‘Abbie can be bloody stubborn.’
‘Tell me about it. She did make one good point. What would whoever it is do if the place was left empty?’
‘I can organise a guard on the place. A couple of the young blokes would help out, I reckon. Do it in shifts tonight.’
Rupe considered the offer. He couldn’t stop them if they wanted to do it, but on the other hand someone could get hurt if these blokes got excited. Vigilante groups were never a good idea.
‘It’s not your job, Tim, thanks, it’s mine. Oh, you wouldn’t lend Abbie your dog for a few days, would you?’ The dog stood up, tail wagging. Tim tugged her ears gently.
‘Sure. I’ll get her over there this morning.’
‘Thanks. See you later.’
Rita was next, although when he reached the road the temptation was to head up into the bushland on the fire trails and see if there was any sign of people camping up there. Succumbing to the urge, he swung the wheel to the right and accelerated up the rise. Rita had seen people tramping about on her land but that was a day or two ago and they could have come in from another access point, which could be kilometres away. He’d need a search team to scour the area properly. One man on his own had Buckley’s. Still he forged on through the forest, the trees closing in around him as the road narrowed. Fire trails led off occasionally heading up the rise deeper into the national park but he was looking for one which went to the right, sloping downhill towards Rita’s land. The track he was on stopped abruptly in a small clearing with just enough space to turn.
Rupe got out and stretched, looking round at the trees, breathing in the fresh morning air heavy with the scent of eucalyptus and a tang of wattle. Birds twittered about in the branches overhead, the breeze rustled and whispered all around. All ordinary sounds. The undergrowth was thick with no trails between the trees that he could see, even when he stepped closer and studied the edges of the clearing. No visible tyre marks either, apart from his own, which were two clear tracks in the dirt behind the car.
Nothing.
He got back in and carefully turned in the narrow space. Rita next. No doubt he’d get an earful for calling so early. But she was an elderly woman on her own and tough as she was, she could still be threatened by a prowler. A very brave one.
Somehow he didn’t think this person was the regular nuisance-type prowler. His gut told him this one was connected to Abbie whether she realised it or not.
Rita’s track was rougher than Abbie’s, more overgrown and with potholes making the drive an obstacle course. In the dark it would be downright dangerous. Rupe drove slowly weaving his way round the biggest holes and grimacing as the wheels dropped with spine-shuddering accuracy into the ones he couldn’t avoid. Should have parked and walked in.
To make it worse, Rita wasn’t home. At least, she wasn’t in the house, which meant she could be anywhere. A trail of smoke came from her chimney so she was about somewhere. He knocked long and hard on both front and back doors. Unlike most people round here, she locked her doors when she was out or he would have gone in. He called loudly but there was no answer. Round the back he walked through her surprisingly neat and flourishing vegetable patch, past the henhouse where half a dozen chooks scratched about industriously, and up to the cowshed in case she was milking. She wasn’t. The Jersey cow lifted her head and studied him for a while before continuing to munch. She wasn’t mooing to be milked so she was either dry or Rita had taken care of it earlier. Rupe stood hands on hips and stared around the land. The cow paddock stretched to the tree line up the back and on the left he could just see Abbie’s roof. To the right the trees were thicker on uncleared land on the other side of another field.
‘Rita,’ he yelled. His voice disappeared into the air. She could have walked over to Abbie’s for a grumble about something. She could be anywhere on her fifty-hectare property.
On the way back to the car he peered into the sheds. An old tractor sat in one, keeping company with an assortment of long-neglected tools and odd bits of machinery. In a lean-to style carport Rita’s blue ute was parked, but what looked like a proper garage was locked.
He tried knocking and shouting at the front door again but the place was deserted and silent. He scribbled a note to give him a call and stuck it in the flyscreen. Not much chance of her responding but it was worth a try and he’d drop in again this afternoon.
Mildly puzzled, he retreated to the car, made his way carefully back to the road and headed for Taylor’s Bend to write up a report. He’d give the police in Wagga a call and see if any other towns nearby had reported prowlers.
