I sighed and shrugged my shoulders. Tears burned in my eyes. “I know. I’m just. I’m scared.”

  Chris nodded and took my hand gently in his as he started to walk down the street again. “I know you are scared. But I swore I would protect you when you agreed to be my girlfriend. I can’t protect you properly while you are at his house.”

  I smiled up at Chris. Our relationship was a secret. I felt terrible for not telling Lisa about it. But it was something I didn’t want to share with anyone. I don’t know how he went from being my arch-enemy to my boyfriend, who stole kisses quietly on the way home. But somehow, it happened. I knew he wanted to look out for me and tried to protect me. I believed him. But even he wasn’t big enough to take on my Dad.

  “What the fuck,” I heard the familiar roar behind me, and my entire body froze. A hand grabbed the back of my neck and twisted it into a handful of hair.

  “Let go of her,” Chris bellowed.

  “Keep your fucking filthy hands off, my daughter,” Dad snarled as he wrenched me away. I cried out as my leg twisted beneath me. Tears streaked down my face from the blinding pain. “I’ve warned you what would happen if you became a whore like your mother.”

  “I didn’t,” I cried. “I haven’t done anything.”

  “It’s true,” Chris tried. “We haven’t done anything.”

  “Fuck off,” Dad roared at Chris. “If I catch you sniffing around here again, I’ll fucking gut you like the mongrel you are.”

  Dad marched me up our driveway and into the house. Mum stood in the kitchen as he carried me through the house by my hair. “Oh god, Mark, what is going on?”

  “I just caught your fucking daughter being a slut at the end of the fucking driveway,” he snarled as he shoved me hard and sent me hurtling across the kitchen floor and crashing into the fridge.

  I looked up at him with wide eyes as I shook my head. “Dad, we weren’t. We weren’t doing anything.”

  “It sure didn’t fucking look like that,” he snarled.

  “What were you doing?” Mum asked with an edge of panic in her voice.

  “Nothing; Chris was walking me home because Harry had to go somewhere; he was making sure I got home safe.”

  “And you suddenly need to hold his fucking hand to do that?” Dad asked.

  My mouth opened and closed as I tried to find a way to reason. But there was no reasoning with this monster. The world slowed as I watched his fist recoil and draw back before the blinding pain that split across my face. My eyes blurred, and I was sure I heard someone yelling my name before everything went black.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Zach (Present)

  Ashton and I didn’t speak again about our encounter, but I couldn’t wipe the smirk off my face. It was like we’d done something naughty that we knew we would do again. It could all turn to absolute shit, and I hoped it didn’t. I knew I’d be no good at doing the whole friends-with-benefits thing, but I wondered if we stuck to only fucking at the club in an anonymous setting and whether it would help. Who knew?

  We pulled up to the house of Robert King just after lunch. I was curious to hear what he had to say about the case of Selina. Someone had dropped the ball, and from what I could understand, much of the blame for that lay at the feet of the disgraced detective, Philip Fenton. But I couldn’t shake that Philip wasn’t working this case alone. He had Robert’s help; there was no real excuse for Selina’s case to fall by the wayside.

  “Ready?” Ashton asked as he turned in the driver’s seat.

  Fuck, this man was sexy. He had no idea just how hot he was. I licked over my bottom lip and delighted in how he followed the movement.

  “Stop that,” Ashton growled.

  I barked out a laugh and shook my head. “I’ve no idea what I’m supposed to stop, but okay.”

  Ashton rolled his eyes. “You have no right being as good as you fucking are.”

  I sniggered as I swung the passenger door open and slid out of the car to wait for Ashton to catch up. As we reached the front door, it swung open, and we were greeted by an old guy with a balding head and grey stubble on his face. His arms sagged beneath his shirt; he would have been muscular once, but age had changed his body.

  “Damn, cops have changed a lot since I’ve been gone,” Robert said as he looked me up and down. I was well used to that reaction from the older guys. I had long hair, for one, that didn’t often sit well with the boomers.

