her off the team, back out into Area Command, straight into the arms of the Tooth. No, she was keeping her head down, staying here, staying out of sight.
Harrigan spoke over her thoughts. ‘What troubles me most is what this girl might do next. We have to hope she doesn’t have another gun like the one she used today back home under the bed. She might decide she wants to use it on someone else. Now, before we all go … ’
He pinned up onto the board a picture of Matthew Liu in his school uniform, smiling for the camera.
‘This is to keep everyone’s mind focused on what we’re doing here.
Think about this boy. He’s had something killed in him today as well.
And remember — we don’t have any time to spare. We work and we keep working until we find her. Let’s get on with it.’
‘If she has got another gun, Boss, she’ll shoot herself in the foot with it first,’ Trevor said to Harrigan as they left the room together.
‘She’s mad. Probably doesn’t know how to fart properly.’
Harrigan was half smiling when Jeffo pushed in beside them.
‘I reckon that gun belonged to someone who likes to sit on their back porch and pick off cats for target practice, because they splatter.
I knew a bloke who used to do that,’ he said, grinning.
There was a brief silence in which neither man replied. Jeffo turned suddenly to Grace who was walking a little behind Trevor.
‘I hear your claim to fame is that you shoot,’ he said. ‘You’ve won trophies or something. Is that right?’
She looked at him deadpan, feeling a chill of aversion.
‘That’s right. Mainly at my club.’
‘You shoot?’ Ian said, appearing at her elbow. ‘I’ve got a pretty good average myself. We should get together for a little friendly competition sometime.’
Grace did not reply to Ian’s attempts at self-promotion other than with her politest smile.
‘Hit anything but a target?’ Jeffo was asking her. She shook her head. ‘Just kids’ stuff. Wait till you aim at something real.’
‘I can always start on you if you want,’ she replied sweetly as she walked away. People nearby laughed, while Harrigan seemed to be trying to suppress a grin. Jeffo flushed brick-red before disappearing without a word.
Later, after most people had gone and as Grace herself was readying to leave, Harrigan appeared at her desk and spoke to her quietly.
‘A private word if you don’t mind, Grace. In my office.’
Out of the corner of her eye, Grace saw Trev watch them walk into Harrigan’s glassed-in eyrie in the corner of the room.
‘Do I need to shut the door?’ she asked, a little puzzled, wondering if he was about to lecture her for swapping insults with a supposed colleague.
‘No. Don’t give anyone around here anything else to talk about, they don’t need it. Sit down. Keep your voice down if you can, this is between us. I take it you already know Marvin Tooth.’
Grace went cold down her spine.
‘We’ve met once. Very briefly.’
‘So he wouldn’t have any particular reason for asking me to move you out of here?’
‘Did he do that? So what does this really mean? Are you asking me to clear my desk?’
‘No, I’m not asking you to do that. I’m going to be blunt with you about this, Grace. I want to know why he’s got it in for you. Is this personal?’
She shook her head, her face pale underneath her make-up.
‘Would it make any difference if it was?’
Harrigan was looking at her directly.
‘Yeah, it would. For a start, he’d want to make things nasty for us all. And very nasty for you. I’d like to avoid that if I can.’
‘You do want me to go. You want me to say I’ll go for everyone else’s benefit.’
He frowned, shaking his head.
‘No, Grace. Listen to me. I’ve already said I don’t want you to do that. I want people I can rely on. I could rely on you today. I don’t care what’s behind this, I don’t want it to reach in here and make life difficult. If that’s going to happen, I need to know about it. That’s all.’
Grace wondered how she could know whether to trust him or not.
How she could know what was really in his head?
‘No,’ she said, ‘it’s nothing. Nothing like what you might think.’
And what’s that, Harrigan thought. He hadn’t been trying to find out if Marvin had put the hard word on her. He decided it would be better if he didn’t say this to her.
‘Okay, fine,’ he said, and then as she got up to go, ‘Watch your back. He’s a bad enemy to have. Come and talk to me if you change your mind.’
She smiled in reply, a slightly crooked smile, full of self-parody and with a sudden sadness that surprised him.
‘Thanks,’ she said and was gone, heading for the lifts.
Outside in the corridor she stopped. She was leaning against the wall, shaking with relief, when Trev appeared.
‘You right, Gracie?’ he asked.
‘I’m fine, I just need a cigarette.’
‘Don’t smoke one in here. You’ll set the smoke detectors off.’
She smiled. Trev took a proprietorial interest in his friends whether they liked it or not; he was inclined to feel responsible for the unprotected. Once, in the very early morning outside a Sydney nightclub, Grace had seen him wade into a street-bashing, shouting,
‘I’m gay. Hit me too.’ When the attackers turned on him, he swatted one of them to the footpath with a single punch. The others had turned and run while he shouted after them.
‘That was about the Tooth. He’s asked Harrigan to move me out of here.’
‘And is he going to?’
‘No, he says he wants me to stay on. I thought I was gone.’
Somehow this did not lessen her anxiety, the extent of the Tooth’s reach left her feeling gloomy and vulnerable. Like it said on the picture of the dead woman in the incident room: you can run but you can’t hide, they were still out there waiting for you.
Trev moved closer. ‘You’ll be fine, mate. You don’t want to worry.
Get yourself home and get some sleep.’
Just then, Harrigan appeared in the corridor and saw them standing there. They looked at him and then looked away as he headed into the Gents.
‘Yeah,’ Grace said. ‘Everything’s going to be okay, isn’t it? I’ll see you tomorrow.’
‘Sure it is. See you, mate. You take care now.’
She left in the elevator. After she had gone, Trevor went into the Gents after Harrigan.
Harrigan looked at him as he walked in the door.
‘What have you got to say, Trev?’ he asked as Trevor came and stood beside him.
‘I hear the Tooth’s been talking to you about Gracie. You shouldn’t believe what he says about her.’
Harrigan raised his eyebrows in slight surprise, thinking that, by him at least, she didn’t like being called Gracie.
‘Look, mate, I don’t. What’s so special about it for you? I know she’s your friend.’
‘It’s my fault she’s in the job, isn’t it? I’m the fool who talked her into applying in the first place. She hadn’t thought about it till then.’
Harrigan gave a short laugh. ‘She won’t be thanking you for it now she’s got Marvin gunning for her.’
Trevor smiled without humour.
Harrigan went to wash his hands and stopped to look in the mirror.
