Faceless, p.22
Faceless, page 22
‘You alright?’ Harry asked.
He pulled himself back up and blinked several times to remove the film that had formed across his vision. ‘Yeah, just tired, that’s all.’
‘You can stay here tonight.’ He’d been debating with himself whether he should even ask, but Harry saved him the awkwardness, for which he was grateful.
‘You sure? Your mum would go ballistic if she found out.’
‘Yeah, I know,’ he said and looked terribly pleased about that idea. Max knew he shouldn’t laugh, that it wasn’t good that the boy was going out of his way to piss off his mother, but he couldn’t help it. A large part of him was delighted with the apparent male sorority thing going on; it was unexpected. Harry shrugged and Max caught the blush in his son’s face before he turned aside to get the printouts from under the desk.
‘Thanks Harry,’ he said, ‘brilliant. But do you feel like getting some takeaways and doing some old-fashioned undercover work first?’
‘Okay, but I guess I’m paying for the takeaways,’ the boy said, deadpan.
Bradley
Ange was in the girls’ room, finishing their bedtime story. Bradley paced the lounge, the anticipation building. His skin was itching with need, he had felt the pressure of it pushing below his ribcage all evening, ever since he’d left her. He hadn’t meant to push it that far, he’d just wanted to test it a little, to see if he could hurt someone, on purpose, not when he was angry or when he had lost control, like the other times. He wanted to see if he could go against all the conditioning, if he could override his mother’s echo in his ears, You don’t hit girls. He’d been surprised to find the answer was an emphatic yes. And the elation, oh the sweet sense of power at doing it. He had chosen to do it, and he didn’t wimp out. He had assumed his conscience would kick in, pull on the brakes, make him step away. But his conscience had let him down. No, that wasn’t right, he told himself; his conscience had finally allowed him to explore a different morality, a morality that he was beginning to thrive on. He felt like he was the movie character when he first puts on the superhero outfit. He longed to know how far he could take it, what he could do. Could he fly with it? The feeling of utter liberation that revelation had brought with it had altered another adage he’d spent his life abiding by: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. He fingered the belt around his waist. The touch of the leather made his prick engorge with blood. He groaned. Hurry up, Ange. He wanted to feel that leather, feel it sting his flesh, hear it sing. And she would do it, too, he knew she would.
A sharp rap at the door made him curse out loud. God, who would be out at this hour of night? Jesus, he hoped it was just collectors or door-knockers and not some friend who wanted to stay for a drink, because all he could think about right now was a hot bitch swinging leather. He flicked on the porch light and swung open the door. Lucky after all. Jehovah’s Witnesses, going by the clothes – a man and a woman. And the woman was damn sexy in that alien kind of way. She was tall and redheaded with freckles smattered across her nose and cheeks. She wasn’t what you’d call beautiful, but there was something feline about her features, especially with her long hair pulled back into a ponytail. Bradley envisaged her dressed in a studded bustier and panties, and thigh-high boots, punishing him for his sins.
‘Bradley Fordyce?’ Her voice was slightly husky, just as he’d imagined it would be, and he wondered if God would strike him down for fantasising about one of his flock.
‘Yes?’
‘Detectives Peters and McCarten.’ A bucket of icy water washed over his fantasy. ‘We’d like to have a word. Can we come in?’
‘Is this about the visit we had earlier from the constable looking at the car?’ His voice sounded remarkably calm. It was in stark contrast to how he was feeling. But among the turmoil in his head he heard a cool, clear voice telling him to keep calm, to play the game; if he held it together it was a game he could win.
‘Yes. We’d like to ask you a few more questions, if you don’t mind.’
Those feline eyes suddenly felt very penetrating, and what before promised exoticism now felt intimidating, and that was appealing too. Ange walked into the room. Her eyes flicked between the two guests and back to Bradley.
‘These are detectives,’ he said, answering her unspoken question. ‘They want to ask us some more things about this afternoon’s visit.’
