by JD Nixon
When the food arrived, we headed to the park across the road overlooking Wattling Bay. The warm weather had brought out a multitude of families enjoying the oncoming twilight and a cheap family dinner from The Salty Seagull. We spent ten minutes searching for somewhere to sit, stepping around exhausted dogs and dodging over-excited children, frisbees and tiddly middle-aged mothers unsteadily clutching plastic champagne flutes while screaming with laughter. I spotted a small patch of beaten grass for us to sit on. Admittedly, it wasn’t ideal real estate, in close proximity to a green ant nest and a smelly overfull bin, and directly in front of a public barbecue area commandeered by a huge noisy family. But it was the only part of the park free on this fine balmy spring evening.
We settled ourselves. I didn’t hide my grin when I noticed the uncomfortable expression on his face as he checked before he sat on the ground, not appearing terribly enthusiastic about our impromptu evening picnic. He was about to place the paper-wrapped food parcel between us when a football landed in that exact spot, scaring the life out of us. An identical expletive exploded from both our mouths.
“Sorry!” yelled a sweaty, tattooed, shirtless man, dexterously holding a bottle of beer in one hand as he ran over to retrieve it. He pulled up and smiled at me as he took the ball from me with his spare hand, showing teeth that urgently needed some dental work. He held the football close to his chest. “Thanks, darling.”
“You’re welcome,” I replied, smiling back. “Seems as though someone needs a bit more practise in kicking.”
“Not me,” he said immediately, drawing himself up taller, sucking in his stomach. He nodded behind him. “My mate, Gizmo. He’s fucking useless at footy. Oops, sorry. Pardon the language.”
“We’ve heard worse,” I smiled again.
“Well, yeah. Thanks again.”
He spun around, nearly tripping over the Sarge and treading on his fingers. The Sarge yelped.
“Oh sorry, mate. Didn’t see you there,” the man mumbled and ran off, throwing the football in the air.
“How could he not see me?” the Sarge asked, incredulous. “I’m bloody six-feet-three tall.”
“And you’re not exactly built like a waif.”
“Finally! Some love for my guns.”
“Meh,” I shrugged. “They’re okay. I’ve seen better.”
“The woman’s a comedian.”
I nibbled on the fish and stared out at the beautiful bay, its deep blue water sparkling as the sun set for the evening.
“Your eyes are like the ocean,” I said as I gazed ahead.
“What?”
“The bay, the ocean. Such a lovely dark blue, but changing all the time, depending on the sunlight or the wind or time of day.” I turned to smile at him, munching on a lettuce leaf. “Your eyes change with your mood.”
“No, they don’t.”
“Yes, they do.”
“Nobody’s ever said that to me before.”
“Then nobody’s ever noticed before.”
We sat in silence, eating our fish and salad, trying to ignore the young couple who’d been writhing amorously together in front of us for the last five minutes.
“God, I wish they’d stop that,” hissed the Sarge in disgust.
“Young love, Sarge,” I said tolerantly. I lay back, my head propped on my entwined fingers, looking up at the darkening sky, spotting Venus and the Southern Cross, which always made me feel centred in some way. “You must remember what that’s like? You and Melissa mad for each other? Not able to keep your hands off each other no matter where you were?”
I was thinking about Jake and me when I said all of that. To be honest, we hadn’t much progressed from that stage yet, I thought, wondering if he was still miffed at me.
The Sarge didn’t answer, but rested his arms on his knees and looked thoughtfully out at the ocean.
I closed my eyes, my mind turning back to Young Kenny. Something he’d said to me this morning twirled with faint enticement around my brain, never quite coming into focus. I concentrated to try to bring it closer to where I could grab it, when I shouted softly in pain, sitting up hurriedly, slapping at myself.
“What’s the matter?”
I jumped to my feet. “Ants! They’re biting me! Ow! Shit! Ow!”
