Chapter 20
“From what I head,” Roberts continued, “it was vampires. Massive blood loss through relatively minor puncture wounds. They must have beat him up first, though. Arms and legs were broken, ribs cracked, teeth knocked out.”
“Enough,” I ground out. “I get the picture.”
There was a short silence.
“Sorry,” Roberts said, but there was something in his voice that made me question the sincerity of it.
“I get it, okay,” I snapped. “I fucking get it. I got him killed. I know that. Do you think I don’t understand what I am? What sort of person would let a vampire live, Roberts? What sort of person would let that vampire out of his sight so she could go attack humans? The same sort of person who would leave another man defenceless against a threat I could have helped him prepare for. I know what I am, Roberts. I don’t need you reminding me that I’m a monst–”
“Shut the fuck up, you fucking idiot,” Roberts yelled. “You’re not a monster. I didn’t mean anything by it. Can’t I be a bit upset as well? They came after me, too, Matt.”
Somewhere in my tirade, I’d stood up. I sat again, hard.
“Jesus,” I breathed, all my self-indulgent guilt flying away in an instant. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I’m fine. They hit my apartment. Luckily I was out chasing down information about your cop. Got home about an hour ago. The place is trashed.”
“Excuse me,” I muttered and put the phone down.
I went out the back and down to the dock. I stood in the early morning sun, soaking it up for a moment, then I picked up the folding chair and smashed it into the banana lounge. I tore that bastard apart. I swung metal piping at the pilings of the dock. I punched the wooden planking. I snapped slates from the lounge over my knee. I growled at the world and gave it the finger.
When I could breathe steadily again, I turned and headed back inside. Charles was at his back door, cup of coffee in one hand, jaw dropped wide. I smiled nastily and waved. He just stared.
“You okay?” Roberts asked when I picked up the phone again.
“Yeah. Just a bit of therapeutic venting. I’m sorry, Roberts. I should never have dragged you into this.”
He was quiet for a moment, then scoffed. “If I remember correctly, I was the one who involved myself. You warned me off Mercy that first night, but I just had to chase her around. I didn’t even care if you were her boyfriend or not. It’s my own damned fault. Don’t beat yourself up about it.”
“Wasn’t myself I beat up. I’m going to need new deck furniture.”
“Dude. That’s some temper. And you’re not allowed to feel too guilty about Nolan, either.”
“Why not? It’s all because of me. They hit my place in Ipswich yesterday with a hired ghoul. They hit your place last night and they took out Nolan. Everything associated with me, even a little bit.”
It hit us both at the same time.
“Jacob.”
I hung up and called the store. He would be in by now. No question. There was no answer.
I don’t even know if I hung up that time. All I know is that I took off as fast as I could. The traffic was at the tail end of the morning rush, so I forced my way through it. It’s easy to be intimidating on the road when you have a car with a powerful engine and no compulsion not to use it. I’d taken a couple of advanced driving classes, but that had been mainly in ambulances. Still, same principles, smaller, faster car. I swung onto Edward Street in the city in what was probably record time, if not sound-barrier breaking.
Every park was already taken, so I slammed to a stop in the lane outside of Vogon Books and ignored the horns and shouts as I piled out, slid over the bonnet and raced into the bookstore.
I skidded to a stop just inside, heart stopping dead in my chest.
The place was a mess. Books and comics were scattered across the floor. One set of shelves was on a serious angle, propped up against a wall. The area before the counter had been cleared out and chairs were flung haphazardly across it. A pair of boots stuck out from behind the counter.
I flung myself over the counter and dropped down beside Jacob. He was sprawled across the floor, arms and legs thrown wide, head turned to one side. There were bite marks on his neck.
“Jacob,” I shouted and shook him. “Hey, Jake. Come on, mate. Don’t be dead.”
He twitched.
Oh, thank God. “Jacob, come on. Wake up. Talk to me.”
Jacob groaned and opened his eyes. “What you doin’, man? Leave a guy to die in peace.”
I straightened out his limbs and felt his neck for injuries. “You’re not going to die, Jacob. I won’t let you. And more importantly, I won’t let them win.”
“But I want to die. And who’s not going to win?”
Fingers on his pulse, I stopped long enough to smell his breath. “Jacob. Are you drunk?”
He clumsily slapped my hand away. “No, I’m hung over. I just got to sleep. Go away.”
I glanced at my fingers. They had red on them. I rubbed it between my fingers and it smeared and glittered just a little bit.
“Lip stick?”
Jacob grinned sloppily. “Yeah.”
I sat back on my heels. “You didn’t get attacked by vampires last night?”
“Sort of. Not a real one. Sally Burkenhoff. Man, she’s hot.”
My head was filling up with images I really didn’t want. I didn’t know Sally Burkenhoff, but the mere thought of anyone getting so busy they created the carnage in the shop was bad enough. At least he’d put his pants back on before passing out.
Jacob decided he wasn’t going to die and struggled up to lean against the counter. I sank down the wall and just stared at him. He still had that funny little smile on his face.
