d shown in making it.

Back in Little Town, I directed him to the cramped house on Kwila Street that Dorrie shared with her mother Cheryl, her younger sister Kym, and their five young kids. I found it hard to remember sometimes who the mother of each kid was, but I was pretty sure that three of them were Dorrie’s and the other two were Kym’s. The kids all looked the same, with the unmistakable golden features of Bycraft brats.

I checked my utility belt – gun, spray, baton and cuffs all ready for action. For the millionth time I wished I had a taser as well, but there was Buckley’s chance of the good officers of Little Town ever being issued with that expensive and carefully rationed piece of equipment. They only had a handful of them in Big Town to go around and we weren’t even
on
the priority list, let alone close to the top. I took off around the back of the house while the Sarge walked up the front stairs and banged on the door loudly.

“Police!” he called out. At the rear of the house I could hear scuffling inside and panicked voices. The back door was flung open suddenly and Dorrie made a run for it straight into my arms. I clasped her in a bear hug but she was struggling like a demon to escape, kicking out at me wildly. Her mother and sister watched impassively from the back door, not offering to help either of us. Dorrie wasn’t anyone’s favourite daughter or sister.

“Sarge! Around the back!” I yelled in my loudest voice and could hear him pounding up the side.

Dorrie struggled more fiercely and turned to bite me on my inner arm. It hurt.

“I’ve had enough of you today, bitch,” I hissed in her ear and pushed her forward towards the house, up against one of its external walls, flattening her to the wall with my body. I reached around and pulled out my cuffs and slapped them around one of her wrists and after an intense tussle, around the other.

Even then she tried to escape from me, but I had a good grip on the cuffs and she was only hurting herself by struggling against them so much. The Sarge took charge then, telling her why she was being arrested as he marched her towards the car, pushing her ungently into the back seat. She fought and resisted him all the way.

“Get in the back with her so she doesn’t hurt herself,” he ordered me.

“I’m not getting in the back with her,” I refused flatly. Was he out of his mind? Ninety minutes of Dorrie Lebutt trying to bite, punch and scratch me? No thanks! “She tried to kill me today and she just bit me.” I showed him her teeth marks in my arm. “I’m not going anywhere near her.”

Sighing with impatience, he threw me the key and slid in the back with Dorrie. And it was an even longer drive to Big Town than usual, the poor Sarge trying to fend off a wildly angry Dorrie and her teeth, nails and fists.

“For God’s sake!” he shouted, his patience long gone, pushing her back into her place, doing up her seatbelt again. “I’m going to beat you unconscious in a minute if you don’t shut the fuck up and sit there quietly!”

“Police brutality!” she screeched immediately. “I’m going to report you!”

“I didn’t hear anything,” I said, slowing down and indicating right for the turn-off to Big Town. “That’s two against one, Dorrie.” And I smiled at her in the rearview mirror.

“Fuck you, Teresa Fuller! You’re nothing but a toffee-nosed bitch. Leaving us all behind, thinking you’re going to make something of yourself. But look at you. You’re back here in Little Town, living with your useless vegetable of a dad. You’re fucking a Bycraft, just like the rest of us and I bet you were still a virgin when poor Jakey had to break you in. You work in a crappy pointless underpaid job trying to tame a bunch of people who want to kill you. You’ve come so far, haven’t you, Teresa Fuller? You’re no better than the rest of us, but you think that you are,” she spat out.

She managed to push every button I had with that tirade and that was Dorrie’s special talent. She knew how to annoy everybody she ever came in contact with. She had been a disrespectful student, a bitchy friend, a purse-robbing daughter, a boyfriend-stealing sister, a neglectful mother, an unfaithful partner, but by God she was good at finding people’s soft spots. I shot her such a murderous glare in the mirror that the Sarge felt inclined to intervene.

“Keep driving, Senior Constable. Don’t worry about this piece of rubbish in the back,” he said, calmer. “I’m looking after it now.”

I flicked on the lights and siren, planted my foot on the accelerator and sped to Big Town, twenty kilometres over the speed limit, dangerously swerving around slower, more legal, vehicles. There was absolutely no reason on earth to have the lights and siren on; there was no emergency. But I was pissed off big time and it just made me feel better. I accidently met the Sarge’s eyes in the mirror once. I didn’t want to meet them again, his expression was so furious. I knew I was due for a reaming over this, but at least he didn’t reprimand me in front of Dorrie.

When I reached the police station at Big Town, driving around to the back entrance where the watch house was located, I screeched on the brakes, skidding slightly as I parked. I jumped out, slammed my door and opened the back door, roughly pulling Dorrie from the seat, making sure she banged her head hard on the door as she exited.

“Fuck!” she yelled loudly in pain. Two uniforms who were strolling out from the station to their own patrol car, laughing together, turned towards us in surprise. She appealed to them. “You saw that! This slut deliberately banged my head on the door.” They regarded her with disinterest before getting into their car and driving away.

With me clutching one of her arms and the Sarge the other, we frogmarched Dorrie into the booking room of the station’s watch house, where the holding cells were situated. She was processed and put into a cell to await interviewing, screaming all the while. I wouldn’t be conducting the investigation into the matter, having an obvious conflict of interest, but gave my statement to the veteran detective, Gil, who was assigned my case. The Sarge gave his statement and handed over the contact details of the two removalist men who had also witnessed the hit-and-run. I told him how to contact Stacey as well.

That took the remainder of the day and the sun was setting by the time we left the station.

“Don’t ever do that again, Fuller,” the Sarge warned me in a chilly, cutting tone once we were back in the car again. I knew what he was talking about straight away and I supposed I should be grateful that he’d waited until we were alone before tearing strips off me. Not all bosses would be so considerate. Problem was though that I wasn’t feeling particularly grateful at that moment. My hip was hurting and I needed more painkillers.

“She made me angry,” I responded sulkily as we drove out of the carpark. It wasn’t much of a defence – she’d made me angry a million times.

Apparently, he agreed. “That’s no excuse for driving so recklessly. You endangered not just us, but everyone else on the road,” he reprimanded harshly. “The patrol car is not your plaything and you can’t let your personal emotions interfere with your professionalism. That’s basic policing that you should have learnt at the academy. I’m beginning to wonder what else you’ve forgotten about being a good officer.”

Go screw yourself
, I thought petulantly, staring out the window, even though deep down I knew that he was right and I deserved it. We didn’t speak for a long while and I took the time to think hard about what he’d just said. He was a sergeant after all, and had more experience than me and I should respect that. The truth was that I
had
become renegade working by myself in Little Town for so long. He was probably a blessing in disguise for the sake of my future police career with his by-the-books philosophy. I made a superhuman effort to appreciate that fact.

“Sorry Sarge,” I said eventually, but probably with less contrition than a genuine apology ought to have.

He cut me a quick glance and nodded silently a few times in acceptance, but I was pretty sure that he’d noticed my failure to promise not to do it again.

I offered even more of an olive branch. “Why don’t we drop in on Miss G to see if she’s had a chance to look at that list of properties,” I suggested, so we detoured over to Bessie Goodwill’s daughter’s place, only to find nobody home again.

“They might have gone to the city to visit Bessie’s other daughter,” I thought out loud as we climbed back into the patrol car.