The Darkest Hour (21 page)

‘Charlie,’ she said. ‘Look at me. We need to take care of you, okay? Once we know you’re stable we might be able to send Joe here over to help them work on Mitchell.’

It was a lie. Charlie needed surgery and far from splitting up they’d be getting him off to hospital as soon as they could.

‘Good pulse.’ Joe had eased off Charlie’s left boot and pressed his gloved fingers to the pale skin.

Lauren shone a penlight torch into Charlie’s eyes. The pupils were equal and reacting. ‘Okay, Charlie, I’m going to put a little needle in your arm and give you some medication for pain and some fluids to replace the blood you’ve lost.’

‘I hate needles,’ he said, his eyes on his brother.

‘So does everyone, but it’ll help you feel better. And I promise that before we go anywhere I’ll get an update on Mitchell for you, okay?’

Soon the IV was in and the fluids running. Lauren injected five milligrams of morphine into the IV line then reached up to turn the flow faster. Joe was standing, holding the fluid bag and gazing over her. She turned to see where he was staring. The gateway was crowded with onlookers, as were the gaps in the hoarding. She looked back at Joe. ‘What is it?’

‘Never underestimate.’

‘Even though we’re down here?’

He didn’t answer. She squeezed Charlie’s arm. ‘How are you feeling now?’

He blinked slowly. ‘Mitchell?’

She looked across at the crane. The squatting workman was crying, holding Mitchell’s hand to his face. Fire officers attacked the framework with cutting equipment. The helicopter came lower. Bryan glanced across at her, on his back under the boom, and their eyes met. ‘He’s hanging in there, Charlie. He’s a tough one.’ The words were sour. She knew it was only a matter of time before Mitchell arrested, and how could you do CPR on somebody who was pinned face down on a metal walkway?

They log-rolled Charlie onto a spine board and lifted him onto their stretcher. The wheels bogged down in the mud so they carried the stretcher to the ambulance and eased it in. Lauren climbed in after it and arranged pillows around Charlie’s leg so it would be supported on the trip to hospital.

‘How’s Mitch?’ he said.

‘Joe’s just gone to find out.’ She injected another five of morph.

Joe came back and leaned into the ambulance to squeeze Charlie’s right foot. ‘He’s holding on, but he’s pretty crook, mate.’ Out of Charlie’s view he shook his head at Lauren and held up two fingers. Code two – cardiac arrest. Then four fingers. Code four. Dead.

As Charlie grew dazed under the effect of the drug, Lauren buckled herself in, trying to keep her mind on what she needed to do. Make a quick radio report to Control for the hospital, check obs again, start the case sheet. But all she could think about was the moment when Charlie would find out he’d lost his brother. She knew what that felt like, and she grasped his hand as the emotion flooded back. She kept her head turned away from him and blinked hard.

Joe looked at her in the mirror as he started the ambulance up the ramp. ‘Want me to make the report?’

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

He called up Control and asked for a code three to St Vincent’s. ‘Male, late twenties, open fracture left femur with severe tissue damage, distal pulses present. Also lower back pain, no tingling or loss of sensation. No LOC. Last obs–’ He looked at Lauren.

She took a deep breath. ‘Pulse one-ten, beep one hundred on sixty.’

Joe relayed the information. ‘ETA about five.’

‘Copy, Thirty-four,’ Control said. ‘Any information on the code nine?’

‘Uh, I believe they’ll be calling you shortly,’ Joe said. He rehooked the mike and Lauren saw him turn the radio volume down low. If the other crew called up to say Mitch was dead, Charlie wasn’t going to hear it.

At the top of the ramp the workman was holding pedestrians and traffic back, and Joe turned onto the street and flicked the beacons and siren on.

When he pulled into the ambulance bay at St Vincent’s four minutes later, Lauren took a final set of obs, turned off the IV line and laid the fluid bag on the bed, disconnected the monitor and tucked the case sheet folder under Charlie’s pillow.

‘How are you feeling?’ she asked him.