“Great party. You should have come. I left you a message. We had a Blade party. One, two and trinity. Fantastic stuff.”
“I didn’t get the message,” I said flatly.
“Pity. There was this girl here, all leggy and dark haired and big eyes. You would have liked her. Very Mercy-esk, but taller, and you know, human. I told her all about you. She’s interested. And cool. I mean, she really likes Blade.”
“Great,” I muttered. “Maybe we can go out on a date, fall in love, get married, have us a whole bunch of kids and die fucking horrible deaths because some mad vampire has marked my friends and acquaintances for death!”
As my voice rose, Jacob leaned further and further away from me, eyes widening until I could have tapped him on the back of his head and popped them out.
“Jesus, man. Do you know how much you scared me?” I demanded. “I thought you were dead. I thought you’d had all your blood sucked out. Don’t you ever do that to me again.”
“Sorry?” he hazarded.
“You should be.” I got to my feet and paced around the counter, lacing my hands together at the back of my head so I wouldn’t punch anything. “It’s getting bad, Jacob. I think you should shut up shop for a while, get out of town.”
Jacob pulled himself up the counter, leaned on it in his usual hunch. “What happened?”
“I don’t really want to talk about it.”
“I could help.”
I kicked a chair. “No, you couldn’t. You could just get dead, that’s all. Go away, Jake. Get Sally Whatshername and go screw yourselves silly in Sydney or Byron or Darwin. Just get out of town. Today. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred bucks. Do not wait for the dark.”
The phone rang. Jacob jumped about three feet in the air, came down gasping for breath and answered.
“Hey, Roberts. Yeah, he’s here. Acting strange, though.”
I glared at him. He just nodded and listened and then said, “He wants me to get out of town.” More listening and nodding. “Really?” His eyes bugged again. “That’s terrible.” After a moment, he nodded. “Sure, no worries. Right. I’ll put him on.”
He held the phone out to me. I snatched it up and he skittered away.
?
??What?”
Roberts sighed. “Calm down, Matt. It’s not Jacob’s fault he survived.”
“He scared me, man. I don’t need this aggravation.”
“What you need is a sleep. You’re getting cranky. Listen, I’ve convinced him to go visit his sister in Cairns for a while. Just leave him to it, okay? He’ll be gone before sunset, I promise.”
“I’ll hold you to that. What about you? What time you leaving?”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
The plastic of the phone creaked in my hand. “Why not?”
“Dude, you can’t deal with this on your own.”
“You were willing to leave me to it yesterday. What’s changed?”
There was silence. I couldn’t make out anything on the other end so I figured he was just thinking.
“I guess I felt a bit stupid for panicking yesterday.”
I grinned tightly. “I think you just found your balls. But seriously, this isn’t your fight. Get out while you still can.”
“Screw that. They made it my fight when they knocked my letter box over.”
“You live in an apartment. You don’t have a letter box to knock over.”
“Poetic licence. Listen, the cops are here to investigate the break in. I’ll call you when they’re gone, okay? Go home, get some sleep.”
“Whatever.” I hung up.
Jacob was standing in the middle of the shop, staring at the wreckage, shaking his head. “Great party,” he mumbled.
“Jacob.”
He flinched. “Yeah?”
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have got angry.”
Jacob shrugged and waved it aside, but I could tell something had changed. He knew all about vampires and Mercy and the other Old World creatures populating the shadows and alleys, but he’d never been out there mixed up in it all. He’d never been in a fight with a ghoul or vampire or troll. To him, it was academic and distant. I came in, told him where, when and how, he wrote it down and that was it.
But just now, I’d shown him the darker side of it. And I wasn’t even the worst thing out there.
“When you get to Cairns, call me or Roberts,” I said on my way out. “One of us will let you know when it’s over.”
He nodded and began straightening chairs. I was at the door when he spoke.
“Matt, I forgot, but I have something I want to show you.”
I turned back around. “Yeah?”
He trotted behind the counter and fiddled with something. “I taped this yesterday. Thought you might like to see it.”
There was a TV fastened to the wall behind the counter, a wide screen LCD of the tiny variety, but apparently good enough to watch a Blade trilogy on and get wasted. Jacob turned the TV on and found the recording.
It was a breaking news report. The footage showed the front of my flat in Ipswich. There were police and ambulances everywhere, crime scene tape dissecting the view. Neighbours milled about at the edges of the picture, straining to get into the shot. A female reporter stood to one side of the image, to give the audience a good view of the results of the attack.
“This is the scene at a small, quiet neighbourhood in Ipswich this afternoon,” the reporter said gravely. “The residents of this peaceful street had their lives shattered by a violent drive-by shooting barely an hour ago. The perpetrator used a submachine gun and fired on the duplex behind me. It’s believed the target of the shooting was not at home at the time.”
The reporter turned and the shot followed her. Miss Browne lay on a trolley from an ambulance, oxygen mask over her mouth and nose. She looked so old and frail. Guilt gutted me.
“Miss Browne lives in the flat next door and was home during the shooting. Miss Browne, can you tell us about the incident?”
