‘Hi,’ she answered.
‘Hello,’ he said.
‘Has she been found yet?’
‘Not yet.’ She could see Alex in the car park, his head on his folded arms on the roof of the car. ‘I can’t really talk.’
‘Once she’s on our news, the other channels will pick it up,’ Laird said. ‘She’ll be everywhere. She’ll be found tomorrow if not sooner.’
‘Let’s hope so. I have to go.’
‘You’ve heard something?’
‘Not really.’ Alex was
looking her way now. ‘His ex might be back, that’s all. We’re going to see her sister.’
‘Sounds promising,’ Laird said. ‘Where’s that?’
Alex moved to the back of the car and spread his arms in a clear
come on!
gesture.
‘Some boatyard in Neutral Bay, somewhere around there.’ She pushed out through the doors. ‘I have to go.’
‘The police know?’
‘I’ll talk to you later.’
She hung up and hurried across the asphalt. Alex was already in the car. ‘Sorry.’
He didn’t look at her. ‘Can we just go?’
TWENTY-SIX
T
he afternoon sky was turning orange when Ella knocked on Grace Michaels’s door.
The parole officer opened it as she’d done earlier, keeping the screen locked. The light was on in the hall now, and Ella could see her. ‘I have nothing to say.’
‘We know what’s going on,’ Ella said.
‘Nothing’s going on.’
‘How did he do it? Did he follow
you? Did he get inside your house somehow?’
It was just a guess, but Michaels blanched.
Ella said, ‘When we first spoke to him, he referred to you as Mrs Michaels. But you don’t wear your wedding ring at work. You have no photos on your desk. You hide yourself well. So for him to know that, he had to have seen you somewhere else.’
Michaels’s hand was white on the door. ‘He might’ve
been guessing.’
‘But he wasn’t, was he?’ Ella said. ‘We can help you. I’ve talked to our boss. We can take you and Elias somewhere safe until we have Canning, and we can make certain that he’ll go behind bars and stay there.’
‘You forget who you’re talking to. I know how the justice system works.’
‘Once you’ve told us what happened, we can get Natasha Osborne to tell what she
knows too,’ Ella said. ‘And then we’ll find the friend who helped him. We’re already looking through his past associates and trying to link up a car I saw near the boatyard. Mrs Michaels, look at me. If we don’t stop him now, what will happen? Is he going to feel that he can trust you forever? Will he one day decide that the risk is too great?’
Michaels was biting her lip. Tears brimmed
in her eyes. Ella felt bad, but better this than she and Elias turned up dead somewhere. Natasha too.
‘Don’t let him get away with it,’ she said.
Michaels unlocked the door. ‘You’d better come in.’
In the living room, Elias was sitting up on the lounge, his gaze fixed on the TV screen where a cartoon bird danced and shrieked. Michaels motioned them past him and into the next
room. They sat around a dark timber dining table.
Michaels fiddled with the cross on the chain around her neck, then looked up at them. ‘I lied. Paul Canning did threaten me.’ She glanced into the living room, as if checking where Elias was, then took an envelope from the top shelf of a sideboard. ‘I’ve only handled these by the corners.’
Ella pulled a pair of gloves from her pocket
and put them on before opening the envelope and taking out the four photos. Murray looked over her shoulder. The first picture showed Grace Michaels studying a packet of mince behind a supermarket trolley while Elias hung off the front. The second had them talking in a car at a red light. The third showed Elias in school uniform and climbing on play equipment with three other children. The fourth
made Ella swallow. ‘This is your living room.’
‘Taken with a flash at night,’ Michaels said. ‘He was in here when we were asleep.’
Ella felt cold fingers touch her spine. ‘No wonder you had to lie.’
‘When did it start?’ Murray said.
‘The day before our first meeting,’ Michaels said. ‘He obviously had it all planned out. We were due to meet on a Tuesday. The pictures turned
up in the letterbox on the Monday, the same day that he got out of Long Bay. I’d met with Osborne a couple of weeks before, checked out what work Canning would be doing, where he’d live and so on, and it all seemed good. She seemed all right, though a little naive about what she was getting herself into. But clearly, she or someone else followed me afterwards, back to the office, then here to
home.’ She shook her head. ‘A parole officer based in Long Bay had been working with Canning to get him ready, and said he was doing well. He’d had some issues early on, got into fights and so on a number of times, but later made it through the violent offenders program with no trouble. None of the psychologists or anyone else he worked with had concerns, and there were no qualms whatsoever about
letting him out. I’m sure he wasn’t blackmailing them, because it would be almost impossible over that length of time and in that scope. I think he’s one of those guys that manages to keep a lid on their rage for years, knowing that one day they’ll get out and have their revenge. For them, that goal is worth any wait.’
