Ladykiller Read online

  The horse was a mare called Peaches. Kerry had paid $30 for her the previous year. It was a tiny outlay, but since then the horse may as well have been grazing on hundred-dollar bills for what she cost in maintenance and feed. Kerry decided to sell her. Peaches had just netted Kerry a $2000 profit. Kerry was thrilled: ‘We’ll have to celebrate when I get back. Tell Helen I’ll take her to lunch. Bernard will be happy.’

  Kerry glanced at her wristwatch as well as the clock on the stove. ‘How long will it take me to get over to Parramatta at this hour?’ she asked.

  ‘Peak-hour traffic. You shouldn’t leave any later than eight forty-five.’

  ‘God, Marge, I’ll have to make a move then.’ Marge had agreed to babysit the Whelan children while Kerry and Bernie were in Adelaide. ‘Let me pay you for babysitting?’

  ‘Kerry, we’re friends. I love the kids. They’re no trouble.’

  ‘Thanks. I’ll ring you tonight to see how the little horrors are. Please don’t cook, just buy Chinese or pizza.’ Kerry folded two fifty-dollar notes into Marge’s hand and squeezed it.

  ‘Don’t leave yourself short, Kerry.’

  ‘No, I’ve got five hundred on me.’

  Kerry caught a glimpse of herself in the entry hall mirror. ‘Do I look overdone in this?’ She seemed anxious.

  ‘Slightly,’ Marge said, tucking Kerry’s heavy antique fob chain inside the neck of her top, ‘but you look fantastic.’

  Whenever Kerry travelled she wore her most expensive jewellery. It was a deliberate safety precaution. On a previous trip to London she had lost a bag containing more than $30 000 worth of valuables. Today she wore a custom-made diamond bracelet and hoop earrings. She never removed her gold engagement and wedding rings, for sentimental reasons. All up, she was wearing more than $50 000 worth of jewellery and felt slightly conspicuous. ‘I don’t want other men’s wives to think I’m overdoing it’, was her mantra.

  She got behind the wheel of the silver Land Rover Discovery.

  ‘Have a good day and enjoy the break with Bernard,’ Marge said from the front gate.

  Kerry waved at her friend and backed out into the street. At around 8.50 a.m. she phoned Bernie to tell him about Peaches.

  ‘That’s great news, love,’ Bernie said.

  Four minutes later, Kerry rang again. ‘I’m just a bit worried about what I’ve packed for Adelaide. Do you think I’ll be warm enough?’

  ‘I put your coat in, don’t worry,’ Bernie said.

  Before signing off , Kerry said, half laughing: ‘Darl, what time’s the flight again?’ Kerry was routinely late for appointments, in particular flights, and it had become a running joke between them.

  ‘You need to be outside my office at 3.45 p.m. Don’t cut yourself short. We can’t be late,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll be there, darl, you know me.’ Kerry put down the phone.

  She made good time and at 9.35 a.m. turned the Land Rover off Phillip Street and down a ramp into the underground car park of the Parkroyal Hotel. The sign to Premier Parking read ‘Full’ but Kerry ignored it. She scraped an overhanging signpost with the roof of the car as she descended.

  Kerry yelled out to the car park attendant: ‘I’m in a hurry, got a space for me?’

  Mark Mascari, recognising her as a regular, obliged and lifted the boom gate. He directed Kerry to reverse in front of a Nissan Pulsar sedan which was parked in bay number 49. ‘Just double park and I’ll move it,’ Mascari said. He scribbled ‘9.37 a.m.’ on her docket and handed it to her.

  Kerry pulled on her jacket and buttoned it as she rushed from the vehicle.

  ‘Leave me the keys, madam,’ Mascari said.

  ‘They’re in the ignition,’ came her reply.

  To Mascari, she seemed stressed and in a hurry, not unusual for one of his customers.

  As Kerry walked up the ramp, a security camera recorded her movement—fifty steps—frame by frame. She was already seven minutes late but the man she was meeting did not care. He was waiting. As patient as a spider. He pulled his green Mitsubishi Pajero into the kerb outside the hotel as he caught sight of her.

  As Kerry disappeared from the security camera’s view, she rushed over to his vehicle, opened the door and climbed into the passenger seat.

