Defending Pacer

by TJ Hamilton

  “But why did you have to kiss him?” Mum starts up again.

  I roll my eyes. “He’s Italian! It’s not what it looks like.”

  Mum’s sigh is loud enough for me to hear.

  Great. Just great. This weekend is going to be real fun.

  ***

  Dad makes a grand entrance just as we take our seats at the dinner table in the smaller of the two dining rooms. The other dining room is saved for larger banquets with friends.

  From the sound of the Elvis tune that he’s belting out, he’s been at the golf club for the afternoon. Hopefully he’s inebriated enough to be in a jovial mood. He spots me on the other side of the table and squints in my direction. Brace yourself, Chelsea.

  “So they’re saying if you pull a rabbit out of the hat with this Fratelli guy, then you’ll be offered a place in the partnership.”

  He doesn’t waste a moment to get straight to the point. Not even a ‘hello, how are you?’

  “I figured as much. It’s nice to see you too, Dad.”

  He shakes his head. “I just hope you know what you’re doing, Chelsea. What have you got so far?”

  Bonnie, the head housekeeper, places plates with our dinner in front of us. I gulp down the extra strong gin that Ed made me.

  “I’ve bought all the files with me, Dad. But I’m leaving it for the night, and I’ll get into it tomorrow afternoon with you. I’ve spent the last forty-odd hours studying the case; I need a break from the intensity of the whole trial.”

  Truth is, I need a break from Pacer.

  I sneak a glance towards Mum and see uncertainty and anticipation on her face. From her darting eyes and pursed lips, I can tell she’s waiting for Dad to react to the paper’s photos of me. From his pleasant mood, I don’t think he’s seen them yet, so I’ll just let it slide and hope he misses it altogether.

  Mum seems to share the same thought as me and also leaves the subject alone. “Have you heard from Logan? Are they coming up here this weekend?” Her question is directed at me.

  I shrug. I haven’t heard from my cousin all week.

  “Speak and I shall appear!” Logan spreads their arms out wide, and dramatically waltzes into the dining room just as dinner is being served.

  They’re wearing combat boots, black jeans with a rip in the knees, and a black leather motorcycle jacket. Their hair is bright blonde and shaved at the back with a big fringe that falls over one side of their face, hiding one half of the oversized round reading glasses they’re sporting. I say ‘their’ because Logan doesn’t identify as male or female. Logan is ‘gender fluid’ as they call it. When we were kids, she was a girl. Our Mums always dressed us in matching sickly sweet pink ruffles and frills, and our blonde curls were always in bows. Logan was the prettiest little girl, so much so that I be jealous because everyone would mention how beautiful she was. But then they’d mention how we were more like sisters than we were cousins because of our closeness and similar features, and my little heart was mended once again.

  You never know if Logan is a guy in heels or a chick that looks like a dude. Truth is, they have a style of their own. Some days she feels like her and other days he feels like him and, when that’s the case, I am allowed to call them a him or her. As confusing as it sounds, it’s really quite simple. Tonight, he’s more he than she, but you don’t see too many guys with bright red lipstick and eyelashes as long as wings. Logan is just Logan. But tonight he’s ‘he’.

  “Gee, the papers gave you a bit of grief today with those pictures. I bet you sorted them out though, hey Aunt Tilly?” Logan sits casually on his chair, keeping one foot on it, knee up to his chest and pops a piece of bread in his mouth.

  “What pictures?” Dad glares at all three of us.

  Thanks Logan. Trust you to open you big mouth.

  “It’s nothing to worry about, Dad. My client was being polite by walking me home after a late meeting, and someone snapped some pics of what looks like us kissing. But as you know, they make it worse than the actual reality of it.”

  “What do you mean it looks like you were kissing?” His tone had dropped. He’s pissed.

  “Pacer was giving me a kiss on either cheek, like all good Italians do, and the one picture they’re all running with looks like I’m kissing him back. But trust me, Dad, it couldn’t be further from the truth.”

