Grave catch, p.4
Grave Catch, page 4
‘I’ll text you when I’ve got everything ready.’ Connie started for the news van and her cameraman.
Dawn reached for her arm.
‘Connie. If you know what Jasmine knew, you could be in danger.’
‘I wish I did know more, but Jaz kept this case close to her chest.’
‘If Jasmine’s death is linked to her enquiries, whoever did this doesn’t know you know nothing.’ She glanced at her partner as he joined the conversation. ‘Are you going to the pub now?’
Connie bit her top lip and nodded.
‘I’ll get Constable Burger or Chung to meet you there. Keep an eye on you while you collect what you have.’
‘It’s fine, Dawn. I’m an investigative journalist. This is what we do.’
‘Grave is right, Connie. Until we know what happened to the victim, we need to keep any potential witnesses safe.’
Connie appeared to hold her breath as she considered Ryan’s words. A quick nod allowed Dawn to relax.
‘You go straight there. I’ll get someone to join you as soon as I can. Don’t go anywhere without your cameraman or one of my officers.’
A curve touched the corner of Connie’s lips.
‘She is a bossy one, isn’t she?’ Connie elbowed Ryan in the ribs.
His face split with a mischievous grin.
‘You have no idea.’
Dawn rolled her eyes skyward as the ambulance doors slammed once more and the vehicle crept through an opening in the police tape toward the main road.
Cooktown was a small rural town. Keeping this quiet was going to be near impossible. The idea Les Richardson, the fake art dealer and organised crime kingpin, could be involved made Dawn’s mouth dry.
When she busted up his local crime effort last year, he sent his goons to try to kill her. Killing a reporter would be right up his alley.
Ryan drew up behind her as Connie jumped into the news van and followed the ambulance along Charlotte Street.
‘Connie might not be the only one who needs a security detail.’ His body pressed against her back.
Dawn leant discreetly into his firm chest.
‘Luckily, I have my own plain-clothes detective on speed dial.’
‘No dialling required. I’m not letting you out of my sight.’
Chapter 9
A hum drew Dawn around the corner into the office area to find Constables Reynolds, Chung and Jamison perched on the edge of the two front desks facing the whiteboard between Sergeant Martin’s and her office doors.
‘Okay team. Detective Grave has given us the victim’s ID.’ Sergeant Martin scribbled details on a timeline at the top of the whiteboard.
Constable Burger hurried past her and Ryan.
‘I’m on my way to the Top Pub to keep an eye on the reporter.’
‘Thanks Burger,’ Dawn said. ‘Report to me if you notice anything odd. There’ll be lots of new faces in town for the tourist season, so keep your eyes open.’
‘You got it Detective.’
‘Who do you want to interview first?’ Sergeant Martin asked as he put the whiteboard marker down.
‘Let’s start with the skipper. What do we have on him?’
Constable Chung hurried back to his desk, rolled out his chair and began typing.
‘I’ve printed out his name, DOB, address.’ He pointed to a sheet of paper sitting on the printer to the side of the office. ‘Other than a speeding ticket here and there, he’s clean. I’m running the rest of the crew now.’
Dawn strode across the office, picked up the printout and read the details. The skipper’s name was Reginald Flint, aged sixty-two, divorced, no kids. His driver’s licence history made him a long-time local.
‘Chung, dig into his financials. Apparently, the wet-boats are doing it tough. We’ve found drugs on his vessel, so we’ll start with him, but I want warrants on each crew member’s phone and financials.’
‘I’ll organise the warrants.’ Sergeant Martin perched on the edge of Jamison’s desk.
‘Good. Reynolds bring the skipper into Interview Room One. Jamison, chase up the AFP for an update into the federal case surrounding Les Richardson.’
‘Richardson?’ Sergeant Martin jumped to his feet and retrieved the whiteboard marker. ‘You think he’s involved?’
‘Connie told us Jasmine was working on an investigative piece on Jane Nichols’ death and was focusing on Richardson. It’s possible he’s back in town. The Australian Federal Police had him on a watchlist. They might know if he’s returned.’
