An Easeful Death Read online

  Neither Stevie nor Monty had been with the SCS during the KP murders. She had been stationed at a quiet outer suburban police station, busy swotting for her sergeant’s exams, and Monty had been taking a course in England. He had not returned to head the SCS until the case had been closed for some time, although he had experienced some of the aftershock and heard the rumours. One of the major problems, he’d explained to her later, was the ridiculous isolationist policy the top brass had chosen to pursue by refusing to accept the offer of interstate aid. This time, desperate to repair a damaged reputation, they’d reluctantly allowed him to call in De Vakey.

  ‘Because of the bizarre nature of this crime, we’re enlisting the aid of a nationally renowned criminal profiler,’ Monty said.

  ‘So, Inspector.’ Stevie could hear the smugness in Michelle’s voice, visualise her condescending smile. ‘You admit the Kings Park murder investigation was a bungle from start to finish?’

  ‘I admit no such thing, Ms Birkby. The case of the Kings Park killer is not, I believe, the subject of this press conference.’

  A question from someone else: ‘Do you have the cause of Linda Royce’s death yet, Inspector McGuire?’

  Monty’s sigh of relief was audible. ‘We’re still waiting for the last of the autopsy test results to come through.’

  ‘Do you have any suspects?’

  ‘Several people are helping us with our enquiries, but no charges have been laid yet.’

  ‘Had the victim been sexually assaulted?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t comment on that at the moment.’

  ‘Apparently, the Kings Park murder victims were sexually assaulted. Is there any chance that this latest death could be the work of the same killer?’ It was Michelle Birkby again.

  ‘The chief KP murder suspect was killed in a car accident.’

  ‘The suspect?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So we can assume...?’

  ‘It would be naive to assume anything at this stage in the investigation, Ms Birkby.’

  For a moment Stevie forgot her own troubles. She laughed aloud as she turned off the highway and onto the airport road.

  ***

  Tottering through the car park in her skirt suit and high heels, Stevie used her umbrella for balance as well as shelter. After lecturing Monty on his appearance, she could hardly go dressed in jeans and a bomber jacket to pick up a dignitary such as De Vakey.

  The press conference had been an amusing diversion, but the icy sting of rain on her calves quickly brought her back to the here and now. She should be at home now, tucking Izzy into bed. Then, once her daughter was asleep, she should be curling up in front of a favourite DVD. Most of her movies were oldies, but there was a special section of recent romantic comedies devoted to George Clooney. She kept them in a banana box on top of the wardrobe, away from prying eyes, like a teenage boy with his hidden collection of porn.

  But there would be no movies tonight and it would be Nanna reading the bedtime story. They’d be sitting in the double bed cuddled together under the heirloom patchwork, the warm air tinged with baby powder and strawberry shampoo. After three nights in her grandmother’s bed, how was Izzy ever going to settle back into her own?

  And this was the least of her problems. What if Tye called, or worse, went around? Would her mother be able to handle the scumbag? How would Izzy react? The unpredictable appearance of Izzy’s father always upset the child.

  Stevie’s wet ankles chafed against her leather shoes as she walked, her high heels slamming into the concrete as if they might crack it. Muscles and tendons tightened, her heart raced, and she found herself glancing around to make sure she wasn’t being followed. She hated having to get tarted up, she hated the shoes; she couldn’t move fast enough in them.

  She couldn’t run.

  A car reversed from a parking bay and behind her a car boot slammed. She passed a line of people queuing at the ticket machine and no one gave her a second glance. She forced herself to take slow, deep breaths until the feeling of panic began to subside.

  Inside the terminal doors she shook out her umbrella and tucked it under her arm, grateful to be out of the weather and the sickening smell of jet fuel. She looked at the overhead monitor. The plane hadn’t arrived yet. She had ten minutes to collect her thoughts, stop thinking about the mess she’d made of her personal life and concentrate on where she was and what she was doing now.

  Looking past the crowds of travel-weary people jostling around the luggage carousels, she spotted a counter at the terminal’s far end. It would be a handy thing to lean on, she thought as she navigated her way towards it. After producing a strip of card she’d kept dry under her suit jacket, she began to search her bag for the marker pen she’d pinched from Wayne’s desk.