  The thick vein on Dad’s forehead starts to surface, as it always does when he’s angry. “Why do you call him Pacer?”

  “Because that’s his name?”

  “It’s also very informal for a client, Chelsea.”

  Rolling my eyes and shaking my head, I can’t help but feel annoyed at this whole thing. Thank fuck no one can actually read my thoughts; then I would really have some explaining to do.

  ‘Sorry’ Logan mouths from across the table to me.

  I shrug in return. This grilling was bound to happen.

  What a fucking mess … and this is just the start.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Eleven hours and twenty-three minutes since I saw my honeybee. Fuck this tracker and fuck her rich parents. Scott better get this sorted or I am going to lose my shit. I slide open the screen on an iPhone that is used for one purpose and one purpose only. Finding the only number that’s in the phone¸ I press Scott’s number.

  Smart phones are a crook’s worst enemy and a useful tool for the cops. But smart phones won’t outsmart someone like Scott.

  The call picks up but the line is empty.

  “Is it done?”

  “Twenty minutes.” The voice answers robotically.

  “What about the location?”

  “Twenty minutes.”

  “You said that fourteen hours ago.”

  The call drops out and I throw my phone into the wall. Pieces of it fly in different directions. My connection to Scott is shattered.

  I grab my everyday phone and send a message to my cousin.

  PACER: I need a new phone immediately. I’m at home.

  Scrolling through the messages, I read my conversation with Chelsea. Studying every word she wrote makes me crave her more, and despite all my attempts for the past eleven hours, I can’t even get close to her. Eleven hours, feels more like eleven days. I need to see her. That’s why I’ve had to call in Scott. He’s the government’s most wanted hacker. He’s more pedantic than I am about his personal security, that’s why I like the guy. I wouldn’t even know what he looks like. I don’t think anyone does. My life is fucked as it is from having to outwit the cops. I can’t imagine what his must be like. Fuck that.

  My phone sounds its message tone.

  FRANCO: Did you smash your phone again?

  PACER: Just get here. Urgent.

  Taking the smashed phone, I swap the sim card over in case Scott calls. He won’t leave a message so I need to take that call. I walk back up the jetty to my house. I’m surprised there isn’t a track worn in the hardwood—I’ve paced it that many times. Especially in the last eleven hours.

  The phone rings. No number displayed. I answer it on mute so they can’t hear me, or my surroundings.

  “It’s done.” Scott’s pixelated voice comes through the speaker.

  The call ends.

  It’s about fucking time! Now I just need Franco to hurry the fuck up and I am out of here. I have the freedom to move once again with the signal from my tracker now intercepted by Scott and access to one of America’s telescopes, in space.

  By the time I’ve made it to the garage at the front of my property, Franco pulls up at the front door.

  “Where’s the phone? I need to go.”

  “Everything alright?” He throws me the box as I make my way to the garage.

  “It will be now.”

  There’s not a moment to waste. With my iPad in hand, I jump in my Audi and finally venture past my front gates for the first time since I had this fucking tracker fitted. There’s one place I need to be.

  Sliding my sunglasses back on, I stretch out on the sunlounge an
d close my eyes for a moment. The winter sun feels lovely against my bare arms. I still have to keep a big knitted rug over my legs to protect them from the ice-cold breeze on the hilltop.

  “So there seriously isn’t anything going on between you and this Pacer guy then?” Logan takes the opportunity to talk the moment my novel drops to my chest.

  I groan. “Not you too.”

  “Well I had to ask. He is pretty hot. I wouldn’t blame you if you did have a thing with him.”

  Raising my sunglasses, I smile. “He is ridiculous looking, isn’t he? But no, I don’t have a thing with him. A thing for him maybe, but at this stage the thing is singular.”

  Logan laughs. “Just be careful. There are plenty of eyes on you at the moment.”

  “Don’t I know it?”

