Natalie’s faced blanched at the admission and her world continued its downward spiral into the abyss. She had spent the last three years of her life hating Craig Thoms and plotting his downfall and the realisation that her energies may have been misdirected shattered her like a fragile wine glass.
“But I saw his face in my dreams, in my memories of the accident,” she said defensively, not wanting to believe.
“Maybe you did. Craig was in the car, but he was on the drivers’ side in the back seat of his 4WD. I was driving that night, Natalie. It was my fault, not his.” She searched his face, looking desperately for a trick, for a sign of a lie but saw none. He had no reason to lie seeing that he already held all the cards.
“But I saw him,” she said, her voice faltering. “He was laughing at us.”
“No,” responded Nelson firmly. “He was laughing because he’d just opened a can of beer and sprayed it all through the car. Sounds ridiculous now, but it was funny at the time I guess.”
Natalie looked inward and replayed the memories of the accident in her mind as she had done a thousand times before. She closed her eyes and willed herself painfully back into her parents’ car again. She looked up at the car that bore down on them and then for the first time, the full hazy veil seemed to lift from the scene and she saw Craig Thoms looking down at them laughing, or, laughing at something, from the back seat of the dual-cab 4WD, and there in the driver’s seat was another man, his face which had been turned towards Craig in the rear vision mirror slowly began turning toward her as they sped past each other in the night.
“I stopped the car and looked back to see where your car was but didn’t see anything at all. I assumed you’d just driven off, so I did the same. If I had known, I would have stopped.” Nelson’s normally calm, unlined face, creased with the memory and Natalie instinctively knew that every word he spoke was the truth. “Five minutes later I drove head long into a breathalyser team of my very own colleagues. Craig and I both knew that if I was caught, it would probably be the end of my very short career. Craig didn’t hesitate for a moment. As we slowed down to queue up for the breathalyser, he swapped places with me in the car and then I slid out the passenger side door into a ditch beside the road and from there made my way home. Fortunately for me it was a dark night and there were half a dozen cars in line waiting to be tested so no-one witnessed my escape. Craig was tested and found to be well over the limit and was charged with drink driving. He took the rap for me and lost his licence for six months, but he didn’t say a word to anyone about me being there. Later that morning I dragged myself in to work still nursing a sore head. I heard about the car accident and started to wonder. I drove to the scene on the pretext of offering assistance. I saw the skid marks on the road and realised what had happened.”
“Stop, please stop,” said Natalie quietly as tears continued to roll down her cheeks.
Nelson ignored her, wanting to get it all out once and for all.
“I stood by the road for ages trying to decide what to do. The other cops there thought I was feeling a bit squeamish because I was a new cop. In the end I just drove away. I phoned Craig and told him to change the tyres on his 4WD and dump the old ones where no-one would find them. Sure enough, a couple of officers paid him a visit two days later but they didn’t have any evidence without being able to match the tyres and Craig didn’t say anything. In time, it all blew over and I left Narooma as quickly as I could to put it behind me.” Nelson felt relief after his admission of guilt. He had never spoken of that moment to anyone but Craig Thoms before. “Natalie….Kylie, I know my apology is a bit late, about fifteen years too late, but I am sorry.”
Natalie’s emotions fluctuated wildly with Nelson’s revelations.
“You’re a murderer!”
“No, it wasn’t murder. I’ve seen murders. I just drove over the centre line on a road by a couple of feet, that’s all, and then fate took over,” Nelson justified. “Once it had happened there was absolutely nothing I could do to change anything. It was just a stupid accident.”
“You could have come forward and acted like a man.”
“Maybe I should have, but that wouldn’t have brought your parents back or given you a better life. The only thing that would have achieved would be to put an end to my career and possibly putting me in jail, and the thought of being a nineteen year old cop in jail didn’t sound too good, so I decided to protect myself and Craig. Self-preservation kicked in I guess.”
Nelson waited for Natalie to respond but she just stared at him, trying to process all he had said.
“I know I did the wrong thing but I’d like to think that over the last fifteen years I’ve done some good in my life and I’ve made a positive difference in a lot of people’s lives through my work. Would society have been better served by me spending five years in jail or me working my arse off to take cold blooded killers like Manuel Torres off the street?”
“I’m going to tell the fucking world that you killed my parents,” she hissed at him, spittle flying from her mouth in her enthusiasm for the idea.
“Are you? I don’t think that would be a good idea,” Nelson replied evenly.
“Why?”
“Because it happened fifteen years ago and you have no evidence. Trust me, I’m a cop and I’ve been through a few internal investigations in my time. It’s my word against yours and Craig will support me, not you. It will get messy for me, but I’ll survive. On top of that, if you stay, you’ll probably be charged with conspiracy to commit murder among other things. That can carry a pretty hefty sentence. Admittedly the star witness is dead,” he said, again indicating Manuel Torres’ corpse on the floor beside him. “And you’re a smart girl who has probably covered your tracks pretty well, so maybe you’d come out of it ok, but then again, maybe not. It’s amazing what a team of Detectives can dig up on a person. We tend to look after our own. And finally there are the Foglianis to consider. No doubt they’d be interested to find out you were involved in Emilio’s murder. Maybe they’d come after you too.”
Natalie stared at him, weighing his words. She hated to admit they made sense and she had the feeling that she had been backed into the tightest of corners.
“Look Natalie, I can’t bring your parents back, but maybe, maybe if I let you walk away now it will go some small part of the way toward balancing the ledger between me and you. Maybe if you agree to disappear and never come back to New South Wales, I can leave Kylie Faulkner out of my reports and pretend I didn’t find you here. You could put all this shit behind you and start your life over again. It’s the best offer I can make you with the way things are.”
Natalie thought hard on his words and didn’t know what to do. She found it hard to accept that her three year crusade had come to such a pointless ending and that her parents’ killer would again walk free, unpunished, and yet she could fathom no other way out of her predicament other than a full scale retreat. She felt desperate, tired and drained of life and her shoulder throbbed incessantly, reverberating through her head.
“What about my shoulder?”
“I don’t know. You’re a resourceful girl, I’m sure you’ll think of something. Go and find a doctor to bat your eyelids at or something. It’s just a flesh wound so as long as it’s cleaned and stitched and you take a few antibiotics you should be alright.” Nelson cocked his head as he heard the sound of wailing sirens approaching. He surmised that the neighbour who he had almost shot earlier had placed a call to the police and told her story. “Now we don’t have much time so I’m going to turn my back for a few seconds and if you’re still here when I turn around then there’s nothing I can do for you and you’ll have to take your chances against me, the police and the Foglianis.” Nelson turned his back on her and pretended to gaze out the window to the night beyond. He wondered if she would make a move for Manuel Torres’ gun that lay on the floor only ten feet away from her and placed his hand within easy reach of his holstered weapon just in case. He watched her carefully in the reflection of the window as she got slowly to her feet. He saw her gaze shift and momentarily rest on the gun on the floor before she turned, grabbed a bag of belongings that she had been in the process of filling when Manuel Torres had arrived and disappeared out the door.