‘What happened when you met?’ Ella asked.
‘He came into the office
on the Tuesday, all smiles, but watching me – I knew he could see I’d got the photos.’
Ella held back a shiver.
‘The office was full of people, so neither of us said anything out of the ordinary,’ Michaels went on. ‘At the end, he said he looked forward to speaking to me again. He rang here that night and told me I had to do what he said, that the photos proved that we weren’t safe
anywhere, that if I loved my child at all I’d keep my mouth shut.’ She was white. ‘I did, but I couldn’t stop thinking that I would always be a threat, like you said. I decided that I had to do what was best for now, had to protect us now, and that meant doing what he said, and when my husband got back I’d ask him to transfer interstate, and maybe then we’d be safe. I haven’t told him anything because
he can’t get back and it would only send him crazy with worry.’ Michaels looked past them to the living room where her son watched TV, her face full of fear. ‘Like I feel.’
*
Langley, Kemsley and Gawande arrived soon after, and Ella and Murray met them on the verandah.
‘Looks like the dark grey Mazda you saw at the boatyard belongs to the wife of one of Canning’s old cellmates,’
Kemsley said. ‘Danny O’Hara, lives at Pendle Hill.’
‘Same suburb where the SIM card was bought that made the calls to Marko’s work,’ Ella said. ‘I bet we find that car on CCTV stopping somewhere around Town Hall station, O’Hara dropping Canning off. I bet O’Hara was the one who followed Michaels and took the photos too.’
‘Good work, even though you shouldn’t have been at the boatyard
to see the car,’ Langley said gruffly.
Ella nodded.
About time you recognised a bit of quality effort.
Gawande had parked close to the house, and Grace Michaels walked out to the car with one arm around Elias’s shoulders. He was wide-eyed and dressed in blue pyjamas and slippers and a snugly tied Star Wars dressing gown. He clutched a figurine.
‘Jango Fett,’ Kemsley said. ‘Cool.’
Elias shot him a smile as he climbed into the back of the car. Michaels put her overnight bag in, then glanced back at Ella. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said.
‘Don’t be,’ Ella said. ‘And don’t worry. We’ll get him.’
Michaels got in and shut the door, then the car moved off down the driveway, the tyres crunching the twigs and gravel. Ella, Murray, Langley and Kemsley followed, heading for
their cars on the street.
‘People are meeting us at the boatyard, and water police are on standby,’ Langley said. ‘He’s going to feel cornered with his back to the water, and we don’t want him turning Osborne into a hostage, so we’re going to go in quietly and grab him before he knows a thing about it.’
Ella squeezed her hands into fists.
*
Alex walked into the workshop
without knocking, Jane right on his heels.
‘Nat,’ he said.
She looked up from an outboard and dropped a screwdriver with a clatter to the floor. Her left wrist was heavily bandaged and she held it carefully away from her body.
‘I promise you, she isn’t here,’ she said.
‘I’m going to see for myself.’
He walked through the shed, pushed open the door to the tiny empty
bathroom at the back, then headed for the stairs leading up to a closed door.
It opened when he was halfway up and a man in grey workshorts and a black T-shirt stepped out. ‘Help you?’
Alex looked up at him. ‘I’m searching for my daughter.’
‘Nobody up here,’ the man said.
‘Paulie, it’s okay,’ Nat said. ‘He’s my brother-in-law.’
‘Whatever,’ Paul said. ‘There’s nobody
up there.’
Alex took a step up, but Paul took two steps down, his heavy workboots thudding on the wood, and loomed over him.
Alex glanced at Jane and Nat, who’d come over to the bottom of the stairs. Jane looked anxious, Nat outright frightened. All Alex felt was determination.
He put out his hand. ‘Alex Churchill.’
Paul took it. ‘Paul Canning. Now we’ve met, but you’re
still not going into my home.’
He slowly increased the pressure on Alex’s hand, then bent his arm back on itself to try to force him back down a step.
Alex moved sideways instead. ‘Let me go up and see, then I’ll get out of your hair.’
‘No.’ The pressure increased more.
Alex tried not to let the pain show. ‘You know that this makes you look like you have something to hide?’
‘You can leave now.’ He bent Alex’s wrist back further. Alex had to step down.
‘Is this what you did to Nat too?’ he said. ‘Twisted her arm until she did what you told her?’