  The phone vibrates on the table next to me.

  PACER: Since you don’t work on the weekend, why don’t we have dinner instead?

  My smile is unstoppable, but I toss the phone back onto the table, frustrated even more about the shitty situation I’m in. Why can’t this just be easy? As in, why can’t Pacer just be a law-abiding citizen who I met out on the town one night? Or we were introduced through friends, like every other normal couple I know?

  From the corner of my eye, I catch Logan smiling. “That was him, wasn’t it?”

  I sigh and flop back against the sunlounge.

  “Is it that obvious?” I lean my arm across my face, blocking the sun and my thoughts.

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  I shake my head.

  “Okay. Well I’m here if you do. You know that, right?”

  “I love you for that … you know that, right?”

  With my phone back in my hand, I know I have to respond to Pacer, regardless of my feelings.

  CHELSEA: Don’t think that’s a good idea. Have you seen the news?

  PACER: I don’t read newspapers or watch the news on TV.

  CHELSEA: Maybe you should. They followed us the other night when we had late lunch, and took pictures of us. They’ve decided to run with the story that you and I are romantically involved.

  He doesn’t reply. Shit!

  CHELSEA: I’m just as angry about it. It’s been sorted though. The media won’t be printing anything like that again without having a defamation case against them.

  PACER: So you would be defamed if you were in a relationship with me?

  I stare at the text for a moment longer. That’s not what I meant. But what does he mean? All of his actions, his little passes at me—I know he likes me. Girls never want to admit it to themselves but we always know. There’s a change in our body when a man takes an interest in us. Our heads make stupid decisions all because the rampant pheromones overrule everything. They shouldn’t be called ‘fair-o-moans’ they should be ‘wrong-don’t-go-there-o-moans’.

  CHELSEA: No, being with you wouldn’t defame me, but it won’t help your case at all if this story develops.

  PACER: If that’s a real no, then we’ll have dinner when my case is over.

  He’s tenacious. Maybe that’s the solution to all of this? If I get him off his murder charge, I can convince the country that he’s not the man the police are making him out to be. Then maybe I could start something with him, or at least we would be able to try out the stock. All of his body language tells me he wants it too, and I’m pretty sure his advances are making my uncontrollable feelings even worse.

  The only people that will have a problem with this will be my family. I shouldn’t get my father involved in the case … or maybe I should, and not tell Dad the parts about Pacer actually admitting to me that he did murder that guy?

  “That’s it!” I jump off the sunlounge and run across the lawn towards the house.

  “What’s it?” Logan calls out.

  I don’t stop; I can’t. I need Dad to help me with this case. If I’ve done my job right, I’ve got the right amount of culpable and non-culpable evidence that makes me still look impartial when Dad goes over my notes. I’m pretty sure I can convince him that Pacer is being targeted in all of this. I know my Dad better than anyone; I know exactly how he works. If I get this right, he will find the best way to get Pacer off this charge.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Why did she run inside the house after I sent her that last message? I zoom into the screen on the iPad and try to focus on the person lying on the sunlounge next to where my honeybee just was. It looks like a girl, but I can’t make her out properly. Getting access to the telescope was an expert idea. I wouldn’t have even known about it if it weren’t for Scott’s suggestion. I knew there was a reason why I kept him on my payroll for all these years.

  I smell my honeybee everywhere. Her terrace is filled with her, and it makes me feel closer to her just by being in here. I flip the comforter back. The smell on her bed sheets gives me a fucking boner. I grab at my cock and rip it out from my pants, gripping hard around my shaft, and start jerking it. I breathe in again and the smell of her swirls in my nostrils. I pull harder.

  Fuck, I wish I could just stick it so far into her that she can’t fucking walk for a week.

  Reaching into the laundry basket next to her bed, I grab a pair of her panties and breathe them in. Fuck me, she smells like heaven. The pressure builds up in my balls and I just want to release myself all over her pillow.