Estelle Browne took the mask off and spoke in a strong voice. “Well, I’d just sat down to watch my stories. I’d missed the start because of the woman who came asking about my neighbour. She was a pushy broad, too.”
The reporter pulled the microphone back. “If you could just tell us about the shooting, ma’am.”
Estelle pursed her lips. “I guess it was just like on those TV shows. A person in a van drove past and shot at the house. Over and over. I don’t know why anyone would want to hurt my neighbour. He’s the sweetest boy. I don’t care that he’s been in prison.”
The microphone was pulled again. “Thank you, Miss Browne.”
I groaned. Someone had let it slip. Probably the pushy broad asking questions. Was she the one who’d been outside my place when Saif attacked?
The reporter droned on for a while longer, talking to a detective and other witnesses. I blocked most of it and watched the background, hoping I could see every face I knew from the street, to make sure they were all right. There was one face I didn’t recognise, though. It belonged to a slender woman in a straight, knee length, grey skirt and cream blouse. Her auburn hair was a tangled fright, her clothes dirty and torn. Blood smeared her left arm, coming from a rent in her top on her shoulder. Still, she worked the crowd, guiding shaking witnesses to the gutter to sit down, holding a sobbing a woman.
She acted self-assured, calm, efficient. I pegged her for a cop, but she didn’t have a badge showing, wore no gun. The pushy broad? Private investigator? If so, I wasn’t so sure I didn’t mind her chasing after me. Nice legs. If only I could work out why she was looking for me.
The report ended and Jacob turned it off, not looking at me. I patted his shoulder.
“Thanks. I appreciate you showing me.”
“That was part of it, wasn’t it? Part of what you want me out of?”
I nodded.
He paled. “I’m going,” he assured me.
“That’s great. I’ll see you when you get back.”
I escaped before he could say anything. My car was where I’d left it, but someone had scraped along the right side. The black paint was torn back to the silver undercoat, and my right front indicator was smashed. I hadn’t even heard the impact. There was no note with a phone number on the windscreen, but there was one that simply said ‘arsehole’.
The phone rang just as I was pulling into the driveway. I didn’t look at the displayed number. Instead I decided to make a dick out myself and presume it was Roberts, checking up on me.
“Forget it, I won’t take you to the prom,” I said as I answered.
There was a stunned pause. “Mr Hawkins?”
Ah. The freaking kid and his werewolf dog. “Hey, Tony. Thought you were someone else.”
“I hope so. Um, have you found out anything about my dog’s problem yet?”
Crap, bugger and damn. “Not yet, tiger. I said I’d call when I had. There’s a lot of research material to cover.”
“I can appreciate that, but the full moon is tomorrow night.”
“It is?” It was out before I could stop myself. “Wow, that came around fast. Been a busy few days. How’s the dog been behaving?”
“Just the usual. If he smells another dog, he goes a bit crazy. Otherwise, okay.”
“Good, good. Listen, I’ll get back in touch with you this arvie, or tomorrow morning at the latest. I’ll really hit the books now and find the proof to put your mind at ease. Don’t worry, champ. It’ll be all good.”
“All right.” He didn’t sound particularly reassured. “Talk to you then.”
He hung up and I stared at the phone for a moment. “Kids.”
I hauled my tired carcass into the house and checked on Mercy. She was in bed, rolled up tight in her sheet, a tuft of hair poking out to assure me she actually was in there. I had to wait a long time to see any sign of life, and when it came, it was a very small movement in her shoulders as she took a rare breath. Her illicit meal had taken its toll; she was in the deep coma caused by incompatible blood. Usually, she just slept, very deeply, but if you poked her, she would move and grumble, if not fully wake up. Now, I could have dragged her out into the daylight and watched her go up in pretty flames.
&nbs
p; If the cop had died, I would have.
At least, I liked to think I would have.
Well, not ‘liked’ so much. She was a violent, instinct driven predator, and yet she was my little girl too. I’d saved her, in as much as she could have been. I’d invested so much in her, done things for her I would never have thought myself capable of. Turned myself into something I never wanted to be just so she could continue to live.
I was supposed to save lives, not take them. As much as I shied from admitting it, there was something of the truth in what Kermit had said to me. I killed indiscriminately. If you were a vampire, ghoul, troll, whatever, I killed you. Or I commanded Mercy to kill you. And what about Nolan? God damnit! I’d liked him. He was what I’d wanted to be once, a person dedicated to saving lives. And now, because of me, he was dead.
Red tinged the edges of my vision. I backed out of Mercy’s room and stalked to the back door. If I stayed in there with her, I was liable to do something stupid.
Still, when I reached the patio and saw the remains of my earlier tantrum, the creeping rage dried up.
This was what I’d become.
No, some sarcastic prick of a conscience whispered inside my head. This is what you always were. You only tried to deny it. Remember Jessica Harrington.
“Fuck off,” I said aloud and went back inside.