Paul’s brown eyes hardened. ‘I said you can leave.’
‘Let me check inside and then I will.’
A helicopter flew low overhead. Paul glanced up at the roof with a scowl.
‘You can watch me while
I look,’ Alex said. His hand throbbed, but he would neither let go nor give in.
The helicopter came back. This time it hovered, and the downdraught rattled something that was loose in the roof.
‘What the fuck?’ Paul shoved Alex out of the way and went down the steps and across the concrete floor.
Alex stumbled up the steps and almost fell through the door. Inside, he saw a small
sparsely furnished flat, the kitchen and living area empty of people. The bedroom, with its one double bed and small bathroom, equally so. There was no sign that Mia had ever been here.
He went back down the stairs two at a time, ready to throttle Paul for wasting his time and wanting to twist Nat’s other arm until she told him where the fuck her sister was. Paul, Nat and Jane were all at
the door, the women looking up at the helicopter, Paul scanning the area.
Alex grabbed Nat’s arm and spun her to face him.
‘Where is she?’ he shouted over the noise.
Before Nat could answer, Paul shoved them back inside the shed. Jane stumbled and fell to the floor. Natasha was pushed into Alex and flinched as her arm was caught between them.
Alex put his face close to
hers. ‘Where?’
‘I don’t know! I don’t know!’ Natasha cradled her arm and started to cry.
Alex believed her. He needed to move on, get out of there, keep looking.
But Paul pulled the big door closed and shoved a length of rebar through the latch.
Alex grasped it to yank it out but Paul pushed him away.
‘Open that door,’ Alex said. ‘I have to find my daughter.’
‘Think I give a shit about your kid?’ Paul rummaged in a bin of rags on a shelf.
Alex grabbed the rebar again. She was out there somewhere. Mason might have a lead on the phones by now. Tips might be coming in from the news broadcast. The rebar was jammed in tight and he heaved, then Paul pointed a handgun at his face.
‘Back away.’
Alex could see the round black hole and Paul’s
finger on the trigger. ‘I have to find my daughter.’
‘Get the fuck away from the door.’
‘Alex, you can’t help her if you’re dead,’ Jane said behind him.
‘I won’t say it again.’ Paul pressed the barrel to his cheek.
Alex let go of the bar and stepped back.
TWENTY-SEVEN
B
ulletproof vest cinched up tight, Ella moved as part of a line across the car park, watching the workshop’s open door for movement, listening for voices. She smelled the salt in the air and felt the blood pumping hard in her veins.
There were three other cars parked near Osborne’s blue truck. Ella hoped no customers were about to get caught up in the
situation. She was moving past the truck when the news helicopter appeared, swooping over the trees and coming low across the car park, then turning and hovering, a camera’s big black lens sticking out the open door. Dust blew up in clouds and the rotor noise made the air pulsate in Ella’s ears.
‘What the fuck?’ Langley shouted, and gestured wildly for the chopper to leave.
But it
was too late. Ella saw Canning and Osborne and someone else in the workshop doorway, then saw Canning spot them and turn and slam the door shut.
She started to run, weapon held low, eyes fixed on the door, ready to duck and dodge if Canning appeared again. But the door stayed closed. She reached the corner and tucked herself around it, Murray pushing in behind her. Langley and Kemsley took
the other side of the door; Marion Pilsiger and Aadil Hossain ran to the far corner of the building.
The door was metal, and the U-shaped handle was right next to her. Langley signalled for her to test it. She grasped it carefully, heart louder than the helicopter’s rotor in her ears, imagining Canning waiting inside with a weapon of his own. She tried to slide it along, then shook her head.
Locked. Langley frowned.
Overhead the camera in the helicopter followed everything.
*
Jane felt Alex’s rage through the tight grip of his hand. On her other side, Natasha’s palm was damp with fear. Paul had shouted at them to hold hands, so he could see what they were doing, she guessed, and now he shoved them across the concrete floor to a closed door at the back of the shed.
The roof rattled under the helicopter’s noise, and Paul’s face was wild, his eyes everywhere like he was trying to think what to do.
Natasha was weeping and trembling, her injured arm cradled against her body. Jane glanced at Alex. He glared at Paul, his face red, his jaw set.
‘Where’re the keys to that cruiser?’ Paul barked.
‘What?’ Natasha said.
‘The keys! The fucking
keys to the fucking cabin cruiser!’
She sobbed. ‘On the thing there, on the thing.’
‘Fuck’s sake.’ Keeping the gun on them, he swept his free hand along the workbench. Tools and bits of machinery crashed to the floor.
