Blood Work (19 page)

The paramedic
grumbled but bound up Erin’s shoulder and then helped her back into
her torn and bloodied blouse.

“Erin McRea,
and this is Ivan Vorel, my assistant.”

Courey peered
at Ivan’s blank face. “He okay?”

“First
timer.”

“Get him to a
pub ASAP and he’ll come good. Now, I assume this isn’t your first,
then.”

“I was a cop
in the city for nine years. Seen a few things.”

The detective
grunted. “I bet you did. A few transfers have been offered to me
over the years. Wouldn’t touch any of them with a ten foot barge
pole. So, any ideas who did this here?”

Erin
hesitated. She’d seen the driver, but she didn’t believe her eyes,
let alone give this guy a snowflake’s chance in hell of believing
her. She decided to go with the partial truth.

“No idea. But
the driver was pretty distinctive looking. Narrow face, flat nose,
big ears.”

Courey noted
that down. “Recognise him in a line up?”

“Shit yeah.”
Though she doubted they’d ever get him in one. If he was caught, he
would probably be sent straight to some institution for study.

“And what were
you doing here today?”

Erin found a
crumpled card in a pocket and handed it over. “I’m on a missing
person’s case. Though I don’t think he’s missing so much as just
doesn’t want to be found. This is the address he gave to hospital
staff last night. I was here trying to find out what I could about
him.”

“Who’s the
bloke?”

She told him
and sketched out the bones of what she already had. Courey
dutifully wrote it all down.

“And you think
the drive-by had something to do with your investigation?”

“Possibly. It
was me he was aiming at and I was in front of Hawkins’ last known
address. If it had nothing to do with my investigation then it
definitely had something to do with him.”

Courey eyed
her speculatively. “You were a target of opportunity?”

“Maybe.”

“Who’s your
client?”

“That’s
confidential.”

“If one of
those kids dies this becomes a murder investigation. You’ll have to
spill the beans then. May as well get some practice.”

Erin snorted.
“Oh come on. You know I can’t do that. It’s a breach of the trust
the client has placed in me as a discreet investigator. Sure, you’d
get your information but you wouldn’t respect me afterward. Not to
mention my boss. I’m not giving you my client’s name.”

Courey sighed.
“All right. Just know that if anything I find so much as smells
like you or your investigation, I will be getting a court order to
get your files.”

“I would
expect no less,” Erin said sweetly. “But I don’t think this had
anything to do with my client. It’s unlikely they’d pay for a hit
on an investigator they’d hired.”

“Maybe they’d
thought you’d found this Hawkins character and decided to take him
out, and you at the same time. Two birds, one stone.”

Ivan
shuddered. “Why would they take us out?”

“Do you do the
accounts, young man? How much does your boss charge per day?”

“But Mrs—”

Erin nudged
him hard. “That’s enough, Ivan. Don’t worry. The hit wasn’t on us.”
She glared Courey. “Is that all, Detective?”

He grunted.
“For now. You’ll both be down the station to give your full
statements within a half hour.” It was not a question.

The paramedic,
who’d been tidying up the back of the ambulance, said, “Make that
two hours. She’s going to get her shoulder stitched first. And he
needs his hands properly cleaned.”

Courey
scowled. “Whatever. Don’t be late.”

He wandered
back over to the main gaggle of police. Erin sighed. It was going
to be a long evening.

She and Ivan
were cycled through the hospital’s emergency department fairly
quickly, a stern faced senior constable encouraging the nursing
staff and doctors along with nothing but his steely presence. Then
they were chauffeured to the Ipswich station to make their
statements. Erin repeated her toned down description of the driver
several times and then went through it all again with the composite
artist. At the end they had a picture of a thin-faced, broad-nosed
bald guy with jug-handle ears. Weird, but human. By that time, Erin
was almost willing to swear on a stack of Bibles that the picture
was exactly what she’d seen. She didn’t want it to be anything
else.

As she was
collecting a weary Ivan from the visitors lounge, more than ready
to head home and crawl into her bed, Detective Courey found
her.