  Her bag was a bottomless pit tonight, the pen buried beneath all the debris. She began to unpack her things to find it. Her purse went next to her ID wallet, latex gloves, handcuffs and pepper spray. Her keys, a mouse-nest of tissues and an old dummy for emergencies joined the pile, then a ragged article about George Clooney torn slyly from a hairdresser’s mag. At last she found the pen—things were looking up, it hadn’t leaked.

  ‘Yessss,’ she hissed under her breath and tossed the junk back into her bag. She began to write his name on the card.

  ‘Are you looking for me?’ The smooth voice, the sudden hand on her shoulder, made her start.

  ‘Sorry to startle you, but you looked as if you were about to write my name—James De Vakey.’

  She turned to see a tall, slender man in a cashmere overcoat. The smug smile he offered suggested he’d delighted in catching her off guard.

  ‘Mr De Vakey? I’m sorry, I didn’t think your plane had arrived yet,’ she said, making a quick recovery.

  ‘They offered me an earlier flight. I’ve been in about half an hour. I was in the bar watching the press conference on the news.’

  Stevie took his hand and introduced herself. His grip was firm and cool, the skin of his hands as soft as his wool coat. His grey eyes scanned her body with disconcerting scrutiny. Men often gave her the eye, despite her efforts to the contrary, and she found herself fighting the urge to turn away.

  He said, ‘I’m sorry to have to drag you out to the airport on such a foul night. I’m sure you’d far rather be at home with your daughter.’

  She gaped at him for several seconds before managing to say, ‘My daughter? How...?’

  He nodded towards the pink dummy still pinched between her thumb and forefinger. ‘Just an educated guess, DS Hooper, and I can see by your reaction that I’m correct.’

  Stevie managed to stop the dive her right hand made for her left, a reflexive attempt to cover her naked ring finger. Fuck him, she thought. If he wants to read me, let him. Let’s just hope he’s as accurate at reading our killer. She looked down at his fine leather brogues as she struggled to regain control. A small suitcase and a laptop bag seemed to be his only luggage.

  ‘If you have your things, Sir, I can take you to the hotel now. Inspector McGuire was hoping to meet us in the bar a little later on to go over the case, if you’re not too tired.’

  ‘The sooner I can get started the better. Lead the way.’

  When she turned, she glimpsed her reflection in the darkened terminal window. She looked confused and ill at ease, quite unlike her usual self. As she led the way to the exit she hoped the shiver running up her spine was not as obvious as it felt.

  2

  The success of the manhunt will depend upon the strengths and weaknesses of the team sent out to capture him.

  De Vakey, The Pursuit of Evil

  Monty stepped into the welcoming ambience of the hotel lobby, pausing to roll his shoulders in an attempt to untangle the knots he’d felt tightening since the beginning of the press conference. His pause also allowed the woman who’d been following him to catch up. She almost crashed into him when she stepped from the revolving door, filling the air in the lobby with an incongruous
mixture of wet wool and Coco Chanel.

  ‘Michelle, what a pleasant surprise,’ he said, showing no pleasure at all. Tracking him through the rain and sacrificing an expensive coiffure was a sign of desperation for a woman like Michelle. He’d give her five minutes.

  ‘You obviously need to talk, though why you couldn’t ring for an appointment beats me.’ He took her elbow and guided her towards a cluster of potted ferns in the corner of the hotel lobby.

  ‘I should have known I’d find you in a hotel.’ She glanced at her image in the gilt-framed mirror on the wall and her look of scorn turned into a scowl as she attempted to fluff her hair.

  Monty raised his eyebrows. ‘Haven’t I already warned you tonight about the folly of making assumptions?’

  Her hand dropped. She faced him head on. ‘You made a fool of me at the press conference.’

  ‘I merely beat you to the punch.’

  ‘Someone has to speak in the public’s best interest. People are getting hysterical, Monty. Perth hasn’t been so traumatised since the Birney murders. The public want answers. They want to know that they can trust their safety to the police, that the killer will be caught.’