  “I presume you are Robert?” Ashton asked.

  “I must admit that when Maverick rang, I had to pull out all my old notebooks to jog my memory about this case.” Robert nodded his head. “Come in, boys,” he said as he moved out of the way of the door so that we could walk in behind him. He led us through to a living room with a couch and two chairs that looked like they dated back to the seventies.

  I frowned as I sat down on the couch beside Ashton. “Were you not working on it full-time?” I asked.

  Robert sighed and let out a small groan as he flopped into one of the chairs. “I was. But sadly, and I’m ashamed to say it, Selina’s case sort of got lost. It was a mixture of being understaffed, the Hoddle Street Massacre happening the following month, her parents not getting on our tail, and my cold-heartedness. I think I’d been in the job too long by then; I was cold to everything,” he explained with a shake of his head. “But as soon as I read my notes about the case, it all came back. I’m happy that little girl might get some justice now.”

  “We are going to do our best to see she does,” Ashton answered. “I’m afraid we don’t have much in the way of case notes about it.”

  Robert frowned and hummed. “That’s strange. I would have typed them up, I’m sure of it. I was always fastidious about my paperwork.”

  “They might have got lost over the years,” Ashton replied. I wasn’t sure whether it was a case of they got lost, or Robert just forgot. As he mentioned, the Hoddle Street Massacre happened only a month after the discovery of Selina’s body. Nineteen people, civilians and cops, were killed in that massacre; it would have taken precedence over everything else.

  “Do you have anything that you could give us? Evidence that perhaps we are missing?” I asked.

  “No, that was the other problem. There was no concrete evidence. The murder happened before DNA testing was any good. All we could tell was that she had semen in her genitals, resulting from what we believed was rape, but we didn’t have the technology that there is today. We could only tell the blood type, and even then, considering she’d been in the water, it was iffy.”

  I nodded my head. “I’m curious. Did you have a suspect in mind?”

  “I always thought it was her father. I couldn’t pin it on him, but there was something about that slimy prick I never liked. He was smug, and he had a real mean eye. After as long as I spent in the police force, I just got a knack for being able to tell who are the bad apples. And he was rotten to the core.”

  “I got that opinion, too,” Ashton nodded. “Was anyone else suspected?”

  “Philip was certain it was the young girl's boyfriend. That’s who her father blamed, but I couldn’t see it. The kid was cut up. He was shouting, telling us that it was Selina’s father. He’d said that it was him that used to beat the girl. But Philip had wanted to finger the kid for the murder. Same as the father, though; there wasn’t the evidence to charge him.”

  I frowned. “Who was her boyfriend?”

  “Shit, hang on, and I’ll look in my notes; I can’t remember his name off the top of my head,” Robert said as he grunted and stood from his chair before shuffling his way to a cabinet. He lifted a notepad from the top of the dresser and started to flick through the pages. “Huh, Chris Borderton.”

  Ashton and I shared a look. Lisa said the same boy was paying Selina much more attention than usual.

  “Did you ever think one of her brothers might have been capable of doing it?” I asked.

  Robert shook his head and sat back down in his chair. “No. Those boys were torn up beyond belief. The second eldest, Harry, committed suicide a few years after the murder; I remember reading about it in the paper. I went back over the notes for Selina’s murder after that, but there wasn’t anything new, so I put it aside again. The eldest boy, I don’t know what happened to him. I’m sure he'd be around somewhere if he is still alive.”

  “Interesting,” I said. “I hadn’t realized that Harry committed suicide.”

  Ashton nodded his head. “Yeah. Andrea gave me a phone number for him.”

  “Really?” Robert asked with shock.

  “Yeah, I rang, and it went straight through to voice mail, just a standard one from the phone company. But I wonder why she would do that if he wasn’t alive.”

  “I don’t know,” I mused. “And if he committed suicide only a few years after Selina, it was before the time of mobile phones, so it’s not like she gave you an old number for him.”

  Ashton nodded his head. “That is really strange.”

