In the moonlight the chain-link fences of the ostrich facility glinted a ghostly silver. A faint breeze blew in off the sea, stirring the humid air and rustling through the tough leaves of the stunted manuka trees and short, bristly coprosma bushes that bordered the beach.
A truck, its headlights doused, idled past the facility and ghosted to a halt. Seconds later, a man exited the vehicle, collected a knapsack from the passenger seat and moved on foot toward the facility.
The wind lifted as he walked, making the sign above the gates creak. When he reached the gates, he shrugged out of the knapsack, extracted a pair of heavy-duty bolt cutters and snipped through the chain that fastened the gates.
Slipping the bolt cutters back into the knapsack, he stepped through the opening.
Grinning coldly, he walked the perimeter and cut jagged holes in the chain-link fences. When he was finished, he examined his handiwork with a critical eye.
The facility had more than served its purpose.
Carter removed his night-vision goggles and examined the pale line of surf, faintly luminescent and easily visible now that the moon was up. Systematically, he skimmed the dark folds of the hills that plunged down to the beach, waiting for his vision to adjust.
Shifting position, he eased the stiffness out of his leg. As on the last three nights, the beach and the hills were empty. Whoever had been concealing their vehicle in the scrub and prowling around Dani’s place hadn’t been back.
Minutes ticked by. A subtle change in the air made him tense. A warm gust of wind intensified the faint drift, turning it acrid. Smoke. Simultaneously, a shift in the shadows caught his attention. He tracked the movement as a dark shape glided from tree to tree until he could identify the outline. The figure was male, tall and well-built.
Keeping his gaze fixed on the figure, Carter began to climb, gauging the point at which his path would intersect with the intruder’s—at the edge of the smooth sweep of lawn just below Dani’s house.
Minutes later, bracing himself against the stiffening pain in his thigh, he surged forward, grabbed the man’s wrist and took him down to the ground in one fluid movement. A knee jabbed into his belly as the man rolled, elusive as a snake. Something metallic skittered across the dusty ground and the intruder lunged, wrenching free of Carter’s hold with a neat twist. Carter caught him by one leg then reared back as a boot caught him in the jaw. Ears ringing, he countered with a wrestling move, lunging forward and using his weight to shove sideways, pinning the intruder on his back.
Moonlight slanted across the man’s face.
“O’Halloran.”
Detective O’Halloran to be precise. A former member of the Special Tactics Squad. Carter hadn’t ever met him personally, but he knew a couple of ex-SAS guys in the squad who had worked with him. Eighteen months previously O’Halloran had headed up an arson investigation. In the process his own home had been targeted and burned down, with his wife and child in it. O’Halloran had tried to save them and failed, ending up in hospital.
Gaze cold, a second, more elusive shadow watched Rawlings and O’Halloran converse from the deep well of shade cast by a towering oak. He couldn’t make out what they were saying, but their topic of conversation wasn’t in doubt. Silently, he retreated further back into the deep cover of the trees hemming the Galbraith house, glad that he’d listened to his instincts and used an alternative route.
When he was sure the coast was clear, he slipped further back into the shadows, skirting the moonlight-drenched stretches of lawn as he made his way to the barn.
In the distance a familiar siren sounded.
Finally someone had noticed that the ostrich facility was burning.
The siren jerked Murdoch out of sleep, seconds later his pager, which was stationed on the bedside table, began to vibrate. Pushing the covers back, he checked the message, climbed out of bed and searched out a fresh uniform. His wife, used to his odd hours, didn’t stir. Her hair was soft and rumpled on the pillow, her face smooth. Murdoch envied her the calm oblivion. Lately, the sound of the siren was beginning to haunt him.
Ten minutes later, after he’d put a call through to the two Mason detectives who’d been assigned to Jackson’s Ridge as backup for the fires, he picked Lowell up and headed out to the ostrich facility.
A kilometre out, something large darted off the road. Murdoch swerved; his headlights caught a flash of white and the gangling outline of an ostrich. As he drove, he glimpsed flighty movement along the sides of the road, in the paddocks and even down on the beach, which was visible from the road. There were ostriches everywhere.