‘I’m worried about Mitch.’

‘I’ll see what I can find out for you.’

He put out his hand. ‘Thanks for everything.’

She stripped off her glove. The calluses on his palm were hard against her fingers. ‘You’re very welcome, Charlie.’

Inside the ED, Joe positioned the stretcher beside the hospital bed and, with the help of two wardsmen, they carefully lifted Charlie across. Claire Bramley appeared, her uniform covered by a plastic apron, and grabbed for the case sheet folder. Lauren was quicker and tucked it under her arm.

‘Sheet’s not done yet,’ she said. ‘How about I just tell you what you need to know?’

Claire huffed and put her hands on her hips.

‘Charlie’s twenty-eight and was working on a crane boom–’

‘Am I meant to know what that is?’

‘The long arm part.’ Lauren squeezed the folder. ‘The boom collapsed and as it fell he was thrown to the ground. Fall was approximately five metres and he landed–’

‘No arterial bleed?’ Claire peeled back the bandage and dressing on his thigh without waiting for an answer.

If there was, you’d be getting a faceful
.

‘I thought you said the damage was severe,’ Claire said.

‘Initial obs were–’

‘Look at the dirt in here!’ Claire said to Charlie. ‘She did a bad job of cleaning that, didn’t she? What else did she stuff up?’

She slapped the dressing back down. Charlie flinched and Lauren felt her blood rise.

‘One good thing,’ Claire went on, ‘at least you didn’t need a tube.’

Lauren saw red. ‘Claire–’

Claire ignored her and looked at Charlie. ‘You got off pretty lucky, I’d say. Unlike your mate.’

‘What?’

‘The other feller, the one who died.’ Claire yanked the blood pressure cuff down from the wall and hoisted Charlie’s arm so she could wrap it around his bicep, oblivious to both the tears in Charlie’s eyes and the pure fury in Lauren’s.

Lauren grabbed her arm and pulled her into the drug storeroom. ‘What the
fuck
are you doing?’

‘That’s assault.’

‘It was his brother who died.’

‘You could’ve told me.’

‘When, exactly? And why should you need to be told? At the very least it was one of his colleagues.’ Lauren clenched her fists. ‘Don’t you have any heart at all?’

‘I’ve got enough for Joe.’ Claire held up her gloved left hand. Her engagement ring stuck out against the latex. ‘It’s me he’s marrying, you know.’

‘I’m talking about a patient’s welfare,’ Lauren snapped. ‘We were holding back about Charlie’s brother until his family could be here with him.’

‘It’s me he’ll come home to every night–’

‘So he could have some support around him – are you listening to me? Are you registering
anything
I’m saying?’

‘Hey.’ Joe stood in the doorway, stern-faced. ‘Everyone out there can hear.’

Lauren stamped out of the storeroom. Another nurse was with Charlie now, talking to him and handing him tissues. So angry she could hardly see straight, Lauren stormed out to the ambulance bay.

Joe came out behind her.

‘I cannot believe her.’ Lauren slammed the case sheet folder down on the bonnet. ‘She told Charlie about his brother, just dropped it into the conversation like it was nothing, then didn’t even have the heart or the sense to realise what she’d done. Even when I hauled her into the storeroom she–’

‘You shouldn’t have left him,’ Joe said.

‘You don’t get it,’ Lauren said. ‘She slagged off our cleaning of his wound as well, just to have a go at me, right there in front of him. She even brought up that bloody tube again.’

‘You still shouldn’t have left him.’

‘But she was going on and on,’ Lauren said, slower now.

‘You took her away and left Charlie completely alone right at the moment when he needed somebody most.’

Lauren’s mouth went dry.

‘What if he’d gone flat? What if he wanted to talk? Who was there looking after him? I came in and found him crying, no bedrails up, no monitor on, nobody with him. That’s pretty shitful patient care if you ask me.’

Lauren flushed with shame. ‘What am I supposed to do? Just take everything she dishes out? Let her bag our treatment in front of him without pulling her up?’