I was tired. Maybe four hours of sleep and the after affects of too much adrenaline dropped into my blood drew energy right out of me. I went to bed and while my body felt like it would never move ever again, my brain just would not stop. It keep going and going, turning around in circles between Nolan, Mercy and a cop lying on the side of the road. Then it spun off in a totally different direction and showed me the face of the woman I’d seen on Jacob’s telly.
Who was she? What was she doing at my place? She had to be the one Saif mentioned.
Knowing I wouldn’t be able to sleep, I hauled myself out of bed, went to the library and turned on the computer. It took approximately a geological age to boot up, then I plugged ‘private investigator brisbane’ into Google and got a list of several direct hits.
Bingo. Halfway down the page I got to Sol Investigations. It was a single page only, enough to give a little blurb about the company and how it was an international organisation. There was also a little story about its Brisbane office investigator. One Erin McRea, ex-cop, who’d resigned with all sorts of honours so she could take up the PI business. There was a photo of her as well. A neater version of the auburn haired, serious woman I’d seen on the news report. Her full lipped mouth was turned up in a little Mona Lisa smile that dared me to wonder at what she was thinking.
Okay, one mystery solved. I knew who she was, but not why she was after me.
I closed the window and resolved to deal with the one issue I could handle at the moment. Pulling out my books on weres, I began reading.
Chapter 21
The phone rang and Erin answered. “Sol Investigations, Erin McRea speaking.”
“Hello, Erin McRea speaking,” a deep, hollow voice said softly.
Erin smiled and sank back into her chair. “Hello, William. What are you doing up?”
“Well, some strange woman I don’t know has been with me all day, getting me naked and wet and hot. Just thought you should know.”
“Yeah? She any good? Should I come home and join in?”
He laughed and it turned into a weak, wracking cough. Erin winced and berated herself for making him laugh.
“Just come home,” William eventually whispered.
“Kate showed you the note?”
“It won’t get infected, Erin. You’re too healthy, too careful. I want to see you.”
She sighed and spun around to look out the window. “I won’t risk that. You know it. It’s better this way.”
William grumbled. “At least tell me what happened? How did you get hurt?”
“It wasn’t anything big. Just a scratch.”
There was a long pause. Erin’s stomach sank. She knew what this meant.
“I saw the news yesterday,” he said, not accusingly, but deliberately. “I saw you at the drive-by scene. Jesus, Erin, there was blood all over you. Are you really okay?”
Oh God, she wanted to be with him. Touch him. Let him hold her and stroke away all the pains and troubles and just be in his arms and happy.
“I’m fine,” she said firmly.
“And what about this case? It’s getting dangerous. Drop it.”
“I can’t do that. Sol—”
“Doesn’t give a shit about your wellbeing, Erin. You know that. You were shot at. Shot at. Don’t you understand what that means? Your life is in danger. I won’t have that. Drop the case. Please.”
“And what about your life, William? If I dropped this case, Sol would fire me and then how would we afford your treatment and care?”
“Forget about that. Erin, this is your life.”
She gritted her teeth. “What about your life?”
“My life is not the issue here. I’m not the one out there being—” He cut off the sharp words with low grunt. After a moment, he continued in a calmer tone. “Erin, I love you and I know you love me, but you are going to get over me, eventually. I want you to. We’ve spoken about this.”
Erin couldn’t talk. She just pressed the phone to her ear and listened to him pinpoint the exact heart of her emotions. No one else had ever seen her the way William did. It was warm and frightening all at once.
“Erin? You there?”
“Yeah. I’m sorry, William.”
“Me too.” His voice broke. “Will you come home tonight?”
She sighed. “No. I called Gavin. He and Kate will be there for you.”
There was another silence. She took several deep breaths while she waited. His breathing still came over the line, so she knew he was there and okay.
“I’m starting to feel like the worst host in the world,” he muttered. “I just lie in bed while they do the dishes.”
“Just don’t let Kate give you any Vietnamese food.”
“I’ll try to fend off her cold rolls.”
“Good boy. Get some rest.”
He laughed, short and shallowly. “Love you.”
“Love you,” she whispered and hung up.
“You okay?” Ivan stood in the door to her office.
“What are you doing here? I told Brad to keep you at home.”
He smiled, a little less than usual. “You’re not so crash hot without your wonder assistant. ‘Sides, I couldn’t stop thinking about it at home. I need to do something.”
Ivan wore a pair of old jeans and loose blue shirt. His hair, usually spiked up with product, hung limp over his eyes like an emo.
“Okay. But I’m buying you lunch.”
He came into the office and sat opposite her. “So, what are we doing today?”
“Looking up anything that might shed some light on this.” She passed him a paper with NYT CLL written on it. “It’s Hawkins’ personalised number plate. I’m thinking it means something to him.”
Ivan began muttering it over as she had been doing all morning. Erin was still stuck on ‘night cell’ and after a moment, that was Ivan’s conclusion as well. Google returned no direct hits but Ivan sat at his desk and his fingers flew over the keyboard as he tried other avenues.
