Chapter Thirty
Judith pulled the box towards her. She used her keys to slit the tape that sealed the top and opened it. Inside, under a bunch of packing peanuts, she found a small tablet, and under the tablet, a single sheet of paper, folded in two. She unfolded the paper, and read:
She told me I was wasting my time. She told me I wasn’t strong enough. She sent me home.
Judith closed her eyes.
She had failed Miriam Hall. She’d known it from the moment that Miriam had walked out of the interview room. Known it before Katy had peeled back all her excuses and made her face the truth of what she’d done. And now Ruth was going to punish her for it.
Judith folded the paper back up and pushed it away across the table. She drew the tablet towards her and pressed the button on the side to wake the screen. There was no log in request, and no password protection. Instead the tablet opened to a video. Judith hit play.
It took her a moment to process what she was seeing.
The video showed a crowd. Judith saw the backs of heads; people were wearing jackets and hats, putting away umbrellas as they came out of the rain and took their places on an escalator that led downwards.
Whoever had made the video—Ruth presumably—moved with the crowd, was a part of it.
Judith thought she recognised the place as Melbourne Central Station.
She was sure of it when the person holding the camera reached the bottom of the escalator.
The crowd split in different directions.
The video followed the group that moved to the left, under signs for Platform 3.
The crowd thinned out; it was easier to make out individuals.
Something caught Judith’s eye and her stomach lurched.
She leaned forward. Ahead in the crowd there was a woman wearing a trench coat and a navy baseball cap.
Was that . . . could it be Katy? Judith could only see her shoulders and the back of her head, where a short brunette ponytail poked out of the back of the baseball cap. It wasn’t much to go on.
Her eyes still on the screen, Judith picked up her phone.
She dialled Katy’s number. The woman on the screen, the one in the trench coat, didn’t react.
But then, why would she? There was no reason to think that the video was live.
It could have been recorded hours before. The call went to voicemail.
‘Katy, call me. Call me the moment you get this.’
Judith ended the call and immediately re-dialled.
Again the call went to voicemail. On the screen the crowd had reached the platform.
The woman who might be Katy took a position close to the edge.
She wasn’t paying attention to anything around her.
Her head was bent over her phone. And now Judith was certain that she was looking at her friend, her best friend, her sister, because she could see clearly the orange and pink stripes of the scarf Judith had bought Katy for Christmas, poking out of the collar of her coat.
The ugliest scarf she could find, bought as a joke, but Katy had loved it.
‘Fuck. Fuck.’ Judith dialled Oliver’s number.
No answer. Straight to voicemail. She tried Bianca.
No answer. Meanwhile, the sounds from the video were growing louder.
The video had been edited, and whoever had edited the video had chosen that moment to turn the volume up.
Judith could hear the sound of a train approaching.
The video shifted. Ruth had stepped closer.
She was right behind Katy now. Close enough to touch her.
Close enough that Katy must have surely felt Ruth’s breath on the back of her neck.
The video shifted again. Ruth had turned her phone to show Judith the rapidly approaching train.
Judith stopped trying to make phone calls.
It was too late. All of this had already happened.
She was utterly helpless, frozen in place, unable to do anything but watch as Ruth placed both hands, one still holding the phone, on Katy’s back, and shoved her.
Ruth didn’t stay in place long. In moments she was moving back through the crowd.
She waited just long enough for the video to capture the scene as Katy fell over the edge of the platform and disappeared under the train.
Judith heard the screech of brakes and muffled shouts before the video went to black.
Judith couldn’t move, couldn’t think. Her hands clutched at the tablet.
She gripped it, then lifted it and smashed it as hard as she could against the table.
The screen fractured. Spider-web cracks spread out across its surface.
Judith was still standing there, breathing hard, her hands still holding the broken tablet, when her mobile started buzzing with an incoming call.
The number was blocked. Inside Judith, her fear and her fury turned to ice.
She stared at her phone, then she answered the call.
‘Did you like that?’
‘Ruth?’
‘It took me a long time to put that together for you. I hope you appreciate the effort.’
‘What the hell did you do?’ Judith’s voice was a whisper, a rasp.
