Chapter Four — The Woman in Daniel’s Car - She Drove Him Into the Dark
By Hasnainhr
For several seconds Maya forgot about the man outside her apartment. She stood on the rain-slick balcony nine floors above the street, staring at the white sheet of paper pressed against the passenger window of Daniel Reid’s car.
HE KILLED VICTOR.
Sophie Hale held Maya’s gaze through the glass. One finger remained pressed against her lips. Don’t speak. Don’t tell him.
Below, Daniel stood beside the car with his phone to his ear, looking up toward Maya’s balcony. He could not see the message Sophie was holding against the window behind him.
“Maya?” His voice came through her phone. “Can you hear me?”
The apartment door shuddered behind her under another heavy impact.
Maya flinched.
“I’m here.”
“Is someone still outside your door?”
“Yes.”
“Stay on the balcony. Officers are coming up.”
Maya looked down at Sophie again. The paper had disappeared. Sophie now sat normally in the passenger seat, both hands resting in her lap as though nothing had happened.
“Who’s in your car?” Maya asked.
Daniel became silent.
That silence told her more than an immediate answer would have.
“Maya, listen to me.”
“Who is she?”
Another impact struck the apartment door.
The chain would not survive much more.
Daniel looked over his shoulder toward the car. Sophie turned her face away from him.
“Her name is Sophie Hale.”
Maya tightened her grip on the phone.
“Victor’s daughter.”
“Yes.”
“The daughter he said didn’t speak to him?”
Daniel looked up again. “This is not the time.”
“It feels like exactly the time.”
The stranger outside Maya’s apartment stopped hitting the door.
The sudden silence frightened her more.
She backed against the balcony railing.
Daniel said, “Can you reach the neighbouring balcony?”
Maya looked to her right. A concrete divider separated her balcony from apartment 9C. Beyond it, perhaps a metre away, another railing began. There was no safe route between them.
“Not unless you want your witness falling nine floors.”
“Then stay where you are.”
A faint scraping noise came from inside the flat.
Not at the front door.
Closer.
Maya turned.
The living room was almost completely dark, illuminated only by the grey light entering from the balcony.
Something moved near the hallway.
“Maya?” Daniel said.
She whispered, “Someone’s inside.”
Daniel’s voice changed instantly. “Do not go toward them.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“How did they get in?”
“I don’t know.”
The answer became obvious a second later.
The emergency stairwell.
Her apartment sat beside it. Every unit on the floor had standard front-door access from the corridor, but the building’s maintenance cupboards and utility channels ran beside the stairwell wall. Someone who knew the building might not need to break the front door at all.
A shadow crossed the hallway.
Maya stepped backward until rain soaked the shoulders of her shirt.
Daniel was speaking quickly now, apparently to someone else. “Ninth floor, apartment nine-fourteen. Suspect may already be inside. Stair access immediately.”
The shadow stopped.
Maya could hear breathing.
Not hers.
The stranger was standing somewhere beyond the kitchen.
She looked down.
Daniel’s car was parked almost directly beneath her.
Sophie had opened the passenger door.
Daniel turned and snapped something at her.
Maya couldn’t hear the words from nine floors above.
Sophie ignored him and stepped onto the pavement.
“Maya,” Daniel said through the phone, “I need you to stay absolutely quiet.”
A floorboard creaked inside.
Maya lowered the phone from her ear.
The dark shape appeared at the end of the hallway.
Man.
Tall.
Heavy jacket.
His face was covered with a black mask.
He saw her.
For half a second, neither moved.
Then he came toward the balcony.
Maya grabbed the metal chair beside her and threw it through the doorway.
The man raised an arm. The chair struck his shoulder, buying her perhaps one second.
She slammed the sliding balcony door closed and locked it.
The man reached it immediately.
He pulled the handle.
The glass shook.
Maya backed away.
The balcony offered nowhere else to go.
The stranger lifted something in his hand.
Not a gun.
A small emergency hammer.
He struck the glass.
A white fracture spread across the door.
Maya stared.
“Oh, hell.”
He hit it again.
The crack widened.
Daniel’s voice shouted from her phone where she had dropped it on the balcony floor. “Maya!”
The stranger raised the hammer for a third strike.
Then a sound came from inside the apartment.
A door crashing open.
Men shouting.
“POLICE!”
The masked stranger turned.
Maya heard running footsteps, furniture being hit, another shout.
