The call, p.1
The Call, page 1
First published in 2024
Copyright © Gavin Strawhan, 2024
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.
Allen & Unwin
Level 2, 10 College Hill, Freemans Bay
Auckland 1011, New Zealand
Phone: (64 9) 377 3800
Email: auckland@allenandunwin.com
Web: www.allenandunwin.co.nz
83 Alexander Street
Crows Nest NSW 2065, Australia
Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand.
ISBN 978 1 99100 679 0
eISBN 978 1 76118 845 9
Cover design by Luke Causby
Text design by Megan van Staden
Cover images: Diane Keough/Getty Images (beach); alexanderstoic/Unsplash (motorbike)
For Adele, Charlie & Gloria
Contents
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
Acknowledgments
1
THE 10K RUN AROUND THE town and along the beach had been fine, the decision to tackle the summit track at full tilt not so much. Lungs burning, hunched over her knees, she forced herself to stand, and raise her freckled arms to the flat grey sky. A bull at a gate, her mother was fond of saying. Under an oversized tee and flannel shorts, she felt the puckered flesh around her spine resisting, tugging at her skin, as her lungs tried to expand. She pursed her lips, slowing her breath, distracting herself with the view from the rocky heads, around the graceful curve of the deserted sandy beach, and down to the pale shards of sandstone of the sheer cliffs at the other end of the bay. Views from the first seventeen years of Honey’s life.
Skinny, eight years old, mandarin curls in a saggy bucket hat, out in the bay in her father’s old boat, pulling in snapper and gurnard by the bucketful. Building sandcastles, running races, swimming and boogie boarding, making best friends forever in the few weeks over summer as the camping ground filled up. Friends to be replaced year after year until she learned better. Lonely, misunderstood tweens. Squatting on an oyster-studded rock, watching translucent crabs cautiously emerge, imagining she knew how they felt.
A first kiss over there, first heavy petting there, first actual sex, clumsy and embarrassing in a battered black Nissan parked by the boat ramp. Down there, also, the bench seat on the little strip of green before the beach, where her mother had taken her and her sister the day their father didn’t come home. Fourteen years old, running to the beach, furious after seeing their mother flirting with the weekend fishermen at the golf club, all cleavage and lipstick, so obvious. And then the other, darker thoughts — the kind the counsellor wanted her to deal with.
Bugger it.
Honey willed her body into motion again and ploughed down the track, jumping patches of sand tussock and pigface in pink flower, then on to the beach again and away.
‘HEY MUM!’ HONEY CAME IN the back door, gulping the last of the water from her bottle.
‘I’m back,’ she added unnecessarily.
Still nothing. An irritating whisper of concern. Would she ever be able to walk into a house and it just be walking into a fucking house for chrissake. She placed her bottle down on the kitchen counter and padded down the passage to the living room. Rachel was stock-still, staring at a pad of Post-it notes, a pen in her left hand.
‘Mum?’
‘What’s it called? That thing. That you put the magazines on?’
‘The coffee table?’
‘Yes, the bloody coffee table.’ She typed it into her mobile phone. ‘Also known as kāfēi zhuō.’ This in a faux singsong accent. Vaguely racist but what was the point. Honey watched her mother carefully write down both versions and stick the Post-it to the edge of the coffee table.
Rachel’s white hair, recently thick and naturally dark, was the texture of dry grass. Her face was lined, deeply etched, her hands too, the crinkle-cut skin of a lifelong smoker. Ironic.
Rachel had been a lifelong health worker, a community nurse in a community that still revered her, even after her forced retirement. She’d been in decline for some time, but nobody had wanted to admit it, least of all Rachel herself. Oh, she’d felt a bit rocky, she’d concede, ever since Ron passed. He’d been a weekend fisherman who ended up staying nearly twenty years before a series of strokes stole away his speech, his mobility and finally his life.
Nearly every family in the district owed Rachel some debt, had stories of how she had helped them or their loved ones. She lunched with the mayor, harassed the regional health board, was quoted regularly in the Bay Advocate, provoked immunisation drives, was a sharp-tongued advocate for those who needed it. In the end, it was Wiremu from the garage who rang Honey to say that something needed to be done.
Ti-i-ming.
Honey was convalescing after the incident. She reassured Wiremu that she’d sort a few things and drive up to Waitutū as soon as she was able. But the moment she put down the phone she had to fight the urge to cry, though it was hard to tell if it was for her mother or for herself. Funny, considering she hadn’t cried during or after the beating that had nearly killed her. Apparently, fists, bats and knives had nothing on her mother when it came to making her feel inadequate.
‘She’s an amazing woman, your mum,’ was the first thing Wiremu said when Honey pulled in to fill her Mini Clubman and do some preliminary reconnaissance.
Wiremu’s garage had been there from the beginning of time: two pumps, a shop that sold everything from bait to bread, and an attached workshop. He’d come waddling out as she was still unfolding herself. It was only a four-hour drive from Auckland, but she’d been weaning herself off the painkillers.