  2 TRIPLE-0

  True to form, Kerry was late. Bernie was accustomed to his wife’s tardiness and waited outside his Smithfield office. Quarter to four came and went. Then 3.55 p.m. By four o’clock Bernie was getting shirty. He dialled Kerry’s mobile. It went to voicemail. When he tried the house, Amanda picked up. She hadn’t heard from Kerry all day. Nor had Marge. This was not like his wife. She always kept in contact. ‘The phone might as well be glued to your ear,’ Bernie used to say to her. He spoke with Kerry on the phone at least three times a day. His wife was rarely on time for anything, but she always rang him.

  Bernie kept calling, every two minutes. Nothing. He asked his secretary, Mary Brady, to reschedule their 5.30 p.m. flight while he headed to the Parkroyal Hotel, where Kerry parked during trips to Parramatta. The drive from Smithfield to Parramatta seemed unusually long. In his rising panic, Bernie could hear his heart thumping. As he manoeuvred his Mercedes through the clogged traffic on the Cumberland Highway, Bernie’s mind swirled with scenarios. Had her car broken down? Had she fallen ill and been taken to hospital? Maybe she had been mugged, wearing all that jewellery? Bernie knew Kerry had had a beautician’s appointment at 9.30 a.m., but he had no idea which one.

  At the Parkroyal he turned into the car park and spotted her silver Land Rover Discovery. For a second he breathed more easily, but it was short-lived. The keys were in the ignition. No sign of Kerry. At that moment he felt frightened. Something terrible had happened to his wife. The time was 5.23 p.m. Bernie dialled triple-0.

  At the police communications centre, operator Derek Manning picked up the call. ‘Police emergency. What is your emergency?’ he said.

  Bernie couldn’t get the words out quickly enough: ‘Look, I have a lady that hasn’t arrived, she is missing, a car, we have found her car, um, I’m her husband in Parramatta at the Parkroyal Hotel. She was to be on an aeroplane flight a couple of hours ago. She didn’t show up and I knew where she was going and I’ve come and found the car here . . . Um, hello?’

  ‘Yes, I’m listening, sir. Just a little calmer for me, please,’ Manning said patiently, as though to a child.

  ‘Yeah, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Your wife is missing?’

  ‘Correct.’

  ‘And she was due to take off for a flight two hours ago?’

  ‘Yes, correct, yeah, she was to meet me for an aeroplane flight . . . um . . . but I knew where she was going prior to that, shopping . . . um . . . and I’ve come, driven to that place and her car is locked in a car park.’

  ‘I see—where you anticipated it would be?’ Manning was used to panicky callers. In most cases the matter was quickly resolved. He hoped this one would be.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Bernie replied. ‘I’d just taken a guess, it was the last known place of, yeah.’

  ‘All right, I’ll just take some details, sir.’

  ‘Yeah. Right.’

  ‘Just calmly answer the questions.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘And we will get there as quickly as we can.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Your name is, Mr . . .?’

  ‘Whelan, Bernard Whelan. W-H-E-L-A-N.’

  ‘You’re on a pay phone now?’

  ‘I’m using the car park’s, um, phone. It’s not a pay phone.’

  ‘Where will you meet the police, sir?’

  ‘Um . . .’

  ‘Firstly, where do you live?’

  ‘I live at Kurrajong.’

  ‘All right, so this is a normal place for her to come down and do the shopping, is it?’

  ‘Well, no it’s not, no, but she told me she was coming here.’

  ‘I see. Where would you prefer to meet the police?’

  ‘Well,
probably here where the car is, I guess. We would start from here, wouldn’t we, looking for her?’

  Manning could hear the distress in Bernie’s voice. He put on his kindest tone: ‘Unfortunately it’s not a matter of us getting the dogs out and making a search.’

  ‘I realise that. Um . . . I thought when I found the car I should at least alert you.’

  ‘Yes, I understand.’

  ‘Because, I mean, should I start checking hospitals or, you know, seeing if she has been assaulted or something?’

  ‘If I could just . . . I understand it is difficult—can you hear me clearly?’

  ‘Yes, I can.’

  ‘It would probably be to your advantage to go to the police station.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘Right,’ Bernie said.

  ‘And start from there.’

  ‘Okay, I can do that. I’m in Parramatta.’