‘Oh.’ She sounded taken aback. ‘Was there a problem? The officer was pretty thorough.’ She walked across the room to stand next to Bradley, hooking her arm through his. It was as if her response to having a stunning woman in her living room, even if official, was to go on the offensive and show exactly who belonged to whom. The show of possessiveness was flattering. The detective appeared to recognise this as she directed her comments to his wife.
‘As the officer would have told you, we have been looking for a missing young woman, as we’re very concerned about her safety. The last sighting was of her entering a vehicle that shared licence-plate numbers with your own. We have since had further information that has narrowed the vehicle down to a make and model, which again reduced the possible vehicles it could have been. One of those is yours. So as you can see, we will need to ask some more questions about your activities on the night in question, and also we would like to make a closer examination of your car.’
The woman’s manner was clinical and even, but Bradley could detect a steel in her voice that told him that she was not someone to be trifled with. Ange must have sensed this too, as she sat down on the sofa, indicating for him to do likewise.
‘Of course,’ he said as he sat next to his wife. ‘Please, sit down. How can we help?’ He noted the length of her legs as she sat, and her heels. Those weren’t standard police-issue footwear. They were sexy, high and black.
‘Were you on Karangahape Road at all on the night of Monday the eighth?’ The directness of the question startled him. He’d expected a more gentle line of questioning.
‘No, no,’ he said, stuttering. ‘I was at home that night.’
‘That was the night you were sick, wasn’t it?’ Ange chipped in. ‘He was vomiting.’ Said like a mother discussing her baby’s bowel motions at a coffee group. There had once been a time that he would have been pissed off at the way she always answered questions for him, but he certainly didn’t mind now, especially as her memory of the night was helpfully wrong, and he wasn’t about to correct her. ‘We told all that to the constable this afternoon.’
‘Yes, that’s okay, but we need to go over everything again, if you don’t mind. We are in the process of eliminating people from the investigation, so every bit of information you can give us helps.’ She directed her question back to Bradley. ‘Were you home for the entire evening? Had you been into the city centre at all on that date?’
‘Well he’d been to work, and I think you went to the gym after work, didn’t you honey?’ She looked at him, but continued on before he could reply. Now he fervently wished she’d shut the fuck up. ‘But it was at the gym when he first started feeling sick, wasn’t it? So he came home. That would have been early evening, definitely by six.’ Silence hung in the air and Bradley felt a buzz of gratification at the look the detective gave Ange.
‘If you don’t mind, Mrs Fordyce, I’d like your husband to answer the questions.’
Ange’s face reddened and she made some put-out noises. Bradley would have laughed had the situation not been so precarious.
‘Yes, I went to work that day. I work at Prime Insurance.’
‘That’s in the city, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, Hobson Street. Then I went straight to the gym after work.’ His mind ran over the gym’s check-in procedure. It was just a tag system – you handed in your gym card when you arrived and picked it up when you left. He was pretty sure they didn’t record attendance on a computer or anything, and he didn’t think they had video cameras, so unless someone specifically remembered him not being there no one would be able to corroborate that he was lying his arse off.
‘Which gym do you belong to?’
‘Freedom Gym, that’s in Swanson Street.’
‘So you came directly home from the gym?’
‘Yeah. I started feeling really queasy, so I wanted to make sure I got home before I threw up.’
‘And your route home: did you travel along Karangahape Road?’
‘No, I park the car off Albert Street – I lease a space – so I always go up Victoria Street to get onto the Northern Motorway. I don’t go anywhere near Karangahape Road, it’s way off my route.’ She looked at him directly, and her eyes seemed to penetrate his mind. Shit, you wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of a full interrogation with her, he thought. His skin tingled, and he decided that the idea of being interrogated by her was turning him on. Again, he had to suppress the urge to laugh. He thought about card nights with the boys and the little tricks he used to keep a straight face.