‘If you want to be professional, yes,’ he said. ‘You walk away.’

Lauren couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘It’s irresponsible for me not to finish my handover.’

‘She had enough to start treatment. That’s all that matters and you know it.’

Lauren burned with anger and humiliation. ‘I can’t believe you’re taking her side.’

His eyes were sad. ‘Lauren, you need to grow up a bit.’

He walked back to the Emergency Department doors. Her vision blurred with tears. She climbed into the side door of the ambulance, pulled it shut behind her with a bang, and sobbed in privacy.

T
he afternoon meeting was short, and Ella and Murray got to Rosie’s earlier than they’d intended. The place looked locked up tight. Murray tugged at the doors then knocked.

Ella cupped her hands around her eyes against the dark glass. ‘I’m sure there’s movement in there.’

Murray knocked again. Ella squinted into the gloom. Had somebody just hurried out of sight?

She took out her mobile. ‘You got that number from Kennedy’s records?’

Murray held out his open notebook. Turning her back to the club, Ella dialled. She could just hear the faint ring from inside. Finally it was picked up.

‘Rosie’s is closed.’ The voice was gruff.

‘This is Detective Ella Marconi.’ With her free hand she got out her badge and pressed it against the glass.

The man sighed. ‘Just a sec.’

Ella put her phone away as the man came to the doors and unlocked them. He looked out and she showed her badge again. ‘You are?’

‘Paul Davids, the manager.’ His head was shaved and he wore a tight black T-shirt and black jeans. The edge of a barbed wire tattoo was just visible below his right sleeve.

‘That phone I just rang,’ Ella said. ‘Where is it?’

Davids pointed inside. ‘On the bar.’

Ella stepped past him. Murray followed. The music was off, the club silent except for the hum of the fridges behind the bar. Davids flicked the overhead lights on and the club was revealed as nothing more than a dank-smelling, low-ceilinged room.

Ella went to the bar and saw a phone sitting on the staff side. She looked up and around for CCTV cameras. Nothing but black-painted ceiling. ‘Who has access to this phone?’

Davids shrugged. ‘Mostly staff, but customers sometimes ask to use it too.’

‘You have no restrictions on that sort of thing?’

‘I want to keep people happy,’ he said. ‘If that means absorbing a forty-cent call, well, fine.’

‘Are you open every night of the week?’

He nodded.

‘From what time?’

‘Seven-thirty we unlock the doors, but not many people are here then. It gets busy from about ten.’

‘A call was made from this phone on Wednesday the fourth, at around six-thirty, quarter-to-seven in the evening. Any idea who made it?’

‘None whatsoever.’

‘But you just said that you don’t open until seven-thirty,’ Ella said. ‘So the call could only have been made by one of your staff, correct?’

‘Not necessarily,’ Davids said. ‘Staff sometimes bring their friends in early, and the DJs are here setting up at that time and they might have roadies.’

Ella said, ‘We’ll need a list of everyone who was here at that time on that night.’

‘How can I be expected to remember that?’

‘Is it really so hard?’ Murray said. ‘You put down everyone you’re sure of, and then you add all the people who only might’ve been here. And we’ll ask each of them who they recall being present that night, and at some point, after we’ve made numerous visits here, we’ll find who made the call.’

Davids frowned. ‘You want this list now?’

‘If you’re not too busy serving customers,’ Ella said.

Davids went behind the bar and took an A4 pad out of a cupboard. When he finished writing he tore the page off and handed it over. Ella read down the list of seven names and their designations. ‘Didn’t you say you were the manager?’

‘That’s right.’

‘You’ve got here that Sal Rios is manager/supervisor. What does that mean?’

Davids capped his pen and laid it on the bar. ‘He’s the son of one of the owners. That’s his official title, though he only comes in now and again, and even then he doesn’t really do anything but get himself and his girlfriend drinks.’

Of the other people on the page, two were listed as bar staff, one was a DJ, one the DJ’s roadie, one was security and the last one was Davids himself.