The man vanished from view.
For several seconds Maya remained frozen against the railing.
Then someone appeared behind the shattered balcony glass.
Daniel Reid.
He unlocked the door from inside.
Maya stared at him.
“How did you get up here so fast?”
“Stairs.”
“That’s nine floors.”
“I’m aware.”
He opened the damaged door.
Two uniformed officers moved through Maya’s living room behind him. Another officer stood near the entrance.
“Where is he?” Maya asked.
“Gone.”
Her stomach dropped. “Gone?”
“He entered the maintenance corridor before officers reached the hallway. There’s access to multiple floors.”
“So you lost him.”
Daniel’s jaw tightened. “For the moment.”
Maya looked past him toward her apartment.
Cupboard doors stood open. One dining chair lay on its side. Her laptop was still on the table.
“The money.”
Daniel’s eyes moved to hers.
Maya immediately regretted speaking.
“What money?”
She ignored him and rushed through the apartment.
“Maya.”
She opened the freezer.
Frozen vegetables had been thrown onto the floor.
The bag containing the fifty thousand dollars was gone.
For several seconds she simply stared into the freezer.
Daniel stopped behind her.
“How much?”
Maya closed her eyes.
There was no point lying now.
“Fifty thousand.”
Daniel did not react visibly, which somehow made the number seem worse.
“Victor left fifty thousand dollars in your car?”
“Yes.”
“What else?”
Maya turned.
Daniel waited.
She thought about the USB hidden in the bathroom cabinet.
The photograph inside the cookbook.
Victor’s phone.
“Nothing.”
Daniel stared at her.
Maya stared back.
“You’re still doing it,” he said.
“Doing what?”
“Lying badly.”
“I’ve had an unpleasant night.”
“You have had a homicide victim deliberately book your car, hide a tracker underneath your seat, leave fifty thousand dollars with you, and less than two hours later a masked man has broken into your apartment. ‘Unpleasant’ stopped covering this situation quite some time ago.”
Maya crossed her arms. “Where’s Sophie?”
Daniel’s expression hardened slightly.
“Downstairs.”
“She told me you killed Victor.”
Nothing moved in his face.
Not even surprise.
That was more frightening than if he had become angry.
Maya continued, “She held up a sign from your car. Three words. ‘He killed Victor.’ She meant you.”
Daniel looked toward the officers.
“Give us a minute.”
One officer hesitated.
Daniel repeated, “A minute.”
They moved toward the corridor.
Maya waited.
Daniel lowered his voice. “Sophie is frightened.”
“So am I. I haven’t accused you of murder.”
“She has reasons to distrust me.”
“What reasons?”
“That is complicated.”
“Everything becomes complicated when I ask you a useful question.”
Daniel walked to the window and looked down toward the street.
Maya watched him carefully.
“Did you meet Victor in that laneway?”
Daniel turned.
“No.”
“My dashcam recorded someone waiting for him.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes. Your camera uploads short emergency backups whenever the vehicle detects sudden acceleration. We obtained one from your provider.”
Maya frowned. “You already have my footage?”
“Part of it.”
“Without asking me?”
“Victor had just been murdered. We moved quickly.”
“How convenient.”
Daniel ignored that.
“The man waiting in the laneway wasn’t me.”
“You sound certain for someone whose face is barely visible.”
“Because I was somewhere else.”
“Where?”
Daniel hesitated.
Maya almost laughed. “Of course.”
“Sophie was with me.”
The answer caught her completely off guard.
“What?”
Daniel looked toward the floor before meeting her eyes again.
“At the approximate time Victor was killed, Sophie Hale was in my car.”
Maya remembered the SUV footage.
The pale face in the rear seat.
“You were in the SUV.”
“No.”
“She was.”
Daniel said nothing.
Maya stepped closer. “The black SUV that followed us from the Langford. Sophie was inside it.”
Daniel’s silence confirmed it.
“Who was driving?”
“I can’t tell you yet.”
“Why was Sophie following her father?”
“She wasn’t following Victor.”
“She followed him across half the city.”
“She was following someone else.”
“Who?”
Again, nothing.
Maya shook her head. “You know what? I’m beginning to understand why she communicates with handwritten accusations.”
Daniel looked exhausted rather than offended.
“She thinks I could have prevented Victor’s death.”
“That’s different from saying you killed him.”
“Not to Sophie.”