Chung’s desktop phone rang. He picked it up as Reynolds left to get the skipper.
‘Only if he came in via a commercial airport or vessel. We know he has access to a private plane, and we still don’t know how he got away last time.’ Ryan took Sergeant Martin’s vacated spot at Jamison’s desk as Chung hung up the call.
‘I think you might want to follow this one up.’ Chung ripped a piece of paper from the top of his notepad and met Dawn.
‘What is it?’
‘Dale Taylor out at Quarantine Bay found some PVC piping out the front of his place in the sand dunes.’
‘I hardly think the detectives have time for a beach clean-up day, Chung.’ Sergeant Martin’s tone wasn’t jovial.
Chung dropped back into his chair, leant back and laced his hands together behind his head with a grin.
‘I think the interesting thing is what’s inside the tubing.’ He pointed to the paper in Dawn’s hand.
Ryan read over Dawn’s shoulder.
‘He’s right. We better get to it before the AFP does.’
Sergeant Martin crossed his arms over his crisp blue uniform.
‘What was in the PVC piping?’
‘Drugs. A shitload of them,’ Chung answered.
Dawn considered their options. There were still four witnesses to interview, and her controlling nature wouldn’t allow the sergeant and his constables to handle it. They could miss a micro-expression or a piece of vital evidence.
‘We need to start on the interviews. I don’t want to be late catching Connie at the Top Pub.’
Ryan pursed his lips as he thought.
‘We don’t have to hang around. Quarantine Bay isn’t far. It’s probably only an hour round trip including interviewing Dale Taylor. This could be linked to Richardson and our victim. We can take Jamison with us and leave him to canvas witnesses and watch the evidence until we get a retrieval team out.’
Dawn rolled her lips and considered the alternative. There wasn’t one.
‘Okay. In and out, then back to interview the crew.’
Sergeant Martin scribbled details onto the whiteboard, slipped the marker into his top pocket and started toward his office.
‘I’ll chase the warrants and follow up with the AFP. Maybe they already have a link between Richardson and our victim that could save us some time.’
Dawn considered the investigation as they drove out to Quarantine Bay. The scenery whipped by unseen as she mentally assessed the crew for a link to the drugs or the death of Jasmine Reed.
Stevo the engineer was aloof. Glenn was smart-mouthed and obviously hiding something by tossing his phone away, but it was the younger crew member Bazza who Dawn wondered about.
Was he nervous because he knew about the drugs, or simply shaken up about the state of the victim?
She voiced her concerns as they passed the turnoff to the Walker Bay Country Club and carried on toward the small enclave of expensive beach houses with metres of private, pristine beach frontage.
Ryan slowed the unmarked police-issue Mustang.
‘Someone on board hid the drugs and the engineer is the obvious choice, but Bazza is small enough to get in and out of the engine room hatch easily. I can’t see any of them being involved in the victim’s death though.’
‘I agree. The forensic team aren’t finished yet, but I can’t see any way the victim died on board. No obvious blood, not enough space to quietly kill someone and toss them overboard without anyone else seeing them—not with those injuries. But what are the chances of her being pulled up in prawn nets so quickly after she was killed.’
‘We don’t know time of death yet.’
‘We know she died after Connie saw her Saturday night. So between 8.30pm Saturday and 8.00am Monday.’
‘It’s a decent window.’
Ryan’s Mustang purred as he slowed to scan house numbers. Dawn was distracted by the sound a moment. She peered around the interior with mild confusion.
‘Did you get a new car? Is this a V8?’
‘The V6 trial failed. Not complaining. I prefer the V8.’
Dawn didn’t have a chance to agree as a narrow bitumen driveway veering off to the right caught her attention. ‘That’s it.’
As the house and lawn came into view, so did a round man on short legs with a beer-belly.
His thick grey hair bounced as he jogged toward them. Ryan parked in the pebble driveway. Dale Taylor yanked the driver’s side door open before the engine stopped.
‘Detective. I just want you to know I called you as soon as I found this. It has nothing to do with me. I was chasing my dog...’