The fax machine beeped and spat out a couple of pages. Erin got to it before Ivan. It was from Detective Courey. The cover page said his captain wanted him to pass it on. The second page was Matthew Hawkins’ work history.
She sat on the corner of Ivan’s desk and read it out to him. “First noted job when he was twenty-one and fresh out of university with a medical science degree. It was at a private pathology lab up the coast. Stayed there for three years, then moved into the ambulance service and transferred down here. We know how that ended up. When he got out of prison, he vanished for a while, then returned and got back into pathology. Oh, look at this. His last job was out at Redc
liffe. He was there for two years before being fired.”
Ivan snorted. “Wonder why they fired him.”
“I’m going to go out there and find someone to talk to.”
“Am I coming?” Ivan asked it casually, but she noted the slight waver in his voice.
“No. You have to stay here and keep working on ‘night cell’. I want it cracked before I get back.”
He smiled, relieved. “Will do. What about lunch?”
Erin grabbed her purse from the office and slapped a twenty on the desk. Then before she could think twice, she kissed the top of his head. “You’ll be all right.”
He shrugged and nodded, taking the money and putting it in a drawer.
After a moment’s hesitation, Erin went back into her office, opened the safe and took out her Glock. She checked it over quickly, slapped in a magazine and slung on her shoulder rig. Putting a jacket on over the top already made her feel warm, but she wanted the security today. Ivan wasn’t the only one holding his coffee mug in both hands.
The drive out to Redcliffe was quick and pleasant. Erin took the time to look around. It was a sweet place, surrounded by the ocean on three sides, bright and colourful. The houses were predominately older, some looking worn down by all their years, some freshly renovated and cheerful. There was a scattering of newer houses and signs that property was in demand, with several battleaxe lots about the place. The waterfront parade was crowded with cars and people at the cafes and walking out along the pier. A big whale-watching catamaran was docked in the small harbour.
Erin decided she liked the place. It was moving forward with the world, but still retained an old fashioned feel. A good place to come to relax, or to live and ease the stress of life.
She was pretty relaxed herself when she reached the hospital, though that evaporated fast. There were police in the foyer when she walked in. They were talking to members of the staff, and a few of the nurses were huddled in a corner, crying and holding each other.
“What’s happened?” Erin asked at the front counter.
“Didn’t you hear?” the woman said, aghast. “One of our doctors was murdered last night. In the car park.”
“My God. Why?”
“No one knows. But it was very strange. He was beaten up and killed, and only the night before, he’d treated a similar case. I think it’s a gang.”
Erin’s knuckles went white as she gripped the edge of the desk. “Not Dr Nolan?”
“Yes. Did you know him?”
“I met him yesterday.”
The receptionist shook her head. “Such a shame. So young and single. A lot of the girls here quite liked him. Now, can I help you with anything else?”
Shaking aside the nagging suspicion that Nolan’s death had something to do with Hawkins, Erin said, “I’d like to talk to someone in charge of pathology. I’m investigating a missing person’s case and I think someone here might know him.”
The receptionist called up to the lab and after a brief discussion, announced the lab manager would come to talk to her. It wasn’t long before an older gentleman appeared. He had white hair and a close cropped beard.
“Hi. James Douglass. I manage the lab.”
She shook his hand and introduced herself and explained why she was here. “I understand Hawkins used to work here. Were you here then?”
Douglass nodded. “He was a good lad. Very capable scientist. No one much worried about his past, so that wasn’t a problem with us. You say he’s missing?”
“Well, only in the sense no one seems to have any solid evidence of him being around. I suspect he’s voluntarily dropped off the radar. It occasionally happens when someone’s been through a traumatic event. You haven’t seen him since he finished up here?”
“Not personally. Couple of the others have mentioned seeing him about though.” Douglass shifted a bit uncomfortably. “He didn’t leave us on the best of terms. It got a little ugly toward the end. It was strongly recommended he not show his face in the lab here again.”
“Did you know he was here in ED night before last?”
“Yeah. We did some blood work on him. Got beaten up pretty good, I hear. Poor kid. I went to see him when I saw he was admitted, but apparently he never made it up to the bed. Scarpered before they could lock him down.” He smiled. “Should have expected it of him. If he didn’t want to be somewhere, it took some work to get him there.”
“He could be uncooperative?”
Douglass shook his head. “Not at first. Then it was more like he just had this need to argue everything out.”
“Like what?”
“Well, like night call. He hated doing it. Said it hurt his knee to disrupt his sleep. I felt for him, sure, but it’s something we’ve all got to do. I couldn’t excuse him from it.”
Bells went off in Erin’s head. “Night call? What’s that?”
“We don’t run the lab twenty-four seven. It shuts down between eleven p.m. and six a.m. For those seven hours, someone has to be available to do any urgent work. I think it’s a nice touch of irony that Matt hated night call with a passion, and then was a reason for someone to be called in the other night. When you find him, tell him I said that.”
Erin noted it down. The list of things they had to tell his guy was growing. “So, night call was a big deal in his life?”