  ‘You’re in Parramatta.’

  ‘Yeah, I can go to the Parramatta police station.’

  ‘All right, take it from there. They will be able to assist you, whereas I can’t directly, not knowing your bona fides.’

  ‘Okay, righto, okay. All right, I’ll do that.’ Bernie’s voice was trembling.

  ‘Thank you, sir, bye now.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  The call had taken three minutes and twenty-six seconds. It was now 5.26 p.m. Bernie’s mouth was dry and his hand felt sweaty on the receiver. He phoned Amanda Minton-Taylor, hoping she would have collected the kids from school by now. He heard her speak to James: ‘Go inside. I’ve got to speak to your father.’ And then, ‘What’s the latest, Bernard?’

  ‘I’ve just found her car in the Parkroyal. There’s no sign of her. I’m going to the police. You better get your mum up to help. We need to sit down and tell the kids what’s going on.’

  Bernie was fifty-nine years old and fit, but even so when he ran to Parramatta police station in just ten minutes, he surprised himself with his speed. Constable Narelle Jamieson was working the station’s front desk. She was finishing a report and getting ready to take her meal break when Bernie burst in.

  ‘Please help me. This is urgent,’ he shouted over the counter to Jamieson.

  The constable stopped writing and turned towards him. Bernie continued before she could speak: ‘I want to report my wife Kerry missing. Her car is in the Parkroyal car park and the keys are in the ignition and the car was parking another car in.’

  ‘Hang on, now, slow down,’ Constable Jamieson insisted.

  Bernie took in a breath and ran through the details, his fingers drumming on the counter.

  The young officer began the routine questions to try to rule out some of the possible reasons for her disappearance. ‘Firstly, did she want to go on the business trip?’ the constable enquired.

  Bernie looked impatient. ‘She was really happy and looking forward to our trip. She had an appointment at a beautician’s in Parramatta. For a facial, I think.’ Bernie could not tell her the name of the salon. What husband would know that?

  ‘Well, how did you know your wife’s car was parked at the Parkroyal Hotel?’ The officer seemed suddenly suspicious.

  ‘We always park there when we come to Parramatta.’

  The probing continued.

  ‘No,’ Bernie assured the officer, his wife did not have any mental health problems. No, she had never tried to commit suicide. There were no marital problems. ‘We’re very happy in our marriage,’ Bernie said, sounding frustrated. ‘We have children and Kerry would never leave the children.’ He said there had been no threats against his company, however Bernie was concerned she might have been mugged. ‘She was wearing very expensive jewellery. It’d be worth about $50 000.’

  Constable Jamieson looked up at this. She turned away from the desk to seek advice from the sergeant.

  Bernie paced up and down the foyer. He called Mary Brady and Amanda. Their response was always the same: ‘No word.’

  Constable Jamieson returned to the counter. ‘Mr Whelan, we’ll list your wife as missing and I’ll send some police to look at her car and around the Parkroyal. If you hear anything or locate your wife, could you contact the police?’ The young officer reminded him that an estimated 30 000 people were reported missing in Australia each year. ‘Ninety-nine per cent are located within hours, Mr Whelan,’ she said and raised her eyebrows in a half-smile.

  Bernie glared back. ‘That’s not good enough,’ he snapped. ‘Something terrible has happened to my wife, I know it.’

  The young officer’s tone was gentle: ‘Sir, why don’t you go home and see if you can find anything, any clues to where she might be. Check her luggage, ring her friends.’

  The sergeant directed two officers to Mrs Whelan’s vehicle.

  Bernie made a quick search as he walked up Phillip Street but it was too dark to see much so he headed home. On the way, he phoned Crown Equipment’s security company, Intellisec. Steve Benton, the director of the security and risk assessment company, was just sitting down to dinner with his family when his pager went off . He called back. Crown had been a valuable client for the last decade, and would frequently call on him to investigate corporate crime and assist with security issues.

  The desperation in Bernie’s voice was evident. Benton left his dinner on the table and drove to Parramatta. He and another investigator searched the car park and the streets of Parramatta for the next three hours. They spoke with anyone who would listen. They walked up and down the Parramatta River, from Church Street to the wharf. They checked unit blocks, alleyways and garbage bins. They peered into beauty and hair salons. It was dark and all the shops were locked up. At the Parkroyal Hotel, the duty manager seemed distracted as he wrote down the details. He was busy but would leave a note for his boss.