I danced about inelegantly, brushing them off my arms and neck, the large green ants, out of their nest foraging as the night fell, falling to the ground around me. I’d been bitten at least ten times and was swelling up unattractively in each spot.
The Sarge took me by the elbow and hustled me back to The Salty Seagull. There he demanded ice with an accusing tone that made all the staff scurry to obey, feeling vaguely guilty about my bites. Later, back in his car, with pain shooting from everywhere and rapidly melting ice pressed on the worst bites, we sped home back to Little Town. All thoughts of Young Kenny’s conversation were driven from my mind by the excruciating pain of multiple ant bites.
Chapter 23
“We should have sat somewhere else and then you wouldn’t have been bitten,” he pointed out with insufferable logic as I quietly whimpered to myself, in ten kinds of pain. That pain made me irate.
“There wasn’t anywhere else! I looked! You saw how busy it was,” I snapped. “You’re the one who wanted bloody fish and chips by the bay in the first place. And then you wouldn’t even let me have any chips! What kind of a sick, twisted monster doesn’t let someone have chips with her fish and chips?”
He did the worst possible thing at that moment and chuckled. I glared at him, about to launch into a verbal attack as painfully stinging as my many bites, when his phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket and threw it to me.
“Answer that for me, will you?” he ordered imperiously.
“Maguire’s phone,” I griped into the receiver. “If you want to leave a message for that cruel sadist who doesn’t let people eat chips, then feel free. But if you don’t, well, I can’t blame you. I wouldn’t want to talk to him either.”
He compounded his crimes tenfold by shouting loudly with laughter.
The voice on the other end of the line was feminine and warm, well-bred, but with an unmistakable hint of amusement. “Oh dear, what’s he done now? Sounds serious. Is that him I can hear laughing in the background?”
I recognised an invitation to vent when I heard one. “Yes, it is. And that only shows just how rude he is.” I launched into my grievance. “He wouldn’t let me have any chips when we had fish and chips. I mean, does that seem like the actions of a sane and reasonable person to you? There’s a reason it’s called fish and chips!”
“He’s always been rather careful about his diet, I’m afraid,” she said diplomatically.
“Oh, that’s right, stick up for him,” I complained. “You’re probably his mother.”
“I am actually.” I could hear her smile through her voice.
“Poor you,” I sympathised.
Her pleasant laugh was startlingly similar to his. “It’s not so bad really. You must be Tess.”
“I am. Tess Fuller, his work partner, for my sins.”
“Hello, Tess. I feel as if I know you already, I’ve heard so much about you from Finn.”
I cut the Sarge a suspicious glance. “Don’t listen to him! He’s completely biased about me.”
“He certainly is from what I’ve heard,” she said, the amused tone in her voice stronger.
“Well, thank you for acknowledging that, Mrs . . . Oh, you’re not a Maguire anymore, are you?” I’d momentarily forgotten that the Sarge had a stepfather.
“Not for a long time,” she laughed again. “Call me Gina.”
“I’m afraid he’s driving at the moment, Gina. In his BMW which he won’t let me drive because he says I’m too reckless. I’m sorry to have to tell you that your son’s sexist against female drivers. It’s probably a terrible disappointment for you. I’m sure he was raised better than that.”
“I’m not sexist against female drivers,” he chimed in, laughing
softly. “I just don’t want you driving my car. Any other woman in the world would probably be okay.”
“Just ignore him, Gina. He has no idea what he’s talking about.” I remembered my manners. “Can I take a message for you?”
She laughed again. “No, that’s okay. It was nothing important. I was just calling to say hello.” She paused and asked casually, “So, Tess, how are you finding Finn as a boss?”
“He’s a great boss,” I said loyally, instantly forgetting that I was angry with him. “At least a hundred times better than my last sergeant. He keeps me well-supplied with Tim Tams, which is extremely important for maintaining my productivity. It’s very indulgent of him too, when you think about it, considering he’s so weird about food.”
