The Lawyer's Secret Baby

by Polly Carter

  Harley left the car park and drove a short distance down the side street before pulling into a parking space outside a primary school. She glanced at the car’s clock. Still a bit over two hours before she had to pick Lyddia up from kindergarten. She turned to watch Jessamy who was standing on the pavement taking things out of the bag on the back seat and putting them on.

  “What do you think?” she asked when she’d finished.

  Harley burst out laughing. “My God, Jess, that’s awesome! Even I wouldn’t recognise you.”

  Jessamy had donned a short, grey wig and tied a scarf over it. She’d pulled a calf-length baggy dress over her tights and top, put a belt around her middle and changed her boots for a pair of slip-ons.

  “You look at least sixty!”

  Jessamy winked at Harley, covered half her face with her large sunglasses, grabbed a plastic shopping bag out of her box of tricks, closed the car doors and hobbled down the road towards the supermarket. Harley watched her go wondering what she hoped to find, but still glad they were doing something. She slipped the uneaten spring roll she was still holding back into the greasy paper bag, and idly watched a group of children in the school yard next to her who were engaged in some sort of outside activity. Harley couldn’t quite make out what it was they were doing, but they seemed to be enjoying it, running backwards and forwards between each other and the teacher, chatting and giggling. They looked to be about six or seven, three or four years older than Lyddia. She found herself imagining one of the little girls was Lyddia, and her chest constricted as she couldn’t stop herself from thinking that she might never get to see Lyddia at school at this age.

  “What are you doing?” Harley leapt and spun towards her window, her heart thumping. A small boy, possibly escaped from the group exercise, was peering in her window. “Are you spying on someone?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she hissed, feeling mean after he’d given her such a start. “Your mother sent me to spy on you.”

  “No, she didn’t,” he replied calmly and accurately. “Is this your mother coming?”

  Harley looked down the road. Jessamy was hobbling back.

  “Yes, and she doesn’t like little boys. Especially ones standing on the road.”

  “I bet she does. How come you made her go and you sat here?” Damn, this kid was good.

  “My legs don’t work.”

  “Then how do you drive the car?” Too good!

  “What’s in the bag?” he asked Jessamy who’d arrived and was opening the back door.

  “Crisps,” she answered. “Want some?”

  “Ooh, yes please.”

  Jessamy handed him a small bag of potato chips. “Now go away.” He ran off, and Jessamy hopped into the passenger seat. “Nosy little guy,” she said. “Okay. Next place.”

  “Did you find anything?” Harley asked as she started the car.

  “Yes. There’re no CCTV cameras anywhere. I reckon that’s why he chose that supermarket. It’d be very hard to prove he was ever there. Maybe someone on check-out might remember him. I asked around but no-one on now does. Apparently quite a few guys with tattooed heads drop in here every now and then, so he doesn’t stand out as much as you might think. I got some grapes, though, so we’d have something to keep us going. Have one. They’re pretty good.”

  Harley started to get the shivers as they got closer to Gary’s house. She now knew it wasn’t his house, that he’d never lived there. It was just some random house he pretended to live in, it seemed. The police told her they had gone there after they’d interviewed her, and the family living there reckoned they’d never heard of Gary Mellors or knew anyone matching his description. It didn’t help her case, and it made her despise him even more. Her fear, anger and hatred rose foul-tasting into her mouth as the small, square brick house came into sight. It was poor, dejected and in every way unassuming. No doubt that’s why he’d chosen it. She wondered now what he’d actually done after he’d watched her drive away. Walking down the front path and in through the front door was obviously not it.

  “Pull up further down. I know the cops reckon these people don’t know him, but we still need to be super careful.”

  Harley didn’t need any encouragement to get away from the house.