  With no sign of Kerry, the pair went to Parramatta police station. They made a futile attempt to get police to move on the case. It was 11.40 p.m. The detectives, they were told, had all knocked off . The sergeant assured Benton that Mrs Whelan’s details were entered on the computer system. Benton understood, but he was not happy.

  Bernie had called on his best mate, Tony Garnett, to telephone detectives he had come to know through his car sales business. ‘I’m worried the police aren’t taking this seriously enough, mate,’ Bernie told Garnett. ‘I’m sure they think we’ve had a domestic, or she’s shacked up in a motel with a lover or something. You know she’s not the sort of person who would just disappear. Is there anybody you can ring to get some action?’

  After Tony had digested the news, he started making calls.

  Back at the house, the children were finishing off their dinner. Marge was fussing around them as Bernie walked in.

  ‘Daddy, why aren’t you on the plane with Mummy?’ Matthew asked.

  Bernie frowned, ‘Kids, there’s something I need to talk to you about.’

  He composed himself. Bernie had to be strong for the children even though he felt like crying. He quietly explained that their mother had not turned up to catch the plane. ‘We’re not sure where Mum is but the police are helping us. Now, I don’t want you worrying.’

  James started to cry and Marge cuddled him. Matthew quietly slipped away to his room. Sarah sat open-mouthed for a moment, and then tried to brush it off. ‘Mum probably found some really cool shops and her mobile’s gone flat. She’ll be home later,’ the fifteen-year-old said.

  While Marge put the children to bed, Bernie hit the phones. He called eighteen people: friends, neighbours, relatives, even Kerry’s doctor. His enquiries to them were discreet. He didn’t want to alarm anyone unnecessarily or set off any gossip.

  Marge phoned an old friend, Karl Bonnette, a retired ‘crim’ who had connections to Sydney’s underworld. ‘I’ll look into it, Marge,’ Bonnette said.

  Bernie searched for clues. Kerry’s luggage in the boot of his car revealed nothing, but her diary did. Kerry kept two, a large one for the house to record events for the whole family, and a personal o
ne which she carried in her handbag. Bernie grabbed the large diary from the kitchen bench and turned to 6 May. Kerry had written ‘9.30’ and nothing else. No mention of a beautician’s appointment. Just blank. This was unusual. On every other day she had written an entry beside a time. For 9 May Kerry had scrawled ‘11 am Arndell College opening’. For 17 May, ‘Steven Warren’s 40th lunch’.

  Bernie did not even try to sleep that night. His mind teemed with thoughts. He read and reread documents, checked pill bottles and searched through Kerry’s bedside table; he desperately wanted a clue. When the phone rang at 6.40 a.m. he was still in his white business shirt and grey trousers, his tie loosened.

  Detective Sergeant Allan Duncan was on the end of the phone line, having just started his shift at Parramatta police station. The detective always came into the office an hour before everyone else, to get settled, make himself a cup of tea and read about any overnight incidents in the situation reports, or ‘Sitreps’, as they were known.

  Drama had often followed the bearded 42-year-old Duncan. Three weeks into his job as a fresh recruit in the 1980s, he was almost killed in a bomb explosion at Sydney’s Town Hall. Criminals Gregory Norman McHardie and Larry Danielson carried out a threat to detonate bombs in Woolworths stores if $1 million in cash, diamonds and gold was not paid to them. The blast was tremendous. A wall collapsed on Duncan and left him permanently deaf in his left ear. While two of his colleagues were discharged from the police force on medical grounds, Duncan accepted the princely sum of $1500 in compensation and got on with the job.

  On the Sitreps this morning, the case of a missing woman jumped out at him. While missing person files were common, arising at least once a week in his command, this one seemed different. Duncan mulled over the facts: the wife of a chief executive officer from a multinational company, missing with $50 000 worth of jewellery, a mother of three. Duncan dialled the Whelans’ number. ‘It’s Detective Allan Duncan here. Mr Whelan? Have you heard from your wife?’

  ‘No,’ Bernie answered. ‘I’ve had my security officers out and there’s nothing. What have the police done?’ Bernie sounded scared and angry.