“McRea, I was
wondering if I could discuss a few things with you.”

Ivan sighed
and slumped back into his chair. He pulled out his mobile phone and
looked at Erin, eyebrows raised in question. She nodded and he
dialled her home number to make sure Gavin’s wife Kate was still
able to stay with William.

“This way,”
Courey said and led her to his office. It was tiny and cramped and
Erin had to clamber over an archive box of files to get to the seat
Courey indicated. “I checked out your credentials, McRea. You’re
legit.”

“Well, thanks
for telling me. I appreciate knowing. Was that all?”

He very
pointedly didn’t respond, instead opening a folder and glancing
over the contents. “I pulled the file on Matthew Hawkins. He’s got
a history.”

“I know. The
assault and a stint in prison.”

“Few other
things besides. He’s on his second lot of court ordered anger
management therapy. The first lot was because of the assault, the
second stemmed from an indecent exposure incident.”

Erin leaned
forward. “How did that come about?”

“Report says
he was seen chasing a woman through the Queen Street Mall early in
the a.m. He caught her and in the tussle, he somehow lost his
pants.”

“Rape?”

“No. Witness
says that it was the woman who tore the pants off him while he
tried to fend her off.”

“Not just a
case of victim gets the upper hand for once?”

“Could be, but
I doubt it. He claimed she had been taking injured animals from
vets around the city and killing them.”

“What did she
say?”

“Nothing. She
got away and never came forward. In the end, all they could get him
on was the exposure. His history was enough for the judge to send
him off to a shrink.”

“How long ago
was this?”

“About three
months. Establishing a time line?”

Erin sighed.
“Trying to. The man doesn’t stick in one place for long.”

“The hospital
last night?”

She
nodded.

“Yeah, I read
that report. Guy’s got some issues, that’s for sure. Chasing down
alleged animal killers, getting beat up by unknown thugs. He’s got
several speeding fines, as well as a couple of charges for
destruction of public property. Always pays his fines up front with
cash.”

“I figured as
much. And now he’s got someone who seriously wants him dead.”

“Or just very
scared.”

Erin asked,
“Why are you sharing this with me?”

Courey sucked
his teeth for a moment, clearly not liking what he was about to
say. “My captain read up about you, as well. He thinks you’re some
bit of hot shit. Figures you might actually find this guy before we
do, or the folks gunning for him. You’re private. He might not
actually smell you coming.”

Erin’s cheeks
warmed up. “Well, that’s a nice thing to say. Thank you. Have you
heard about the two kids?”

“Yeah, they’re
both gonna be fine.”

“That’s the
best thing you’ve said yet.” She didn’t even think before asking,
otherwise she probably wouldn’t have. “Can you run down a car rego
for me?”

He studied her
for a long moment, not quite meeting her eyes, but not bothering to
look anywhere else, either. “I suppose. Is it part of the
case?”

“Could be.”
She dug through her bag and pulled out the picture from the
hospital security camera. “That’s our guy right there, the tall one
with his arse hanging out of the hospital gown. The other two
helped him escape the ED very early this morning.”

Courey turned
to his computer and began plugging in details. Erin waited as
patiently as she could but it was a hard thing watching him type
with two fingers. Finally, he sat back and read off the screen.

“Silver Toyota
Prado registered to Robert Robertson. Apart from being pretty sad
in itself, that name mean anything to you?”

“Not right
now, but it might soon. Got an address there?”

He wrote it on
a scrap of paper and handed it over.

“Does Hawkins
have a car registered in his name?” she asked while Courey was
feeling generous.

Courey pulled
in a deep breath and began tapping away again. Erin resisted the
urge to throw herself over the desk and do it for him.

“He does. A
black Holden Monaro, address of residence the same one that just
got hit. Oh, and the boy’s got personalised number plates. Nit
sill.”

“Nit sill?”
Erin got up and leaned over the desk to look for herself. The
screen displayed NYT CLL. She muttered it a few times, eventually
settling on, “Night cell. At least, that’s about the only thing
that might make sense.”

