‘Well, I need these samples at the lab now,’ I insisted. ‘A detour to Chatswood is going to add an hour to the timeline that I don’t have. If there’s a delay I’ll get hammered by the lead detective, and so will you.’
‘Yeah, he seems like one scary dude.’ She nodded. ‘I won’t be answering that phone call. If you want to get something to the lab as fast as lightning, give the lab geeks something to get started on, you could maybe take these sets of bio samples and the vic’s clothing. But you’ve got to take official custody, sir. I’m not having that guy blasting me about the protocol.’
‘I can do that.’
‘You sure?’ She raised an eyebrow.
‘Let’s do it.’ I waved her off. ‘I’ll start loading this stuff into my car.’
We did the transfer in the bright light of the car park, drawing curious glances from patrons who were arriving to the medical centre for their appointments only to hit the sign on the door like cars arriving at a road block. I was handing the chain of custody paperwork back to the officer when Delle called me. The tightness in her voice vibrated down the line. I’d had many a phone call with her like this: a mother trying to keep calm in the face of crisis. ‘We’re leaving.’
‘What?’
‘Your son and I,’ Delle hissed. She always called Chrissymyson when he fucked up. ‘He’s been kicked out of the paintball centre and banned for two years.’
‘What?’
‘Get in the car, Chris,’ Delle shouted, her mouth away from the phone. When she came back, the line crackled with a huffy, angry snort. ‘Your son shot one of the girls in the head.’
‘What do you mean, Delle?’
‘Exactly what I just said. They’d just finished the safety briefing, where they tell you eighteen-fucking-thousand times not to shoot someone from a distance of less than fifteen metres, and your sonimmediatelygoes and shoots one of the girls point blank in the side of the head before they’d even started the first bloody game.’
My neck was suddenly hot with fury. I slid into my car and turned the ignition, pulling out so fast a few of the sealed paper bags of evidence fell off the back seat and into the footwell. ‘Put him on.’
There was a long pause. I wound up the hill through the bush, the engine struggling as I pushed it too hard. ‘Chris?Chris?’
‘Yeah.’
‘What thefuck?’
‘I don’t know, Dad.’
‘You shot one of the girls in the head?’
‘I didn’t shoot her. Not on purpose. I, like, put the gun to her head and it … it went off. I didn’t know it was that sensitive. I hardly touched the trigger at all.’
There was a rumpling sound on the line. Delle came on. ‘I stood there and watched you do it, Chris. Evan, he walked up to the girl in the corset, put the gun to her head and said “Die, bitch!”, then pulled the trigger. I was standing right there. It was a deliberate act, Chris, and you’re not going to try to convince your father that it wasn’t.’
Muttered dissent in the background.
‘I don’t know what in the world you were—’
‘Is she okay?’ I asked.
‘The paintball people are saying he could have killed her if he’d lined it up right. Jesus.Fuck. Evan, I’msoembarrassed!’
‘Delle, try to calm down.’
‘You fucking calm down! My next call has to be to the girl’s father!’
‘What condition is the girl in?’
‘She turned her head at the last second and the shot glanced off her forehead, but she came up with a huge fucking grapefruit-sizedbruise that’s as dark as ink, Evan. She didn’t have her helmetorher safety glasses on. He could have got her in the eye. Can you please come and help me with this?’
‘I can’t.’ I winced. ‘Delle, I just can’t walk out of the case.’
‘Fuck you. Fuck the both of you. Chris, I don’t knowwhatgot into you. That wasin-sane.’
