Crucifixion Creek (7 page)

‘Would you like me to take a look?'

‘Would you, Harry? I'd be so grateful. We didn't have any secrets.'

Harry hopes not. But the stuff in the study is all domestic—bills, some share certificates,
school reports, an insurance file. Greg took out a policy on his own life just six
weeks ago. Did he sense his own mortality?

10

The coroner has released Greg's body for a funeral, which takes place on a blustery
winter day, the trees in the crematorium grounds swaying and flailing in the wind.
All Greg's employees have come, all men except for the heavily pregnant Jamila. Peter
Rizzo tells Harry that she's been helping him with the books, and they should have
something ready for Sam Peck soon, maybe tomorrow. Greg's daughters stand on each
side of their mother, cheeks and noses pink in the chill, bravely shaking hands.

That night Harry is woken from a dream of sliding out of control down a steep scree
slope. The phone. He sucks in a deep breath and looks at the time—2:26. ‘Hello.'

‘Harry? Hello. Peter, Peter Rizzo.' The voice is barely audible above a roaring noise. ‘There's
a fire, Harry, at the depot. I'm there now.'

‘I'm on my way.' He tells Jenny and
grabs his clothes.

He sees the glow from blocks away. Closer, there are tongues of orange flame flicking
above the rooftops of the Creek and an ominous red glow reflecting off the underside
of a large black cloud. The entrance to the industrial road is closed off by emergency
vehicles
and Harry sees Peter there, standing mesmerised by the sight.

‘Paint,' he says. ‘We took a big delivery of paint to finish off the Punchbowl job.'

And timber, Harry thinks, and plastics, and all Greg's business records. He wonders
if Peter did it.

‘How did you hear?'

‘Someone called triple-O, and the cops had my number for emergencies. By the time
I got here it was an inferno. They're trying to save the buildings on each side,
but they'll be lucky I reckon.' He turns to Harry with a desolate expression on his
face. ‘It's a bloody catastrophe, mate. On top of everything else…'

They stand side by side watching the fire brigade struggle to control the blaze,
feeling the gusts of heat on their faces.

‘Harry!'

He turns and sees the reporter, Kelly Pool, pacing towards him, face manic in the
eerie glow.

‘Is this a crime scene? Is there a murder?'

He turns away, but she won't be shaken off. ‘Come on Harry. Why are you here?'

‘I'm not on duty, Kelly. I knew the owner, that's all.'

‘The builder who was stabbed? He was known to you lot?'

‘No, he wasn't
known
to me. He was a relative. And that's not for your column.'

‘Come on, Harry. Something's going on, isn't it? First the murder, now this.'

‘If you know anything, you tell the cops. They're over there.'

She comes right up close to him and says in a hoarse whisper. ‘We need to talk. There
are other things going on.'

‘What other things?'

‘Coincidences, Harry. Too many.'

She's just desperate for a story, he decides, looking at her wild hair, her over-eager
eyes. He turns to Peter. ‘I'm going now,' he says. ‘We'll talk in the morning.'

He heads for his car and Kelly chases after him. ‘I mean it, Harry,' she cries. ‘We
can help each other…'

He slams the door and drives away.

When he gets home the lights are on for him. Jenny is in her dressing gown at her
computer, whispering into the headset. She smells rather than hears his arrival,
her nose twitching. She gets to her feet and removes the earphones.

‘Better not touch me,' he says, aware of the chemical stench on his clothes, in his
hair and deep in his throat. When he's had a shower and thrown his clothes into the
machine she's made coffee and toast. The darkness is paling in the eastern sky through
the kitchen window.

‘Was it bad?'

‘Nothing will survive that fire. Peter Rizzo was out there. He looked like he knew
that was the end of the business.'

‘Is that what's bothering you?' She puts a hand on his arm.

‘That, and a few unanswered questions.'

‘About Greg?'

He nods, then remembers she can't see that. It still catches him out. ‘Yes, about
Greg.'

‘I discovered he had another email address,' she says. ‘One that's not entered on
his home computer. It doesn't have anything over a month old, all personal messages.'

