Montgomery Steel tapped his fingers on his kitchen bench as he waited for the microwave to finish. The football was on in the background and he was shitty because the Brisbane Broncos were losing again. His favourite rugby team were having a crappy season so far. He cursed and clenched his jaw as he watched the Penrith Panthers make a run up the sideline.
The microwave dinged and he pulled his leftover spaghetti bolognaise out, grabbed a fork and his beer and walked back to the lounge room.
As he put his food and drink down he felt the familiar tingle along his scar. He reached up, touched the point above his eyebrow and traced the jagged scar into his hairline. The tingle was a sign. He’d never admit to any superstitious hocus-pocus, but whenever his scar tingled like a mozzie bite, something was about to go down. He couldn’t explain it, but he’d long ago given up ignoring it.
As if on cue, his phone rang and he cursed himself for not taking it out of his pocket ten seconds sooner. Fumbling with the clamshell, he finally flipped it open, glanced at the unfamiliar number on the screen and then held it to his ear. “Steel.”
“Hey Sup, what’s happening? It’s Darren Eden.”
The man who’d once been his young rookie at Coorparoo Station was now a senior sergeant at a busy station on the west side of Brisbane. “Eden, how are you?”
“I think you’ll be buying me a beer after I tell you what I heard today.”
“Hit me with it, and we’ll discuss the drink of choice afterwards.”
“Do you remember Uncle Roland? He sat at your table at my wedding.”
Steel would never forget him. The bloke was one of the few people Steel had met who could actually drink him under the table. “Sure do. How is the old bastard?”
“He’s all right. He called me last night. Says Jackson Rich had an interesting day at the prison.”
By the time he finished the call and said goodbye to Eden, his scar was zinging like a wasp bite.
No longer hungry, he tossed his unfinished dinner onto the already overflowing kitchen bench, grabbed his keys and headed for his car.
This was the first time Steel had been to the Brisbane Correctional Centre at night. The traffic was minimal for most of the way and he arrived in record time. Which was good, because he was getting dizzy from all the unanswered questions whizzing around his mind.
The lights on the prison’s surrounding perimeter fence lit the sprawling whitewashed building up like it was the White House. He parked the car and made a beeline for the visitor area. Steel knew the drill and within fifteen minutes he was sitting in one of the interview rooms, tapping his short-cut fingernails on the metal tabletop. The door opened with a squeaky protest and he put on his most welcoming smile as Jack stepped into the room.
“Oh man, what do you want? It’s not Melbourne Cup day.” Jack looked drained. No, that was an understatement. He looked more like he’d run a marathon in the searing desert and had failed to stop for water. He looked angry, too.
“Just want to chat.”
“Bullshit. You heard about yesterday. Still got your connections, I see.”
That was true. Even though Steel had left the force—actually it was more like driven out; Internal Affairs made it impossible to do his job—Eden helped him keep tabs on all his outstanding cases. Jack and the Case of the Missing Money was the last one on the list. He’d promised himself he wouldn’t take up fishing until the job was done. And he was sick of looking at all the shiny new fishing gear he treated himself to from time to time.
“Take a seat, Jack, before you fall down.”
Jack didn’t argue. The metal chair scraped along the polished concrete as he pulled it back from the table. Jack flopped down with closed eyes. He placed his hands in his lap and looked like he was exercising some kind of new-age measured control technique. Steel had heard about this meditation stuff. It was all bullshit as far as he was concerned. Finally the prisoner opened his eyes and he saw just how exhausted Jack was. Nearly a decade of guilt would do that to a man.
“Want to tell me what happened?” Steel said.
“No.”
“Want me to tell you what I know?”
Jack rolled his eyes. “No.”
“One of the prison guards just happens to be the uncle of my buddy Eden. He got a call last night to inform him of your…incident yesterday. Eden, being the nice lad he is, told me all about it.”
Jack sighed loudly. “Why?”
“’Cause he’s a good bloke. And cold case protocol.” Steel waited for a response, but got none so he carried on. “He said you yelled the name Tiffany all night long.”
“You know that woman’s been giving me nightmares for years.”
That was true. But when Eden had told him Jack had freaked out while watching TV, his coincidence-meter shot right off the scale. Given that Jack had pretty much played out his eight years inside without a single incident, whatever he’d seen on TV was worth knowing about. “Come on, Jack, I know you and—”
“You don’t know me. Nobody knows me.” His shoulders sagged. “I don’t even know myself anymore.”
“I know you saw something yesterday that flipped you out.”
Jack cocked his head and gave a look that implied he was the one holding all the cards. “I’ve got two weeks left of my sentence, Steel. Once I leave here I’m moving on. I never want to think of that woman again.”