  “Stop here. I’m going back,” Jessamy said. “Look, there’s a bowls club there with a car park. I wonder…”

  Harley stopped in the car park, and before she had chance to find out what it was that Jessamy was wondering, the ‘old lady’ was out of the car and hobbling back down the street. Harley felt her skin prickling and her palms sweating. She locked all the doors. Maybe Gary didn’t know the people who lived there, but maybe he did, and maybe he was there right now, and maybe he would guess that Jessamy was in disguise and that she, Harley, was parked down the road and he would… what? Realistically what could he do, and why would he want to draw attention to himself? He could tell the police she was a crazy woman stalking him and take out a restraining order and then her bail would be revoked and she’d be thrown in prison straight away and then she’d never have the chance to prove her innocence and she’d be in prison for years and years and…

  She shrunk down further in her seat thinking now that being here was probably a really bad idea. What could Jessamy hope to achieve? Her mind swirled with dark thoughts about what could happen to her if she were discovered, and then what would happen to Gary if she had him alone and unable to defend himself. That made her smile.

  She was in the process of cleaning under his grimy fingernails with sharp pieces of bamboo when she was startled by a tapping on the passenger window. As if she’d been jabbed with a cattle prod, she leapt off the seat, her heart stopped and then started again racing furiously.

  She turned to the window to see Jessamy’s face pressed up against the window, her grin as close to from ear to ear as is anatomically possible.

  “You frightened the daylights out of me,” Harley said, the shock making her somewhat surly.

  “Really? I didn’t realise you weren’t expecting me,” Jessamy said, still grinning as she climbed in and did up her seatbelt. “That was pretty funny, you know. But, hey, it’s not like I snuck up on you or anything.”

  “No. Sorry, Jess. I didn’t mean to snap. I was just so caught up in imagining torturing Gary Fucking Mellors.”

  Jessamy laughed again. “Now that I would like to see. I’m guessing I won’t, though, so let’s finish our quest. Before we leave, it’s your turn to do a little prying.”

  “Oh?” Harley looked surprised. “What?”

  “Go into the bowls club there and ask if they have CCTV cameras and if so, how long they keep their tapes. I think those are cameras there, see?” She pointed to a black box near the roof. “I’m guessing lots of these sports clubs would have pretty good security considering they have booze and stuff.”

  “What if they ask why I want to know? They might think I’m casing the joint.”

  “Tell them your car was stolen and somebody said they’d seen it parked here. Say you told the cops but they won’t do anything. I don’t suppose they’ll just happily let you look at the tapes–maybe they will–but you might at least find out if they have them. My guess is they probably just tape over them, but we should find out for sure anyway.”

  Harley hadn’t ever fancied herself as a private or any other kind of detective or security person and she could feel her heart pounding as she walked down the path to the door and went in. Inside, three people were standing in a group chatting. They looked up as she entered. A vast blonde lady, around forty, shuffled towards her.

  “Hi,” she said pleasantly, probably hoping Harley had come to talk about booking the club for some kind of do. “What can I do for you?”

  “Oh, hi,” Harley replied, swallowed and took a deep breath. “I was wondering if those were CCTV cameras out the front? Do they record the car park, do you know? My car was stolen a few months back and someone reckons they saw it in your car park. I was wondering if
you have tapes?”

  “Hmph,” the other lady grunted. “Wouldn’t surprise me. Yeah, they’re cameras all right, but I don’t think we keep the tapes. Hey, Joe,” she called to one of the men she’d been talking to. “How long do we keep the tapes from the security cameras?”

  “Week,” he replied.

  “A week,” she relayed to Harley.

  “Oh, okay. Well thanks anyway,” Harley said, and hurried back to Jessamy. “No go,” she reported, getting back into the car. “They only have them for a week.”

  “Shame,” Jessamy replied “but not unexpected. So, let’s press on. One more stop?”

  “Yes, we better get this done so I can get back in time for Lyddia.”

  “Then drive on again, driver.”

  Back on the road, Jessamy filled Harley in on her visit to the house.

