She was gone. It was closure now he knew. He closed his eyes and rested.

74 – Things are not as they seem

AARON WAS THINKING ABOUT SOME WORDS he heard someone quote from the Bible: He must increase, but I must decrease. It had something to do with John the Apostle blending in the background and Jesus becoming more prominent. Detective Taylor’s case was widening while Aaron’s was narrowing.

Aaron was pursuing a person who he believed held the key to an important piece of technology they needed to secure. The detective had the deaths of the girl’s parents and the deaths of two police officers to solve, and he had a good idea who the suspect was. At least Aaron had helped him by locating his two missing persons, Lucas Fell and Isabella Rose.

Yes, Aaron must become less and the detective must become more.

It was the beginning of another week and general office housekeeping had delayed their meeting until later in the morning. They had exchanged pleasantries.

“You did the right thing, Aaron. There was a risk factor with that Lucas fellow. Although minimal, it was there. There was also a risk factor with them being in your house, although that would have been alleviated when we sent out a call to say they had been picked up and were in custody.”

“Thanks. The decision was easy as they all knew I had no option. I feel for the girl, though—there obviously was an attachment there. But as my wife said, if it was meant to be, it would be. And they’re safe and now we just need to find this crazy lady.”

“Yep. I spent some time talking to James Black on Saturday. He’s somewhat remorseful about his actions. The girl’s grandfather had trusted him to look after his granddaughter but he feels he’s let him down badly. He’s also had some strange experiences with Ava Perdu.”

“Strange experiences?”

“Yep.

“Well, he confirmed they had some recordings in which this Ava unknowingly confessed to the murder of the girl’s parents. She had worked out that such a recording possibly existed. But James was smitten by her and gave their hiding place away. They were gassed, put to sleep, and the recordings were taken and presumably destroyed. But she obviously didn’t know about the copy in the letterbox which we retrieved thanks to your friend, Lucas. And thanks to gravity, the envelope had settled nicely into the bottom of letterbox so it would’ve been hard to see.”

“So you have some proof. Good. One thing I forgot to ask was how did Lucas connect up with Isabella again?”

“Isabella was staying next door to them and they didn’t know it. Both properties owned by Isabella’s family. Anyway, they joined up but separated from James.”

“Phew. Who’d want to be a detective?”

Taylor smiled. “It gets better. James says Ava Perdu was in his shack when Fell and the girl showed up. She vanished before the authorities arrived. Apparently, Fell said he thinks he saw her after the car accident which killed our officers.”

“Sounds like she’s the one. Can you take her into custody now?”

“That’s what I’m going to have to work out.”

“Well, I think my time with you can wind down now. I’ve nothing to go on regarding my missing man. We have joined the dots and they lean heavily in your favour. I’m happy to stay with you, but I’m not sure how I can contribute.”

“Was the girl able to enlighten you regarding your missing person?”

“No. There’s something mystical to this man.”

The detective stood up and put out his hand towards Aaron. “Thanks, you’ve been good to work with.”

“You too.” Aaron shook the detective’s hand. “I’ll work in the background and I’ll be in touch if anything relevant crops up.”

“There was one other thing.”

Aaron raised his eyebrows.

“You’ll have to come to a football game with me. Being a Queenslander, you need to be broken in to the great game we play down here.”

“I will be polite." Aaron smiled. "See ya later.”

<°)))><

Things were not as they seem. Aaron sat on a park bench staring into the muddy waters of the Yarra River. He unwrapped a sandwich and took a bite. He’d heard the Yarra called an upside down river, a reference to its muddy appearance despite it being one of the cleanest city rivers in the world. Yes, things were not as they seem.

He turned and looked along the path that flowed with the river. A tall man was approaching, his purposeful stride a stark contrast to his mismatched clothes and unfashionable plaid jacket. Aaron knew who it was.

“Hi,” said Aaron.

The man smirked. “An acronym for higher intelligence, and also a brand of clothing. You understand such things, Aaron.” He extended his hand. They shook hands, and the man sat next to him.

“Things are not as they seem, are they, Aaron?

Aaron smiled. “No, they’re not.”

“The lady will no longer be a problem.” The messenger reached into his coat pocket to retrieve something, and handed Aaron a phone. “There’s a device locator app on the phone. It’s called LocApp. Open it up and you’ll locate the device you’re looking for. And the woman.”

Aaron did as instructed. A map appeared with a blinking dot. He zoomed in on the dot and then picked up his own phone and pressed a number.

Aaron waited for his call to come through “So who exactly are you?”

“Let’s just say I work for Hi.”

Aaron chuckled and gave him a smile. “Taylor, it’s Aaron. Will explain in detail later but you need to get your team to the address I’m about to text you. There’ll also be a device there that’s to be the property of my department and I entrust that to you. Good luck.”

Aaron turned. “How can we—” The messenger was gone.

75 – Surrender

AVA COULD HEAR VOICES. She looked around. She was in a familiar bedroom. A picture of Anthony, Ava, and Madeleine sat on her bedside table. She breathed deeply. This was not the location she’d entered into the device. She dropped her head into her hands. It had either been overridden or hard coded to bring her here.

She could hear her husband’s voice.

She recalled what that messenger man had said. He’d known she’d kill him. So why did he have the device at all if he knew what she’d do?”

Then she thought of the evil presence that grabbed at her as she tumbled down some kind of tunnel. It was true. Things were not as they seem.

She heard her name. There were footsteps.

The door burst open. Their weapons trained on her. Then she knew. It was a setup. The messenger knew what he was doing all along. The shack was a setup.

She raised her arms.

She surrendered.

76 – Surprise, surprise