Maya studied him. “Did you?”
“Did I what?”
“Could you have prevented it?”
Daniel looked away.
That answer was enough.
Before Maya could continue, one of the officers returned. “Detective.”
Daniel stepped into the hallway.
They spoke quietly.
Maya could not hear everything, only fragments.
“…maintenance exit…”
“…camera disabled…”
“…no visual…”
Then the officer handed Daniel a clear evidence bag.
Inside was the tracker Maya had stored in the metal coffee tin.
Daniel returned.
“Where did you get this?”
“Under my seat.”
“And Victor put it there?”
“My dashcam shows him doing it.”
Daniel examined the device through the bag.
“Did you activate it?”
“No.”
“It was already transmitting.”
“Who to?”
“We’ll find out.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because investigations generally involve finding things out.”
Maya pointed toward the shattered balcony door. “Someone already found me.”
Daniel’s expression softened slightly.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
For the first time, Maya heard something in his voice that did not sound professional.
Guilt.
Daniel looked down at the tracker.
“Victor used you.”
Maya said nothing.
“I don’t yet know why, but this wasn’t an accident. He selected your car. He planted this device. He left money behind. He made sure multiple people could locate you after he disappeared.”
“Why would anyone do that?”
Daniel looked at her.
“To move attention away from something else.”
Maya understood slowly.
“A decoy.”
“Possibly.”
“He made me a decoy?”
“I said possibly.”
“He knew people might come after me.”
“Yes.”
The word came quietly.
Maya felt anger replace fear.
Victor’s frightened face returned to her memory. His questions about Luke. His apology. His warning that she should go home.
She had thought he was trying to protect her.
Maybe he had been apologising because he already knew what he had done.
“Son of a bitch.”
Daniel did not disagree.
Maya walked into the bathroom before he could follow.
The cabinet was open.
Her stomach tightened.
She pulled out the vitamin bottle.
Still there.
She unscrewed the cap.
Tablets spilled into her palm.
The USB was gone.
Maya stared at the bottle.
Daniel appeared in the doorway.
“What?”
She remained silent.
“Maya.”
“The USB.”
His expression changed.
“So there was one.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“In here.”
“And now?”
“Gone.”
Daniel swore.
The intruder had ignored jewellery, electronics and anything else of obvious value. He had taken exactly two things.
Cash.
USB.
Maya suddenly remembered Victor’s phone.
She rushed toward the kitchen.
Her handbag lay open on the floor.
Wallet inside.
Keys inside.
Victor’s phone gone.
Daniel followed.
“He took that too?”
“Yes.”
“What exactly?”
“Victor’s phone.”
Daniel closed his eyes briefly.
“Anything else you’d like to mention while we’re discovering them one at a time?”
Maya glared at him.
“The photograph.”
“What photograph?”
She moved toward the cookbook.
It remained on the shelf.
Maya opened it.
Empty.
The photograph was gone too.
Everything Victor had left had been taken.
Except the tracker.
The one object the intruder could have easily found in the kitchen.
Maya looked toward the evidence bag in Daniel’s hand.
“He left that.”
Daniel followed her gaze.
“Why?”
Maya asked, “Maybe because he didn’t know about it?”
Daniel shook his head. “He came here because of it.”
“Then why leave it?”
Daniel examined the tracker more closely.
Something changed in his expression.
He turned the evidence bag over.
“What?”
Daniel held it toward the light.
There was a tiny red mark beneath the tracker’s casing.
Not a light.
A second component.
Daniel called the officer back.
“Get bomb response to examine this before anyone opens it.”
Maya took a step away.
“You said it was a tracker.”
“It is.”
“And?”
Daniel looked at her. “Maybe not only a tracker.”
Maya stared.
“Are you telling me I carried a bomb upstairs?”
“I’m telling you we don’t touch it again until someone qualified tells us what else is inside.”
Maya suddenly felt sick.
The officer carried the evidence bag away.
Daniel placed both hands on his hips and looked around the damaged apartment.
“You can’t stay here.”
“I gathered that.”
“Do you have somewhere safe?”
“My mother.”
“No.”
“Luke.”
“No.”
“You don’t get to reject my entire family.”
“If someone selected you specifically, assume they know your family.”
The thought had already occurred to Maya.
She hated hearing it confirmed.
“Hotel?”
“Too easy to trace.”
“Then what?”
Daniel hesitated.