‘A woman?'

‘It's not clear. One person, though. They sign themselves ‘J'. They're more ultimatums
than love letters—
I hate being like this. I want everything to be resolved. What
are you going to do?
That kind of thing.'

He thinks of Jamila, eight months pregnant, and tells Jenny about her.

She ponders. ‘That could fit. I'll check the messages again. Oh God, poor Nicole.
We won't tell her.'

But they may have no choice. It could be a motive for murder.
Would her family have
arranged for the boy to meet Greg and kill him? Could they have firebombed the depot?

‘I've also been trying to find out more about Alexander Kristich,' she says. ‘He
and Sandi Krstić, if they are the same man, seem to lead a charmed life. He got into
all kinds of trouble in Queensland and Vanuatu, before that the Philippines and Malaysia.
He seems to have a knack of getting in with influential people who pull strings for
him—allegedly.'

‘A con man.'

‘Well, yes. With a darker side. His first wife died in a fall from the balcony of
a twenty-third-floor apartment on the Gold Coast. And a man who lost his life savings
in one of his scams and went on TV to complain was killed a week later in a hit and
run.'

‘The twenty-third floor,' Harry says. ‘That's where he is now, in the Gipps Tower.'

‘Oh yes…His lucky number.'

Later that morning he returns to the Creek to view the place in daylight. Greg's
building is just a blackened hole now between shattered brick side walls. Faint
traces of steam still rise into the air and the whole site stinks of toxic smoke.
Harry has to jump around large puddles from the fire hoses to approach the scene,
fenced off now by police tape.

The black shell of a ute stands in the forecourt. He can see several men in yellow
protective clothes moving about inside the collapsed shell, between crumpled roof
sheeting and steel trusses hanging limp like spaghetti.

When one of them comes outside to get a drink of water from his truck Harry goes
over and flashes his police ID. ‘Found anything?'

‘Looks like it started in that corner over there, at the back.'

‘That's where the office was. Cause?'

The man shrugs. ‘Not yet. We're testing for an accelerant.'

‘Any signs of a break-in?'

‘Oh mate, if there ever were signs they're gone now. But you're welcome to take a
look.'

He gives Harry a jacket, gloves, mask, helmet and a pair of boots, and they go into
the ruin, stepping carefully over the hazards. All that's left are the husks of steel
equipment, piles of charred timber, puddles of melted plastic. In the corner where
the office stood, the side wall has collapsed inward. What might once have been a
computer casing is visible beneath a heap of blackened bricks. Paper has all gone
to smoke and ash. Harry remembers a safe in one corner, but when he hauls away a
twisted steel beam and slab of brickwork, he finds the burnt-out steel box, deformed
by heat or impact, the door burst open and the contents incinerated.

Harry's foot crunches on something as he leaves the office area, a shard of rippled
glass. The kind that was in the window at the back, where the wall has fallen outward
into a narrow yard that separated the building from the rear boundary fence. He goes
over and examines the remains. Looks over the back fence at the roofs of neighbouring
buildings and an odd watch-tower construction standing up against the sky.

Inside again, he shows the fireman the glass on the floor. ‘It came from that window—the
one on the wall that fell outwards. How do you reckon these bits got over here, unless
maybe someone smashed the window from the outside?' He shows the man where things
had stood, explaining that the windows in the office partition facing into the workshop
had clear flat glass. The man nods, making notes on a device he's carrying, and crouches
to pick up samples.

Harry thanks him and leaves them to it.

As he returns to the street he sees someone on a big Harley over there watching him.
The figure is motionless and clad all in black. Black helmet, black glasses, black
scarf over the lower half of his face. Harry moves closer, round towards the back
of the bike. The man revs the throttle and roars off as Harry takes a photo of the
number plate and the symbol on the man's back, a bird's skull
surrounded by a halo
of orange lettering—
Crow Australia 1% MC.
Harry's phone beeps in his pocket, a text
reminding him of his follow-up appointment with the police shrink.

‘So how have you been this past week, Harry?'

