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The paramedics treated Lexi with competent kindness. They settled her in the ambulance with an oxygen mask and an ice pack covering her painful throat. Detective Inspector Grunwald travelled with her, and the next hour passed in a blur. Lexi drifted in and out of sleep on the emergency ward, calmed by the chemicals pumping through an intravenous tube. It deadened her pain and encouraged her to paint the last few hours as a psychedelic dream.
The hospital whirred around her like a busy wasps’ nest, and she involved herself with none of it. After a time, thirst clamored uppermost for attention and forced her to wake, her lips sticking together as she tried speaking after the long silence. A hand touched her cheek and Lexi blinked up into Garima’s worried face. His hair rose like a cockerel’s plume and red rims marred his beautiful blue eyes. His shirt appeared rumpled, one side hanging over his belt, but the pristine white collar still ringed his neck like a safety rope.
“Hey,” Lexi managed. She cracked a smile, but also her lower lip. Garima reached for a tissue and dabbed away the blood. Deep lines scored his forehead.
“Couldn’t let you go without absolution and the last rites,” he joked. The sentiment fell flat, humour without conviction. He pursed his lips and blinked away the threatening tears. “Nahla says hi.” He dropped the tissue onto the nightstand and lifted a plastic cup containing a straw. His fingers bore twin lines of scratches which had drawn blood.
Lexi took a sip through the straw and coughed. Pain radiated from her broken ribs. To her disappointment, Garima withdrew the drink. “You have a drip in your arm,” he said. “You don’t really need this.”
“It might help though,” another voice challenged him. Lexi turned her head to discover Detective Inspector Grunwald slumped in the second visitor’s chair. His rumpled appearance betrayed hours of sitting upright and worrying at his cuticles until they bled. He grasped a cup of muddy coffee in his right hand and skin rose like antennae from three of the nail beds. He’d made her a promise and kept it. Lexi saw no sign of Harvey Rojas.
Garima relented and presented the straw again. Lexi sipped with more care and the cool liquid oiled her vocal cords. “Careful,” he urged as she emptied the cup.
“I need to talk,” she rasped. “Please, help me sit up?”
Grunwald produced his notebook from an inside pocket with a flourish. He removed his jacket to reveal a creased shirt with sweat stains beneath the armpits. His fingers clutched a cheap pen, and his expression grew hungry. A man starved and desperate for facts. So, Lexi fed them to him, enmeshed in the sad story of a sweet woman who loved children but couldn’t sustain a pregnancy. And the man who adored her and borrowed the earth, before committing the worst of all sins against her.
Both men kept their heads bowed. One scrawled words on tiny pages until he needed to shake out the cramp from his wrist. And the other kept his gaze downcast while pushing the beads of a rosary through his fingers as though requiring divine support.
Lexi took a shuddering gasp and used the oxygen mask to even out her breathing. Cold and refreshing, the gushing air seeped into her lungs like a gentle rain. But when Grunwald fidgeted in his orange plastic chair, Lexi forced herself to continue. “Churchill Barrymore and Samuel Barnard ran a money lending sideline through an accounting firm. For decades, I imagine.” She considered Lachlan’s warning. Had he known of Sam Barnard and sought to protect her, or to keep an injustice hidden?
Lexi glanced up to find Grunwald and Garima both studying her. She forced her mind back to the tale. “I don’t believe Trent Barnard realised who he’d borrowed the money for the IVF from, but the interest rate accrued to make the debt a hundred thousand dollars back in 1995.” She took a shuddering breath, which twanged every nerve and fibre in her body. “Someone paid Grant Herbert to open a wrongful imprisonment case a year before Trent became entitled to apply for parole. I couldn’t understand why, when he’d served almost all a ten-year sentence and lost the use of his legs. But we traced the payment to Keith Barnard at a Hamilton business address. He used company funds to clear the invoices. I learned from Darlene that he worked for her husband. Churchill Barrymore died around that time and perhaps Keith stepped in to perform an audit of the accounts. He’d worked there for years and held positions of trust. It’s possible he uncovered Trent’s extortionate debt from Barrymore’s nasty sideline with Sam Barnard and rebelled. Why not pay for his brother’s restoration with blood money? Or perhaps he believed no one would question his misappropriation of funds with Barrymore dead and the company in flux. But they did, and Darlene fired him. Trent would have earned his parole, anyway, but then the other bodies came to light.”
“But Trent Barnard pleaded guilty to his wife’s murder.” Incredulity laced Grunwald’s voice. He held his phone in his left hand and scrolled through an old news article.
“Guilt,” Lexi rasped. “Liza left because of his betrayal. I think he always believed she’d run off, right until the moment a walker discovered her body. By that time, he’d spent a decade running from his debt and whatever Churchill meted out to those who couldn’t pay. Trent Barnard oozes regret from every pore. He feels he deserves everything he gets.”
“Because of his affair with the surrogate?”
“Not just a surrogate,” Lexi croaked. “Liza’s best friend.”
“Ah dear,” Grunwald sighed. His shoulders drooped, and he placed his pen into the fold of his notebook. “And the other two bodies had the same modus operandi, and a man serving jail time for a similar crime. Geez. No wonder his not guilty plea fell on deaf ears.”
“The jury doesn’t hear about previous convictions,” Garima challenged.
Grunwald shrugged. “New Zealand has five million inhabitants and our national news stations broadcast countrywide. Everyone knows everything about anything.”
“True.” Lexi heaved a sad sigh. “But there’s another thing too. Sam told me he bought a baby for his wife when she couldn’t conceive. Would Trent’s initial arrest and the subsequent investigation involve taking DNA samples from him?”
Grunwald closed his eyes and tilted his head back in thought. “They arrested him in the early 2000s, didn’t they? Possibly. I’m not sure if it became routine that far back. Easy to check, though. Why?”
Lexi took a fortifying breath from the oxygen mask. She struggled to keep the horror from her tone. “The DNA of the unknown victim didn’t match anyone else’s on file back in 2016. So, ask Keith Barnard for a sample of his.”
Garima’s features knotted into a painful frown. “Oh, no!” he breathed.
Lexi nodded and winced. She resettled the ice pack against her sore neck as exhaustion washed over her like a tsunami. “Yes,” she replied, her words slurring. “I believe the poor Jane Doe discovered alongside Layla Jasper’s body was Samuel Barnard’s missing wife, Allison.”
