Siren by Tara Moss Page B

cars, his absences, and even the unveiling of his infidelities. Andy’s own marriage had survived precisely nothing. And his wife, Cassandra, had not even survived their bitter divorce. She had been sliced up by the Stiletto Killer like some kind of sick present, as a cat would leave a dead bird at the end of the bed. It was precisely because Andy was working the case that the killer had gone for her. It was Andy’s fault that Cassandra was dead. He had not joined the police force to be the cause of murder. And after all that hell, he had really thought he could make it work with Makedde—if he could make it with anyone. She was not bothered by the morbidness of his work as a profiler of violent serial criminals. Her father was a retired cop. She understood the job, the hours. Sure, she had been a model for many years, but she wasn’t precious or self-absorbed. They really had something, but it had gone wrong yet again.
    To make it worse, they had fought over professional issues as well as personal.
    The Cavanaghs.
    They had not seen eye to eye on what had transpired in Mak’s last Sydney assignment, and she had been bitter at his lack of support.
    If only she knew his real reasons, things might have been different.
    Sorry, Mak. Sorry.
    Andy looked listlessly round Jimmy’s spare bedroom and tried to gather his thoughts. The room appeared to be used for storage of anything that didn’t fit elsewhere. There were a fewcardboard boxes along one wall, a television that looked like it didn’t work, and, taking up precious space, a home gym. It was hilarious to Andy to imagine his former police partner even knowing what such a thing was. The man was perpetually out of shape and overweight, and his doctor had him on blood thinners. Still, there it was, complete with bench press and various pulleys.
    There was a knock, and the door opened.
    ‘Papa!’ a smaller Cassimatis yelled, and Jimmy slipped inside and shut the door behind him as if keeping back a wave.
    ‘Mate, never have kids. They’ll suck the life out of you!’
    Andy laughed. They had this kind of exchange from time to time. It was an unconvincing display, especially given the naked look of fatherly pride in Jimmy’s eyes. He had four children now, between the ages of fifteen and ten months. Andy was childless.
    ‘What did Bill Hicks say? That kids are naturally smarter than we are, because he’s never met a kid who was married and had children.’
    ‘Yeah!’ Jimmy declared. ‘They’ve got it worked out. Beat up kids in the schoolyard, come home, get fed, yell at their dad. Kids have it made.’
    Jimmy’s boys were at the age where they still idolised their father, and swelled with pride at the knowledge that their dad was a cop and carried a gun. It gave them cred at school. It was cause for boasting, for a couple more years anyway. Once the boys started going to parties, it would be different.
    ‘So, mate, you wanna find some beers tonight after dinner? Maybe hit the local? Or…’ he winked lasciviously, ‘we could check out the shows.’
    He didn’t mean the Opera House.
    ‘Uh, I’m seeing Mak tonight,’ Andy told him. ‘Maybe after.’
    ‘Okay, mate. Sure,’ Jimmy said, clearly disappointed. ‘That’s okay. I have to go in and check on some stuff at work, anyway.’
    The reality of what he had returned home to filled Andy with a mix of rage and grief. He didn’t know what he would do when he saw her; he only knew that he needed to.
    ‘Maybe we can do a work-out, too,’ he managed to joke, gesturing to the rusting equipment.
    Jimmy cracked a smile. ‘Fuck you.’

CHAPTER 9
    Mak pocketed her phone, and held back a strange sensation of drowning. Andy’s name had come up on her caller ID and she had not answered. It was not the time or place. But already a series of unwanted memories had begun flickering below the steady surface of her professional focus.
    Dammit.
    ‘I’ll show you upstairs,’ Glenise Hart told Makedde, and the women