The Dry (Aaron Falk #1)(75)

In the front office they heard the station door slam. Deacon and his lawyer had arrived.

“Mate, listen to me now,” Raco said. “You don’t know it. You get caught saying stuff like that outside of this station and that harassment charge is going to stick, so watch your mouth. There’s nothing linking Deacon to the Hadlers’ murders, no matter how much you want there to be.”

“Ask him.”

“Tunnel vision is a dangerous route.”

“Just ask him.”




The lawyer was young and infused with a deep passion for her client’s rights. Raco listened to her patiently as he escorted them both into the interview room. Falk watched them go, then leaned back in his chair, frustrated. Deborah came out from behind the reception desk and handed him a cold bottle of water.

“Not ideal to be stuck out here with Mal Deacon in there,” she said.

“Yeah.” Falk sighed. “Procedure. It works for you until it doesn’t.”

“You know what you need to do? Make yourself useful while you’re waiting.” She nodded to the hallway. “The storeroom could do with a clear-out.”

Falk looked at her. “I don’t think—”

Deborah regarded him over her glasses. “Follow me.” She unlocked a door and ushered him inside. It was musty, with shelves of paper and office supplies stacked around. She held a finger to her lips then touched her ear. Through an air vent above the shelves, Falk could hear voices. Muffled, but audible.

“For the tape, I am Sergeant Raco, present with my colleague Constable Barnes. Please state your names for the record.”

“Cecilia Targus.” The lawyer’s voice was bright and crisp through the vent.

“Malcolm Deacon.”

In the storeroom, Falk stared at Deborah.

“This has to be fixed,” he whispered, and she gave him the shadow of a wink.

“I know. But it won’t be today.”

She pulled the door to behind her, and Falk sat down on a box to listen.

Deacon’s lawyer tried to kick things off. “My client—” she began and stopped.

Falk could imagine Raco holding up his hand to silence her.

“You’ve given us the written copy of the complaint against Federal Agent Falk, thank you.” Raco’s voice drifted through the vent. “As you’re aware, he is technically off duty and not a member of this police force, so that will be directed to the appropriate member in his chain of command.”

“My client would like assurances that he will be left in peace and—”

“I’m afraid I can’t give any assurance of that kind.”

“Why not?”

“Because your client is the nearest neighbor to a house where three people were shot dead and currently remains without an alibi,” Raco said. “He’s also a suspect in the vandalism of a car last night, as it happens. We’ll come to that later.”

There was a silence.

“In regards to the deaths of three members of the Hadler family, Mr. Deacon has nothing more to add to—” The lawyer was cut short by Deacon this time.

“I had bugger all to do with that shooting, and you can put that on your record,” he piped up.

Cecilia Targus’s high voice cut in. “Mr. Deacon, I advise you—”

“Oh shut it, love, will you?” Deacon’s scorn was blistering. “You’ve no idea how it works down this way. These blokes’ll pin it on me in a heartbeat given half the chance, and I don’t need you getting me slammed up.”

“Nevertheless, your nephew has asked me to advise—”

“What’s wrong? Those tits make you deaf as well as stupid?”

There was a long silence. Falk, sitting alone, smiled despite himself. Nothing like old-fashioned misogyny to make the ignorant turn down good advice. Well, Deacon couldn’t say he wasn’t warned.

“Maybe you could tell us again about that day, Mal. Please.” Raco’s voice was calm but firm. The sergeant had a good career in front of him, Falk thought—if this case didn’t kill his enthusiasm stone dead before it really started.

“Nothing to tell. I was round the side of the house fixing that fence, and I see Luke Hadler’s truck come up his driveway.”

Deacon sounded more alert than Falk had ever heard him, but his words had the singsong quality of a story memorized rather than remembered.

“Hadler comes and goes all the time, so I pay no attention to it,” Deacon went on. “Then I hear a shot from down their farm. I go inside my house. Then a bit later there’s another shot.”

“Did you do anything?”

“Like what? It’s a bloody farm. Something gets shot every day. How was I to know it was that woman and her kid?”

Falk could picture Deacon shrugging.

“Anyway, I told you before, I wasn’t paying attention, was I? ’Cause I was on the phone.”

There was a shocked silence.

“What?”

Falk heard his own confusion echoed in Raco’s tone. There had been no mention of a phone call in Deacon’s statement. Falk knew. He’d read it enough times.

“What?” said Deacon, seemingly unaware.

“You took a phone call? During the shootings?”