Violent Exposure (7 page)

‘Do you know Stewart Bridges?’ she asked.

They shook their heads. ‘Who’s
he?’

‘We believe he’s a friend,’ Ella said. ‘Have you met any of their friends?’

Lydia said, ‘We’ve met Lucy and Daniel, and Susie talked about Katie and Peta with an A and Scott.’

Ella scribbled the names. ‘She never mentioned a friend who’s a photographer?’

‘No,’ William said, then, sadly, his voice breaking again, ‘Can we see her?’

Glebe Morgue just before dawn was about as chilly emotionally
as a place could be. Suzanne’s body hadn’t long arrived, and Ella and Dennis sat with the Sheppards in the family room until a staff member came to get them.

They followed the man down the corridor and into the viewing room, their footsteps loud in the silence. The Sheppards held hands so tightly their fingers were white. Ella felt the cold sink into her soul.

Dennis said, softly, ‘If you could
just tell us please whether it’s her.’

The staffer lifted back a sheet and William let out a wail that reverberated off the walls and straight through Ella’s head.

‘It’s her,’ Lydia cried, then sobs burst from her with such force Ella feared her heart might come out next.

‘I’m sorry,’ Dennis said, the words all but lost in the sounds.

Ella felt her phone vibrate and went back into the corridor.
‘Marconi.’

‘It’s Jen Katzen.’ The detective sounded excited. ‘The Crawfords’ car was snapped by a red-light camera on Elizabeth Street in Strawberry Hills about twenty past three.’

‘Fantastic,’ Ella said. ‘Any traffic cameras around there that’d let us see our bad boy’s face?’

‘We’re on it.’

‘Thanks.’ Ella hung up then peered back into the room to see Dennis standing with his arms around the
Sheppards as they sobbed.

Ella closed her eyes and thought about a man driving through the city, the cameras everywhere tracking his path and building a route map of images for them to discover.

A
t 7 am the full meeting room smelled of coffee. Every detective held a cup and most shovelled in pastries as well. Ella’s was as black as tar and even loaded with sugar it tasted foul, but the caffeine zinged into her cells and increased the tingling in her spine until she found it almost impossible to stand still.

When everyone was seated and silent, Dennis told them about the talk with
the Sheppards, the lack of information on Connor’s family, and the discovery of the bloody knife in the hedge. Ella described Aidan’s story and the response of Stewart Bridges to the second round of questions. Hepburn said that a Google search of Bridges’ work had turned up only the kind of portfolio he’d claimed: weddings, portraits and commercial stuff. Not the sinister skulls and bizarre nudes
Ella had almost hoped for.

‘Canvassers?’ Dennis said.

Steve Mitchell flattened out his notebook. ‘We found two residents in the street who said they saw a small red car driving north at about half past eleven, fifteen minutes before Bridges claims he found the body. One said he thought it was a Honda, the other couldn’t say. The first witness thought he saw one person in the vehicle. The other,
again, couldn’t say. Neither noticed the plates. Both said it was speeding, which was why they noticed it.

‘Three residents heard what they believed was a scream at around eleven. One was that woman across the street, who didn’t get up to look. The other two thought it was somebody’s television turned up too loud. Neither of them went to investigate either.

‘People said generally they had no
problem with the Crawfords – didn’t even know them for the most part. Seems to be about standard for the street. A couple of people mentioned seeing the police and ambulance there at the time of that domestic call but none had heard any sounds of fighting.

‘At five houses in the street, including one directly next door to the Crawfords, we got no answer. We’re going back later.’

‘How’d you go
with the description of the man that Bridges gave?’

‘Interesting,’ Detective David Watkins said. ‘Because we only have his word that the man went south, we searched north too but got nothing there at all. Going south, there’s a twenty-four-hour convenience store six hundred metres down the street on the same side as the Crawfords’. The employee was standing on the street having a smoke at midnight
when a man roughly matching that description came past. He said the man was walking quickly with his head down, and when he glanced up and saw him he veered off and crossed the road. The employee watched him take the next street left and thought no more of it until we turned up. We showed him the photo of Connor but he didn’t think it was him. The CCTV covers an area near the door and we managed
to get this off the system.’