‘So did you make any calls on that phone that night?’ Ella said.

‘Nope.’

‘Did you see who did?’

‘Nope.’

‘Where would you have been at about that time? Here at the bar?’

‘Back in the office, most likely.’

‘You said you didn’t mind customers using the phone,’ Ella said. ‘Did your staff have to get your permission first?’

‘They’re supposed to, but obviously if I’m out the back I can’t see them.’

‘Obviously.’ Ella folded the page. ‘We’ll be in touch.’

It was strange, Lauren thought, sitting at her kitchen table in the evening gloom, that with everything that was going on, she couldn’t stop thinking about Joe.

Or maybe it wasn’t so strange. Maybe it was a kind of self-defence for the mind. Think about Joe, his eyes, his smile, his lips, and you didn’t think about how maybe you were only breathing today because of the location of a microwave.

She looked at it. Even in the dim light from the hallway she could see the shine of the fresh cuts was gone.

Kristi stood at the window. Felise was in bed down the hall. Lauren had finished work late and come home to a roast chicken dinner under foil in the oven. She balled up the foil in her hand, her plate now empty at her elbow. The dry chicken felt like it was caught halfway down.

‘They’re there?’ she said, just to say something.

Kristi nodded, her eyes on the street.

The house stayed silent.

Lauren put her head in her hand. The arguments with Claire and then Joe weighed heavily on her mind. She and Joe had hardly spoken for the rest of the shift, besides what was necessary to get their cases done. ‘Would you like the stretcher now?’ he’d say. ‘Yes, please, officer,’ she’d reply, hoping for half a smile, for some response at least, but he’d only turn and walk out to the ambulance. One patient had even said, ‘Are you just new working together?’

She’d wanted to come home to a busy house full of light and noise, and forget about both the argument and poor Charlie, her last sight of him sobbing in the arms of his parents, but Felise had a cold and had been put to bed early, and Kristi was angry and close-mouthed about something.

Lauren said, ‘Did you paint the microwave?’

‘Felise asked what the marks were from.’

She squeezed the ball of foil tight. ‘Is that why you’re mad?’

‘Who says I’m mad?’

‘Spleen,’ Lauren said, with a smile so Kristi would know she wasn’t being mean, but then she realised it was too dark for her to see it.

Kristi grunted and looked back to the window.

‘Why do you have to watch them?’

‘It’s the only thing that makes me feel safe.’

‘But he’d be an idiot to try again,’ Lauren said.

‘He’s got more to gain than to lose.’

Lauren put her plate in the sink. She touched the side of the microwave. The paint was dry but lumpy. She smelled bleach, and looked at the aged linoleum under her feet. ‘We already cleaned this.’

‘Not right down into all the little cracks and splits, you didn’t.’

‘Is that why you’re angry? Because you had to clean again?’

‘Lower your voice, you’ll wake Felise.’

Lauren shoved her hands deep into her pockets and frowned at the floor. She wondered about life; why on those exact nights that you needed something to lift you up, a bit of fun family time, a few laughs, you collided head-on with somebody else’s bad day, the both of you needing something from the other that neither was capable of recognising or giving.

‘And no, that’s not why I’m angry,’ Kristi said. ‘It’s because you never told me you were going to be late.’

‘It’s the bloody job.’

‘Yeah, but you had time to ring the surveillance people so they’d know when to meet you and follow you home, didn’t you?’ Kristi came away from the window. ‘Meanwhile, I’m watching the clock and wondering if I’m going to see that detective get out of her car alone and come up to the door looking all grim with her bad news.’ Her voice wavered. ‘If I’m going to have to say goodbye to you the way we said it to Brendan . . .’

‘Nothing’s going to happen to me.’

‘How can you say that? I saw you on the news, at that crane job. They said a man died. He went to work this morning thinking he would live forever too.’

‘What do you want me to say?’ Lauren said. ‘What can I do about any of this?’

‘Take time off, stay home until he’s caught.’

