Cold Justice by Katherine Howell

Author:Katherine Howell
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General, Women Sleuths, Mystery & Detective
ISBN: 9780330521338
Publisher: Pan
Published: 2010-01-01T16:00:00+00:00

NINE

They dropped the USB stick into Technical on their way through the city. Ella’s mobile rang as she was about to get back into the car. She saw her parents’ number and sighed.

‘Do you know how many messages I’ve left?’ Netta said.

‘I’m sorry,’ Ella said. ‘I should’ve called you back.’

Murray put his hand out for the keys.

‘I called this number, your home phone, and at the office.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘I even called your old number in Homicide and asked if they knew where you were.’

Ella closed her eyes.

‘Didn’t they tell you?’ Netta said.

Murray waggled his fingers.

‘I’ve been out.’ Ella reluctantly handed the keys over and got in the passenger side. ‘I’ve been busy.’

‘Too busy to let your poor mother know that you’re still alive.’

‘Of course I’m still alive.’

‘How am I to know that?’

‘Don’t give her a hard time,’ she heard her father say in the background.

Netta shushed him.

‘I mean it,’ he said. ‘She won’t want to come for dinner tonight.’

‘Of course she’ll want to come for dinner tonight,’ Netta said. ‘After making us worry like this, she’ll absolutely want to come for dinner tonight.’

‘I was going to have dinner with Wayne,’ Ella said.

‘Bring him! Stella from down at the club gave me some lovely fresh eggplant and I’m making those rolls you like. I’ll make extra. It’s time we met him anyway.’

Ella could hear the joy in her mother’s voice. ‘Okay.’

‘Half six? Or seven? Whenever you like.’

‘Okay. Bye.’

She rang Wayne. ‘I’ve just received a summons. Mum wants us there for dinner tonight.’

‘Great,’ he said. ‘Meet at your place when?’

‘Six thirty’d be good.’

‘See you then.’

She put the phone away. It was overdue, she had to admit. It was the thought of the sizing up that would go on, the glances between her parents, the scrutiny that poor Wayne would be under, that had made her less than willing. But there was no getting around it. She would just have to remember to tell him that whatever else he said he had to praise the cooking.

Murray turned off the Great Western Highway into Concord.

‘Pendle Hill and Wade Tavris are that way,’ Ella said.

‘We should drop in on his ex first.’

‘Little consultation might’ve been nice.’

‘You were sorting out your social life.’

‘For all of five minutes.’

He shrugged. ‘We’re almost there now.’

She looked out the window at the sun on the leaves and tried to count to ten.

‘Listen,’ he said. ‘I read your reports. I think Tavris is the one to focus on.’

‘Really.’

‘That family-barbecue-argument angle – I can’t see it. Whereas Tavris had the car that was a) seen near the pub where Tim and his friends were, and b) later found burnt out.’

‘The car he claimed had been stolen, and that was used in a robbery that night.’

‘Claimed being the operative word.’ Murray turned off Concord Road. ‘And he couldn’t have done the robbery himself?’

‘So he grabs Tim off the street, kills him, does the robbery, dumps the body, burns the car? Busy boy.’

‘Kinda handy that it was “stolen” that very night,’ Murray said. ‘The robbery is a nice extra touch.

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