Maya immediately disliked the hesitation.
“What?”
“I have somewhere.”
“No.”
“You don’t know where.”
“If it belongs to you, no.”
“It doesn’t.”
“Police safe house?”
“Not officially.”
“That phrase is doing a lot of work.”
Daniel looked at her. “A property used during an old investigation. Different name on the lease. Only three people know it’s still available.”
“How many of those three do you trust?”
“Two.”
“Are you one of them?”
“Yes.”
“Who’s the third?”
Daniel did not answer.
Maya laughed without humour. “Excellent.”
“We don’t have many options.”
“I have one. I can leave Melbourne.”
“Whoever is behind this found your apartment within an hour. You think the freeway will confuse them?”
Before Maya could answer, Daniel’s phone rang.
He checked the screen.
“Sophie.”
He answered. “Where are you?”
Maya’s head snapped toward him.
Daniel’s expression changed.
“What do you mean you left?”
He moved toward the balcony.
“No, Sophie. Listen to me. Do not—”
The call ended.
Daniel immediately rang back.
No answer.
“What happened?” Maya asked.
“Sophie left the car.”
“Wasn’t someone watching her?”
“There was.”
“That inspires confidence.”
Daniel ignored the comment and called another number.
“Where is she?”
Pause.
“What do you mean she walked away? You were supposed to keep eyes on her.”
His frustration was genuine.
He ended the call.
Maya asked, “Where would she go?”
“I don’t know.”
“She clearly knows more than you’re telling me.”
“Yes.”
“Finally, something we agree on.”
Daniel was already moving toward the door.
“You’re coming with me.”
Maya stared. “Absolutely not.”
“I’m not leaving you alone.”
“I’m not getting into the car of a man whose passenger just accused him of murder.”
Daniel stopped.
“Then you can ride with the uniformed officers.”
“And where are we going?”
“To find Sophie.”
“Why?”
“Because if she left protection voluntarily, she believes she knows where Victor’s killer is.”
Maya thought about the white paper against Daniel’s window.
HE KILLED VICTOR.
“What if she left because she thinks you’re the killer?”
Daniel looked straight at her.
“Then I need to find her before she tells the real one where she is.”
The argument made enough sense to be annoying.
Maya packed quickly. Jacket, charger, toiletries, spare clothes. Daniel stood outside the bedroom while she changed.
When she returned, two officers were waiting in the corridor.
Maya looked at her apartment.
The broken balcony door. Open cupboards. Frozen peas melting on the kitchen floor.
Six hours earlier, her biggest concern had been a car payment.
Now she had no idea when she would sleep in her own bed again.
Daniel led her downstairs.
Maya rode with the uniformed officers, exactly as promised.
Daniel drove ahead.
They had travelled only four blocks when Maya’s phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
Her stomach tightened.
She opened the message.
A photograph loaded.
Maya sitting inside the police vehicle.
Taken through the windscreen less than thirty seconds earlier.
Another message arrived.
Daniel cannot protect you.
Maya looked out the rear window.
Several cars followed.
None close enough to identify.
Then a third message.
Ask him what happened to your father.
Maya stopped breathing.
The officer beside her noticed.
“Everything okay?”
Maya did not answer.
Her father had been dead eight years.
Stroke.
That was what the hospital had said.
That was what everyone had said.
Her phone buzzed again.
This time the message contained an attachment.
An old scanned document.
Maya opened it.
At the top was her father’s name.
MICHAEL CARTER.
Below it:
CONFIDENTIAL WITNESS STATEMENT — VICTORIA POLICE.
Maya stared at the date.
Nine years ago.
One year before her father died.
She scrolled.
Most of the document was blurred or blacked out.
But one paragraph remained readable.
Mr Carter states that financial records supplied by Victor Hale demonstrate payments connected to Hale Urban Group, Adrian Mercer and two serving members of Victoria Police. Mr Carter has expressed concern for the safety of his family should his cooperation become known.
Maya’s hands began to shake.
Her father had known Victor.
Victor had lied.
Or perhaps he had been waiting for Maya to realise.
Another line appeared near the bottom.
Primary interviewing officer: Detective Daniel Reid.
Maya looked through the windscreen.
Daniel’s dark sedan drove twenty metres ahead.
Her phone buzzed once more.
Victor did not choose you because you were a driver.
Then another message followed.
He chose you because Michael Carter was your father.