  ‘Rekindling public hysteria over the Kings Park murders isn’t going to help us catch this killer.’

  With a soft smile and a hand on his arm she tried a different tack. ‘Come on, loosen up. You and I both know there’s a lot more to this than meets the eye. I’m onto something, Monty, I’m nearly there, with just a little help from you—’

  ‘What are you onto? I’m in no mood for game playing.’

  She dropped her hand and hardened her tone. ‘What I’ve discovered will stir up an ants’ nest for the police, but given the right incentive, I might be able to carry out the necessary damage control.’

  ‘And what might that incentive be?’

  ‘To-the-minute updates on the case.’

  ‘You get that anyway.’

  ‘Don’t give me that crap!’

  ‘Michelle, you know we have to be careful about the information we give out. We can’t warn the killer we’re onto him.’

  And that wasn’t the only reason, Monty thought. Once, in happier times and in a private moment, he’d speculated with her about the rumours he’d heard about the KP murders, only to find a distorted version of his words staring back at him from the paper the next morning. She must have waited for him to fall asleep before emailing the pressroom.

  ‘That old cliché?’ she said. ‘You know damn well they use it as a cover-up for their own corruption, incompetence at the very least. You hinted as much the last time.’

  ‘Okay, okay, maybe in the past, but with a new team...’

  ‘For God’s sake pull your head out of the sand, Monty. You still have the same moronic porker at the top of the pile!’

  ‘Things are different now.’

  Her gaze fell to his feet, she gave an unladylike snort. ‘And I see you still have that same old pilot’s briefcase. I’m surprised you never threw it away, but I suppose if the catch still works, why bother—you were always a believer in function, not form.’

  Michelle bent at the knees and flicked the catch. Monty watched her hand creep to the file he’d prepared for De Vakey, allowing her to get as far as caressing the edge with her fingertips.

  ‘What’s this about?’ she said, licking her lips like a lioness eyeing an antelope. His hand clamped around her wrist. She yelped. Heads turned in the lobby.

  Michelle hissed her breath through her teeth. ‘Get your hands off me.’

  A suited gentleman he presumed to be the hotel manager approached. Monty rose to his feet, pulling Michelle up with him and flicked his ID at the man. ‘Police,’ he said. ‘Please call security and have them escort this lady from the hotel. She’s a known troublemaker.’

  Michelle’s eyes widened and Monty waited for the explosion. She didn’t disappoint. Whirling to face the manager she said, ‘That’s a pack of lies! You saw him, didn’t you? You saw what he did?’

  The manager put a hand lightly on her arm and said something in a placatory tone before turning to Monty with a look of helplessness.

  Monty shrugged and picked up his briefcase. ‘She’s your problem now, mate.’ He gave Michelle a calculated wink and turned in the direction of the hotel lounge.

  ***

  Stevie seemed to be the only one in the lounge who noticed the ruckus coming from the lobby, and even to her it was no more than a minor rip in a tranquil sea. A woman’s agitated voice, gruff masculine tones, then Monty’s silhouette in the entrance. As he scanned the tables, the air around him was soothed by the gentle strains of Gershwin from the baby grand in the corner.

  ‘Inspector McGuire?’ De Vakey queried.

  Stevie nodded and let out a silent sigh of relief. Waiting with the profiler had been awkward. She’d had just about enough of De Vakey’s penetrating gaze and invasive questioning for one night—now it was Monty’s turn.

  Monty ordered from the bar then ambled over to join them. She made the introductions and they exchanged small talk until his drinks arrived: a beer and a tomato juice. He fumbled around in the pockets of his suit coat for a plastic bag of dried chilli and added a generous pinch to his Virgin Mary. He didn’t touch the beer.

  De Vakey gave Monty a subtle nod of understanding, reinforcing Stevie’s earlier impression that there was a lot more to the man than a handsome face and a Geelong Grammar accent. Monty liked to practise his self-control—so what. But what else had De Vakey picked up on? She found her foot tapping a rhythm totally unrelated to the melody from the piano and had to force herself to stop.

  ‘Has DS Hooper filled you in on the details, Sir?’ Monty asked.