‘But it was getting out of hand,’ he went on, ‘her forgetting appointments, losing stuff, denying she’d done this or that. And her temper, oh, boy, she called Henry Scott up at the school every name under the sun when he tried to persuade her to see the doc.’
‘No, that’s fine, I’m glad you called,’ she said.
‘I’m just grateful you could come, Honey. Considering everything …’ Wiremu let that linger like a question.
Honey just smiled and shrugged. ‘All good.’ Though of course it wasn’t.
‘Well,’ Wiremu beamed, ‘bet you’re glad to be home.’
Everyone who stayed in Waitutū thought it was the best place in the world. Everyone who disagreed got out as soon as they could. Honey had left a few days shy of her eighteenth birthday. She never regretted it. Too many ghosts, not just her sister’s, she told her counsellor, offhand, but of course that was her hoping to avoid having to go into the details. The counsellor had kept digging until Honey stopped going to appointments. And here she was anyway, back at the source.
‘Yeah, it’s great. Apart from the bit where my mother has dementia.’ She smiled wryly to show he didn’t need to tiptoe around her.
But Wiremu stiffened slightly, as if he detected some criticism lurking. ‘She’ll be pleased you’re here,’ was all he said. ‘Everyone needs their whānau with them at times like these.’
Honey really wished she could agree.
NOW, THREE WEEKS LATER, HER mother was putting bilingual Post-it notes all around the house. Table. Chair. Teapot. Some days she was unable to remember the thing in her hand with the sticky sweet dark coating (chocolate biscuit/qiǎokèlì bǐnggān) but she wasn’t going gently. She applied her formidable will to the task of not getting to the point where Honey, with a clear conscience, could have her assigned to supported care. Or sent to the knacker’s, as Rachel would have it.
The internet was a wonderful thing. It had guided Rachel to daily aspirin and turmeric supplements. It inspired her to learn another language to exercise different parts of the brain. She finally kicked smoking and started yoga classes at the local hall. Honey wasn’t sure it made any difference. She’d done her online swot too. There were dozens of possible causes for the plaque that was clogging up her mother’s brain and would lead to her death long before her heart stopped beating. As the specialist tried to explain, ‘It’s like the floor to your garage is wet and getting wetter, so you try to find ways to mop it up, but actually there are numerous holes in the roof, and you have to find vastly different ways to stopper up each of them. Imagine the water on the floor is the plaque in your brain and …’
Until Rachel snapped, ‘You don’t know what causes it, haven’t got a clue, so why don’t you bloody well say so!’
Rachel never asked Honey how long she intended to stay — it was a topic both were keen to avoid. Honey had injury compensation and had rented out her little house for a ridiculous amount. Her mother had savings and a pension, so there was no great financial pressure
Part of Honey’s concern was that, while she felt haunted in Waitutū, and bearing witness to her mother’s deterioration was exhausting, she couldn’t muster much enthusiasm to return to Auckland. Her ‘couple friends’ had mostly sided with Tony after the break-up; the rest had busy lives. Until recently she’d been the busiest. They mostly kept in touch through social media and the occasional phone call. She could do that just as easily from here. The bosses had assured her she could take her time returning to work, even to light duties; they appreciated what she had been through, how hard it must be. Honey was glad of the support, but the truth was she didn’t know if she’d ever want to go back. She had loved her job, been bloody good at it too, and it had very nearly killed her. It had almost certainly killed Kloe Kovich.
2
SOMEWHERE IN THE DARK A phone was grating, vibrating insistently against a bedside table. His or hers? She listened a moment. Tony wasn’t moving. So, he wasn’t on call.
‘Damn.’
‘Huh?’
‘Never mind.’ It was her phone. Unknown caller. She swung her feet out from under the duvet and perched on the edge of the bed.
‘Hello, Detective Chalmers.’
Silence.
‘Hello?’
‘You give me your number, eh.’ It was a woman’s voice. Almost a whisper.
‘Okay.’ Honey could feel Tony shifting beside her, but fuck it, he got his share of late-night callouts too. ‘So, what can I do for you?’
There was no response.
‘Do you want to give me your name?’ Honey ventured. She wasn’t overly optimistic.
‘Later, maybe.’
Another long pause.
Tony sighed loudly and turned away.
‘The Knights are coming up for a big meeting, eh,’ the caller said at last. Another pause, then, ‘You interested in that kind of stuff?’
‘What kind of stuff is that?’
‘Meth. A shitload of it.’
Honey was Serious Crime and this was Drugs but yeah, she was interested.
At the kitchen table the recording app on her phone blinked red. She also opened her notepad.
‘Okay, the Knights are coming up. You said it was for a meeting? Can you tell me who they’re meeting with?’
Another pause. And then, ‘The Reapers.’
Honey took a moment. The Reapers were blow-ins from Australia, 501s named after the clause in the legislation that allowed New Zealand-born residents to be deported if they had done prison time or were deemed to be of ‘dubious moral character’. An Australian senior Minister had called it putting out the trash. Well, treat people like trash, no surprises what happens next. The Reapers had brought with them a new level of violence and no respect for tradition. They’d made enemies, Knights included. A fatal shootout at a funeral had led to a cycle of bloody paybacks.
