I looked over the three forms on the scarred table in front of me.

Scanning the documents, it seemed David Josef Denechev, Wen Leung and Ding Weizhong had all shuffled off this mortal coil in the last few days.

The forms were a list of each individual’s details and the circumstance of their deaths. Near the bottom was a doctor’s signature and a date, time and location of death. They’d died of various nasty things - in the “Cause of Death” section Denechev’s form said “endocarditis”, while Leung, a 40-year-old male, had died from something called “acute myocardial infarction” and Weizhong, a 29-year-old woman, had died of “anaphylaxis secondary to peanut allergy”.

Dark outlines around the paper suggested that these were photocopies of the original forms, which must have been slightly smaller than these A4 sheets and could have gone on for pages. As far as I could decipher, there were no suspicious circumstances surrounded the deaths, but I wasn’t sure that they put that kind of thing on a death certificate.

My first theory was that Crombie was doctoring the books at the hospital to try to hide his bikie mates’ hits, but that didn’t ring true. The forms were only copies, and it looked like it took a doctor to sign off on the cause of death, so red flags would go up if there were brains bashed in or bullet holes involved. An OD might be easy to fake, but I reckoned “pulmonary edema” meant heart attack and if so, there was little chance of foul play.

So either Tom was just a fat little sickie who liked to revel in the misfortune and gore of others - a real possibility - or he was delivering the forms along with the drugs to his biker buddies. Probable - but why?

I couldn’t figure it, so I gave up and procrastinated up a diversion. There was stuff strewn around the room, but checkout time was 11am, so there was plenty of time to get my shit together, so I sent a text message to Nurse Brooks to see if I might eat dinner in her pleasant company - and in a restaurant for a change. All this fearing for my life didn’t exactly snap the needle off the fun-o-meter, and I craved company of the attractive, skirt-wearing variety. Anyone who didn’t want to see me dead, maimed or in jail would do, but you gotta aim high.

Waiting for what would surely be an instantaneous reply, I hit the teev and waited for the overnight World Cup highlights. It was another get-out of jail escape for the Aussies, this time against the Kiwis, and the Cup was practically full of champagne and chilling in the bar fridge. It all brought half a smile to my face, even among in the ambiance vacuum of the Hotel Room At The End of The World. Several massive stand-and-deliver sixes from Brett Lee had me whooping with glee, and elicited a thump on the wall from a neighbour. I thumped the floor in reply but was distracted by a snatch of the chorus of Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick. Hot text already! 

I was thumbing at my phone to get to the message when there was a knock at the door and, grinning and not thinking, I sauntered over and opened it.

Out in the hallway, Detective Kessler was smiling too.
“Hey, Detective,” I said, waggling my phone. “Got a date.”
Then he was in the room, uninvited mind you. “Congratulations, dickhead. Now how about you call him back and tell him you’re going to be late.”

“Hey, you can’t…”
Kessler was going over to the table. Oh, Jesus H. Christ on a joint Senate ticket. The detective grabbed a pethidine bottle. “By the way, cricket man, what the fuck is this?!”