  “The mother always did strike me as strange. When I saw her after we found Selina’s body, her face was banged up pretty bad. I asked her what happened, but she gave the whole walked into a door excuse,” Robert sighed. “I’m sorry, boys, I really dropped the ball on this case.”

  Ashton gave a small smile and shook his head. “It can’t be helped. At least we have some new possible leads that we might be able to follow. Hopefully, we will discover what really happened to Selina.”

  “I truly hope you do,” Robert said with a sigh.

  Chapter Twenty

  Ashton

  “We definitely need to meet with Chris,” I said as we drove back toward the precinct.

  Zach nodded his head. “Yeah. I’m still not convinced that he is our guy, though.”

  I sighed. “I know. I get the feeling that he isn’t, either. He was an easy scapegoat. But I’m curious about his story.”

  “Same,” Zach smiled before he twisted in his seat. “Come home with me tonight?”

  I pulled into the precinct car park and parked in my assigned car spot before killing the engine and turning in my seat. “Zach.”

  “I know, I know, it could all go wrong. But it could all go right too.”

  I scrubbed my hands up over my face. “I didn’t want to do anything because I know what happens if this all blows up.”

  “I’m sorry, Ashton; I shouldn’t have done that last night. I promised I wouldn’t, and I did it anyway.” Zach smiled and reached out his hand, cupping my cheek before he dropped his hand and winced.

  I took his hand and placed it back on my cheek. “I’m glad you did,” I whispered. The more I thought about it, the more I knew where this would go. There was going to be no denying it. We were destined to fall into bed with each other again. Hell, I think even if I was honest with myself last night, I knew exactly who was fucking me.

  Zach’s eyes flared as he leaned in and gently pressed his lips to mine. My eyes fluttered closed. His kisses were just small pecks, soft, subtle. “I want to see where this takes us,” he whispered, looking up into my eyes.

  I nodded my head. “I want to as well, but I’m scared.”

  “I’m not like that other guy; I’m not trying to hide my sexuality.”

  I stroked my fingers over his cheek. Licking over my bottom lip, I nodded my head. “Can we take it slow?”

  Zach chuckled. “I can give it my best go.”

  I snorted. “I guess it’s trying to shut the gate once the horse has bolted.”

  Zach chuckled again. “Come on, let’s go in before people start wondering what we are doing.”

  I smiled and nodded as I climbed out of the car and followed Zach inside the precinct. I wasn’t sure that I was making the right decision. But for some reason, I couldn’t seem to stop myself. Something about Zach intrigued me like no one had ever before. I didn’t think it was only concerned that he’d fucked me at Peel Street the night before. Even if I hadn’t worked out if it was him, I think he would have intrigued me.

  He was hot. But there was more to it. His personality, whole being, and entire face lit up when he smiled. The animation took over his body as he talked about something he was passionate about. There was just something in him that drew me to him like a moth to a flame. All I could hope was that this flame wouldn’t get me burned.

  “Hey, Zach and Ash, can I get a rundown of how the Lewis case is going?” Jennifer asked as we approached our desks.

  I nodded my head and smiled as we walked into her office. “Currently, we don’t have much to go on. We are still waiting for the DNA to return; Dean reckons it could take a few months. We spoke to Lisa and Nicole Reynolds, who were the ones to report her missing in the first place, this morning. Then we’ve just returned from speaking to Robert King, the original detective on the case. He was on with Philip Fenton.”

  Jennifer nodded her head and sighed. “That prick has caused a bit of a nightmare for us, I’m afraid. Shelley O’Ryan demands we go back over his old cases and reinvestigate them.”

  I winced. When the Mayor had a bee in her bonnet, she was not stopping until it was quenched. If she wanted all of Philip’s cases reinvestigated, she wouldn’t be satisfied until every last rock had been turned over.

  “How is that going to affect us?” I asked.

