Assassin (28 page)

Early Friday morning, Andy’s phone rang.
It’s Jimmy
, was his first thought on coming violently into wakefulness.

He sat up and brought his mobile to his ear. ‘Flynn,’ he croaked.

‘How fast can you get to Davoren Lane?’ Inspector Kelley asked him abruptly.

Davoren Lane?

Andy looked at the hotel clock. It was five-thirty. ‘By six,’ he said, with a mouth that had instantly been drained of all moisture. ‘Another victim?’

‘Just get here,’ Kelley said sharply and hung up.

When Andy pulled into Davoren Lane there was no question where the action was. John Dayle’s terrace was cordoned off with police tape and the whole narrow alley was crawling with cops. He recognised two of them instantly: Mak’s friend Detective Karen Mahoney — and Agent Dana Harrison.

Andy parked his car carelessly just beyond the action and stepped out, confused by what he was seeing, his AFP
badge displayed for the benefit of a constable who waved him through as he ducked under the barrier. Andy’s eyes were fixed on Dana’s slumped figure. She turned her head slightly and he caught a glimpse of her puffy face in the early morning light. His heart constricted. Had she been crying? Oddly, she was wearing clothing that seemed not to fit. Denim jeans and a sports jacket, both too big? What the hell was she doing in Sydney? Doing
here
?

Detective Mahoney had an arm around her. She seemed to be comforting her.

‘What the hell’s going on?’ Andy blurted, feeling himself panic. He strode towards them, and Karen met his eyes with a look that told him to cool it. ‘What’s going on?’ he said, looking from her to Harrison.

Dana flicked her bloodshot eyes in his direction and then quickly looked to her feet. She appeared as white as paper. ‘Sorry, Andy,’ she said, and before he could ask her why she was there and what she was sorry for, Inspector Kelley emerged from the terrace.

Kelley waved Andy over. ‘Flynn. I need you over here.’ His eyes went from Andy to Dana and back again. ‘Now, please.’

Disoriented by Dana’s presence, Andy walked towards Dayle’s threshold, where Kelley pulled him to one side of the entrance. ‘Please tell me you don’t know anything about this,’ he said quietly before they went inside.

‘About what? What the fuck is going on? What is Agent Harrison doing here?’

Kelley watched him. ‘So you don’t know?’

‘I don’t know what?’ Andy thought he might punch the brick wall.

‘Dayle is dead,’ Kelley explained.

All things considered, the news was welcome. ‘What happened?
Why is Harrison here?
’ Andy asked.

‘Your agent is talking us through everything she remembers, which isn’t much. She was found here, unconscious, after a call to Triple 0 last night.’

Andy’s face froze for a moment, gaping.

‘She was taken to St Vincent’s.’

St Vincent’s.
His mind flashed to Jimmy and for a moment he tried unsuccessfully to piece together what had happened to Jimmy and what he was seeing now.

‘She was released half an hour ago,’ Kelley continued. ‘She says she’s fine. They did a rape kit and thankfully found no obvious evidence of any sexual assault. They kept her clothing to be tested, anyway. Blood tests haven’t come back, but it looks like she may have been drugged.’

Holy fucking hell.

Andy had to work hard to keep himself calm. ‘I don’t … understand. What was she doing here? Did he track her down? He
drugged her
?’

‘Your agent spent the evening at the White Cockatoo, Flynn. She was spotted being dragged here afterwards, according to an anonymous call.’

Andy’s mind scrambled to make the connection, and when it hit, it felt like a kick to the stomach. He recalled how Dana had reacted when she’d heard the surveillance team had been called away. How livid she’d been. Her reaction had given him pause, but he couldn’t have imagined she would do something like this. Just exactly what had she done?

‘This is the scene of a suspicious death now. Though it appears your agent was drugged — was a victim here — technically she will need to be cleared as a suspect.’

Andy’s head swam.

Kelley caught Andy’s eye and spoke in a low, steady voice. ‘You were right about Dayle. He’s our guy. There’s no question now. Your agent has been through a lot, so whatever her reasons for being at the White Cockatoo, take it easy on her, okay?’

Andy nodded. ‘Show me what we have.’

Kelley turned his back and stepped inside the terrace. Andy followed. ‘You’ve been in here before, yes?’

‘Yeah.’