Chapter 8
At nine, Tim and Connie, full of concern, turned up with the dog, Jet, who was supposed to be Abbie’s guard dog. She was chained up out the front right now.
‘If we don’t tie her up she’ll come home,’ said Tim. ‘Bring her in at night.’
‘I gave her a bath,’ said Connie. ‘She didn’t like it much but she’s clean.’
Jet wagged her tail and smiled and seemed happy enough lying on the verandah when Abbie went out periodically to scratch her ears and see if she was all right.
She spent the morning trying to paint but it was difficult to concentrate and at eleven she gave up and made potato soup for lunch. Now, at twenty-five past twelve, Jet proved her worth by barking when Georgia’s car approached. Abbie flung the door open, told Jet to shush, which she didn’t, and ran down the steps, heart thudding, hands clammy with nerves.
Georgia got out of the red hatchback slowly, stretched and looked around. Made no move to give her mother a hug or a kiss.
‘Hello, sweetheart.’
‘Where’d the dog come from? Is it yours?’
Abbie stopped short.
‘It belongs to the neighbour.’ Cool it. Let Georgia lead. Don’t frighten her off. Don’t smother. ‘How are you?’
‘Can you shut it up?’
Abbie turned and told Jet to be quiet, firmly and loudly the way Tim had instructed. The racket stopped. She faced her daughter again. She’d cut her once long hair. The dark waves had been shaved on one side of her head and left at jaw length on the other. She wore jeans and a black tank top. A dolphin tattoo adorned her left bicep.
‘Your hair looks great,’ she said and meant it. ‘You look well.’
‘Thanks. I’m okay.’
‘Come in. Bring your things in.’
‘I’m not sure if I’ll stay.’
Abbie swallowed the disappointment. ‘Okay, but your room’s ready if you do. Where are you heading?’
‘Back to Melbourne.’ She leaned into the car, retrieved a large canvas carry bag and slung it over her shoulder.
‘Lock the car,’ said Abbie. Red car, not silver. When had she moved to Melbourne?
‘I was going to.’ Georgia gave her an exasperated look and pressed the remote.
‘Sorry. I mean … normally there’s no need out here but there’s been a prowler about so I’ve started locking up.’ Abbie gestured Georgia should come inside.
‘What sort of prowler? A Peeping Tom? Someone nicking your underwear off the line?’
‘No, just someone walking about at night. Outside.’
‘Freaky when you’re stuck out on here on your own. Do the cops know?’
‘Yes.’
Georgia gave Jet a wide berth despite the wagging tail.
‘She’s friendly,’ said Abbie. ‘The neighbours loaned her to me as a guard dog until Rupe catches the prowler.’
‘Who’s Rupe?’
‘The local policeman.’
Abbie led Georgia inside. She paused at the spare room. ‘If you decide to stay, this is your room.’
‘Okay.’ She dropped the bag in the doorway. ‘Where’s the bathroom?’
‘Across here, and the toilet’s there. Come through to the kitchen and have lunch when you’re ready. There’s a towel on your bed.’
Abbie left her to it and went to reheat the potato soup she’d made earlier. She put bread
in the toaster and waited, fidgeting about, wiping the stovetop unnecessarily and checking the table setting, also unnecessarily, ears straining for sounds of her daughter’s approach. The toilet flushed, doors opened and closed, water ran in the bathroom. Light footsteps tapped in the hallway.
‘Nice house.’
Abbie spun around. ‘Thanks. Hungry?’
‘Yeah, what have you got?’
‘Potato soup.’
‘Fine.’
‘Like a glass of wine?’
‘No thanks, water will do.’
Abbie took a water jug from the fridge and poured two glasses. She handed one to Georgia.
‘I’m so glad you came,’ she said.
‘I nearly didn’t.’
‘What changed your mind?’
She shrugged. ‘Don’t know. Curiosity? I was going to visit Sophie and it’s not a big detour to come through here. But you weren’t home.’ Again the casual implication of guilt.
‘I was out all day sketching on Monday.’
‘Sophie talked me into phoning you.’