  “Definitely a family living there. Mum, Dad and three kids. Two kids at school, one snot-nosed toddler in dirty clothes at home. Dad was home in front of the television with his beer. Mum looked bitter and exhausted. Both old before their time, I reckon. They were definite that they didn’t know Gary, and I believed them. It is possible that they know someone who knows someone who knows Gary, but that line of inquiry could take a very long time if we have to go through everyone they know and then who they know. I think we may as well cross Poor Sad Family off our list of suspects.”

  If being near the house where she’d dropped Gary off had made her skin prickle and her palms sweat, approaching the house of her doom was bringing back the horror of that day as though it were yesterday. Without her realising, her foot lifted off the accelerator as she approached the turn-off from the highway. More and more cars were passing them, and the car in front had disappeared towards the horizon.

  “Should you be doing like forty kilometres an hour?” Jess asked. “Do you want to get pulled up for going too slow?”

  “Oh!” Harley gasped, looking at her speedometer and realising she really was going suspiciously slowly. “Oops.” She forced her foot down on the pedal and turned off soon after.

  “I know you don’t want to go to the house, but I need you to drive past and tell me what it was like when you were there in case it’s changed.”

  “It’s a dead end.”

  “That’s okay. Probably good. You will just look like someone who doesn’t know.”

  Harley forced herself to turn into the street and drive slowly to the end. The house didn’t look all that different, but there were definitely some changes. The black car was gone and the gardens looked tidier. Washing was visible on a clothesline out the back and a tricycle lay on its side in the front yard where it had last been abandoned.

  “Looks like someone might be living here,” Harley said. “Should we just leave?”

  “No, I was hoping there might be someone here. What’s changed? Draw me a picture of when you were last here and drive back down to the end of the street. I’ll walk back from there.”

  “Well, the black car was parked there.” Harley pointed to the front yard as she circled at the end of the cul-de-sac and headed back out. “Apart from that, it just looks a bit tidier and, well, lived in. I don’t know why I didn’t notice before that it actually did look empty. What a dill I was.”

  “Gotta love hindsight,” Jessamy said, patting her arm. “Just go round the corner here, and you can drop me off there.”

  “I might just go for a quick drive and come back and pick you up in a few minutes, if that’s okay. I don’t think I can sit here.”

  “Yeah, good idea. I’ll be ten minutes at least. If you’re not back, I’ll just walk towards the highway.”

  This time when Jessamy got back into the car a little over ten minutes later, she had some news.

  “I got the name of the real estate agent who handles the lease. Let’s swing by on our way home and see if we can find out anything about who had the lease before.”

  “They won’t give you that information, will they?”

  Jessamy winked at her. “Turns out I can do a pretty good impersonation of a bereft ma looking for her darling son. Let’s give it a go. You can watch this time.”

  Good impersonation or not, they still didn’t discover anything obviously useful from the agent, a smartly-dressed woman in her 40s with permed hair, bright red lipstick and a brisk, efficient manner.

  She listened to Jessamy’s story about looking for her son.

  “Oh, you poor dear,” she said patting Jessamy’s arm, and taking a small handkerchief from her sleeve, she dabbed the corners of her mouth as she looked sadly at Harley. “How awful for you, having a son and brother like that. I can’t imagine what it must be like. Fortunately all my children have done very well for themselves.” She tucked the handkerchief back into her sleeve, smoothed her skirt and looked smug. “Here, let me give you what I have.” She primped importantly as she readily handed over the information while Jessamy noted it down: name, previous address, phone number and references.

  “I gave this information to the police when they interviewed me a few months ago,” she said, pausing to allow the other two women to fully understand that she was an important witness in a manhunt. She sniffed for effect. “But they said it was all just made up. I rang them up after to see if they’d found him, but they said it was all fake: fake name, he was never at that other address, the phone number doesn’t work anymore and I reckon the references were just his mates. He paid six months upfront in cash so there aren’t any bank details, and then when the next lot of rent was due, he’d disappeared. He only came in once, but I can remember clearly what he looked like: average height, brown hair and beard, fat belly, and he was wearing jeans and one of those windcheaters that have a hood; what are they called? They have a name, don’t they? Is that your son, do you think?” She looked at Jessamy pityingly as she described the man, her eyes sweeping the baggy dress and faded slip-ons, and then at Harley. Like mother, like son and daughter, she was clearly thinking.