  Fuck!

  I cock my leg up onto her bed just as my creamy jizz spills all over her white linen.

  Money shot!

  I’ll always be in here with her now. And when she washes her sheets, I’ll just come back in here and do it again. I want her to smell me every night when she sleeps.

  She’s going to be riding my cock before she knows it.

  Taking a moment to sort myself out, I wipe my sticky hand on her sheets and pull the covers back. I shove her delicious smelling panties into my pocket, and I slide my gloves back on as I walk out of her bedroom.

  What other possessions can I claim for myself?

  Downstairs, her fridge has fuck all in it. Her rubbish bin is full—health-bar wrappers and takeaway coffee cups. Three empty bottles of wine sit beside the bin, waiting to be taken out to the main bin outside. I wander into a spare bedroom and find something that interests me more than her delicious panties.

  A corkboard with pictures of me covers a quarter of the wall. She has a timeline of all my charges, dating back to when I was a teenager. She has done her research. I wonder if she does this for all her clients, or if she’s saving this special treatment for me? I’d like to think she’s just done this for me.

  What an interesting little honeybee.

  Some of this information is serious; the dogs know a lot about me.

  The old pictures provoke memories of when I was a scrawny kid. I remember every charge. I remember all of the custody photos. Thank Christ my sense of style has evolved. No one needs a little Vanilla Ice wannabe running around town with way too much fluorescent for one outfit. ‘Juvie’ taught me how to become a man. It’s survival of the fittest in a place like that. Being locked up with a bunch of punk-ass street kids with adolescent hormones that they can’t control is the best way to learn how to fight hard and be better than your competition.

  Standing here longer than intended, I find myself reflecting on what my life has been and what it’s become. I don’t think I would’ve changed any of it. Everything I’ve done in my life was necessary. My Uncle needed someone strong in the family, an attribute that his own sons failed to rise to. I couldn’t imagine Franco doing what I do. He’d fuck our name, reputation and finances within a goddamn month. I need to stay out of prison, for the sake of the family. My Uncle’s getting old now; he can’t do it all on his own.

  I find a section that contains photos of Zio Carlo when he was in his prime. He will always be the most intimidating man I’ve ever met. But he’s not the man he used to be twenty years ago. I also find a photo of him and my Dad together. I miss my Dad. My childhood memories fade more and mor
e as the years go on, and I feel as if I’m losing him all over again. When Dad and Carlo were in their prime, we were the main family in the city and Kings Cross was ours. When my Dad died in prison, my family took it hard. Now the city’s full of these Muslim gangs, and territories have split. These new guys are all irrational and a little too trigger-happy for my liking. They like to shoot first and ask questions later. I hate dealing with them, but I have to. I’m just glad our family is still the one they come to when they need something. They will always know we’re the old crooks of the city.

  I don’t see why business can’t be dealt with the old way—interrogation and punishment. That Sean asshole took almost six hours to knock off … just the way I like it. Slow and painful. None of this shooting shit. I like to take the real assholes apart, limb-by-limb. Especially when the anaesthetic wears off, and they feel their limb missing. That’s my favourite part. They say you can sometimes still feel a limb, even when it’s gone.

  I see the forensic photos of all the arms and legs I’ve taken over the years. They’ve only got me on two of those. The others had their charges dropped before court. I remember the screams when I sliced the saw through their flesh. The initial screams are just from the shock of what’s happening to them; they can’t actually feel it. It makes me smile every time.

  As I close my eyes, I can hear the ripping of their skin as the sharp teeth of the saw hit them. Ah, that sound never gets old.

  ‘Get out of your daydream, kid,’ I hear my Dad’s voice.

  Studying back over my photos, I wonder how many tattoos the dogs know I’ve got?

  The board has my obvious ones, but my left arm’s sleeve is practically finished, except some shading. It would be too hard for them to tag and document every inch of ink. The latest police profile has it listed as ‘full sleeve’