‘And there is no way you might have taken a different route on that evening?’
‘No, as I said, I was feeling awful, and I just wanted to get home as fast as possible before I started vomiting.’ She must have accepted that, as she moved on to a new question.
‘Have you ever seen this young woman before?’
She held up a photograph of a very young-looking woman. His eyes focused on the hair, glossy and dark, pulled tight in two braids down the sides of her face so the curls were less noticeable. She then held up another picture, this one grainy, and going by the shelving and stock in the background looked like it had come from a security camera in a petrol station.
‘That’s the girl who’s gone missing. I saw both these pictures on the news tonight. After the visit from the constable this afternoon we thought we’d better watch and find out what was going on. But other than that, no, I’ve never seen her before.’ Even he was amazed by how calm his voice sounded, with just the right tinge of concern. His pulse was elevated, but not hugely so. In a bizarre kind of way, it was exciting.
‘We would like to take a closer examination of your car.’
‘Of course, I’ll take you down to the garage. Do you want to look at it in the garage, or do you want me to park it in the driveway?’ He congratulated himself on having the foresight to clean it out. As well as a vacuum he’d wiped down any of the exposed metal or smooth surfaces she might have touched in the boot. One step ahead, that was all he had to stay.
‘Thank you, but we will need to take the vehicle away, so our people can do a full forensic examination of the car.’ That he hadn’t anticipated, and for a few wild heartbeats he panicked, then he told himself not to be so stupid. He’d done the job well, it would be alright.
‘But he told you he hadn’t been on K Road. Why do you need to take the car? And don’t you need a warrant to do that?’ Ange’s voice was strained with annoyance.
‘As I said, we are in the process of eliminating people from the investigation. This will enable us to eliminate your husband faster. We are examining all of the vehicles on our shortlist, not just his.’ The manner reminded him of a school principal, when you’d just been caught throwing paper balls at the teacher. This detective was the first person he’d met who could put Ange in her place. He was unaccustomed to seeing his wife back down from anyone, let alone a woman. ‘Unless you have any objections we will have a truck arriving to remove the vehicle soon. We should have it back to you in a couple of days.’
Ange began to open her mouth to protest, but Bradley held up his hand to stop her. ‘It’s okay, I don’t mind. If it gets things sorted out faster so we get left alone then that’s good. It will be fun car-sharing for a few days. Just as well it’s the weekend tomorrow, huh?’ He gave her a reassuring smile and thought he’d done a superb job acting as if it was no bother to him whatsoever. This was pure front, though, because a niggle was worming its way into his head: he was beginning to worry about blood. She’d been bleeding when he’d bundled her limp form into the car that day. At the time he’d wrapped her head in a sports towel, and when he’d cleaned the boot of the car he hadn’t seen any traces of blood anywhere. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t there.
He felt like an automaton while he watched his car winched up onto the flat-deck truck, and as they saw the detectives to the door. Although he’d been a picture of calm on the outside, inside his mind was whirring through all the possibilities, trying to find a way to salvage this. If they found blood he was fucked. He only had a day – if that – if worst came to worst. If they found blood they’d start looking into his background, and when they found the investment properties, they’d find the girl. The game had changed and now one thing was for certain. The girl had to go.
Max
They both slid down low in their seats as the car headlights came around the corner. Despite the windows being wound down slightly to stop them from steaming up, Harry’s car still had the unmistakable fug of stale fish and chips and end-of-day male.
‘Who’d be dropping by at this hour of the night?’ Harry asked as they watched the Holden Equinox pull into the Fordyces’ driveway. Max had a suspicion as soon as he saw the vehicle – he knew an unmarked police car when he saw one.
‘Oh, shit.’ The tall redhead who climbed out of the driver’s seat was unmistakable. He smiled to himself. He should have known she’d be on the ball and would have narrowed the numbers down fast. ‘That’s the police, come around for a little chat – although I pity anyone who finds themself on the receiving end of one of her chats.’