‘Okay. Got it.’ Ryan shimmied from his seat into Dale who seemed unaware of the concept of personal space.
Dawn stifled a grin as Ryan manhandled Dale from his path.
‘Can you show us what you’ve found Mr Taylor? We’ll take it from there.’
Dawn rounded the Mustang to join her partner.
‘No one in Cooktown is going to assume you had anything to do with drugs Mr Taylor.’ Dawn tried to assure the long-time local.
‘This town is small you know and tongues, they bloody wag more than my dog’s tail.’ He pointed to the black-and-white border collie who appeared to smile in agreement.
‘Totally understand,’ Dawn assured him. ‘Now where is the plastic piping?’
Dale scratched the back of his head as his face contorted.
‘Well. I kind of told the constable a little porky on the phone.’
‘You lied to a police officer.’ Ryan’s tone was firm, but his face made Dawn chuckle aloud.
‘Where did you find the pipe, with the drugs Mr Taylor?’
The little man opened his mouth to speak but was cut off by a harsh voice.
‘Dale! Stop prattling like a two-year-old and show the detectives what you found.’
A tall woman appeared from the open garage, wearing a tiny bright yellow bikini. Her tanned skin and toned body contrasted against her blonde hair and bright-blue eyes.
Dale hurried toward her.
‘Of course, Luv. I get a little, you know, ditzy sometimes.’ He turned back to Dawn and Ryan. ‘Follow me.’
The woman appeared more than twenty years younger than Dale, but Dawn assumed she must be Mrs Taylor. Dale hurried past, waving for them to follow.
Mrs Taylor stepped back and waited for them to pass by before joining the procession. They stepped into a pebbled courtyard with enormous potted leafy green plants framing the double entrance doors.
A narrow pathway skirted the side of the house, and opened into an expansive, neatly trimmed lawn that ran all the way to a low sandhill. Dense native windswept shrubs hugged the sand and beyond, crystal blue water views flowed all the way to the horizon.
A white sail bobbed in the distance. Dale scurried into the vegetation, stopped, held his dog’s lead and tapped his foot. He waited for them to catch up.
Dawn reached the top of the low sand dune which acted as a natural barrier to the storms and surging sea. She scanned the twigs and driftwood mounded with crushed and broken, long-dead coral and other ocean debris.
‘I don’t come to this spot often. The dog was up here digging her way to China. When I saw it, I thought it was rubbish. Planned to load it up on the trailer and dump it but when I picked it up, it bloody weighed a ton.’
‘So you opened it,’ Dawn surmised.
‘I did. So, my fingerprints are all over it, but I swear on my beautiful Anastasia’s life,’ he waved toward the woman now dragging the border collie away from the scene, ‘I had nothing to do with the contents.’
‘It’s fine Mr Taylor. But we will need to take your prints for elimination.’
Dale clutched his chest as though having a heart attack.
‘My prints. Good lord. I’ve never given my prints.’
Mr Taylor had obviously never travelled to a country where giving a thumbprint was a mandatory requirement of entry.
Ryan passed her a pair of gloves and hurried along the sand toward the 6-metre-long tubing. She slipped a glove on as she assessed the tube diameter. Likely 150mm sewerage pipe. Thick-walled and almost indestructible.
It was a clever way to transport drugs. They could be dropped at sea and if sealed correctly, would float until retrieved by whoever was tasked with distributing them.
One of the many tropical cyclones or low-pressure systems likely dumped this delivery into Mr Taylor’s front yard a few months ago. She vaguely wondered if this sheltered bay was a regular drop-off point, but considered they’d find out soon enough if the AFP got involved.
She snapped the second glove on, then glanced up before joining her partner. A large motor yacht bobbed in the bay, protected from the southerly winds behind the headland between Quarantine and Walker Bays.
‘Whose boat?’ she asked.
Mr Taylor spun around and craned his neck to peer at the luxury vessel. His eyes narrowed into an expression Dawn read as anger, but a smile popped to his lips as he turned back to her.
‘No idea. Can’t bloody see past my nose these days without my glasses.’