“He’s a good bloke, no second thoughts about it, but he got that bee in his bonnet and wouldn’t stop shaking it about.”
“You said he became uncooperative after a while. What happened?”
Douglass shoved his hands in his pockets. “He began missing shifts, not coming in on calls. I had to cover for him and we argued over it a lot. When he did show up for work, he was overly tired and listless. Useless to us really. We’re a busy lab. Then one day, he lost it. Blew a gasket or two. Trashed a lot of glassware and broke a computer. I knew he was having issues. Something was happening in his personal life that he wouldn’t talk about. But when he did that, he had to go. I wanted him to get some help, but he wouldn’t listen to me.” He sighed. “I haven’t seen or heard from him since that day.”
So Hawkins still had his temper. “Do you have any idea what provoked his anger that day?”
“One of the analysers broke down. Backed the work up and we were having big trouble getting the blasted thing fixed. It happens. You take it in stride and get on with the work. That day, Matt just couldn’t deal with it.”
“Any thoughts about what caused the initial change in his behaviour?”
Douglass looked around, spied some seats and led her over to them. They sat and he took a moment to order his thoughts.
“I’m guessing with some of this. I kind of put it together after he was let go. He was on call one night and had to come in. It was for a Jane Doe, found beaten in a park. She had low haemoglobin and red cell count. The doctor ordered a transfusion. Matt did the group, but it came out wrong.”
“Wrong?”
“When a person has a transfusion, ninety percent of the time, they’re given their own blood group. When they aren’t, and there’s two different types of red cells running around the system, it shows up in the blood group as a mixed result. You see the patient’s true group and the introduced one.”
Erin shook her head. “Wait. I thought if you got the wrong group, you were in trouble.”
“No. You’ve heard that the O group is a universal donor?”
She nodded. “So anyone can get an O group?”
Douglass nodded. “Within a few limits, yes. People with AB group can receive all types, again with some limits. Some groups are rarer than others, so if you have a rare group that the blood bank doesn’t have much stock of, you’re generally given one of the more readily available, and compatible, groups. This was what Matt had thought had happened with this patient.”
“Was it?”
“We never found out. She wasn’t identified. No one came forward to claim her. There was no way we could check her medical history. But that
night, faced with this, Matt had to do extra testing. I hesitate to say that he got angry with the nursing staff over it, but he did. In the end, he went down to collect more blood himself, to ensure there hadn’t been a mistake with the initial collection.”
Douglass paused and stared at the wall behind Erin for a moment.
“This is where I really had to start piecing bits and pieces together. Matt wouldn’t talk about it afterward. Even though he didn’t say anything, the attending doctor thought Matt recognised the girl when he saw her. Either way, Matt did the required testing and issued her blood. She was admitted. Matt then spent a lot of time in her room. He wouldn’t talk to anyone, he just sat with her whenever he wasn’t in the lab, and sometimes when he should have been. She was in a coma for three days.”
“He spent all that time with her and no one could get him to talk about whether or not he knew her? I hardly believe that. What about the police?”
“They asked him, he said he didn’t know her. When they asked why he sat with her, he said someone had to.”
That struck a chord deep inside Erin. She hated leaving William alone, even when he was sleeping. She felt no one should ever have to be alone, even if they didn’t know someone was with them.
“He was a good lad,” Douglass said softly.
“But a complicated one. What happened when she woke up?”
“She was violent, uncontrollable. They suspected neural damage and organised a transfer to a specialist unit in the city. She was kept sedated while they waited for her to be transferred.”
“And Hawkins? What did he do?”
“He stopped sitting with her. Didn’t tell anyone why. She was transferred out a couple of days later. It was about a week later that Matt really began to deteriorate. I know it had something to do with that girl.”
“Do you know where she was transferred to?”
“The Mentis Institute.”
Only the most specialised psychiatric hospital in the state.
“Thank you, Mr Douglass. You’ve helped me a great deal.”
“I hope you find Matt. He shouldn’t be alone. No one should.”
Chapter 22
Erin decided to take another drive around the peninsular before heading back. She needed a moment to clear her thoughts. This case was messing with her head. Hawkins was a troubling character. He had experienced some things no one should ever have to, but that plenty of people did. He seemed to deal with them with violence, but somehow, he managed to leave behind people who still cared for him. Even if they didn’t forgive him for his outbursts, they at least understood them.
She couldn’t get the image out of her head of him sitting beside the bed of a comatose girl, staying there because he thought she needed someone, anyone, to be with her in the dark. Over it, she saw herself beside William’s bed. She tried to blot it out, but couldn’t.
Following the tourist drive signs brought her to a pub on the waterfront. Her stomach grumbled and she impulsively pulled into a park. The pub was busy and every table inside was taken. There was a vacant one on the deck, so she took her chips and steak out there and sat facing the water, sipping her beer and watching the waves break on the rocky shore.
“Calming, isn’t it?”
She looked up, squinted into the sun. A man stood by her table, his hands full of lunch plate and beer as well.
“It’s crowded today. Do you mind if I share your table?”
