Black Ice (21 page)

Friday 12 April, 11.50 am

'So what happened, Marco?' Seren asked.

Suspended. At ten years old, for godsakes. Even younger than she'd been the first time. A storm cloud darkened his face, his fists were clenched and his arms hung rigid at his sides.

Seren felt the pull again. Fate.
Just give up
, it whispered to her.
You know this is how it works. Did you seriously think your child could ever amount to anything? You just got out of prison! You're a loser – born that way. Stop struggling; just relax, let go and let the current carry you down to where you're supposed to be.

'Why should I tell you anything?' said Marco. 'You don't care about me anyway.'

See! There! Take that!

'Marco, I love you more than anything, more than anyone.'

'Except Christian.'

'Marco, I don't love Christian.'

'Why do you always lie to me? I know that's where you go. Who else would give you all that money? Pay for taxis? Buy you clothes? That's what he did before. And you'd rather be with him than me.'

'Okay,' she said. 'All right.' When did he grow up? How could he know these things? 'You're right. I have been seeing Christian, but I don't love him.'

You see, he was right. You are a slut.

'I'm doing some work for him,' she said. 'It's only for a little while. That is the truth, I promise you.'

'Is the work against the law?' he said.

Ha ha! Tell the truth? Tell a lie? Either way, I win,
laughed Fate in her head.

'Baby, you shouldn't have to worry about things like that.'

'No, I shouldn't,' he said. 'But I do.' The storm build-up broke, and Marco's face crumpled. He pushed his fists into his eyes, but they couldn't hold the tears. 'I hate it in DoCS!' he cried. 'I hate it! You're going to go to gaol again. You're going to leave me.'

Seren dropped to her knees. She could physically feel his suffering. She remembered, now, how it felt when he was pulled from her arms when she was led down to the cells; how she had left him standing, helpless, at the mercy of strangers. Powerless to do anything other than what he was told. Eight, when she went to gaol. He was eight years old; the top of his head did not even reach their waists. And when he cried at night, alone, for her, she didn't come. And when he wondered what would happen to him, what would happen to her, if they would ever see each other again, she couldn't console him. No one reassured him; no one could. That was her job. Marco had been fed, housed and clothed while she had been locked up. She did thank the State for that. But Marco had been completely alone; she felt it more than ever, right now.

She wrapped her arms around her son. They stayed there, on the floor, for a long time.

Seren shut her thoughts to Fate. She concentrated on Marco.

Friday 12 April, 10 pm

Jill smeared at the mascara with a cottonwool ball. She looked like a panda. Kasem wouldn't be so keen to take her out again if he saw her like this. Then again, remembering the intensity in his eyes as he'd leaned into her to say goodbye, her spine pressed hard against his car, she figured he wouldn't notice a bit of smudged make-up. She wondered what would have happened if Jelly hadn't chosen that moment to lose it, shouting at them that he wanted to go home. Actually, she knew what would have happened, and it freaked her out. Intimate contact with any man could panic her, send her nervous system scuttling back down memory lane to when such a touch meant terrible pain. How would she react if Kasem Nader tried to kiss her?

She brushed her teeth and stared into the bathroom mirror, beyond her reflection. It was strange, but pinned against the car she hadn't felt distressed at all. She thought back to the moment. The street and all its sounds had seemed to disappear, and she'd felt cocooned with him in a trancelike state. When he'd inclined further towards her, she'd felt her hips tilt up to meet his.

Oh fuck, Jill thought now. That wasn't good. She turned on the cold tap and doused her hot cheeks. It was the Krystal Peters thing, she decided. It had started this morning, putting on the costume, becoming another woman with another life, another history, who had different predilections and attractions. Who hadn't been defiled by two men in a basement.

Or maybe it was the wine. She shouldn't have had anything to drink.

She turned from the mirror. What the hell. What's done is done, she thought. She'd better call it in.

She took her mobile into the centre of the apartment, furthest away from the insubstantial walls, and dialled Superintendent Last's number.

'Jill, I'm pleased you called,' he said. 'Did you pick up a mobile phone to take Damien's calls?'

'Yes sir. I'll be meeting him at Sydney Uni tomorrow. Gabriel will be there.'

'Excellent. You're okay with working with Delahunt again, I trust.'

'Yep.'

'Good. Good. Now, I want to let you know what we're doing on our end,' he said. 'As you know, we can't afford to leave a drug lab in operation in the suburbs for too long. They're okaying it for the time being, but it's going to be a day by day thing, and we could be told to shut it all down at any time.'

'I understand,' she said, 'but it would be a pity if that meant losing the networks associated with it. We could take down the whole web.'

'I know. I'm keen to do that too, and if Gabriel is correct in his hunch that this Kasem Nader is importing precursor chemicals, it would be a particularly important takedown.'

Jill paused a moment. She should tell her commander what she'd been doing today. Before she could, he spoke again.

'The commissioner wants a listening device in there, Jill. We're going in tomorrow.'

'What about Damien's accomplices?'

'We'd like you to ask him to do something about that. We'll need twenty minutes to install the LD. Half an hour would be good. We want to do it tomorrow after nine pm. Damien will have to think of a way to get them out of there for at least that amount of time. But the problem is Nader,' he said. 'Damien has no control over him.'

'Well, actually,' said Jill, 'I went out to lunch today with Kasem Nader.'

'To lunch.'