He handed around grainy black and white images. Ella inspected hers. The employee stood with his back to the door, one hand in his pocket, and in the top of the picture a man was moving out of frame and stepping off the curb. Dark clothes, long pants and a long-sleeved shirt. Dark hair. She picked up the photo of Connor but it was impossible to say if it was him.

‘They get many people coming past at that time of night?’ she asked.

‘Nope,’ Watkins said. ‘He said there’d been two half-pissed girls and one old lady on a ride-on scooter in the twenty minutes prior, and nobody at all in the same period after.’

‘He notice blood on his clothes?’

Watkins shook his head.

‘Six hundred metres in fifteen minutes,’ Ella said.

‘I know, it’s slow,’ Watkins said.
‘It should only have taken him about eight to ten.’

‘If it was even the guy Bridges claims he spoke to,’ Daniel Farley said.

Dennis said, ‘Search the gardens and drains and so on in that six hundred in case he was delayed by hiding something. And see if you can find where he went from there.’

‘Okay,’ Watkins said.

Ella nodded at Detective Katzen to go next.

Jen told the group about the Crawfords’
car being snapped by a red-light camera. ‘That was at twenty past three. The RTA’s checking the other cameras in the area. They said they should be able to give us images of the front of the car in enough detail that we can look at the driver.’

‘Great,’ Ella said. ‘Laurel? Daniel?’

‘We interviewed Katie Notts, the friend Bridges mentioned,’ Laurel Macy said. ‘Katie said she’d remembered her
partner, Peta Davies, telling her that Suzanne had made it clear a couple of times over the past year or so that the relationship wasn’t all roses. Peta had said that Suzanne had told her Connor had a secret, and when Peta asked if she thought he was having an affair, she said it was nothing like that but wouldn’t be drawn further. Peta is currently on a flight back from a business trip in the UK
and lands this morning.’

‘We then spoke to the other friends,’ Daniel Farley said.

‘They’d all figured out that Connor might be in the frame but swore he’d never do such a thing. Lucy Cavasini and Dan Kennedy-Jones had been working till midnight in their restaurant in Waverley and hadn’t seen or heard from Connor since a birthday dinner held there for Peta last week.

‘Scott Barnley said he
met Connor yesterday afternoon in a pub at about two. They watched some horse races and had a few beers. He said Connor had been fine, cheerful. Connor had told him that Suzanne was meeting an old schoolfriend for lunch. He said Connor was talking about their plans for the nursery. They went their separate ways at about four. Ben Morton, Scott’s partner, wasn’t there. They were home together last
night and said they’ve had no contact with Connor.’

Laurel Macy said, ‘None of them had been taken into confidence by Suzanne, or suspected anything was wrong. They all said that when they’d last seen Suzanne and Connor together, at the party last week, they’d seemed happy together. Perfectly normal, they said.’

Ella fought not to bounce from foot to foot.
Perfectly normal on the outside. But
on the inside, a secret.

Glorious.

By the end of the meeting, Dennis’s lopsided capitals covered the whiteboard and people were shifting in their chairs. If they didn’t get out soon, Ella was going to have to pace and maybe scream as well. Meetings were necessary but she’d always,
always
, rather be out doing something – talking to possible witnesses or suspects, following leads, checking CCTV,
even sitting on the most boring surveillance – than sitting about in here.

‘Round two,’ Dennis said. ‘Mitchell, take your team back for the rest of the canvassing. Watkins and Hastings, follow up on Bridges’ mystery man. Katzen and Murphy, get onto the phone records for the Crawfords’ home and business and their mobiles too, and also keep checking about the car. Hepburn, get the photo of Connor
and the CCTV image from the convenience store to the media with the usual story that we want to speak to these men as possible witnesses, not suspects. Ella and I have the post-mortem this morning, then we’ll visit the Crawfords’ nursery, and we’re still looking into Connor’s next of kin as well. Call if you need to, otherwise back here at one.’

Stewart Bridges had moved his chair to the corner
of the interview room and was resting his head against the walls. His eyes were red and his face pale behind his dark stubble.

‘I want to go home,’ he said.

‘It won’t take much longer,’ Ella said sweetly. ‘Could you move back here, please?’

He shuffled his chair to the table and Ella held out the CCTV photo. ‘Do you know this man?’

‘No.’

‘Is he the man you walked into outside the Crawfords’
house?’

Bridges rubbed his eyes. ‘Hard to say.’

