‘It could make it worse,’ said Gemma. ‘You’ll have to relive the whole thing again.’
‘Gemma,’ said Natalie, slowly turning to her, ‘I remember you as a clever woman. But you’re not thinking. What the hell do you think I’ve been doing since Monday night? Nothing
but
reliving the scene. Over and over and over. It’s all I can see! I close my eyes and there it is. I open them, and it’s still there. My husband and my sister-in-law lying dead in their own blood. My little boy haemorrhaging like a geyser. I haven’t been able to see anything else.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Gemma. ‘It was a thoughtless thing to say.’
‘Okay,’ said Angie, putting a steadying hand on Natalie’s arm, then handing her the first of the large glossy prints. There were several copies of each shot, taken at slightly different angles, some in colour, some in black and white.
‘Who took them?’ Gemma asked.
‘Paulette Heath. She’s out on a job at the moment.’
Gemma was about to make a positive comment about the quality of the photographs, but under the circumstances, with the widow of the dead man staring at the first one, said nothing. Instead, she watched while Natalie slowly worked her way through them, studying some longer than others before putting them down on the desk. That’s what Findlay Finn painted, she thought – his wife, Bettina, lying partly on her side, beside a large pool of blood, her pale blue jumper dark with blood and her legs drawn up beside her brother-in-law. Bryson Finn lay on his back, staring at the ceiling, one arm across Bettina’s back, the other spread out at shoulder level pointing towards the studio door.
Gemma, Natalie and Angie studied the photographs, the silence punctuated by the ringing of phones, Natalie’s harsh breathing, the half-audible comments and laughter of the people outside Angie’s office and the cooing of the pigeons perched on the grey window ledges of the building. Jaki stood alone near the window, her back to them, blowing her nose.
‘I think you should know,’ said Angie, turning to Natalie and pointing to one of the photographs, ‘that Findlay has done a painting of this scene.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Gemma saw it when she was at his place,’ Angie explained. ‘Findlay Finn has done a painting. And it looks just like this.’
Natalie’s face, at first bewildered, hardened. ‘The bastard,’ she said. ‘The bastard. Why would he want to do that? What is it with him? That is so typical of Findlay! He’s sick. I’ve never been able to understand him. No one can. There’s something malicious in him, something hateful. When Bryson and I married, he sent a huge painting as a gift – he didn’t come himself.
Gift for Jason’s Bride
, he called it. It showed Jason the Greek hero and his bride embracing and a centaur approaching them carrying a glorious, flame-coloured gown. I thought it was wonderful – a superb present – a tribute to Bryson’s qualities and a celebration of our wedding. I was so grateful to him. It’s pathetic to think about it now. He must have had a good laugh about that.’ Gemma almost winced at the hard bitterness of her voice. ‘It used to hang right in the middle of our lounge room. Where the big abstract lilies are now.’
Gemma remembered the large painting, its green, lime and creamy tones, and also how Natalie had turned a dark red when she’d mentioned Findlay Finn’s work and how she wouldn’t have it in the house. ‘So what happened? Did he want it back?’
‘I wish he had. That painting hung there for years until someone told me what it meant.’
‘And what did it mean?’ Gemma frowned.
‘It was horrible,’ Natalie said, looking away. ‘I don’t want to talk about it. It’s going to be bad enough having to face him at the funeral!’
‘The funeral?’ Jaki said, reminding them of her presence near the window. ‘When’s that?’
‘Tomorrow,’ said Natalie, her voice shaking.
Gemma made a mental note of it, then turned her attention to a crime scene photograph showing several pieces of debris lying on the floorboards of the entrance hall at Killara.
‘This stuff near the cartridge shells,’ she said, ‘it looks like it’s made from the same type of glass that I found, Angie.’
‘That’s my feeling too. Venetian glass beads, crystal with gold leaf inside. Bettina was wearing a necklace made of them. They were smashed in the shooting and scattered everywhere.’
‘Bryson gave her those,’ said Natalie, taking the photograph and studying it. ‘I’d admired this necklace in a window and he bought two of them – one for me and one for Bettina. He bought other pieces of Venetian glass for friends and relatives. Keyrings, medallions – that sort of thing. Bryson had no imagination as far as gifts went. If he liked something, he bought multiples.’ She pushed the photograph away. ‘I used to tease him about it.’ She lowered her head and seemed to have a private moment of grief before continuing her perusal of the photos.