'Yes,' she said. 'To Bondi. He told me he had to pick something up. He left me for around fifteen minutes, so I couldn't determine what that was. He took and made around ten to twelve calls. Very brief conversations, often just yes or no. Sounded maybe like deals being made.'

'That's good work,' said Last. 'And you felt safe enough with him?'

How do I answer that? she thought. 'It was fine.'

'You went to lunch as Krystal Peters, of course?'

'Of course.'

'Okay. Well, that's a new development,' said Last.

Here we go, she thought, no backing out now. 'I can keep him away from the house tomorrow night,' she said.

'You can?'

'He's asked me to dinner. I'll accept, and make sure we don't go anywhere near Merrylands.'

Last was silent for a few seconds. 'You haven't had a situation like this come up while you've been undercover, Jill,' he said finally.

'A situation like what?'

'Well,' he cleared his throat, 'a potential love interest for Krystal.'

'I'll be right,' she said.

'And if Nader wants to . . . develop the relationship?'

'I'll handle it,' said Jill.

Saturday 13 April, 10 am

'What do you even need me for, then?' asked Damien.

Jill smiled at the young man in front of her. He had a scattering of pimples across his chin, and his cheeks still had that adolescent chubbiness. 'What are you, nineteen?' she asked.

'Twenty,' he said.

'What'd you get mixed up in this shit for?' she wanted to know.

'I was cursed,' he said.

'What?'

He shook his head. 'I don't know why. Because I'm a dickhead, that's why. Because I thought just because I can, then maybe I should. I really was going to get out of all of this, concentrate on my studies, and then Nader showed up. And now you guys.'

'That's right,' said Gabriel, his boots up on the seat in front of him, his hands in the pockets of his black cargoes. 'Now us. And to answer your question, the reason we need
you
is to cover all our bases.'

Jill couldn't see Gabriel's eyes as he spoke; his trucker cap sat low on his brow. He didn't look like one of the other students around here, but he didn't look like a cop either. She realised that he seemed to blend in wherever he went; no one seemed to pay him a lot of attention, but she was pretty certain she'd have noticed him in a crowd, even if they'd never met.

'Like we said,' Gabriel continued, 'we are going to put a listening device in your house, and we'll also have one on your landline and your mobile, but you could be in the street when Nader tells you something important. You could be in a pub; you could be in a car. Our line could go down. Whatever. So you need to call in twice a day and tell Detective Jackson what you know.'

Gabriel reached across for a handful of chips from a packet on the table in front of them. Three soft drink cans shared the space, and Damien had ordered a vegetarian burger he hadn't even unwrapped.

'You're going to report anything Nader tells you about deals coming up,' Gabriel said, 'about how much he wants you to cook, how quickly he can get you the base ingredients.' He paused. 'You could be even more helpful, if you like. You could ask Nader where he gets the chemicals; act interested, you know, you're a chemist, you would be interested in that sort of thing.'

Damien sat there, his face sour. 'If I want to be helpful?' he said. 'Do you think it's fair to ask me to interrogate a gangster? You're using me as bait! Why should I go out of my way for you people?'

'Well,' said Gabriel, popping chips into his mouth and then licking his fingers, 'you should go out of your way for us because you're jammed up, that's why. We can lock you up now, today, and you'll get five to eight years. We'll shut down your lab and get Nader another way. If you do like we say, though, Damo, we can get you off.' Gabriel continued to stare straight ahead. 'But if you snake us, Damien, we'll get you an extra ten years on top for being an arsehole.'

Jill noticed that the couple of pimples on Damien's chin stood out livid red against his ashy pallor. She hoped he wasn't going to throw up.

'Anything else?' Damien asked.

'Yeah,' said Gabriel, raising his face. Jill was always a little distracted by Gabriel's eyelashes when he wore that hat; they were so long, and the brim seemed to frame them. She mentally shook herself, refocused. 'If you happen to see Detective Jackson here when Kasem Nader is around, you will act like you don't know her.'

'Well, obviously,' said Damien. 'You think I want to get killed?'

'If you do see Detective Jackson outside of this university campus,' Gabriel continued as though Damien hadn't spoken, 'she will be presenting as someone named Krystal Peters. Is that clear?'

'Yes.'

'And if you think Nader is someone to worry about,' said Gabriel, 'you have no idea what'll happen to you if you blow this operation. Not only will we lock you up, Damien, you need to understand that you won't make it out again. Gaol's a very unsafe place for rats.'

'I get it. I fucking get it, all right. I'm fucked, every which way, sideways and up against the wall. I get it, okay?'

'There's another thing,' said Jill.

'Of course there is,' said Damien.

'We need you to get your friends out of there tonight,' she said. 'You're to be out by eight-thirty at the latest and you can't return until ten at the earliest.'

'Is that when you're going to bug the place? Whitey won't just let me go out and leave the place unlocked for someone to walk in.'

'We won't be worried about the locks,' said Jill.

'Lock it up,' said Gabriel.

'Can I go now?' said Damien.

'One last thing.' Gabriel took his feet from the chair and leaned forwards.

Damien made an are-you-serious face, but he waited.

'You should relax a bit,' said Gabriel. 'Have you tried yoga?'

'Yoga,' said Damien, his voice fracturing around the word. 'Did you say
yoga
? I have been literally shitting myself for three days straight, and you think I should do yoga?'

Gabriel grinned and clapped the boy on the shoulder.