Ella propped her chin in her hand. Dennis crossed his legs and laced his hands in his lap. Bridges frowned under the scrutiny. ‘I can’t really see him well enough, but I don’t think it’s him.’

‘How is this man different from the one you bumped into?’ Ella said.

More frowning. ‘He might be taller? I don’t know.’ Bridges clutched his shoulders.
‘I really want to go home. I can, can’t I, if I’m not under arrest? I’m so tired.’

Ella looked at Dennis. He exhaled through his teeth. ‘Okay. We’re going to need all your clothes.’

‘Huh?’

‘You bumped into him and he could be the killer,’ Dennis said. ‘He might’ve left evidence on you. So.’ He gestured. ‘Clothes off. We’ll take your prints too, in case you touched anything in the house.’ Bridges
sighed.

Ella stood up. ‘We’ll give you something to wear home.’ There was a box of old clothes out by the cells.

He started unbuttoning his shirt. ‘And you’ll give me a lift back to my car, right?’

Ella found a worn tracksuit, too short in the limbs, and a constable to drive him back to his car at the Crawfords’ house.

In the corridor, Dennis checked his watch. ‘Forty minutes till the PM starts.
You hungry?’

Glebe Morgue looked better in sunshine. Ella walked in ahead of Dennis, full of eggs Benedict and buzzing from still more coffee, keen to see what the post-mortem would reveal.

The business side of the place smelled as it always did, of disinfectant and cold meat, like a cross between a hospital and butcher’s shop. Suzanne Crawford’s body was laid out on the table and Dr Sam Fielding
was readying her equipment with the help of her assistant.

‘Hi, guys,’ she said. ‘Lovely day.’

‘It is indeed.’ Dennis laid down the evidence bag containing the knife from the hedge.

Sam smiled, then turned to the body, which had been photographed and washed. ‘Formalities first: can you confirm the identity of this person?’

‘Suzanne Crawford, identified by her parents,’ Dennis said.

‘Ta.’
Sam began by examining the stab wounds. ‘Measure up that knife there, please, Helen.’

Her assistant bent over the bag with a ruler. Ella looked past her to Suzanne’s body, so still and silent on the stainless-steel table. Right now the only flaws in her skin were the stab wounds, but soon Sam would make the Y incision running from both shoulders to the pit of her stomach then down the length
of her belly. She would slice around the back of her head and roll her scalp forward to her eyebrows so she could examine her brain. She would lift out the internal organs, lungs and liver heavy in her gloved hands, intestines like slippery ropes, all to be weighed and measured and cut apart. This time yesterday Suzanne might’ve been full of eggs Benedict herself. Ella shivered.

Helen said, ‘Blade
width three-point-five at the hilt, length twenty centimetres.’

Sam turned from the body and inspected the knife. ‘This is it. Look.’

Ella came close.

‘These marks on her skin here are from the hilt,’ Sam said. ‘The knife went in all the way on two of the three wounds. The marks are the same size and shape, plus see how there’s a chip out of the hilt just there? The same defect is visible on
her skin.’ She held a magnifying glass so they could see. ‘This is your murder weapon.’

Ella clenched her fists behind her back.

Sam picked up a probe and a light and leaned over the wounds. ‘Hmm. Something in here.’

Ella leaned in beside her.

‘Something very small.’ Sam picked up a pair of fine tweezers. After a moment of careful work she lifted a thin piece of grey plastic from deep in one
of the wounds.

‘Looks like duct tape,’ Ella said.

‘The knife may have been used to cut tape just before the killing,’ Sam said. ‘Or she was stabbed through it.’

‘But she wasn’t bound.’

‘That we know of,’ Dennis said.

‘I’ll look for traces,’ Sam said.

‘Maybe it was on somebody else.’

‘Or it could be incidental,’ Sam said. ‘Search the house, see if there’s tape like that anywhere. We’ll do
an analysis later and find out for sure what it is.’

She took up a scalpel and began to cut. Ella watched with a combination of awe and aversion. The doctor handled her tools with grace and dexterity, and to see what was inside us all was fascinating, but Ella could never forget that she had stood in this person’s house, looked at them smiling from photos, seen the place they slept, and talked
with the people who loved them. It wasn’t easy to watch, but you never knew what else Sam might find.