‘Good, good. I've had some time to be with the family, you know.' He's rehearsed
this in his mind, the steady tone, the relaxed posture, remembering all the while
that she's seen every avoidance routine in the book.

‘How are they coping?'

‘It's difficult, but we've got support. Nicole's mother has been a big help to her
and the girls. She's very sensible, very capable. Now the funeral's past I think
things will settle down.'

‘And do you need more time with them?'

‘There are still things to sort out, but we're pretty much on top of it. No, I'd
like to get back to work.' A little smile, sad, resigned, but open. Not holding anything
back. This must be what suspects feel like under interview; he imagines how phoney
his expression would look on an ERISP video. ‘You don't look convinced.'

‘I am still concerned, Harry.'

‘What's bothering you?'

She smiles at his attempt to take over. ‘A few things. For example, when most cops
go through a traumatic experience they like to go into all the particulars—number
of wounds, how deep they were, how much blood, that kind of stuff. It's a cop thing.
But not you. You haven't said a word about all that.'

It's true, he recognises what she's saying—they all love to rehash the gory details.
Their way of debriefing, perhaps, and perhaps he was like that once. Not anymore.

‘I think the army got me out of doing that,' he says. ‘We handled things differently.'

‘How?'

‘Oh…we spent more time keeping fit, working out. Having to
be alert all the time
changes your perspective somehow.'

She's not convinced. She waits for him to say more, but he keeps silent.

‘You're a bit of an enigma, Harry,' she says finally. ‘All right, if you're sure
you don't need more time, I'll clear you for duty.'

‘Thanks.'

He takes a deep breath as he walks out, feeling relieved until he switches his phone
back on. A missed call from Sam Peck.

‘Sam.'

‘Harry!' The accountant sounds rattled. ‘We need to talk.'

‘Okay, I'll come over.'

But first he runs a check on the motorbike at the Creek. Registered to one Benjamin
‘Benji' Lavulo. Convictions for assault and drugs.

Harry parks in a lot behind the shopping strip, and steps out into the smell of frying.
The heater is on full blast in Sam's office. He's got his sleeves rolled up and his
forehead is glowing pink, sweat stains under his arms.

‘What's up, Sam?'

‘We've had a bankruptcy notice served on us, mate.' He shows Harry the document.

‘Who's this come from, building suppliers?'

Sam shakes his head. ‘We know Greg owed money to a few of them, but this is a single
creditor, Bluereef Financial Services. Served by their lawyer, Nathaniel Horn.'

The lawyer's name seems familiar. Then he remembers—the list of tenants on the twenty-third
floor of the Gipps Tower. Harry studies the papers, and his eye snags on a figure.
‘This…' he shows Sam. ‘That's not possible, is it? It's huge.'

‘First time I've seen it. But there are copies of supporting documents, contracts
signed by Bluereef and both Greg and Nicole, putting up their joint assets as guarantees
against loans.'

‘What assets? The business, you mean?'

‘I mean
everything
, Harry—the business, the premises at the Creek, their house, its
contents, the shares in Nicole's name, her jewellery, the cars, everything. If this
is kosher, she'll be lucky to walk away with the clothes on her back.'

Harry is stunned. ‘Would Nicole have agreed to that?'

Sam dips his head. ‘Maybe Greg didn't really explain it to her. I've seen him hand
her papers to sign that she didn't read. She trusted him. The only bright spot is
his life insurance. They shouldn't be able to touch that.'

And the dark little thought that has been lurking in the back of Harry's mind for
the past week finally emerges into the light. It was suicide. What Greg was looking
for, circling the western suburbs in the small hours, was someone to kill him, in
exchange for his car and the cash that was all over the inside of the wreck.
He wana
me do it
, that's what the dying boy said. In the end it was all that Greg could do
for Nicole and the girls.

‘She'd better get a lawyer, Harry,' Sam says. ‘The trouble is, we have nothing to
argue with. All Greg's records have gone. Apart from odds and ends about his current
contracts that Peter Rizzo's been able to give me, we've got nothing. Tax'll be a
nightmare.'