The Last Guests

by JP Pomare

  I don’t know how much time has passed when I emerge from slumber. I know it’s late because Cain is beside me, stirring. That must have been what woke me. I lift my mask just a little, see the light. He has his phone in his hand. I could doze back off, but I don’t. He makes the smallest noise to clear his throat. His elbow nudges me as he rolls. Does he realise he’s woken me? Then he is up, peeling the covers back and slipping from bed. I know he gets up to watch sport, to bet. I know he doesn’t have any training sessions to take tomorrow, yet still I feel something is off. Now the door opens almost silently, just the subtlest moan of a hinge that sends a current down my spine. What are you doing, Cain? The door closes, just as slowly and not all of the way. Soft feet on the carpet outside. Then down the stairs.

  I wait, rigor mortis still. Minutes pass. I’m not going to sleep, not until I know what he is doing. I could always go check on him, walk through the house like I was getting a glass of water. But clomping my way downstairs would give him ample warning. Stealth is key. Slowly, I sit up and reach for my phone. It lights up the room when I touch it. I listen to the house for a few heartbeats, then turn and lower my feet to the carpet. I move gently, navigating by the dim glow of the phone screen. Through the door, sucking my stomach in so I don’t touch it. Then to the stairs and down on the balls of my feet. The air is cool, and I can hear the distant whir of his computer. He’s in his study. I creep towards the door, holding my breath. I’m suspended between flight and fight, compelled forward by a need to know, to understand what my husband is doing. It’s probably nothing, I’m sure it’s nothing. But how can I trust him after finding out he had been to that WeStay on Hillview Terrace? And why come to bed at all if he was just going to use his phone and get back up? I grip the handle and turn it so slowly that it doesn’t make a sound. Pressing inward, I feel weak as though all of my energy has been sapped by the cool door handle.

  Cain is there, standing hunched before the computer in his pyjama pants, peering close to the right monitor, blocking it with the bulk of his bare back. On the left monitor I can see he has his emails open. Whatever is on that other screen has his full attention.

  I move a little closer now. Stepping carefully, watching him. His right hand comes to his mouth, covers it and he leans closer still. I keep moving. Sidestepping to open up a view of the screen beyond his shoulder.

  He’s watching a video. He’s clicking through… footage. Of me. I freeze. He’s watching me. He has the footage. I can’t breathe. This is the moment I’ve feared most. But then I realise it’s not the footage from the night with Daniel in Auckland, but the night at the lake house. I’m cuffed to the fire. Daniel is there on the couch. It’s… It’s the video. Could it be? My husband is on Peephole. What if he planted the camera? The room seems to twist around me and a small gasp escapes. It’s so tiny but he hears. His head jerks around, his eyes find mine. I jump back but he’s on me before I have a chance to run. Something Rata says comes to me. If it’s not feeling right, or you’re worried things are going south, get out and call me. His hand reaches for my throat, gripping the front of my gown. I’m trapped. He’s got a crazed look, his eyes all white.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ he yells.

  The room seems to vibrate. My vision blurs. Panic courses through my veins and my phone slips out of my hand and crashes to the floor. My knee rises instinctively, it catches him and his grip loosens enough for me to tear away. Get out.

  ‘Lina,’ he calls after me. But I’m already running, out the door of the study. I sense him behind me, but I don’t look back. I throw the door closed, hear him tearing it open again. I rush down the stairs to the front door. If I make it out I can get away, I know I’m faster than him with his bad knee and I can run further. There’s no thinking, no room to stop or consider what I saw. I pull, turn and twist through the door then I’m out in the dark of night, my head swimming. I sprint, the cool air claws at the inside of my throat. My feet carry me away from the house. I don’t stop until I get to the corner, searching in the cones of light thrown from the streetlamps. My phone is back in the study. I could knock on doors until someone answers. No one has that video. It’s not online. The police can’t find it, can’t access the servers that host it. But he has it.

  I hear a car in the distance and turn to see headlights. Turning back to the house, I can’t see Cain anywhere. The car slows as I step out into the road and hurl my arms around in the air. It’s a taxi. I look back again – I see Cain pass beneath a streetlight and his form is thrown into full colour. He’s coming now, chasing me.

  ‘Stop, please!’ The taxi slows. Pulls over just past me. I run to it but the back door is locked. The window drops a crack.

  ‘Hi,’ the driver says. ‘Where are you heading?’ then a pause as his eyes take me in – my pale sleeping shorts and top, torn at the front from Cain’s grip. ‘Is something wrong?’

  ‘I need the police. Let me in quick.’

  ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘We don’t have time. Just open the door.’

  The lock rises, I rip the door open, drop inside. Then I see him. Cain hobbling closer three house lengths from the corner. His angry eyes fix on me. Despite his grey pants he looks like an animal.

  ‘Go,’ I scream. The tyres give a little squeal as the Prius accelerates. I look back and see Cain watching me, his hands on his hips.

