Chapter 36

TOX DIDN’T HAVEany kind of desk. No police station would officially lay claim to him, so he would wander from station to station picking up cases as he liked. I’d heard his old department over in Auburn had started processing a transfer to North Sydney for him, and then the paperwork had “stalled.” They’d been waiting for the police officer in the transfer position in North Sydney to transfer out, apparently, and then he hadn’t. They’d filled Tox’s spot in Auburn. So he existed in administrative limbo, not really Auburn’s problem, not really North Sydney’s. He might have complained and had the whole thing cleared up, but I got the sense that the wandering life suited him. He was basically a freelance detective, a consultant, but without the extra pay consulting detectives receive. Sometimes he would nab cases from the police scanner radio that he kept in his car. That’s how he’d gotten onto Claudia’s crime scene before me. He’d been out driving and had heard about the find.

When I arrived at Surry Hills station he was perched on the corner of one of the coffee-room tables, tapping away at that old, broken laptop. A group of my colleagues glared at the back of his head. I wondered if he’d gone home at all—he was still wearing the bloodied shirt. He didn’t see me come in. Chris Murray was scrolling through pictures of boats. His computer screen was littered with CCTV footage of yachts. He looked at me guiltily as I went right to Pops’s office and threw open the door.

“I need a gun, a badge, some handcuffs, and a phone,” I said.

Pops glanced up. Detective Nigel Spader, whom I hadn’t noticed sitting in the chair behind the door, burst out laughing.

“Oh, yeah,” I said, slumping into the chair next to him. “It’s really funny when police-issue items go missing. It’s hilarious. Laugh it up.”

“How did this happen?” Pops asked.

“How do you think? I’m radioactive from spending too much time with Tox Barnes. I’m practically glowing. Cops are coming out of the woodwork to mess with me.”

“Who?” Pops asked. “Which cops?”

I sighed. Pops knew I’d never snitch.

“No one’s forcing you to stay with him.” Nigel shrugged. “Just drop him. He’ll solve it himself. There’s a new sexual assault on the case board this morning. Tell him you’ve got to prioritize that.”

I closed my eyes and reveled in a private fantasy in which I thumped Nigel’s head back into the wall behind him.

“Maybe I should just drop him,” I said. “Maybe I’ll give the sexual assault to one of the probationary detectives and jump over onto the Georges River task force. Oh, wait! I forgot! I don’t have a penis!”

Nigel sighed.

“Did you seriously shut me out of that case because I’m a woman?” I asked. “Or do you actually have a reasonable motive? Like, do you have a suspect? Why don’t you think you can trust me with your suspect?”

Both men were quiet. Again I felt that strange tingling up the back of my neck that told me something was very wrong here. That there was something very important being hidden from me. But one look at Nigel’s face convinced me it was just him and his team being misogynistic assholes. He looked like one.

Soon I would know how wrong I was.