‘Did she? Why?’
‘She said I needed to talk to you.’
‘She’s right. I need to talk to you too. I miss you.’
Too much too soon? But it was true. They’d been so close centuries ago.
Georgia drank water and stared out the big glass windows at the far end of the room for a few moments as she sat at the table.
The toast popped. Abbie ladled soup into bowls and served lunch. Should she talk or wait for Georgia to start? Sophie deserved a medal for instigating this visit.
‘What’s wrong with this chair? It feels like it’ll collapse any minute.’ Georgia stood up and moved to another one.
‘The leg’s a bit loose, that’s all. I haven’t got around to fixing it yet.’
‘Why don’t you splurge and buy some new ones. These look as though you got them at trash and treasure.’
Abbie ignored that. She did have a point, they were second-hand but she’d liked the old wooden straight-back style despite the loose joints. ‘What’s Sophie studying?’
‘Applied Psychology. She wants to do social work.’ A tiny smile appeared for the first time ‘She’s practising on me.’
Abbie smiled. ‘She cares about you.’
Georgia nodded.
‘What are you doing in Melbourne? Have you gone back to uni?’
‘I finish my degree this year.’
‘Arts?’
‘Yes. I’m focusing on creative writing and literature.’
Abbie smiled. ‘You were always good at writing.’
‘I’m thinking of doing a Masters.’
‘Good for you.’
‘But I don’t know yet.’
She picked up a piece of toast and dunked it in the soup.
Abbie ate, pleased the hand holding her spoon wasn’t shaking with the nervous tension running through her body like electricity.
‘Why did you decide to move to Melbourne?’
‘Do you really need to ask?’
‘I suppose not. No.’ Another careful mouthful of soup. ‘But why Melbourne in particular?’
To Abbie’s surprise Georgia answered. ‘I needed to escape, obviously. I thought I’d suffocate living in that house with you—and Dad … arrested for …’
‘I know. It was a nightmare.’
‘And then when you changed your story and smashed his alibi … I …’
‘I understand, darling. I’m sorry.’ But by then the marriage was a festering mess, her own transgression minor by comparison. Except to Georgia. And Susan.
‘Aunty Susan was a victim too. We both were and she was the only person I could go to who understood completely, who loved me and cared, really cared, about me.’
‘I always loved you, and I cared. I always will.’ More than Susan. Way more.
‘If you had cared you wouldn’t have done what you did. You were at fault before Dad.’
Abbie put her spoon down with a clatter, anger rushing up from nowhere. ‘Your father had been raping and abusing young women for ten years—longer! How can you say that? You mean I was at fault before he was caught. Did you ever think maybe something was wrong in that marriage for me to even consider doing what I did? I was living with a rapist. So were you.’
Georgia mouth set in a stubborn line. ‘You didn’t have to do it with my uncle.’
The anger subsided as abruptly as it arose. ‘No, I didn’t.’
She’d never even considered Greg as a sexual partner until a couple of weeks before that blasted night. Her sister’s husband, married for sixteen years, who said he’d always fancied her, liked the streak of abandon missing in her sister. In Sydney for business with an invitation to dinner her own husband turned down. But she accepted, furious that he chose to attend a dull university function yet again. Except, of course, he hadn’t. Not on that night and, as it transpired, on all those other nights.
‘It was the worst mistake of my life. And I’ve made a few.’
She topped up Georgia’s water glass then her own.
‘I should go after lunch. If I hang around here too long I’ll have to stay.’
‘I want you to stay.’ Abbie picked up her spoon and finished the soup. ‘Did you move in with Susan after you left home?’
Maybe it was the passage of time, leaving the teen years behind, experiencing life, but Georgia had mellowed. Or maybe she was tired. The fine, pale skin under her eyes was tinged with dark shadows.
‘Sophie for a little while then Susan. Newcastle was a good place to hang out. I spent most of my time at the beach.’
‘I asked Sophie if she knew where you were. And Susan. I haven’t spoken to her since.’ The latter a terse monosyllabic denial from Susan, followed by a dial tone.
