Free Murder with the Lot by Sue Williams Page A

around the glove box. One Mercedes manual, a handful of parking tickets and a couple of letters from the infringements court. I peered underneath the seats. Nothing. I closed the door with a quiet thud. The boot was locked. Stepping back from the car, I bumped into Ernie’s old water tank and slipped in a wet patch below the tap.
    Hang on. There was another car parked here yesterday. The silver Mercedes, Clarence’s Lexus, the undercover police car—a white commodore—and another, fourth car. Yes, four cars. What had the other one looked like? I screwed up my eyes while I tried to remember. Orange. A beat-up orange ute. Who did that belong to? And where had it gone?
    I stared through the dim at Ernie’s shed. Maybe the ute was parked in there.
    Ernie’s shed has never been an orderly, pine-shelved establishment, it’s more a piled-up-with-dusty-old-sinks-and-handy-bits-of-piping type of spot. It had an overpowering smell of oil, with a hint of something nastier underneath. I shone my torch around. No utes. Down the end was the old tin bath that Ernie called his bathroom. It had a new-looking tarp draped over it.
    A sound. A light, scuffling sound, possibly a rodent sound. I swung the torch around. I’m not wild about being near rats, especially in the dark. I shone the torchlight along the floor. No rats. I moved slowly towards the bath, then heard a sob. Rats don’t sob in my experience. I waved my torch wildly all around.
    â€˜Who’s there?’ I said in my boldest ragged whisper. I waited, holding my breath. Silence. I stared at the tarp. When had that arrived? Ernie’s been in the home for the past year, he doesn’t go out tarp-shopping. Not to my knowledge, anyway. I whipped the tarp from off the bath.
    I sucked in a quick frantic breath. There was a woman’s body in the bath. She lay there in her gold knit dress, her eyeless face grey in the torchlight. The smell hit the back of my throat. I gagged.
    There was another sound, behind me. I swung around. A girl’s face looked back at me in the torchlight, blonde hair ragged around her face. She put her hand up to her eyes, turned and ran out of the shed, lugging a water bottle in one hand. I charged out after her.
    â€˜Aurora,’ I shouted, waving the torch at the cars, the track, the trees.
    But she was gone.
    I’d learned my lesson about phoning Dean. This time I fished out the bit of chip paper from my bag and called Terry.
    â€˜I’ll be there right away.’ His voice was bleak.
    He didn’t ask any pointless questions like if I was sure she was dead.

Terry hadn’t said how long ‘right away’ would take but he was coming from the Muddy Soak police station, about two hours south of Ernie’s. It was possible he might do it a little quicker than that in the circumstances.
    I waited at the doorway of Ernie’s shed, the wind gusting, hauling at my hair and dress, with a whingey, fractious sound. My torch flickered a few times, then went out. I found myself wishing I’d never heard of Clarence or his relatives. There were a lot more interesting things I could be doing. Like scrubbing out my fryers or Jexing down my sinks.
    I leapt in the air as my phone rang.
    â€˜Where are you?’ Brad.
    â€˜Ernie’s. Something’s…come up. I’ll be a little while.’
    â€˜Come on, Mum, it’s dark. You need to come home. This Clarence bloke could be dangerous.’ He hung up.
    Brad had a point, but I knew I had to wait near Mona. I wasn’t turning my back on her body. Not this time.
    Then, from the shack, a shriek. I jumped, my heart jack-hammering in my chest. The shriek ended in a nasty muffled sound.
    I spent a hectic moment panicking. Was it Aurora being killed? If I went in, I could be next. Should I jump in my car, get right out of here? But then the murderer might follow me and kill us all.
    I inched towards the shack, stepping as quietly as I