  “It could be,” Jessamy nodded, leaning on Harley for support. “What do you think, dear? Is that our Kev?”

  Biting her lip to stop herself from laughing, Harley slipped her arm through ‘her mother’s’. “Could be, Ma. He always was a fat, ugly sack, eh?”

  “True,” was the sad reply. “He definitely got his looks from his father. Come on, then. We can try this phone number later and see. Thank you, Missus,” she said to the agent, who had walked to the front door encouragingly.

  Harley and Jessamy left, still thanking her and waiting till they were outside and out of sight before exploding into giggles.

  Getting back to the car, Jessamy stripped off her disguise and shoved it back into the bag on the back seat.

  “What a hard case,” she said, still chuckling. “Okay, well, I think we’ve done all we can today. You’d best get me back to my car and think about picking up Lyddia.”

  “Did you learn anything, do you think?” Harley asked Jessamy as they set off.

  “It’s hard to say,” Jessamy replied thoughtfully. “Obviously nothing concrete as yet as to the whereabouts of the flat-headed, dead-eyed object of our search, but it’s given me some useful background and some ideas. Leave it with me. I think I might do the rounds of any other drop-in type places I can find in this neck of the woods. I doubt he will have strayed too far.”

  Chapter 5

  Two days later, Harley opened the front door, car keys in hand, on her way to collect Lyddia from kindergarten, and walked straight into Arian about to ring the doorbell. As they collided, he instinctively grabbed hold of her to prevent her from falling.

  “Well,” he murmured in her ear, “we are making quite a habit of this bumping into each other, aren’t we?”

  “Arian! What are you doing here? Why aren’t you at work? Let me go,” Harley babbled, her heart thumping like a kettle drum as she wriggled to get free. “I can’t stop. You caught me going out.”

  “‘Caught’ being the operative word,” he answered, grinning, an
d far from letting her go, his arms encircled her tighter. “It’s Friday so I thought I’d knock off early and come and see you.”

  “Arian?” Hearing voices, Harriet had come to the door. “Oh, Arian. How lovely! It’s been so long! My goodness, aren’t you looking splendid!”

  “Hi, Mrs. Brand. It’s lovely to see you too,” he said smiling broadly, releasing Harley and giving Harriet a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

  “Please, call me Harriet. You make me feel so old if you call me Mrs. Brand.”

  “Harriet it is then, seeing as how you don’t look ‘so old’,” Arian said with a laugh. “In fact, I reckon you look younger than last time I saw you. I like your cool ultra-short hairstyle too. It really suits you. And that colour.”

  Harriet laughed. “Thanks, Arian. Well, the big five oh is looming and I just wasn’t ready to do grey yet. Not that there was much grey but I figure short and light hides it better than when it was a bit longer and darker. Anyway, don’t stand in the doorway. Come in. Harley, invite him in,” Harriet urged her daughter. “Oops, Toby wants to say ‘hi’ too,” she added as Toby appeared at the door and, taking his cue from her, acted as delighted as she was to see Arian.

  “Hi, Toby. I’m pleased to meet you,” Arian greeted the dog, bending to pat him as Toby danced around, wagging his tail and his tongue, and bumping Arian with his nose for more pats. Then, suddenly remembering something important, he turned and skittered inside, his claws slipping on the hard floor.

  “Nice dog,” Arian said.

  “He is. He’s just a sweetheart,” Harriet agreed. “Harley, take Arian in.”

  “Of course,” Harley interrupted their greeting. “Arian, won’t you go in? As I said, I’m just on my way out, but I know Mum would love to catch up.”