They walked along the short hallway, past the base of a steep staircase, and stopped. Dayle was in front of them, surrounded by a small milieu of officers recording the scene. He was seated in his computer chair in the middle of the small lounge room. There was a lot of blood, all in the one area, soaking Dayle’s T-shirt, his pants, his shoes. There was a crimson pool under the chair.

His face was slack, eyes open, looking upwards.

The weapon, a knife, was on the floor, his right hand dangling above it. Thousands of Australians took their own lives each year, and many more attempted it, but it took a certain amount of dedication to open your own throat with a blade. It happened practically every year, even in Sydney, but it was quite rare compared with hangings, fatal jumps and intentional overdoses. Quite rare. Investigators had to consider it suspicious until fingerprints were taken and the angle of the cuts closely analysed. A quick glance told Andy that at least there had been no real struggle. No blood had hit the walls.

But the way Dayle had seemingly topped himself wasn’t the most interesting part. The most interesting part was the display that surrounded his blood-soaked figure. In a semicircle around
his thin corpse was a visual confession of his crimes. Weapons. A gag. News clippings. Souvenirs. Andy stepped towards the corpse and its grim accessories and bent to look at what was there, hands folded behind his back.

Yes. By all accounts Dayle appeared to be their man. And rather than be arrested he did …
this
?

‘So what do we know so far? Dayle was at the bar. He brought Harrison here and then …?’ Andy trailed off. ‘Intended to assault her but had a fit of remorse? Changed his mind about attacking her and instead attacked himself? Or maybe he’d intended her to witness his suicide? He recognised her from the police canvass and knew it was over?’

‘But why abduct her?’

‘Why set up this whole confessional scene? He wanted her to see it? To witness it?’ Andy theorised.

‘She doesn’t seem to think she witnessed anything. She told me she was at the bar and he came in, and then she started to feel very intoxicated and she blacked out.’

Rohypnol possibly, or GBH
, Andy thought.
Jesus, Dana.
He inhaled sharply. She was lucky to be alive.

‘Be easy on her,’ Kelley said again.

A uniformed constable opened the door for him and Andy saw a rainstorm had hit. Within Dayle’s dark house he hadn’t noticed the thunderous din of the rainfall outside. He could see Dana’s profile as she waited in a car in the lane, staying out of the downpour.

He paused before ducking under the police tape. ‘Are you finished with my agent for now?’

‘Yeah. I’d like to speak to her again this afternoon,’ Inspector Kelley said. ‘Or tomorrow, depending on how she’s doing.’

‘I’ll give you a call and we’ll come to your office.’

Andy ran over to Mahoney’s unmarked car, hands shielding his eyes from the wet. He knocked on the window and Karen opened the car door.

‘Quite a mess in there,’ she remarked and stepped out with an umbrella. She opened it and struggled to avoid jabbing him in the eye.

‘Thanks for your help, Mahoney. I’ll chat with Harrison now. Come on. Let’s go for something to eat,’ he told his junior agent. She walked with him to his Honda in a bleak march, shrugging off Mahoney’s umbrella and not even attempting to keep the raindrops off her own face. She slid into his passenger seat without a word and Andy started his car.

‘Okay, let’s have it,’ Andy said.

Agent Flynn and Agent Harrison sat at a small table in a mostly empty café in Darlinghurst. Before them were plates littered with the remnants of breakfast — scrambled eggs and scraps of toast. They were not far from St Vincent’s — the hospital where Andy’s agent had been treated overnight without his being told, and his closest friend, Jimmy, was, according to Angie, being prepped for further surgery for complications from the gunshot wound inflicted, some believed, by his ex-girlfriend Makedde.

It was not a good day and Andy was not feeling particularly patient.

‘I’m deeply sorry I’ve let you down. That’s all I can say,’ Agent Dana Harrison told him. She looked up at him with puffy red eyes, then looked to the table again. She gripped her ceramic coffee cup as though it were a lifeline.

‘No, that’s not all you can say,’ he countered, his voice low. ‘You can tell me what the hell you were thinking. I mean, what were you doing at the White Cockatoo?’

She hesitated, probably trying to decide what story to give. ‘I went out. I was having a drink,’ she said, cagey.

He crossed his arms and leaned back. ‘Any particular reason you picked that bar, in Sydney, to drink alone?’