Across Natalie’s bowed head, Gemma encountered Angie’s eyes. Were they thinking the same thing? Maybe the old love affair between Bettina and Bryson hadn’t been cold ashes after all.
Gemma took the photograph again. The killer would have tiny shards of glass embedded in their clothing and shoes, and she remembered Natalie at the hospital remarking that the police had taken her clothes away. I’ll chase that up, Gemma thought.
Natalie’s mobile rang and she snatched it up. While she was speaking, Gemma took the opportunity to leave Angie’s office and approach Sean Wright, who was speaking on his desk phone, the handset tucked into his neck, while he wrote something up on his laptop. He waved to her to hold on a moment.
‘Yeah, mate,’ he said to his phone, ‘I can wait a little while.’ Then, warily, he looked up. ‘What do you want?’
Was he suspicious of her, Gemma wondered, remembering the times she’d flirted with him but never taken up his offer of a drink.
‘Do you remember something blowing up about Bryson Finn and Dan Galleone? From years ago?’
‘Don’t know anything about years ago,’ he said, ‘but just recently there was a real stink about the filling of a region commander vacancy at Northern Region. Galleone and Finn were the main contenders. Everyone thought Galleone was a certainty and then this internal affairs business surfaced.’
‘What business?’
‘Some woman and a sexual harassment story. Don’t know the details. Reckons Galleone goosed her or something.’
‘A member of the public?’
Sean shook his head. ‘No. Someone in the job. Something happened at a staff training session. You’re a woman. Don’t all you girls whinge about men all the time? I’m surprised you haven’t heard the whole story. It’ll put the mockers on Galleone’s promotion bid, that’s for sure. Until it’s cleared up anyway.’
‘I’m told that according to the people who attended the crime scene on Monday night, Findlay Finn acted pretty strangely,’ she said. ‘You were there. What are your thoughts about it?’
Sean pulled his mouth down and shrugged. ‘I realise that people can have very different reactions to a shocking incident like that,’ he said. ‘I’ve seen it for myself over the years. But this guy seemed really off. That was his dead
wife
on the floor – and his brother. He felt to me like a curious bystander, like he had no connection to the people whose bodies were lying there. We kept him away until we’d finished our job and because we were worried he’d be really upset. That scene at Lindfield that Paulette attended earlier in the day? The one I dropped in on for a while? That guy was hysterical. Had to be sedated. Mind you, he’d lost an ear and part of his face.’ Sean smiled. ‘The ear turned up sitting on a chair on the other side of the room.’ Serious again, Sean added, ‘But not this Findlay Finn character. He just kind of stood staring at them, and later, just before the contractors arrived to take them to the morgue, I spotted him standing in a doorway with a camera. He was taking photographs of them on the floor.’ He paused. ‘I’ve never seen any relative do anything like that before. It really spooked me. I said something to him and he said, “What’s your problem, Officer? Can’t I take some photographs too?”.’
Sean’s caller came back on the line and he waved Gemma away.
She recalled the painting that had shocked her in the studio. The FBI had compiled a list of characteristics of the violent criminal, which Gemma had read through when Angie was working on her VMO – violent major offender – files some time ago. She thought of the PCL-R – Professor Hare’s famous checklist of psychopathic traits. One of them was callousness – a lack of empathy. She wondered what other characteristics Findlay Finn might demonstrate.
Angie was dealing with a phone call when Gemma returned to the office, while Jaki remained in position by the window. There was nothing to see out of it, save for the grey cement wall across the lightwell. Natalie seemed still to be fixated on the photographs of her husband’s and sister-in-law’s murders.
‘Were you aware there was a sexual harassment complaint lodged concerning Dan Galleone?’ Gemma asked Angie as she put her phone down.
‘Dan Galleone?’ said Natalie, putting down the photograph she was studying, a blush spreading up from her neck to her face. ‘What was it about?’