‘I can’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because–’
Because while you might only feel safe watching the police outside on the street, the only time I feel safe is with Joe.
‘I just can’t.’

Kristi stormed away.

The evening was cooling, and a fresh breeze brought the smell of the river up the hill as Ella parked in the driveway of her half-house. Murray had been keen to knock off, so she’d agreed to check the Rosie’s names out in the morning and they’d gone their separate ways. Now she unlocked the letterbox and peered in to find only a folded note on which her half-house neighbour Denzil had scrawled,
Big job in Melbourne, back next week
.

She walked up the path alongside the house, scrunching the note in her hand. The lawn was getting long with the warm weather, the paspalum brushing against her legs. She’d have to get somebody to mow it before her dad found out. Last time he’d almost killed himself trying to lift his mower into the boot of the car. She could just imagine her mum hurrying to help and getting entangled, and both of them ending up on the ground with fractured hips.

She unlocked her front door and went inside, careful to deadlock and chain the door behind her. She loved her house, small and bloody expensive though it may be. She felt . . . well, she felt at home. She dropped her bag and kicked her shoes off and fell into her big blue armchair. She turned sideways to dangle her legs over the arm. From there she could stare out the window at next door’s palm trees and the sky turning pink behind them.

It was funny the way a case unfolded. Clues came in from all over the place – like today’s information that Deborah Kennedy had fled from police out at Griffith, and the fact that the call to Kennedy’s phone had been made from inside Rosie’s – but you couldn’t tell what you had until it was over and you looked back at the detail that broke the case open. And things could change so drastically at any moment. She could go into the office tomorrow and find that Deborah Kennedy had turned herself in and confessed to paying Thomas Werner to kill James because of his affair with Helen Flinders. Or she and Murray could knock on the door of one of the names on the Rosie’s list and run into the man himself.

She loved this work, and the deeper she got into the case, the more it hurt to think of being sent back to the suburbs. Back to stolen cars, petty assaults and break-and-enters. Ugh. She did her best work here, where it really mattered that they caught the guy. Surely the bosses could see that, and would change her status to permanent sooner rather than later?

Oh well. No point sitting there stewing. Ella rubbed her face with both hands and got up to see about dinner. There was more of her mother’s vegetable lasagne in the freezer but she couldn’t deny a sudden craving for pizza. Oh, a mushroom special from the gourmet place up on Vicky Road at Gladesville! Her mouth watered and she knew it was all over; once you hit that point, you weren’t firing up the stove and making something yourself.

In the kitchen she reached for the flyer on the fridge but it was gone. The apple magnet was there, as were the rates notice and the phone bill and the photo of Lachlan Phillips on his first birthday, all under their respective fruit-shaped magnets, but no pizza-shop flyer. It wasn’t on the floor either, nor had it somehow fallen and slipped under the fridge. She got up and brushed off her knees and tried to think.

Had she stepped off the scales one morning recently and decided enough mushroom pizzas were enough, out of sight was out of mind, and so it was time that flyer went into the rarely opened cupboard of recipe books? She shuffled through the books and torn-out magazine pages that Netta sent her, but the flyer wasn’t there.

Had she thrown it out?

No, she wouldn’t have done that, not even on the worst-scale day. Mushroom pizzas were an important part of life, it was a recognised fact. Or if it wasn’t, she thought, it should be.

No use fussing. She looked up the shop in the phone book and rang in her order. Twenty minutes, they said.

In the bathroom she stepped into the shower. The water was hot and lovely. She reached for the shampoo but found an empty space. She blinked through the water at the rack on the wall. Razor dangling from the bottom, facial scrub, conditioner, fancy bath gel stuff she never used and should get around to throwing out, but no shampoo. She looked on the floor, at the top of the vanity, at the windowsill. She was sure she hadn’t finished the bottle and tossed it. She was certain it was new just last week.

She felt ridiculous standing there in the water with her hands on her hips. So maybe she was confused, she thought. Life had been hectic, you can’t remember every little thing you did. Get the spare and get on with it. Pizza will be here soon!