She stared down at her plate. She’d barely eaten, he noticed. Andy let it go for a minute, let his question hang in the air. And then he couldn’t leave it be any longer.

‘Would I be safe in assuming that your gun is in your gun locker at AFP, locked away where it should be?’

She swallowed.

Fuck.
‘Please tell me I won’t find that you were at a bar, off duty, carrying a loaded gun?’

‘I fucked up,’ she said so quietly he could have missed it.

‘Dammit,’ he muttered. ‘You weren’t authorised. You didn’t have authority to go after him, Dana.’

‘I wasn’t really going after him. I was just … I was just going to see —’

‘You didn’t have authority to follow him. Or use yourself for bait, goddammit, if that’s what you were thinking. He could have killed you. He drugged you and he could have done anything. He could have used your own weapon on you.’

She raised her cup to her lips, hands shaking slightly.

Take it easy on her
, Inspector Kelley had said. Andy tried to calm himself. She had a promising career, but she’d shown poor judgement. Very poor judgement. She’d nearly got herself killed.

‘We’ll get through this. So what happened? What really happened?’ he pleaded softly and waited for her to answer in her own time.

‘I went to the bar and ordered a drink. A virgin cocktail,’ she explained. ‘I’m not stupid. Yes, I had my firearm on me,
but I was
not
drinking. After a while I spotted him. I was on my third cocktail by then, I think, and I swear none of them were alcoholic. You can ask the bartender. I noticed Dayle notice me and he walked past close and sat nearby. I was nervous and thirsty so I guess I drank my glass pretty fast after that. It didn’t taste different and I didn’t realise what was happening until it was too late. When the drink was nearly finished, he still hadn’t approached me again, but my head wasn’t right. I was feeling intoxicated, a bit light-headed. Before I knew it, he was right there next to me and I couldn’t … couldn’t …’

Andy leaned forwards, placing a hand on hers. ‘You’re okay. You’re okay now,’ he said.

Maybe he didn’t have to check into the firearm. She hadn’t discharged it. Dayle had not been killed with it. It might not come up as an issue, and if it did, he could say she had been on call and might have needed it. He could do that to cover her, couldn’t he?

‘So you weren’t drinking and the blood tests will show that?’ he pressed.

‘Yes,’ she said with conviction.

That was a small mercy.

‘Because if you were found to be out drinking, off duty, with your gun, I might not be able to prevent you from being charged.’

She nodded. ‘I was not drinking.’

‘Okay, then what happened?’ he prompted her.

‘Things seemed to go quickly. I was sweaty and … and I couldn’t think straight. Like I was disoriented and couldn’t focus on anything. And Dayle, whom I’d been watching, was suddenly very close, as I said. There were other patrons in the
bar, and I think I tried to call out but realised I couldn’t speak, and then I was just going out the door. I remember the fresh air on the street for a moment. I remember seeing the cars passing. He had me under the arm, I think. He seemed surprisingly strong. I don’t even remember walking, or how I got inside his house.’

Fuck. Anything could have happened to her. Anything.
‘And then what?’ he said.

‘I woke up at St Vincent’s. I was on a drip for hydration. I don’t know how I got there, but apparently paramedics took me. I don’t remember anything else except …’

‘Except?’

‘Well, this doesn’t make sense, but there was a woman’s voice telling me I would be okay.’

‘At the hospital?’

‘No. Before then. When I was in the house,’ she said.

‘You told Kelley this?’

‘I told him. I remember fragments, I think. But it’s confusing. I’m not sure what’s real and what isn’t. Something about my being on the floor and there being a conversation of some type. There was some talking, I think, between a man and a woman.’

‘Dayle was talking to you?’

‘No. Someone else I think.’ She frowned and took a moment to gather her thoughts. ‘I don’t know, Andy. I really don’t know.’

He rubbed his chin, which was rough with stubble. ‘Can you remember anything else?’

‘That’s it right now. There was basically nothing from about ten-thirty last night to five o’clock this morning at hospital. Nothing but these kind of impressions, like I said.’

He thought about that. ‘I want you to write down everything you remember, or think you remember, even if you aren’t sure, okay?’

She nodded.

‘You never know what might be important. Now, tell me, did you have anything to do with what happened to Dayle?’ He watched her carefully.