‘Maybe you know something about it, Natalie?’ asked Angie. She’s noticed the blushing too, thought Gemma. ‘According to people who knew both of them fairly well, Galleone and your late husband had a difficult relationship.’
‘I don’t know anything about any sexual harassment,’ Natalie said. ‘I was simply surprised to hear Superintendent Galleone’s name come up like that. I mean, in that sort of context.’
‘Oh? Why is that?’
‘Forget it,’ said Natalie. ‘I can’t think at the moment.’
A silence before Angie said, ‘I’ve been trying to get hold of the woman who made the allegation. She works out at Parramatta. Melissa Grey knows her.’
Gemma remembered slim, competent Melissa Grey and how helpful the young detective had been to her during a previous investigation. She looked over at the other two. ‘Anyone want a coffee?’
Both Natalie and Jaki declined, but Angie, giving Gemma the eye, stood up. ‘I’ll give you a hand,’ she said, following Gemma out to the meal room.
‘What is it, Ange?’ Gemma asked, as Angie turned to her, her face pale and strained under the fluoro lighting.
Angie paused in opening a new packet of polystyrene cups. Then she continued, not looking at Gemma, plonking two cups down on the counter. ‘Trevor called me. He’s left his wife.’
‘Trevor? The guy you horsewhipped?’
‘Says he really loves me. That he can’t stop thinking about me.’
‘Come on, Angie. Translate that: it probably means his wife’s kicked him out.’
‘He wants to see me. Says he’s never stopped loving me.’
‘Ange, he’s a cheat and a liar. He failed to mention he had a wife and kids when he met you. What sort of loving you is that?’
‘I know, I know.’ Angie made herself a coffee and put a teabag in the other cup, then held it under the hot water. ‘This isn’t the right time or place to be discussing this,’ she said. ‘But I wanted to get you away from the others for a moment. I’ve been getting the gear on Superintendent Bryson Finn – Mickey Finn, they call him. Ex-footie hero, used to travel the world competing in all those police comps and games. He was being groomed to be an assistant commissioner – maybe even commissioner one day. Legendary rifleman, Peter Mitchell award, other commendations and awards. He was the guy up the tree at that Rocky Ridge siege.’
‘That siege near Newcastle?’ Gemma asked. ‘In the early nineties?’
Angie nodded. ‘Bryson Finn popped the offender through the kitchen window of the cottage, in a one in a thousand shot.’
‘I read about that,’ said Gemma, remembering the incident – two terrified children taken by their stepfather to an isolated bushland cottage, his threats to murder them unless his estranged wife came back to him. How to win friends and influence people, she thought. ‘I didn’t realise Bryson Finn was the shooter.’
‘An ace shooter,’ said Angie. ‘When it comes to attitudes towards hardware, cops seem to fall into two categories. The dutiful ones who do their weapons training and their range work because they have to. And then there are guys who just love their firearms. They live and breathe weapons. They know all the specs of just about every firearm that’s ever been made and they get into arguments and have bets about which ones are best.’
‘Bryson Finn was one of those?’ Gemma asked.
‘He inclined towards it,’ Angie nodded. ‘Everyone agrees that the late Bryson Finn was extremely ambitious and competitive. And that he had another talent as well. He had a bad reputation as a pantsman. Several sources have told me that he had a habit of taking young women officers under his wing, first as protégés, then he’d put the moves on them. Any sign of trouble, they’d be dumped immediately.’
‘What do you mean by trouble?’ Gemma asked.
‘Anyone who might threaten the Finn marriage,’ said Angie. ‘Or anyone who got too keen. You know, started getting ideas about being the third Mrs Finn. Bryson had a nasty way of setting something up and getting rid of them. Transfers out. That sort of thing.’
‘Natalie was furious about his affair,’ said Gemma, thinking of the dead man and his love of weapons, work and women. ‘She’s made that very clear.’
‘According to my sources,’ Angie said, ‘he’d quietened down a lot since his marriage to Natalie.’ She corrected herself. ‘Well, let’s say he hadn’t been caught out. Until Natalie threw him out of the house.’