  Jennifer sighed and shrugged her shoulders. “Nothing too bad at the moment. Derek has been given extra funding to put on a few more detectives, so I’m sure he will have them look into the cases. We will probably only have ones like the Lewis case, the unsolved ones.” I nodded my head. That was something, at least. “So, could you gather any helpful information from the visits today?”

  “Not really. They both mentioned Chris Borderton, Selina’s boyfriend at the time. Robert said that Philip liked him for the case, but Robert wasn’t convinced. The only thing that makes me consider Chris is that he is serving time for a sexual assault against a fifteen-year-old girl.”

  Jennifer raised her brow. “Violent?”

  I shook my head. “No. Statutory rape, he met her at a nightclub, he said that she told him she was eighteen, she reckons she didn’t.”

  Jennifer hummed. “At a nightclub, it would be understandable that he assumed she was eighteen.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, we will speak to him in Port Phillip tomorrow. Apparently, he is willing to talk to us.”

  “Great,” Jennifer said with a smile. “Maybe whatever he says will give us something to move forward with.”

  I nodded my head. “Other than that, we found out that Selina’s older brother Harry committed suicide a few years after Selina was murdered, but the mother gave me a phone number for Harry, so I want to find out what that was about.”

  Jennifer frowned and shook her head. “That’s weird. Is the mother with it?”

  “Appeared so, but in truth, I don’t know.”

  “Go back and speak to her. If you can try to get her without the husband, that would be even better.”

  I nodded my head. “Will do.”

  “All right, well, I’m off for the rest of the afternoon. We have an IVF appointment.”

  I knew that Jennifer and her wife, Allison, had been desperate to have a child. I grinned. “Congratulations,” I said with a smile.

  “Well, fingers crossed,” she said, holding her fingers up.

  “I’ve got everything crossed for you,” Zach replied with a grin.

  Jennifer smiled, and we turned, leaving the office. Children weren’t something I’d ever been interested in having. After being a homicide detective and seeing the horrible things that could befall a child, there was no way in hell I wanted to bring a child into the world.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chris (1987)

  My heart pounded as I jogged the streets, looking for Harry. I finally found him at Chelsea Burns's house.

  “Harry, fuck, you have to get home; your old man, he’s beating the shit out of Selina,” I shouted.

  Harry looked up at me with wide eyes. “What the fuck happened?”

  “I was holding her hand as we walked home, and your Dad saw us; he basically fucking frog marched her inside, and then I heard him roaring at her. When I looked through the window, he’d punched her in the face.”

  “Jesus,” Chelsea gasped. “Go, Harry. Do you want me to ring the police?”

  Harry shook his head. “No. No police.”

  He took off at a run toward his home, and I kept up as I ran with him. “She’s a fucking whore, Andrea, just like you. A fucking whore,” Mark Lewis shouted.

  Harry and I bustled our way into the house. Selina was slumped on the kitchen floor against the fridge. Her eyes were closed, and a sound like snoring fell from her lips. Blood poured down her face from a split above her eyes.

  Mark bailed Andrea against the kitchen cabinets as he swore and screamed in her face.

  “Dad, stop,” Harry shouted.

  I ran to Selina’s side and lifted her into my arms, cradling her head against my chest.

  “What the fuck?” Mark screeched when he saw me. “Let her go.”

  Mark wrenched Selina’s body from my arms like a rag doll. Her head slammed into the edge of the cabinet with a sickening blow.

  “Stop, you’re going to fucking kill her,” I screamed in panic.

  Mark’s eyes narrowed, and he glared at me; dropping his daughter's body on the floor, he grabbed me by the front of my shirt, pulling me to him.

  “You fuck my kid, your own fucking sister,” Mark sneered.

  I shook my head. “I’ve never had sex with her.”

  Mark’s lip curled over his top teeth, which were yellowing and rotting. His fist curled tight in the front of my shirt, and his other beefy hand grabbed my throat and squeezed tight, cutting off the air. My eyes widened. Fear pounded in my chest. He was going to kill me. A single tear trekked down my cheek.

  “Please,” I managed to utter. “Don’t kill her.”

 

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