The caller seemed to anticipate Honey’s doubts.
‘They got some new arrangement.’
‘What sort of arrangement?’ The criminal world was rife with rumour and lies, most of them not worth getting out of bed for.
‘Reapers maybe want to talk about Tauranga.’
‘Do you know where and when this meeting will be?’
‘Can probably find out.’ There was a sudden change of tone. ‘I gotta go.’
KLOE KOVICH SAT ON THE back step, smoking, staring into the night. It was too cloudy for many stars, but a nearly full moon poked through. It hurt every time she inhaled.
Fucking Jason had cracked a couple of ribs this time, for sure, and there was a big lump on the side of her head where he’d shoved it into the door frame. After that she’d just lain on the floor, curled up, while he sank in the boot. She should probably go to the Emergency Department but what good would that do? They wouldn’t give her any decent drugs anyway, not with her history.
All she’d done was ask for some money to treat the kids to some fish and chips. That was the thing about Jason: another time he might’ve enjoyed being the big man, thrown some cash on the table — ‘Go on, have a big old feed on me.’ Maybe he was stressed about this deal with the Knights. They didn’t fuck around and Jason wasn’t the most reliable. Kloe had heard him on his phone, talking in some kind of code, as if they were talking about delivering a load of dog food or some shit. As if Jason was important enough for the cops to bother bugging his phone.
Kloe used to think he was cool. Okay, he was a bit of a dick, with a boom in the boot that shook the whole car, but she loved the way he could take the piss and make her laugh. Now, nights like this, she wished she could put a gun to his head and pull the trigger. Then she’d laugh all right.
He had this dumb-arse habit of repeating most of what was said to him, so it wasn’t hard to work out both sides to the conversation. He’d been trying way too hard to sound confident, when she could tell he was wetting himself. It was right after that he got stuck into the piss. And then he’d got stuck into her.
‘What’s to eat?’
‘There’s some bread and peanut butter.’
‘A man needs real food, bitch.’
‘A man should’ve given his bitch the money she asked for, so they could’ve got some fish and chips then.’
‘What did you say, woman?’
‘You deaf as well as stupid?’
If Shyla hadn’t come through from putting the baby down and screamed at him to stop, it could’ve been way worse. Now who was laughing. It felt good to know she could drop him in it any time she wanted.
Detective Sergeant Honey Chalmers. Funny name, a pigshit called Honey. Kloe flipped over the card. On the back was chicken scratch scrawled in blue biro, ‘Anytime you want to talk’, and another number. She shoved it back deep into the pockets of her jeans, but then had second thoughts and dug it out again.
It wasn’t likely that Jason would go through her pockets, though you never knew. Or maybe she’d be pulling out a lighter and accidentally the card would come with it. Even if she put it in the rubbish and Jason was taking it out because it was the only useful thing he ever did around the house and somehow he noticed it … She was overthinking it, but now it was a worm in her head and she knew it wouldn’t let her sleep. On impulse she shoved the card through a crack between the warped, faded timbers of the back step. As she let it go, something else struck her, made her smile. This Honey might be pigshit, but it was kind of choice to have someone to talk to.
HONEY HAD PUT THE KETTLE on, listening to the recording, making notes. New Zealand accent. ‘Street’ if there was such a thing. Maybe Māori or Polynesian, maybe not. She counselled herself not to jump to conclusions. Institutional racism starts at home, and from what she knew of the Reapers, they were colour blind, recruiting displaced Kiwi-born Australians. For some reason she didn’t think the voice sounded rural. Thirties, maybe older? Anxious but not terrified. Not exactly. Tauranga presumably referred to the port, the busiest in New Zealand. The Knights were a criminal gang known to be active there.
Honey closed her eyes and let her mind go blank, waiting for whatever else would bubble up. The caller wouldn’t give her name but said ‘later, maybe’. So, it wasn’t only about the information. She might be seeking to make a connection. Maybe she just needed someone to talk to. But there was something else in her tone. Honey couldn’t put her finger on it right away. She went back to the start of the call. ‘You give me your number, eh.’
Honey thought back to women she’d given her number to over the last few weeks. There were quite a few. She had recently wrapped a long investigation into a horrific case of child abuse resulting in the death of a two-year-old girl. The family, four generations under one rusted roof in the backblocks of Henderson Valley, unemployed, a history of domestic abuse, crime, alcoholism, drugs, violence and all-round fucked-up-ness, was quite naturally distrustful of the police and had closed ranks. Honey was sure they knew who was responsible, but no one was saying.
Honey and her team had worked closely with local community reps and social workers. She’d been patient, which, it’s fair to say, was not her natural condition. There had been heartbreaking moments, like a teenager claiming to have done it, until Honey sussed it was a cry for help, that the girl would rather be locked up than live the way she was. Honey probably shouldn’t have been so free and easy with her private number, but she’d been frustrated by the lack of progress. Eventually an anonymous tip-off led to a forty-eight-year-old grandmother and her twenty-two-year-old mentally disabled boyfriend being charged and convicted. It wasn’t the kind of win that made anyone feel better.