Erin glanced about. There were no other free seats anywhere. She sighed. “Sit down.”
He sat opposite her, but to the side so she still had her view. “Thanks. I won’t be long. I’m just catching a quick meal.”
“Me too, so no worries.” She picked at her chips.
Her unwanted lunch partner opened a magazine and began reading while he ate. He had dark blond hair, worn a bit too long so it fell thick and heavy to his shoulders. It didn’t seem to have any product in it but it swept back off his forehead and only fell forward slightly as he leaned over his magazine. He absently ran a hand back through it, revealing how it had been trained backwards. His fingers were long, his hands broad. Under his long-sleeved work shirt he looked toned and fit, if a touch on the thin side.
“See anything you like?” He spoke without looking up. There was humour in his voice.
“Sorry. I wasn’t staring.”
He did look at her then, mouth stretched into a wide, unabashed grin that positively lit up his entire face. Hazel eyes sparkled with mischievousness. “Yes, you were. Didn’t mind, though.”
He was flirting with her. It had been so long since anyone had she didn’t know what to do. But that was okay, he seemed to know. He held out his hand.
“Dave. And you are?”
“Erin.” Her voice shook a bit, but she gripped his hand firmly.
“Pleased to meet you, Erin. I haven’t seen you around here before. Are you local?”
“No, just out here on some business. You live in Redcliffe?”
“Yeah. Have for a while now. I was here some years back but had to leave. Couldn’t stay away though. Love the life out here.”
Erin found herself nodding. “Yes, it’s very relaxed.”
“Do you like seafood?”
Erin checked her watch. He’d been sitting there for ten minutes and he’d already worked his way up to asking about food? That usually preceded talk of dinners and dates. Wow. He worked fast.
“I’m not going to ask you on a date.”
She stared at him. “What?”
There was that smile again. “You were wondering why I was asking if you liked seafood. You thought maybe I was working up a dinner proposal.”
“Do you read minds, Dave?”
“Not so much. I read faces.”
“And I have a face you can read like a book?”
He sat back, eyeing her pensively. “Like a braille book, maybe.”
She wanted to toss her beer in his face, but all she could do was blush. Dave winced.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to embarrass you. Sometimes I say things without thinking.”
Except that he had thought about it. Erin shrugged. “It’s okay. I’m not used to the flirting game anymore.”
“Married?”
“So, what sort of work are you in, Dave?” She leaned over the table to look at his magazine. “Werewolves?”
His grin was a little bashful this time. “Just some research.”
Erin took the magazine and flicked through it. “Research in a magazine that also features articles on alien abductions, something called a chupacabra and declares that Elvis isn’t dead, but living in Alaska training vampires into an army?”
Dave nodded. “Yeah. Fun stuff.”
“You believe in this?”
“Some people do.”
“And you’re researching it?”
He took back the magazine, folded it in half and put in his back pocket. “Maybe I’m writing a book.”
“Fiction or non-fiction?”
“Wouldn’t it be fiction either way?”
Erin couldn’t stop the smile. “You have an amazing ability to not answer any questions.”
“You’re no slouch yourself. So, Erin. What do you do?”
“Real estate.”
“Really? Interesting. Private or commercial.”
“Commercial.”
“Interested in Redcliffe are you?”
“I have a client who is, yes.”
“See anything interesting?”
“Just one thing.”
Erin leaned forward, looked him directly in the eyes. One thing she’d learned in the police force was that staring someone in the eyes was a sure fire way to intimidate them. No one liked it much. It was too intimate a thing to be shared between strangers. She’d trained herself to do it and laid it on this man without hesitation.
And he returned it. He didn’t blink, didn’t look away. He just stared right back.
His eyes weren’t just hazel. They were clear cut
green around his pupils, darkening to light brown at the edges, with flecks of each colour scattered throughout. They were bloodshot but bright and it felt as if he reached out through them and touched her.
Erin pulled back with a gasp. A shiver went down her spine, but it wasn’t an unpleasant one.
“Sorry,” Dave said softly.
She focused on the water behind him, not quite sure what had happened, or what he was apologising for. She’d started it, after all. Her experience told her he shouldn’t have met the challenge, he should have looked away first.
Before she could recover, he was standing up.
“I should go.”
She wanted to tell him to stay, but something kept her mouth shut.
“It was good to meet you, Erin. I hope I didn’t disturb your lunch too much.”
He left and she couldn’t watch him walk away.
“You okay, miss?”
Erin jerked at the touch on her shoulder. The bar tender stood beside her.
“I saw the way he was staring at you,” he said, frowning. “Did he say anything to upset you?”
“No, he didn’t. It’s okay.”
“I just wanted to make sure. He’s a bit of a hot spark sometimes.” Reassured of her wellbeing, he walked away.
“I bet he is,” Erin whispered. Then she was out of her chair and racing after Matthew Hawkins.
She caught sight of him just as he slipped into a black Monaro. He was too far away for her to catch, parked in the opposite direction from her own car. If she went back for it, he would well and truly be gone. He pulled out and headed away from the water. The number plate, NYT CLL, flashed in the sunlight.