‘Is she hard?’
‘That’s one way of putting it.’
Max heard the note of admiration in his own voice.
‘You like her, don’t you?’ Apparently it had betrayed him. He was surprised at the question. It was rather personal, considering they had been carefully avoiding anything that could be vaguely challenging or confrontational.
‘I respect her. There’s a difference.’
There was silence for a while, before he heard Harry suck in a deep breath. Max wondered what was coming next.
‘Don’t you want to know what Greg is like?’
‘Who?’ He played dumb.
‘Mum’s boyfriend.’
Truth be told he was dying to know what Greg was like, but had restrained himself from asking. But it was an odd question, and one that set vague alarm bells ringing in his head.
‘Why? Has there been a problem with him? Do you want to tell me something?’ The thought of some strange man giving his son or his ex-wife grief riled him. If there was trouble going down he would be quite prepared to deal with it.
‘No, there’s no problem, he’s nice, and he’s good to Mum, and me. It’s just…’
‘Just what?’
‘Well, I kind of feel bad that Mum didn’t wait for you, you know. I was a bit mad that she went and found someone else. I might have been a bit, well, difficult.’
Not a conversation he thought he’d be having anytime soon, but he felt gratified Harry had stayed so loyal to him, after everything he’d done.
‘You know, I don’t have any hard feelings towards your mum because she found someone else.’ A lie felt appropriate at this time. ‘What I did, walking away from you all, was pretty despicable, and I only did it because I was utterly desperate and didn’t know what else to do. It wasn’t because I didn’t love you, or love your mother. I still love you both. But things had started to fall apart between us after Jess died. The strain on us both was huge, and then, well, I ran. Plain and simple. I ran. It was the wrong thing to do, I know that, but believe me I was at my wits’ end, I was a mess, a head case. So I don’t blame her at all that she wanted to find someone else. So don’t you blame her either.’
Harry’s hands rested on the bottom arc of the steering wheel, his index finger tapping away against the leather.
‘Did you miss me?’
Cold nausea hit his stomach. How the hell did he answer that question? Because the sad truth of it was, he hadn’t.
Honesty seemed to have worked so far, or degrees of it.
‘Look, Harry, I know you’re a bright kid, and you can sniff out bullshit a mile away, so I won’t insult you by saying, yeah, of course I missed you, because it wasn’t that simple. I think the best way to describe it is I shut down, I shut everything out. I had to or else I would have gone insane. I shut out Jess, and I shut out your mum, and I am ashamed to say I shut out you.’
He dared to look at his son, and the boy was staring straight ahead, tears streaming down his face. The sight made him feel as if someone had wrenched his ribcage apart and was ripping away at his heart with a cheese grater.
‘It was like a blackness had descended over me and on the occasions I emerged from it, the pain of it all seared so much I willed the darkness to return. I existed but I wasn’t really alive. The only thing that kept me from tipping right over the edge was Billy. These last few days have been an awakening, and I’ve had to face up to a lot of things. One of those things is the horror and shame I feel at the thought of missing so much of your life.’
‘You’re a fucking nutcase.’
‘Yeah, I know.’
Harry turned and looked at him then. The hurt in his eyes cut to the bone. ‘I hate you for leaving us.’
‘I know that too.’
They sat for several minutes in a silence that was uncomfortable, but not excruciating. They’d both said their piece, and Max didn’t feel the need to add anything to the conversation. After a time, he noticed neither did Harry; and with a wry smile he realised his son was an awful lot like himself.
‘What do we do now?’ It was Harry who broke the ice.
The question could have meant many things, but Max took the pragmatic approach.
‘We go home.’ They had watched as a tow truck had arrived and started to haul Fordyce’s Nissan aboard. ‘The game has changed. He’s our man, I know it, and this is going to force his hand. So we go home, we get some sleep, then we come back in the morning, early, really early, and we wait for him to make his move.’
