14 July 2026
‘Excellent. Auhl deserves a series of his own’ THE TIMES
‘A superb chronicler of cop culture’ SUNDAY TIMES
‘Disher’s sublime touch for atmosphere and tension permeate this absorbing, emotional story’ DAILY MAIL
TIME WON’T BURY THE TRUTH
Sergeant Alan Auhl has come out of retirement. Once a shining light in Victoria’s homicide squad, he now runs the Cold Case Unit, casting an experienced eye over unsolved murders and missing persons. The young detectives think he’s washed up, but this doesn’t faze Auhl. He does things his own way, and his way delivers.
Whether he’s identifying a skeleton found under a concrete slab, gathering enough evidence to finally convict a doctor who killed three women, or answering a daughter’s plea that her father’s death was no accident, Auhl always gets results. Because every case, no matter how cold, deserves justice.
From the author of the beloved Paul Hirsch mysteries and Hal Challis investigations comes a riveting standalone, perfect for readers of Ian Rankin, Jane Harper and Chris Hammer.
They found themselves in a land not quite flat, the horizon barely decorated in any direction. Two extremes of human habitation: older gum trees, broad paddocks and cypress hedges marked the original farm homesteads. Dusty razed lots sprouted the colonnades of Mediterranean mansions, cheap kit homes and low-slung tan brick places with broad verandas. Some shrubs and saplings here and there, a miserable replacement for the gum trees bulldozed to ease the creep of the young families. Boats on trailers, bloated SUVs, satellite dishes. Signs advertised grass slashing, yoga, dog grooming and horse agistment. Now and then a grazing goat, a horse, an alpaca. A guy tearing around in an ATV with a dog on the back.
Finally Sarah told Auhl to turn left and he bounced them along a dirt road to an open gate in a white railing fence. At the end of a gravel driveway, several vehicles beside a new-looking house of outdated design, triple-fronted brick veneer with a tiled roof. Auhl made a mental note of the vehicles as he turned in: a small tradesman’s truck, a station wagon, a marked police car, a white unmarked like the one they were driving, a crime-scene van, two SUVs in a carport. Several figures came into view, gathered around a blue poly tent, the kind they always put up to preserve the body and conceal it from the media.
Auhl slowed the car, bumped over the grass, pulled in behind the crime-scene van and they got out, taking a moment to scan the property.
Not really isolated, Auhl noted. People bought five- and ten-hectare blocks out here, meaning they had a sense of isolation but often were no more than a horse paddock away from their neighbours. And this place had untilled land on all sides, with a hint of red tin roof above wattle trees three hundred metres further along the road. The only other nearby structures were an aluminium gardening shed with a lean-to for firewood and a shiny corrugated shed containing hay bales, a horse float, a trailer, a ride-on mower.
Hay bales. Auhl scouted around again and saw two miniature ponies in a fenced enclosure behind the house.
The Homicide Squad was represented by a pair of detective constables, Malesa and Duggan. Auhl knew them by sight, Pascal better than that.
‘How’s it going, Claire?’ Malesa said.
He was a slight, strutting character with a strong stink of aftershave. Duggan, a gangly gum-chewer, slouched behind with hands in pockets.
Malesa went on: ‘Old Retread here showing you how it’s done?’
‘Something like that,’ Claire said. She looked uncomfortable.
‘Left his Zimmer frame in the car?’ Duggan said.
Auhl was tired of the Zimmer frame jokes. Maybe Claire was too. She said, ‘Yeah, thanks guys, hilarious. So what have we got, et cetera, et cetera?’
With Malesa outlining the circumstances leading to the discovery of a skeleton under a concrete slab, they wandered over to the crime-scene tent. A slight breeze flowed over the open fields. The tent walls billowed in, out.
‘First impressions?’ said Auhl.
Malesa snorted. ‘A first-impressions guy. First impressions, the body’s been there for a lot of years.’
They paused at the entry. Auhl watched a photographer at work, a videographer, two crime-scene technicians, the latter thigh-deep in a hole in the ground. All wore disposable forensic-examination suits and bootees. The skeleton had been lifted out and placed on a tarp, where another tech crouched over it, brushing dirt from the bones. Auhl could see a belt buckle and a scrap of leather. Scraps of rotted fabric on the upper torso, around the waist and on one leg. Running shoes, synthetic, mostly intact.
Freya Berg, the crime-scene pathologist, knelt on the other side of the remains, watching the brush reveal the bones. She looked up. ‘Alan? You on the job again?’
‘For my sins.’
That was enough idle talk. Berg peered back down and said, ‘Male, shortish, probably young, going by his teeth. By young I mean late teens, early twenties. Possibly shot. There’s a chip out of his bottom left-hand rib, a corresponding chip’ – she craned her head – ‘lower spine. So, maybe shot in the chest, the bullet going right through.’
Auhl turned to the hole, the excavated dirt and bits of concrete piled beside it. ‘Metal detector find anything?’
The technicians ignored him. Duggan paused mid-chew to say, ‘Nope.’
‘Shot elsewhere,’ Pascal said. She glanced around at the house.
Malesa gave her a twisted grin. ‘Hate to disappoint you, Claire, but that gorgeous residence has been there less than two years. Same with the sheds.’
Pascal pointed at the excavation. ‘What about the slab? Used to be, what? Floor of a shed?’
‘Who knows?’ Malesa shrugged.
‘Thing is’ – Duggan chewed his gum, stopping long enough to rub his palms together, slyly satisfied – ‘old Slab Man here is very dead. As in, very, very dead. Not our headache.’
‘Yours,’ confirmed Malesa.
Slab Man, thought Auhl. Everyone’s going to call him Slab Man. ‘Your boss spoke to our boss?’
Malesa grinned. ‘Got it in one.’
Duggan chewed happily. ‘So if you two lovers don’t mind, we’ve got a recently dead carcass up in Lalor. Lebanese on Lebanese so no great loss, but we do have to hit the road.’
‘Kind of you,’ Pascal said.
‘We aim to please.’