‘That’s what she’s told us,’ said Gemma. ‘But what if she’d found out that Bettina and Bryson were on again – like Charles and Camilla – and decided to do something about it? Remember, we’ve only got her word about the child-minding arrangements that day. She mightn’t have had a clue that Donovan would be there, and he comes running down the stairs and her old training causes her to start shooting before she’s even recognised who he is. I know that’s a pretty horrible scenario. Especially if Donovan recognised her.’
‘The question I have to ask,’ Angie said, ‘is why just now? She said he’d been having this affair for some months. So why would she kill him now and in such a messy and complicated way?’
‘She may have known about the affair,’ Gemma suggested, ‘but only just discovered the identity of the other woman.’
‘So knowing they’re together, naturally she goes there – to Bettina’s place,’ said Angie, thinking aloud.
‘But she’s got to lose the weapon and get Donny to hospital,’ said Gemma.
‘She could have dumped it somewhere and then dealt with Donny.’
‘Angie,’ said Gemma, ‘all the information we have about her behaviour at the scene, and even the existence of the affair, has come from Natalie. She’s the only source. Somehow we need to verify everything she says.’
‘But she would hardly make up a story about an affair. That makes her position worse. Because it gives her a motive,’ said Angie. ‘She’s already pencilled in as a suspect. Why make up something that’s going to invite even more suspicion? And she asked you to investigate this crime, remember. Why would she do that if she’s guilty? Even if she did know about an affair, it would be in her interest to keep quiet about it.’
‘At this stage, I can’t answer that,’ said Gemma. ‘Perhaps Jade Finn might be able to tell me more about the family. And her father.’
From the open plan office area came a loud guffaw of laughter. Something had amused Sean Wright.
‘You told me about the four cartons from Bryson Finn’s flat,’ said Gemma. ‘What about the marital home?’
‘We’re going through the contents of the marital house now to see if we can find anything helpful. The techies are going through Bryson’s hard disk to see if there’s anything there. And his diaries. Meanwhile, we have to wait for the results on Natalie’s clothes. If she was the shooter, there should be traces of glass from the beads deeply embedded in the fabric of the clothes she was wearing. Not to mention blood splash patterns.’ She paused a moment before continuing. ‘That portion of Venetian glass you gave me earlier. Where exactly did you find it?’
‘I can show you the spot. At the picnic clearing,’ said Gemma. ‘The gold gleamed in the torchlight.’
‘It must have been caught up in the killer’s gear somehow,’ said Angie, ‘and then dropped during the getaway. We’ll get a fingertip search done all along that bush track area. The weapon might have been dumped there.
‘I also discovered that Bryson Finn and Dan Galleone used to be great mates,’ Angie continued, ‘but it all ended in tears about ten years ago. Some dispute about a winning lottery ticket.’
‘How much was involved?’
‘Not sure. I’ve heard several figures, but none of them were less than a hundred thousand. Finn was holding the ticket and collected all the money. Galleone reckoned he’d put half the purchase price in.’
‘And Finn disputed that,’ said Gemma. ‘That would be enough to bust up a happy friendship.’
‘You can’t tell me Natalie wouldn’t have known about the mutual antipathy,’ said Angie. ‘I wonder why she hasn’t mentioned it?’
‘It’s ten years ago,’ Gemma reminded her. ‘Old enmities fade. No reason to mention it, really.’
‘Unless it was the sort of falling out that results in homicidal hatred further down the line,’ Angie said. ‘It wouldn’t be the first time a police officer has been implicated in the death of a colleague.’ She leaned against the counter next to the sink. ‘But why wait ten years before acting?’
Gemma ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it back from around her face. ‘My brain’s looping the loop. One minute I’m suspecting Natalie, next minute that seems crazy and we’re jumping on Galleone instead.’
‘Keeping an open mind is what it’s all about, Gemster,’ said Angie, taking a quick glance through the door to make sure no one was looking. ‘Suspect everybody. That way, you get to be right, no matter who you end up charging.’
She pulled a large envelope out of an inside jacket pocket. ‘Or it could be just baby hormones. Here’s some info on The Group,’ she said, handing the envelope to Gemma as they walked back to the office, cups in hand. ‘I only had time to glance at it, but they look pretty suss.’
‘Thanks,’ said Gemma, touched by her friend’s concern in the midst of this busy, stressful time.