  Investigation notes for Task Force Riding Hood

  Transcript nine of eleven from Deepchan message boards, in which agents attempt to gain access to the service Peephole:

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  it doesn’t exist otherwise I would be on it by now

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  it does. I am not going to risk my money and my access. Just trust me it’s there online. Dozens of streams.

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  send one screenshot. Unless you’re full of shit.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  here’s all I will tell you. It costs a lot to join. It’s better/more real than any porn, or video leak site you’ve been on. If you’re a voyeur there is no better or safer service. The streams are from dozens of different countries and nobody knows they’re being watched. You will not find anything else like it.

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  don’t hold out on me. You’ve known me for months. give me the referral.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  you don’t understand. You can’t tell anyone, you can’t screenshot. Everyone’s streams have a unique overlay, leak a single frame and you get banned and lose your deposit.

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  I’m not going to tell anyone shit.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  I can’t do it.

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  refer me, I will pay your next year subscription.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  Bullshit.

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  I’ll send any crypto you want right now to prove it. I’ve got money.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  You’re a fucking fed aren’t you?

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  Yep. And a voyeur and I’m sick of the same shit porn and the same hard candy. Of course I’m not a fucking cop. JUST LET ME IN. come on dude.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  Let me think on it for a day. They don’t mess around. You break a rule, we both lose out.

  Anon4qJjy4rE:

  If it’s as good as you say, if it’s really worth it, I’ll be on my best behaviour.

  Anon6AsRk9k1:

  don’t make me regret it man. I’ll refer you as thanks for the shit you’ve sent me in the past, but please don’t make me regret it. They take it all pretty seriously.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  I WAS SO wired when I arrived that I barely noticed where I was. I’d taken the taxi driver’s card – he’d eventually left me here when I’d promised I would pay him double the fare when I got my bank card. Now, as dawn breaks, the forecourt of the real Auckland police station reveals itself to me outside. It’s different to the plac
e Rata took me last time. This one is all glass, modern yet imbued with authority.

  Waiting areas are never designed for comfort. Police waiting rooms are cattle stations. The cold plastic chair does its utmost to cut off circulation below the knee and when I stand to stretch, I get pins and needles. My nerves are frayed as it is, but sitting here for half the night has only made it worse. I think about the baby, stress is bad for both of us. I make myself breathe slowly and try to relax. I imagine her or him growing, expanding.

  The doors open. I see Cain and a cool blade of guilt runs down my spine. I’ve never felt like this looking at him before; the shame, the sense that I barely know my husband. My eyes avoid his and settle somewhere near his waist, where his hands are cuffed. Then they fall to his feet, he’s wearing neat sneakers, then up over his pants, his button-up shirt. But no higher. I can’t look at his face. He’s the biggest person in the room but he seems diminished. His head turns to me as he passes, and I freeze. I’m not angry or stressed anymore. I feel… sadness.

  ‘Lina, this is a mistake,’ he says. ‘You don’t understa –’

  Then I meet his eyes and see they’re pleading but before he can get another word out, he’s pulled through a door by the beefy arresting officer. I almost rise to stop them, to tell them to let him go but then I remember what he was watching. How could he access it? What does it mean? He’s my husband, and I still love him, I just don’t understand why he was watching that footage. In place of the panic that rose so suddenly in the study there is something else: doubt. I’m not even sure what really happened. Was he actually going to hurt me? He would never hurt me, would he?

  A second officer follows him in and I continue doing what I have done for the past few hours: thinking about my husband, him visiting that house on Hillview Terrace, him volunteering to go to the lake house so often without me, and now watching the footage from that night. All while I wait for Rata. The taxi had dropped me here at around 2 am, and it’s now almost six.

  •

  Next time the doors gasp open, it’s Rata coming through. He gives me a curt nod and approaches the front desk. He speaks briefly with someone out of my view.

  ‘Lina, let’s go,’ he says. I rise and pass through the door he holds open for me.

  This time round, the conversation is much more direct, just a timeline, the facts of what happened last night. What I discovered on Cain’s computer. Did I want to press charges for assault? Of course not. But he grabbed you? It says here by the throat. No, not technically by the throat but that seemed to be what he was reaching for. No, it didn’t feel like assault, not now in the light of day. Everything happened too quickly. I don’t even really know what happened.

  There’s no subterfuge, I’m barely cognisant.

  ‘I can understand your loyalty, you’ve been married to the man for a long time. You probably feel like you should know everything about a person after seven years.’

  I just shrug. ‘I guess so,’ I say. ‘I just want answers. I don’t know why he was looking at that video or how he got access to it, I wish I knew but I don’t have anything else to tell you.’

  He squeezes his lips together and gives a small nod.

  ‘Some men need control. In the military all they have are rules. As odd as the rules are they will stick to them. I started out in the army in my early twenties. Willie Apiata was my hero. But they’re not all heroes. I’m sure you know.’

  ‘Why are you telling me this?’

  ‘I’m thinking aloud I guess.’ He runs his tongue over his top lip. ‘It’s possible that your husband installed the cameras in the lake house. I’m not saying he did, I’m just saying it’s possible. He has the footage and he visited that house. He might have done it for the money, he might have justified it to himself as a victimless crime. But why were you at that house that night, Lina?’