Jane felt Alex move a little. She tightened her grip.
Don’t do anything.
The cops were outside; nobody was going anywhere. It was better to stay safe as long as
you could.
Paul grabbed up a set of keys and pushed past them to the back door. He listened for a moment – as if anything could be heard over the roar of the helicopter, Jane thought – then pointed the gun at them.
‘Get over here,’ he snapped.
*
Ella and Murray were nearing the back corner of the workshop, hoping to find another way in, when they heard Pilsiger shout, ‘Police!
Drop your weapon!’
Ella inched up to the corner to see Canning backing towards the dock with his arm around Natasha Osborne’s neck, a handgun screwed into her temple. Walking from the other side of the shed were Pilsiger and Hossain, guns drawn. Facing Canning and walking hand in hand were the paramedics who’d taken Marko Meixner to hospital after his car crash.
‘What the fuck?’ Murray
hissed. ‘What are they doing here?’
Ella had no idea and no time to think about it.
Natasha stumbled as Canning dragged her along. Ella could see one of her wrists was bandaged. Canning had a set of keys in his hand. He was going to take a boat, and the hostages with him, she guessed. But out on the harbour, right in the middle of the entrance to the bay, waited the water police boat.
‘Give it up, Canning,’ she shouted over the noise of the helicopter. ‘Look over your shoulder. Where you going to go?’
‘Fuck you.’
‘Look behind you!’ she called again.
He kept moving.
They were all on the dock now: Canning and the sobbing white-faced Natasha, the two paramedics, then, five metres back, with no hope of a clear shot, Ella, Murray, Marion Pilsiger and
Aadil Hossain. The helicopter hovered overhead, its blades chopping the air, the wind lashing the water and whipping the cables against the masts.
‘There’s nowhere to go,’ Ella shouted.
But Canning kept moving.
*
Alex’s mind raced. Whatever happened, he was not getting on any boat. Mia was out there somewhere and he had to find her. Plus he could see the water police boat
bobbing on the swell and knew Paul wouldn’t be getting out of the bay, no matter what.
The noise of the helicopter was deafening. He could hardly hear Natasha, who was almost hysterical. He felt bad for her, but he couldn’t help her directly. What he could do was get himself and Jane out of the way of the police. And here and now was his best chance.
Up ahead on the dock there was
clear space on both sides, gaps between moored boats. The water was grey, the surface rumpled by the helicopter.
He squeezed Jane’s hand. She squeezed back.
Keeping his eyes on Paul, he put his free hand behind his back, fingers spread and ready to count down. Then he loosened his grip on Jane’s, and tightened it once, twice – and hoped she understood that something was going to happen
on three.
*
The grey planks of the dock clanked under Ella’s feet. The water police boat was heading towards them.
She saw the male paramedic put his hand behind his back, fingers spread at first then folding down, one by one, little finger first.
‘Get ready,’ Ella murmured to Murray, as adrenaline thumped into her blood.
As the paramedic tucked his thumb into his
closed fist he wrenched his other hand free of his partner’s, gave her an almighty shove into the water, and leapt the other way himself.
Ella now had a clear view of Canning and Natasha. She saw Canning start at the splashes, and his eyes dart between her and Murray. He was nearing the last boat, big and white with two silver motors.
‘You’re surrounded,’ Langley bellowed on a megaphone
from somewhere behind Ella. ‘Water police are waiting. You will not get away.’
‘Fuck you!’
Natasha Osborne flinched as he rammed the gun tighter into the side of her head.
No, fuck you, Ella thought. She was aiming straight at him now. She could see his arm and part of his chest and legs. Her breath was coming hard in her throat, her heart thundering in her chest, her hair blowing
in the chopper’s downdraught.
She glanced past him at the boat. The step at the back was high. He was going to have trouble getting Osborne in. She tightened her grip and narrowed her eyes.
‘Give it up,’ Langley shouted.
Canning reached the boat. He hesitated.
What will you do? Ella thought, her eyes fixed on his chest. Push her in first, or drag her in last?
Canning
lifted his leg to climb the step. While he was off balance, Osborne kicked out against one of the motors and they both went over backwards on the planks. Ella started running, Murray pounding alongside her.
A shot rang out.
Ella expected to see a puff of blood spray and Osborne slump over motionless, but there was no blood and she was still struggling. Canning seized her neck, and
as Ella and Murray reached him he raised the gun.
Ella squeezed her trigger and saw red flowers appear on his chest, flowers that spread and spread and spread.