They re-entered the office to find Natalie and Jaki where they’d left them. Jaki’s face was deathly pale. She looked terrible, Gemma thought.
‘Natalie,’ said Gemma, putting her tea down on the desk and pulling up a chair nearby, ‘yesterday you mentioned the winding up of old Mrs Finn’s estate? Had that caused any tension between Bryson and Findlay?’
‘It’s a complicated story,’ Natalie said. ‘Bryson and Findlay’s mother died last year and we found the will was quite different from what she’d led us to believe. Originally, she’d split her estate between both her sons. But we discovered after she died that she’d changed her will and left the house to Findlay.’
‘She’d cut Bryson out?’ Angie asked, jotting notes discreetly on her lap.
‘More or less. The house was the only major asset, so there wasn’t anything much left to Bryson. He got several thousand dollars and some shares. It came as quite a shock. Bryson believed that Findlay had been badmouthing him to their mother. Running down his character. The old girl was a very rigid churchgoer. Hats on Sundays and off to the service.’
During the ensuing silence, Gemma tried to make sense of that. It was quite likely, she thought, that Findlay knew something about his brother that his mother wouldn’t have approved of. He might know all about his dead brother’s mistress. So if Bryson was having an affair and old Mrs Finn found out, she might well have decided to punish her sinful son.
‘We’re talking about the same house at Killara?’ Gemma asked, picturing the rambling, spacious home, its established gardens and the gate in the back fence to the bush track leading to the picnic area half a kilometre away.
Natalie nodded. ‘It’s a very valuable property,’ she said. ‘It’s a huge triple block – there’s an overgrown tennis court on the eastern side and extensive gardens on the western side of the building. All a jungle now, but it used to be a local showpiece. Old Mrs Finn used to live there with Findlay and Bettina until she moved into a retirement unit some years ago.’
If the murders were about the estate, wouldn’t it make more sense to murder Findlay rather than Bryson, mused Gemma. Perhaps the killer had made a mistake and shot the wrong brother. Contract killers had made that sort of error before, Gemma knew.
‘How many people would have known about the gate in the back fence of the property?’ Gemma asked.
‘The old gate?’ Natalie seemed genuinely puzzled. ‘How do you know about that?’
‘Someone has used the gate quite recently,’ Gemma said. ‘Although the lock is rusted on, it’s been pushed open on the hinges side.’
‘I’d forgotten it was there,’ said Natalie. ‘I can’t imagine anyone knowing about it. Who wasn’t in the family, I mean.’
‘You knew about it though,’ said Angie.
Natalie’s mobile rang and she answered it quickly. The other women fell silent, knowing from Natalie’s demeanour that she was speaking with the hospital. Natalie finished the call and put the mobile in her bag.
‘I’m going to have to go. The doctors have detected a slow leak of fluid into Donny’s skull. It needs draining. He’s on his way to the theatre now. And I want to be there when they bring him out. But before I go, I want you to see this.’
She dipped into her smart leather bag and, from an envelope, pulled out an enlarged colour photograph.
‘This is how we were before all this happened. I want you to see Bryson and Donny, and Bettina, the way they were. Not the way they look in these.’ She indicated the pile of crime scene shots.
She wants to honour the dead, thought Gemma. She wants to show us something important to her. She moved closer to see the large print better.
It showed a family gathering at Bryson and Natalie’s, with an elderly woman Gemma presumed was the late mother-in-law seated in the middle of the group. To the left of the old lady stood Bettina, pretty in white linen and her Venetian glass necklace; Bryson on the right, stylish in casual slacks and polo top. Natalie stood in the centre, behind Mrs Finn, with her arms around her two children, a beautiful young girl, Jade, and Donovan, grinning hugely and holding up a peculiar half-dinosaur, half-human figure. Natalie’s voice was barely audible as she spoke. ‘This is how I want to remember them.’
Gemma was about to straighten up, when something about Bettina’s necklace made her stare closer. In this photograph, the individual beads of the necklace showed very clearly, glistening against the skin of Bettina’s neck, the gold leaf within their depths showing as a soft radiance. Something was wrong. She reached towards the photograph. ‘May I?’ she asked politely before picking it up.