  ‘Please, call me James. I’m a civilian consultant, not a policeman. Let’s dispense with the formalities.’

  ‘Suits me,’ Monty said. He removed the file from his briefcase and glanced around the lounge as he did so, ready to keep it from prying eyes if necessary. ‘It’s all here,’ he said, sliding it across the table to De Vakey. ‘Bar a few test results we’re still waiting on.’

  De Vakey flicked through the autopsy photographs as if looking at pictures from the Woman’s Weekly. ‘I’m going to have to keep these for a while. I’ll need time to study them.’

  Monty leaned to the side and picked up a plastic bag by his seat. ‘I’d like you to look at these, too. They’re videotapes of the witness interviews. I’ve had an office at Central cleared for you and set up a TV and VCR.’

  ‘I plan on working in my hotel room,’ De Vakey said. ‘I’ll have the management install a VCR. I don’t want any distractions. I have to have quiet and plenty of time to think. He gestured to them both. ‘Have either of you worked with a criminal profiler before?’

  Stevie said, ‘No, but I think most of our team have read your books. We know what you’re about.’

  ‘And we know about your research at Quantico,’ Monty added. ‘We’re going to need an accurate profile of this offender if we’re going to get him. This case is like nothing I’ve ever come across before.’ He let his hands drop in a gesture of helplessness. ‘It has me baffled.’

  ‘Well, I’m glad you called me in,’ De Vakey said.

  Stevie wondered if De Vakey had any idea of the amount of red tape Monty had to cut through to get him here.

  ‘I’d imagine your more conservative colleagues would have baulked at the idea,’ De Vakey said.

  He was a mind-reader too; she’d already guessed as much.

  ‘Criminal profiling is an art more than a science, some even see it as psychic quackery, I’m afraid.’

  ‘That’s not how I see it,’ Monty said. ‘I’ve lost count of the number of cases from the States that have been solved with the help of a profiler, and I know the Victorian police often use your services. I want this creep caught. I don’t care how unconventional your methods are, just so long as you help us get the bastard.’

  ‘I’m glad I have your confidence.’ De Vakey dr
ained his glass and signalled the waitress for another. ‘Now,’ he rubbed his hands together, ‘I’ve heard Stevie’s account, let me hear yours.’

  Monty tapped at the file with his finger. ‘It’s all here.’

  ‘Humour me,’ De Vakey said with the flash of a smile.

  ‘The body was discovered outside the bank by a security guard at six-thirty am, just as it was getting light.’

  Stevie smiled to herself. Monty wouldn’t be getting away that easily.

  The profiler held up his hand to prove her right. ‘I don’t want a standard police report. I want to hear it from your point of view and your point of view only. It helps me to put your account into the right perspective. Where were you when you heard the news?’

  Monty shifted in his chair. ‘I was in bed.’

  ‘Were you sound asleep? Were you with someone or were you alone? Drinking a cup of tea, watching the early morning news?’ De Vakey asked.

  Monty glanced at Stevie. Under the table she pressed the toe of her shoe into his shin. Hard. She hadn’t been able to wriggle out of it, and neither would he.

  Monty sucked in a breath. ‘I was alone. I’d had a bad night. I was semi-awake when the phone rang. I was glad to have something to get out of bed for. I had no idea what the day had in store for me. All Central said was that a body had been discovered at the bank. I rang Stevie and we arrived at the same time.’

  ‘What did you see when you first arrived?’

  ‘Some uniforms were already at the scene. I was pleased to see that they’d taped off a wide area; there was already a crowd of early morning gawkers gathering around. I told the cop to call for reinforcements. I didn’t want any of the general public seeing the body, though I’m sure several already had.’ He grimaced. ‘It was hard to hide.’

  ‘Then what happened?’

  ‘The cop took us over to the body.’

  ‘Describe it. Tell me how you felt when you saw it,’ De Vakey coaxed, his voice soft and low, his deep grey eyes fixed steadily on Monty’s. The ability to extract information was a talent as rare and as specific as water divination. In the hands of a gifted interrogator such as De Vakey, the average witness gushed. Wise to the craft, Stevie and Monty were hardly your average witnesses, but she could see the technique working on Monty.