‘I know.’ Georgia ate the last of her toast.
So Sophie and Susan had both lied to protect Georgia from her mother the cheater, the family wrecker, conveniently forgetting the fact her father had been arrested on suspicion of being the Uni Rapist.
‘What’s for dessert?’
Abbie smiled. Some things don’t change. It had become a family joke, Georgia’s passion for dessert.
‘Ice cream.’ Luckily Rupe had left the unfinished tub of ice cream he’d brought to dinner.
‘That all?’
‘Yes. There are tinned peaches if you’d like some. And Gingernut biscuits.’
‘Fine.’
‘I’ll make coffee.’ Abbie cleared the table while Georgia opened the pantry cupboard and examined the contents. ‘You haven’t got much food in here.’ She took out the packet of Gingernuts.
‘I don’t need much food just for me.’ But she’d provided meals for extra people since she’d been into the town on Tuesday and her stocks were low again already. The truth was, she hadn’t wanted to leave the house unattended.
‘I’ll go to the shops later. I saw a supermarket on the way in,’ Georgia said.
Abbie smiled, back turned as she prepared the coffee. So she was staying. ‘We can go in together. When did you move to Melbourne?’
‘About eighteen months ago.’ Georgia took the ice cream from the freezer and found herself a bowl and spoon. ‘Want some?’
‘No, thanks. Do you like it there?’
‘The weather’s shit but apart from that it’s fine.’ The ice cream tub went back into the freezer a lot lighter.
‘Been back to Sydney at all?’
‘Do you mean did I ever visit Dad?’
Abbie nodded, but it was something else niggling in the back of her mind.
‘No.’ Georgia sat down and started spooning ice cream out of her bowl with a Gingernut biscuit, slurping it into her mouth.
‘I saw Kaelee on Tuesday. She came to visit.’
Georgia looked up with an oh-so-familiar crinkle in her brow. ‘Kaelee who?’
‘Kaelee from school. Kaelee Strong.’
‘God, I haven’t seen her for years.’ She gave a disbelievin
g snort. ‘Why on earth would she come to visit you? How did she even know where you lived?’
‘She told me she’d run into you at a party a few weeks ago and you told her.’
Kaelee had been so convincing, or was it that Abbie wanted so much to believe her?
‘No way. I haven’t seen or heard from her since we left school. We weren’t ever friends, not really. She hung around with us for a bit then … I don’t know …’ She shrugged and continued eating. ‘She was odd.’
‘She said she was studying art and was interested in my work.’
‘Maybe. She did do art at school.’
‘She had her boyfriend with her. Aaron. He was a bit weird. Very intense. I didn’t like him much.’
‘Why would she say she’d run into me?’
‘I’ve no idea. I didn’t get a chance to ask her about you. I wanted to but he was there all the time. A bit controlling, I thought.’ Abbie’s breathing caught, suddenly shallow and tight in her chest. Why had they arrived like that, out of the blue? Telling lies.
‘Kaelee was always a bit of a follower. It was risky, wasn’t it? We might call each other all the time for all she knows.’ Georgia paused, spoon upraised. ‘Does she live in Melbourne?’
‘Sydney still, I think.’
‘Well, that’s crazy.’
‘What?’ But Abbie knew already.
‘How could she run into me at a party? She obviously doesn’t know I’m not living in Sydney.’
‘She could have been in Melbourne for a visit.’
‘Except she wasn’t, she lied about meeting me. There was no party, Mum. Why would she do that?’
‘I don’t know. Odd things have happened this week. They stayed overnight and Aaron seemed to resent having to leave when I said I had work to do. He went all surly.’
‘Maybe he liked it here.’
‘Yes, but it wasn’t that sort of vibe. He was almost... nasty. I was really glad when they left. Kaelee was all right though.’
‘When was that?’
‘Wednesday. He asked for your address.’
‘You didn’t tell him, did you?’
‘I couldn’t, I had no idea where you lived. Though I didn’t say that.’
The Secrets that Lie Within (Taylor's Bend, #1) Page 10