  ‘Someone had stayed there as well as our place. That’s the truth. I just wanted to check it out.’

  ‘So why didn’t you visit all the other places that profile had booked? There was another place in Auckland, one in Whitianga. That profile booked eight places in New Zealand in total, but so far we have only found evidence of cameras in two properties, yours and the one you booked at Hillview Terrace. So why choose that place?’

  ‘I’m not going to beat my head against the wall trying to convince you. I’ve answered your questions. I want to go home.’

  The room is silent for a moment. Then he drums the table. ‘Do you have somewhere to stay for now?’

  ‘I can stay at home,’ I say. ‘I’m fine to be home.’

  He rises, opens the door. ‘I’ll arrange a car for you. If and when your husband is released, you will be notified.’

  ‘I’ve really got to get going,’ I say. ‘I have work.’

  ‘You’re working today? After last night?’

  I just shrug. I feel compelled to go in. I don’t want to wander around the house all day thinking through everything that has happened, and it’s too late to find someone to cover my shift.

  ‘I’ll get a ride for you now. A couple of my guys are picking up Cain’s computer. He’s volunteered access to assist in the investigation.’

  •

  It’s a silent trip to my front door, and I notice a second police car following us.

  I don’t have my keys, but Cain has left the door unlocked.

  ‘Help yourself to whatever,’ I say to the two officers. I quickly shower and find my clothes for work. The officers spend most of the time in Cain’s study, carting his computer out to their vehicles. I have two missed calls on my phone from an unknown number this morning. I don’t bother calling back. Probably journalists.

  The cops go through Cain’s drawers, take zip drives, old CD-ROMs, hard drives. They clean it out, then they’re gone. They’re efficient. There’s five minutes to spare when I walk out the front door.

  It doesn’t make sense, nothing makes sense, I think on my way to the station. I see Daniel again, those green eyes staring down at me on the ground. Why would Cain have the footage? How did he get it? Is it possible my husband set the cameras up to spy on the guests then Daniel turned up and derailed his plans? Or… what if they knew each other somehow?

  In the end I arrive a touch early to the station. I park and put my seat back in the car, waiting for my shift. I close my eyes for a second. Next thing I know someone is tapping on the window. It’s Judy, one of the old heads who I’ve worked with a few times.

  ‘Lina?’ she says.

  ‘Oh sorry. I just dozed off.’

  ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I say, scratching at my eyes. ‘I’m just waiting for my shift. What time is it?’

  She looks confused for a moment. ‘You’re not rostered on today, darling.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘You’re not rostered on. It’s Erica and August taking over now for us. You’re off today.’

  ‘Oh,’ I say, blinking. ‘It’s Thursday, right?’

  ‘It is, but you’re definitely not on. I checked the roster when I saw your car.’

  I swallow. ‘Oh, my mistake. I must have misread it.’

  ‘No worries. Go get some rest.’ She taps the roof of the car with her fingers and starts out towards her own vehicle.

  I can’t muster the energy to drive home straight away. I tip my seat back again and stay like that for a period. I could sleep right here with the radio soothing my mind, and for a moment too long I stay in that position because when I open my eyes, the car is full of mid-afternoon sun. I check the time to find it’s almost three o’clock. It’s been hours. Pressing my fingers to my eyelids, I let out a long yawn before reaching for the keys and starting the car.

  The gate opens and I head off.

  At home something has changed. I’m grieving for my old life, for the man I’ve loved all these years who might not be who I think he is. Rata’s words, you should know everything about a person after seven years, are trapped like flies in the web of my min
d. He’s right and I’m angry. Angry at Cain. What has he done?

  I do something productive to take my mind off things. I print out the next fortnight’s schedule and pin it to the fridge with a magnet. Now I’ll see it every day.

  Dragging my anger and my empty stomach up the stairs to the bedroom, I collapse beneath the covers once more and protectively wrap my arms around my belly. My last thought is about the baby, what this means for it. My connection to it has already grown so strong; the instinct to protect it fuelled me last night.

  I don’t need my sleep mask, or tea, or rain sounds, I just tumble into the dark hole of slumber once more.

  •

  The phone call from Rata comes at around midnight. I’m in bed, the same bed I’ve shared with Cain for so many years. This house is only a rental but like the lake house it’s charged with memories. I reach for the phone, see the time and want to hurl it at the window but I know it must be about Cain. I bring it to my ear.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Lina, it’s Detective Rata, sorry to call you at this hour.’ He doesn’t sound sorry. He sounds rushed and frustrated.

  ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘Cain has been cooperative in assisting the search through his personal computer files, and web use. We have no evidence to suggest your husband has engaged in any criminal activity outside of his use of proxy servers to access international gambling websites – something for which he will be cautioned and not charged.’

  ‘But what about the video? Where did it come from?’

  ‘The footage you discovered your husband watching was sent by an anonymous email address from an encrypted server.’

  A wave of relief rushes through me, but immediately the shame and guilt empties me. I put him through hell today. ‘So what does this mean?’