Dawn was about to tell him to go get them, when her partner interrupted her.
‘Dawn. Grave,’ he corrected himself. ‘Look at this.’
His finger hovered over a logo Dawn was familiar with. After Richardson escaped and she did some digging into his operation—as much as the AFP would allow, she discovered Richardson was up to his neck in all sorts of smuggling.
From native animals, to people, if there was money to be made, Richardson handled it all. But his drugs came in from Indonesia, and the brand was easily recognisable.
She drew a frustrated breath as Ryan’s gloved finger tapped below a faded image of a mythical mermaid-like creature inside a thick, blue circle.
‘Mr Taylor. When did you last come up this way?’
‘Oh,’ he rubbed his chin, ‘this would have to be the first time since the low pressure came through early January.’
Dawn thought aloud.
‘If this has only been here since late summer, then our old friend is definitely back working the area.’
Chapter 10
Dawn embraced the cool air as she joined Ryan in the cramped interview room. The FV Sandringham’s skipper, Reginald Flint seemed happy to pick the dirt from under his fingernails as Dawn arranged a manila folder in front of her.
His eyes squinted at the file but returned to his manicure.
‘Mr Flint. We need to confirm you’ve waived counsel at this time.’
‘That’s right Missy.’
Dawn grinned. Being called Missy, or Luv was like Mate in rural Australia. It was rarely meant to be derogatory, but there were always exceptions.
‘We’ll get started then.’
‘I still don’t understand why you kept me here. I called the Coast Guard about the dead girl. You’ve held my boat long enough to finish your work. My entire catch is ruined. The least you can do is let me go home and wash up.’
Dawn doubted the skipper knew the truth of those words. She was shallow breathing for a reason.
‘We appreciate you doing the right thing when you found the victim Mr Flint, but while we were searching the vessel for any evidence pertaining to the victim’s death...’
‘I told you she didn’t die on board my boat.’ The skipper’s dirty fingernail pointed at Dawn’s chest.
‘The forensic team have confirmed that now.’ Dawn decided to clear all her questions relating to the victim before moving on to the drugs. ‘Did you recognise the victim at all?’
‘Bit hard to tell like she was, but she didn’t seem familiar.’
Dawn slipped a driver’s licence photo of Jasmine Reed from the manila folder, rotated it and placed it in front of the skipper.
‘Maybe this photo might jog your memory?’
He studied it a moment, then shook his head.
‘Still not recognising her.’
Dawn retrieved the photo and slipped it back into the folder.
‘Okay. Back to the search I mentioned. We know your vessel wasn’t involved in the woman’s death, but the search turned up drugs hidden in PFDs concealed in the engine room.’
‘Drugs. Blimey.’ He dropped his now picked-clean hands into his lap and leant forward, voice lowered. ‘I don’t know anything about any drugs.’
Dawn opened the manila folder wide this time, not hiding the piece of paper she wanted to retrieve. She barely started turning it toward the skipper before his fist thudded the table.
‘How the hell did you...’ Dawn jumped. Ryan lurched forward. The skipper fell back in his chair hard enough to nearly topple backwards.
He waved his hands in front of his face.
‘Sorry. I...’ He muttered under his breath. ‘Bloody stupid thing to do.’ He waved at the walls. ‘I should have realised you’d search my financial records.’
‘You’re at risk of losing your trawler, Mr Flint,’ Dawn continued.
‘Reg. Call me Reg. I know, I know, and that bloody new zoning bullcrap is going to ruin me. But I didn’t start smuggling drugs to pay off my debts if that’s what you think.’
Dawn tapped the loan summary.
‘This figure is a lot of money to owe. This kind of debt might make a man do things he wouldn’t otherwise consider moral or right.’
Reg crossed his arms and shook his head.
‘Never. My divorce cost me the house. All I have is the Sandringham. She needed some work done last season and a loan secured against commercial equipment is the bank’s excuse to steal from good, honest, hardworking people. You should bloody arrest them, not me.’
‘You’re not under arrest Mr Flint.’