“Damn it.” She slowed to a stop and caught her breath.
What did it mean to him that he would take something he hated and put it on his car like that? She pulled out her phone and called the office.
“Night call,” she snapped at Ivan before he could say anything. “Not cell. Call. Look it up now.”
There was a staccato of typing. “Ah, let’s see. There was an episode of The Twilight Zone called Night Call. And an agency that specialises in night call nurses. Other than that, no direct hits. How did you find out?”
“Ivan, I just met him.”
“What?”
Erin held the phone away from her head while he screamed some more. “Shut up! I can’t believe I sat there with him for all that time and didn’t realise. He knows I’m after him. He knows me. He came to me deliberately.”
“Erin, what did he say? What did he do?”
Walking back to her car, she decided she would follow the street he took and see where it got her. “He flirted with me. He knew who I was and he tried to charm me.”
There was a speculative pause. “Did it work?”
“Of course not. I’m married.”
Ivan snorted. “Like that matters. I think it did work. You sound really shaky.”
“If I’m shaky it’s because I’m an idiot for letting him slip through my hands.”
“Yeah. You could have jumped him then and there, kept him pinned down.”
There was entirely too much innuendo in Ivan’s voice for Erin to ignore, but all she could do was blush.
“What are you doing now?” he asked as more typing sounds came through.
“I’m going to follow his getaway path. Just in case.”
“In case he’s waiting for you at the next corner? Think he might want you to follow him?”
“It’s a possibility. He did present himself to me.”
“Keep in touch. If he starts leading you onto a back road or anywhere dark, don’t follow!”
“Yes, Ivan. Thank you. Call if you discover anything.”
She got into her car and followed his vanishing trail. The street led straight into a suburb full of modern homes backed onto canals. There were docks and boats everywhere but no sign of a black Monaro. She drove down random side streets and peered up driveways and found nothing. There had been no true expectation she would find him waiting for her, or that she would be lucky enough to catch sight of him if he didn’t want her to. Still, it cut to lose him after so briefly having him.
Erin believed him when he said he lived in Redcliffe. He hadn’t actually lied to her at all, she felt. And maybe he’d told her something else as well. She called Ivan back.
“I haven’t got anything yet,” he announced immediately.
“That’s okay. Don’t give me any shit over this, but I want you to check out things like werewolves or vampires or aliens in connection to the ‘night call’.”
She waited for the outburst of laughing. It didn’t come.
“No problem. Anything else? Was he waiting for you?”
Erin stared at the phone to make sure she was talking to the right Ivan. “You accept the supernatural angle just like that?”
“Yeah. I mean, why not?”
“Because it’s not real?”
“Can you prove that?”
She sighed. “Whatever. Just look it up. I’ll be back soon.”
“So he wasn’t waiting to lead you into a darkened room?”
Erin hung up.
Ivan had some good news when she got back to the office.
“Found a mention of Night Call,” he announced proudly. There was an empty Chinese box on the desk beside his computer and he seemed brighter.
“Where?”
“On a message board. Weirdoteens dot com. Seems like a place for emos and Goths and they talk about suicide and death and stuff.”
Erin winced. “Really? That’s just sad. Where did our guy come into it?”
“A message posted a couple of weeks back asking if anyone knew about Night Call. The poster said that his dog was acting strange and he suspected it to be a werewolf. Apparently, he’d heard somewhere about this Night Call guy who helped people solve supernatural problems. He wanted to know if anyone knew if it was legit.”
“A dog turning into a werewolf? That kind of makes sense, really.”
Ivan stared at her. “Really?”
“Yeah, why not? I mean, wolves and dogs are closely related. Why wouldn’t they get together, and you know, do stuff?”
“Do stuff?”
“I don’t know. Make little werewolves or something.”
“You don’t know anything about werewolves, do you.”
Erin scowled. “I saw that Hugh Jackman movie.”
“Oh, that is like the worst werewolf depiction ever. You need to see something classic. An American Werewolf in London. Or The Howling. Then you wouldn’t say dogs and werewolves went off to make little werewolves.”
She belted him lightly on the head. “Go mousse your hair or something.”
“The guy didn’t get a lot of helpful replies. No one seemed to know anything about Night Call but they seemed to find his theory about his dog pretty funny. A bit later on, after a lot of ‘you’re dreaming’ replies, the kid comes back and tells them how he heard about Night Call.”
“How?”
“In the Fringe Bar.”
“Hawkins works out of bars?”
“No. At least I don’t think so. This kid says he was at the bar, talking to someone about his dog when this ‘old guy’ overhears and gives him a card.”
Erin sat on the desk. “He doesn’t give out any of the details on the card?”
“Just that it said ‘Night Call, for things that go bump in the dark’, and a guy’s name and number.”
“Presumably Matthew Hawkins.” She couldn’t believe it. How complicated could this guy make his life? “Are you familiar with the Fringe?”
“Am I gay?”
“Right. Go home and get your game face on. You’re taking me out tonight.”