There was no answer, just the sound of a car door closing. Then, ‘An eye for an eye. That’s what we were taught when we were children. You took my sister from me. Now I’ve taken yours.’
Judith lowered her head into her hands, the phone still pressed to her ear. She couldn’t talk. Couldn’t find any words at all.
‘Judith? Are you there?’ Ruth’s tone was chatty, conversational, as if they were girlfriends arranging to meet for coffee. The accent was Australian, but she didn’t sound like Alexis. Alexis had had a rawness to her, a rasp. Ruth sounded like a private school girl.
‘Where’s Cameron?’ Judith said.
There was no answer. Only silence.
‘He’s just a kid. Look, I understand what you’re doing and why you’re doing it.
’ It was a lie. In truth she had no understanding for Ruth.
No empathy for a monster. All that was left inside Judith was purpose.
‘But he had nothing to do with it, okay? He didn’t hurt Miriam.
She loved him. She wouldn’t want you to—’
‘You don’t know what she’d want,’ Ruth said. ‘And honestly, Judith, you’re the last person I’d be taking advice from right now. I think your life’s about to go down the shitter, actually. You haven’t really been making great decisions.’
‘Ruth—’
‘Also, if you think about it, Cameron is as responsible for this mess as any of you. If he hadn’t been born, then Miriam would still be alive, because she wouldn’t have had postnatal depression, which means she wouldn’t have gone to see Walker, or you. Do you see?’
‘That’s not—’
‘But yes, I take your point. He didn’t actually choose to be born, did he? So for that reason, I’m going to give him a chance. Because I think it’s important to play fair.’
Ruth was walking somewhere outside—Judith could hear the change in her breathing as she exerted herself—and there was wind too.
‘What do you mean, you’re going to give him a chance?’
‘I suppose I mean I’m going to give you a chance, Judith. A chance to be a hero. You can save Cameron, if you care enough to do it. Are you wearing your watch?’
‘What?’
‘Your Garmin. You wear it every day, so I presume you’re wearing it now?’
‘Yes, I—’
‘Set a timer for one hour and forty minutes. Do it right now.’
Judith set the timer.
‘I’m going to send you a message. A pin drop to my location.
It’s not the easiest place to find. Not without a lot of help.
And I’m not giving you a lot of time to get here, because I don’t want you to take any little detours.
You get here, on time, by yourself, and you and I can have a chat.
And I’ll let Cameron go. If you’re late, or if you try to bring a friend, I’ll shoot him in the back of the head. Got it?’
‘I’ve got it.’
‘And Judith? Don’t forget, please, that I’m very good with cameras. This whole area is under surveillance. I’ll know if you try to break the rules. And then you can be the one to bring Cameron’s body back to his dad.’ Ruth ended the call.
Fuck. Fuck. Judith drew in a shaking, shuddering breath. Her phone was still in her hand. She could call Rocky, ask for help . . . except she couldn’t. The phone was loaded with malware. If she called Rocky—if she called anyone—Ruth would know.
The phone buzzed with a message. It contained a dropped pin on a map.
Judith clicked on it and it loaded to her maps app.
The location was marked as Devil’s Elbow Scenic Viewpoint, Great Ocean Road: a spot very close to the place where Ruth Hall had grown up as Renée Palmer.
The distance from her location was one hundred and thirty-six point eight kilometres.
Predicted journey time was just under two hours.
Jesus Christ. Judith’s watch was counting down the minutes. She had an hour and thirty-eight minutes until Ruth’s deadline.
There was no time. No time for anything.
She was either going, or not going. Trying, or not trying.
She had no gun. She had no phone, or none that she could use to make a call.
Judith picked up her keys and helmet. She took a knife from the knife block and a torch from the cupboard, and then she was running down the stairs, three steps at a time.
This was a trap; a glaringly obvious trap, but she could not see any way out.
Judith hated herself for all her failures.
For Katy, most of all. For her failure with Miriam Hall, her failure to save her own mother from the bizarre fantasy life she lived, and for all her other screw-ups.
But she didn’t want to die. She wanted to go on being a cop, doing a difficult job as well as she could, though of course that was no longer an option.