“I’m just headed over to her house to interview an elderly neighbor. Crime scene’s still working, so you could meet me there. Zimmer’s leading the charge.”
“Give me the address. I’m leaving now.”
Anya hadn’t realized that Natasha lived a few short blocks away. They could have run into each other at the delicatessen or fruit shop. Come to think of it, she always had fruit in her office. It could have been from a shared greengrocer. She wondered what else they had in common.
She parked down Natasha’s street, which had been cordoned off. Once considered a working-class area, most of the terraces had been modernized internally while maintaining the original facades.
A tarpaulin had been erected outside number 82, to obscure media and allow privacy for the police officers.
John Zimmer ordered the uniformed constable to let her through.
The hip-height gate was open, and a short path led to a security door with blackened bars. Similar bars adorned the windows. Few other houses in the street had them. Natasha had obviously been safety conscious.
Anya pulled on paper shoe covers and twisted her hair into a knot.
What immediately struck her was the amount of blood between the doorstep and the first few feet of the corridor.
Milo Sharpe was examining the wooden black-wood architrave and doorway frame and didn’t seem to notice her. Zimmer seemed to read her mind.
“It looks like she lived long enough to try to move, and lost a lot of blood.” The rings around his eyes suggested he had been there since they got the call. Knowing Zimmer, he would have refused to leave for a break in case he contaminated the scene on his return.
In a mass shooting at a cafe he had stayed inside for thirty-six hours, refusing to let anyone else in or out, for fear of destroying evidence. He hadn’t heard whether the shooter had been caught, he’d just got on with the job until it was done.
“Could be that the killer moved her, or whoever found her rolled her over and blood that had pooled without clotting spilled out.” Anya tried to picture the scenario. “How was she found?”
“The briefcase was on the doorstep. The first witness says she was facedown just inside the door. The security screen was half-closed, blocked by her legs.”
She knew the briefcase. The same one Natasha carried to court each day. “Handbag?”
“The strap was still around her elbow. It was open but the purse doesn’t appear to have been disturbed, it still had cash and credit cards. And get this, she carried a can of Mace with her but it wasn’t touched. She was still clutching the house keys. The only footprints inside are of the cat walking through the blood.
So Natasha had arrived home, opened the screen door outward, then the front door inward. Someone she trusted had to have been with her, or she was ambushed and had no time to defend herself. Anya turned to face the street. A small brick fence would barely have hidden a small child.
“No robbery, what about the actual wound?”
“It looks like she was shot in the back of the head. Emergency doctor said it exited right between the eyes.”
“Got it,” Milo announced.
With a pair of tweezers she carefully removed the remains of a bullet from the lower section of plaster on the right-hand wall.
Anya studied the location. “If the bullet entered the back of the head, exited the skull and embedded there,” she bent down, “then the head has to have been reasonably low to the ground when the gun went off.”
“If she were standing up, you’d expect her to have to have her chin tucked right to her chest for the projectile to end up where it did.”
“The killer could have grabbed her and forced her head down.”
“Either way, she didn’t have time to react or grab what was in her handbag.”
Anya wondered if Natasha knew she was about to die.
“There is something odd,” Milo chimed in. “There is no kitchen in this house. There’s a bathroom and bedroom, just no kitchen. A coffee machine and a bowl of fruit in the lounge room. No fridge. I’m thinking this woman had a serious calcium deficiency, or maybe an eating disorder.”
Zimmer tried to explain. “This is a pretty small place and professionals who work in the city aren’t home during most mealtimes, so they may decide against a kitchen and have a wide-screen TV instead.” His voice became louder. “And maybe Ms. Ryder liked her coffee black and didn’t need a fridge. Can we stick to our job description?”
Either the case, Milo or both were getting to him.
“She walked past a deli and greengrocer on the way to and from work, so she didn’t starve if that’s what you were worrying about.” Anya could understand Zimmer’s frustration.
It was difficult to concentrate, knowing this was where Natasha had been shot. Seeing her colleague’s blood where it had hemorrhaged life from her brought a lump to Anya’s throat. She could almost smell the floral perfume Natasha wore.
And six feet away they were violating her privacy. Suddenly Anya felt claustrophobic and excused herself.
Zimmer followed.
“You okay?” he asked, outside the gate, away from listening ears, but still inside the crime scene tape.
“It’s hard to be here,” she said, wiping her nose with a tissue. “Harder than I thought.”
“I know.” Zimmer bowed his head and spoke softly. “When it’s someone you know, you think this job can’t get any worse. But because we knew her, we care. For that reason we should be the ones here.”
She nodded. “Who’s doing the PM?”
“They’re flying in a guy from interstate. None of our lot could face it, given how much time they spent with her preparing for trials.”
Anya had a sick feeling. “Giverny Hart, Savannah Harbourn and Natasha Ryder, all dead within the space of a few weeks. I knew them all.”
Giverny could have been written off as a suicide, if not for the threats made by the Harbourns. And Savannah’s death could have been considered an accident, if it hadn’t been for the beating at the hands of her brother. And Natasha had been killed while prosecuting the very same, Gary Harbourn.
“It’s been rough, but anyone could have murdered Natasha. She upset a lot of people just by doing her job. And as far as I know, your three women died in different ways. Whoever did this one planned it and knew what they were doing. The scene’s clean. So far we haven’t found so much as a hair.”
“Just like for Giverny. Nothing but my hair was found on her.”
Kate Farrer strolled along and Anya excused herself. The Harbourns had to be behind Natasha’s murder. Surely Kate had to understand that.
33
Kate greeted Anya with a worried expression. “We need to talk.”
“Are you looking at the Harbourns?” Anya removed her shoe covers and discarded them in a police-issue plastic waste-bag outside the gate.
“That’s what I wanted to see you about.” Kate led her down the street, beyond the border of the scene.
“We found a property out west they go to a lot. A search of the place turned up a list in Noelene’s handwriting. A number of addresses and phone numbers.” She shoved her hands in her trouser pockets. “Yours was on it.”
She showed Anya a photocopy. Her home address and car registration were written down, along with an asterisk and the words
“Keep reading,” Kate urged.
Anya scanned and saw Natasha Ryder’s name and address, along with the same addendum.