Cursing beneath his breath, he brought the cruiser to a halt beside what remained of the facility. Given that both of Jackson’s Ridge’s ostrich “experts” had spent the evening in town at the pub it was unlikely that either Harry or Jim would be in any state to recover the birds. He’d once read somewhere that those birds could clock up to thirty miles an hour, and counting. By morning they would be in Mason. Someone was going to have to round them up, and fast.
The fire truck was parked just inside the open gates, its lights strobing. According to the information he’d gotten from emergency services, they had responded quickly, but even so the main building was a smoking ruin.
As he climbed from the cruiser a lean figure was briefly visible in the flash of a camera. Flynn had beaten him to the fire and was already busy taking pictures.
Murdoch slammed his door. “Don’t you ever sleep, Flynn?”
“I do my job, Murdoch, you do yours.”
“So why does mine seem so much more worthwhile?”
Flynn clicked the shutter, the flash lit up the night. He lowered the camera, not bothering to hide his amusement. “It’s not a good idea to upset the media.”
“Better wipe that smile off your face, I hear you had shares in this place, which puts you on my list of suspects.”
Flynn didn’t bother to adjust his expression. “In that case, you could be indicting the whole town.”
A burly figure in a helmet and coverall appeared out of the gloom, backlit by the dying glow of the fire.
Walter Douglas took off his helmet and wiped his face. “Half a dozen ignition points. Whoever lit this one wanted it to burn. Even lit up some of the fences.” He shook his head. “They had containers of ostrich oil in there. That didn’t help.”
“Heard you got here early—again.”
Walter’s face grew cautious. “Some evenings I stay late at the station.” He turned his gaze back on the smoking ruin. “Now that Lily’s gone there isn’t an awful lot else to do.”
Lily was Walter’s wife. Ex-wife now. A couple of years ago she’d moved back to live on her family’s orchard. The fact that Lily Douglas, née Barclay, was living at the address of the first fire to hit Jackson’s Ridge was something that had been keeping Murdoch awake at night. He liked Walter, he didn’t want to find a reason for him to be the arsonist, but when it was staring him in the face it was more than his job was worth to ignore it. “Even so, seems to me you’re spending a lot of time hanging out at the fire station.”
The pump sputtered and the hose deflated. Walter shoved his helmet back on his head and roared an order. For a few seconds the air turned blue as Walter undid the coupling from the empty water tank and transferred the hose to the second, smaller appliance pulled up beside the main truck, getting drenched in the process. The new pump started, stuttered, then settled into a steady rhythm. Flaccid hose bloated out and embers hissed as the new stream of water hit the last remaining hot spot. Walter, still swearing, wiped water and soot off his face and bellowed instructions.
Murdoch waited out the process as the last hot spots were doused. This was the country. One of the refreshing differences he enjoyed about the place was that people here were blunter and more direct. Of course there were exceptions and, lately, Jackson’s Ridge had taken on a whole new feel he didn’t like. Families that went way back were leaving town, their properties and beach houses bought up by the syndicate that wanted to turn the place into a resort—the houses left derelict. On top of that farmers were going broke because of the drought—and now these fires.
Taking out his notebook, he flipped it open and turned his attention back to Walter. There was no point in beating about the bush. “Since when have you taken to hanging out at the station at night, Walter?”
Walter’s face reddened. “What are you getting at?”
Murdoch transferred his gaze to the fire crew, who were now rolling up hose. “Nothing, except that all that solitude can’t be good. You should get out more, maybe get some counselling. A marriage breakup is never easy.”
Walter’s face was stony. “I don’t need counselling. Lily left two years ago. It was tough, but I handled it.”
“One more question.”
Walter’s face reddened. “I’m putting the fire out, I didn’t light it.”
“You’ve got shares in this place.”
“And I’d be crazy to light it up. Those scamming bastards owe me money.”
Murdoch scratched his head. That was where the logic on this one fell over. Walter was right. Burning the place now just didn’t make sense.