She laughed. “Don’t snitch on me to him, but I like to sneak a Tim Tam now and then too.”
“Doesn’t every woman? Well, maybe not our boss. And speaking of her, she gave us hell today. I think your son does a good job of keeping me in line, but she really gave him a serve about it.”
“You didn’t have to tell Mum that, Tess,” the Sarge said from the sideline, displeased.
“Interesting,” said Gina. “Is that Superintendent Midden?”
“Yes. She was actually angry with me, but the Sarge copped it too. He was sort of collateral damage.”
“The Sarge? Is that what you call him?”
“Only because I have so much respect for his position, Gina.”
“I’ve never heard a bigger load of bollocks in my life,” muttered the Sarge under his breath.
I was about to ask Gina what she did for a living and then about all those alleged siblings the Sarge said he had, when she spoke up again. “I have to run, Tess. I have an engagement to attend this evening that I can’t escape, but it’s been lovely to finally speak to you after all these months. I hope we can meet in person soon as well. I’m really looking forward to meeting you.”
That was mighty nice of her. “Thanks, Gina. I look forward to meeting you too one day. Bye for now.”
“Bye, Tess.” She disconnected.
I handed the Sarge his phone back. “Your mother sounds really nice.”
“She is.”
“I hope I can meet her one day.”
“One day.”
Thinking about my hostile relationship with Lola made me morose. “Do your mother and Melissa get on well together?”
“Yes. Both are very good at schmoozing other people at a very shallow level.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“They have a ‘relationship’, but not a relationship.”
“Huh? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I know. You’re cute like that.”
“Don’t patronise me.”
“Then stop being so cute.”
“I don’t feel cute,” I moaned, the distraction of my phone call with his mother fading under the incessant stinging of the bites. “I feel lumpy and sore.”
“It will pass. I have some lotion at home you can use.”
“It’s a long way until we get home.”
“I know. Hang in there. You’re tough.”
“Sometimes I’m tired of being tough.”
“That’s when you need someone who –”
He didn’t get to finish, interrupted by his phone ringing again. He threw it back to me to answer for him.
“Maguire’s phone. He’s busy driving right now. Can I take a message?”
“Tessie, lovely. Why aren’t you answering your phone?”
Red Bycraft.
I instantly forgot about my ant bites. The fish and salad rested like a brick in my stomach. The Sarge, sensing that something was wrong, divided his attention equally between the road and me. “Piss off, Red.”
“You hurt my feelings when you say that.”
“I’d like to hurt you.”
“The feeling is extremely mutual.”
I didn’t answer.
“Tessie? I know you’re there. I can hear you breathing. Why are you with that man all the time? You are fucking him, aren’t you? What’s Jakey going to say about that, you little whore?”
“I’m not sleeping with him. I told you that already,” I replied, only because sudden fear stabbed me that he would start to target the Sarge if he thought there was something between us. I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to him because of me.
“I wish you were fucking me.”
“I’d rather die.”
He laughed. “That would possibly be an outcome of us fucking. I tend to get a little . . . carried away when I’m doing the dirty.”
I hung up on him. I didn’t need reminding that he was a violent sexual predator. I didn’t know why gentle Sharnee stayed with him, or allowed him to have any contact with their daughters, particularly with him being such an abusive partner.
“Red Bycraft again?”
“Who else?”
“I think we should forget about our mystery man and focus on recapturing him. You won’t be safe until he’s in jail again.”
“But I owe it to Miss G to bring her some justice. She was always so kind to me.”
“I know her death has really knocked you around, but how are we going to find that man? The mountain range is riddled with boltholes, caves, and escape routes, all of with which this guy seems familiar.”
“But he’s not a Bycraft. How could he know all that?”
“He’s not a local or you would have recognised him. Maybe he lives in one of the outer properties and he’s just moved here.”
“Wouldn’t we notice him around town though? And the townsfolk always gossip about newcomers. Nobody goes unnoticed for long around here.”