“In someone’s
crazy world, sure.” He yawned. “I’ve got your number if I need to
call you.”

Erin got the
hint and said goodbye. No one interrupted her escape this time and
Ivan collapsed into the passenger seat of her car, which some nice
officer had brought to the station for her, and promptly fell
asleep. She took him home, walked him up to his apartment and
handed him over to his boyfriend. Brad put him to bed and then Erin
told him the basics of what had happened, just so he knew what he
might be dealing with if Ivan had nightmares. She said Ivan wasn’t
expected at work the next day and then left.

She reached
her own home around three a.m. and found Kate asleep on the couch.
Rather than disturb her, Erin put a light blanket over her and went
to check on William. He too was sleeping. She stood in the door to
his room for a long time, just watching him, trying to reconcile
this wasted shadow with the vital, energetic man she’d married five
years ago.

Had it only
been five years? Sometimes it felt like a lifetime since she hadn’t
had to worry about safe guarding against infections and slogging
through sessions of chemotherapy and radiotherapy and God knows
what else the doctors had tried over the years. Decades since she’d
made the painful decision to leave the police force and take the
job with Sol Investigations just to earn enough money to get
William the care he needed and everything the doctors said might,
just might, possibly, help him survive for a few months more.

And then there
were the times she wondered if she should. He was in pain more
often than he wasn’t, though he faced it with an incredibly strong
and brave face. But there were nights—and it always seemed to be in
the night—when he broke down with the agony of the cancer
tunnelling through his bones. She would hold him and tell him it
would pass and that it would get better and she would hate herself
for lying to him when he really needed her honesty.

Still, he was
sleeping peacefully tonight, face smooth, eyes closed gently, chest
rising and falling in steady rhythm. She wanted to go to him, lay
her head on his chest and feel him living, reassure herself he was
still with her. But she had a fresh wound and despite the thorough
washing it had undergone, she didn’t dare risk getting close to
William until she was certain it was not infected.

Erin pulled
herself away from William’s room and wrote a note for Kate, asking
her to stay until the Blue Care nurse arrived in the morning. She
quickly and quietly packed a small overnight bag and left again.
There were showering facilities at the office building and a fairly
comfortable couch in her office. That would do her until she was
certain she wasn’t a danger to her husband.

There was dirt in my mouth when I
came to. I coughed to get it out and my chest ached. My throat was
sore and I’d bitten my tongue and inner cheek. Lovely. Apart from a
bit of pressure in my temples, my head didn’t hurt. However I’d
gone unconscious it hadn’t been from a blow to the head, which all
things considered, was fabulous news.

Opening gummy
eyes netted me zero more intelligence. Well, no. It gave me two
options. Number one, I was blind. Bit of a bummer if it was
correct. Number two, I was somewhere that was completely dark. For
the sake of my sanity I decided to go with option two. A moment
later, I realised that the rhythmic whooshing sound was me
breathing. Wherever I was it was very dark, and confined, and
stinky.

Oh dear
Lord.

I was in a
coffin.

Fumbling
around revealed only torn and slimy satin over a hard surface that
sat very close to my body. The sides of the coffin were right
there, bare inches from my shoulders and arms, the lid not much
further away from my face. The rhythmic whooshing lost its beat,
became erratic. My heart pounded so loud and fast I could hear it
echoing through the cramped space.

Let’s take a
moment here. I’m not claustrophobic. Not at all. But put anyone in
a used coffin and see if they don’t freak out.

I was buried
alive. Not only did I have the hard wood of the coffin to deal
with, but also crap knew how many meters of dirt on top. Ghouls are
the natural excavators of the supernatural world. They burrow
through cemeteries scavenging for food and make themselves lairs
under the ground. With no idea how long I’d been out, there was no
way to judge how deep they could have buried me. I could very well
be closer to freaking Alaska than Australia.

Okay, calm
down. Don’t use up all your air hyperventilating. You need to
think. You’re in a bit of trouble and you don’t know the entirety
of it. Must find out just how deep in the shit heap you are before
doing much else. For that, you need to get out of the box and look
around.