A vehicle pulled up behind his cruiser. Murdoch let out a breath. Rawlings and O’Halloran. Why did he have the feeling that a messy night had just gotten more complicated?
A second vehicle swerved into the water table, parking askew. The driver’s door flew open and Harry Tapp lurched onto the road. He stared blearily at the building.
Murdoch blocked Harry’s path. “There’s been a fire.”
Harry gave him a blank look, which meant he’d turned his hearing aid off. “What?”
Murdoch took a step back. Harry’s breath was one-hundred-percent alcohol. If he got too close to a naked flame, he’d probably ignite. Murdoch tried to blank out the fact that despite being drunk, Harry had driven to the fire. Irritating as he was, he’d just lost his livelihood; sometimes you had to turn a blind eye. He pitched his voice just short of a bellow. “We need to ask you a few questions.”
Murdoch jerked his head at Lowell.
Lowell frowned when Murdoch explained what he wanted. “What am I supposed to ask?”
Not for the first time Murdoch wondered what it would feel like to take one of the little happy pills a doctor had once prescribed him for stress. At the time he hadn’t succumbed to temptation. He’d decided that if he were going to have a breakdown he’d rather have it out of the city, in a quiet country town where no one knew him—and without the medication. “Just keep him busy.”
Lowell sidled closer to Harry, then stumbled back. Murdoch grinned, the perverse sense of humour that had kept him sane surfacing. “And Lowell…”
Lowell darted him a blank look.
“Question him about the ostriches.”
Carter studied the charred building and all the people present. Murdoch was there along with Lowell and a couple of other cops who were unfamiliar—reinforcements from Mason. Now that the fire was out, crime scene tape was already being strung around what was left of the building.
Murdoch’s greeting was accompanied by a hard glance at O’Halloran. “If you want to help, stay off the site and round up those birds. Lowell’s got his hands full controlling Harry—” he jerked his thumb at the two city cops “—and those two guys won’t move from the scene.”
Carter made a call. Minutes later the flash of headlights as a car approached drew his attention.
West exited the car, his gaze settling on O’Halloran. “You’re a long way from Auckland Central.”
O’Halloran’s expression didn’t change. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised to see you here.”
West shrugged. “I get around.”
“I heard.”
The previous year West and Carter had both been involved in the bust of a notorious jewel thief and a gang that fenced artefacts. Carter had escaped publicity, but West hadn’t been so lucky. The story and some of his previous exploits had made the front page of both the city paper and a national tabloid. O’Halloran, an inner-city detective, hadn’t worked that case—but only because he had been in hospital at the time.
An ostrich jogged past the opened gate, heading for the beach.
O’Halloran studied the bird’s gait. “How do you catch those things?”
Lowell looked depressed. “Harry said you get ’em with brooms, but all the brooms burned.”
“Looks like it’s your lucky day.” Carter reached into the rear of his truck and tossed him a broom just as a large horse trailer came to a halt outside the gates.
Lowell caught the broom, then just as promptly dropped it.
“And Lowell?”
Lowell straightened, handling the broom as if it was an automatic weapon without the safety.
Carter’s expression was deadpan. “Wait until you see the whites of their eyes.”
The ramp dropped on the back of the horse trailer. John McKay led out three horses, all saddled and ready to go. He handed the bridle of a rangy chestnut to Carter. “Don’t tell me you’ve got an ostrich contract.”
“I didn’t have time to sign up.”
John swung up onto a tall bay. “Then you must be the only one.”
Carter jerked his head, indicating West could take the remaining horse.
West backed off. “I am not getting up on one of those things.” Back streets and alleys were his environment, not the Wild West. “O’Halloran, it’s all yours.”
With a shrug, O’Halloran swung into the saddle, wincing at the stiffness in his neck and shoulder. He’d had a farm background before he was a cop, in theory he could do this.
West grabbed the remaining broom from the bed of Carter’s truck, put two fingers in his mouth and whistled. A black-and-tan dog shot out of the open window of his car. As the dog lolloped up to him, wagging his tail so hard he almost fell over, West looked vaguely embarrassed. “He’s a huntaway. Out here that’s gotta mean something.”