“Maybe he’s a recluse.”
“Who’s suddenly decided to start killing defenceless elderly women?”
“I don’t know, Tess. If we could just get the Big Town dees interested in him, they could go looking for him.”
I sank lower in the seat. “I don’t think the Super’s going to be interested in anything we say, and that’s all because of me.”
“She never listens to anything we say anyway. We could talk to her all day and she would pretend to not understand, so don’t beat yourself up.”
I sprang up in my seat. “Thanks, Sarge! I suddenly remembered what Young Kenny said that’s been teasing me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“He said that the man spoke to him, but he couldn’t understand what he said. I assumed that meant the man mumbled or Young Kenny’s hearing is fading. But what if the man talked in the same strange phrases painted on Miss G’s walls?”
“The demon is redeemed. The angel is served. Peace will be my reward.”
“Wow. That’s impressive, Sarge. Good memory.”
His smile was modestly small. “Young Kenny has always struck me as being of sound mind, but I can see that someone startling him and threatening him with a knife while sprouting off obscure phrases like that would leave him bewildered.”
“Not to mention frightened. This only makes me certain that Young Kenny’s assailant was Miss G’s murderer.”
“But there’s no evidence, Tess. What we have is a man who has broken into people’s houses –”
“Mine included.”
“Yours included, but that doesn’t mean he murdered Miss G or that he was responsible for the writing on her bedroom wall. He may just be an opportunistic thief who stumbled onto it.”
“Sarge! You don’t believe me either. I’m telling you it’s him. Young Kenny couldn’t understand him because he was talking in those incomprehensible phrases.”
“Perhaps he spoke to Young Kenny in another language, which is why he couldn’t understand him. We have lots of international visitors passing through town. Maybe one has fallen on bad times and has taken to living rough and thieving to survive?”
Frustratingly, I could see the logic in that. “There’s only one way to settle this. We have to find Young
Kenny and ask him to clarify what he meant.”
“Not tonight.”
“Yes, tonight.”
“I was hoping for a quiet evening, not another night adventure with you.”
“I’ll find him myself then,” I insisted stubbornly.
“You know I’m not going to let that happen.”
“The two musketeers?”
“More like Abbott and Costello, if you ask the Super.”
“I’m not asking her anything again for a while. I want to lie low when it comes to her.”
Back at his house, I sat patiently on the edge of the bath while he applied anti-itch lotion to my ant bites, most of which were already less swollen.
“There,” he said, leaning back. “Did I miss any?”
“Just one.”
His hand holding the cotton ball hovered over me. “Where? Show me.”
“An ant crawled into my bra. I think I’ll look after that one myself.”
His eyes held mine captive. “Are you sure? I’m more than happy to help.”
Flustered, I jumped up without warning, cracking skulls with him.
He staggered back, his hand to his head. “Shit! No need to headbutt me, Tess. I was only joking.”
I rubbed my own sore spot. “Sorry, Sarge. It was an accident, honestly.”
“I don’t know who’s more dangerous – the Bycrafts or you.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s all right. The new bruise on my forehead will match the one on my nose.”
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay, really. When my brain stops rattling, let’s talk about Young Kenny. Where does he hang out at night?”
“He spends a lot of time at the primary school, but I have the feeling he’ll be avoiding there for a while after the incident with our man. Otherwise, I have no idea about his other favourite sleeping places.”
“We can’t search the whole town.”
“I’ll ring his niece. She might know.”
That ended up being a good call on my behalf, because not only did she know, but he was currently bunkered down on her back verandah. She confided that his encounter with the thief had shaken him badly enough to drive him to seek some security close to his only relative. The verandah was the nearest they’d been able to entice him to coming inside, but at least it meant she was able to feed him a decent hot meal, and provide him with a new blanket and one of her husband’s old coats. However, her offer of a shower and a change of clothes had been firmly rejected.
