Baby Did a Bad Bad Thing (23 page)

•

When she arrived home, after rehearsing a few sentences to use on the Ratbag, she was puzzled to see her place in darkness. Maybe he’d gone to sleep on the lounge watching telly, she thought. But her puzzlement turned to alarm when she stepped up onto the small tiled area that led to her front door. Her security door stood wide open and her front door was also slightly ajar. She pushed it cautiously, spooked by this breach in her security.

‘Hugo?’ she called. ‘Where are you?’ He must have gone out and left the door open. She didn’t like this one bit. ‘Hugo?’ she called again.

But her apartment was darkly still. She stepped into the hall and could see the eerie glow of the screen saver in the operatives’ office. She reached for the hall light and switched it on. Now she could hear the sound of the television in her living room. ‘Hugo?’ she called again, walking with more confidence in the light. She was about to lock the door when she recalled some advice: don’t lock the exit until you’re sure the place is empty. Remembering this, she walked to the door that opened onto her lounge room and switched the light on. The television was on but the rumpled nest of blankets and coats on her lounge was empty except for Taxi, curled up in a ball, half-opened eyes reflecting the colourful gleam of a television advertisement. She went through every room but there was no trace of the Ratbag or anyone else. She went out onto the timber deck. The old sleeping bag was gone. Back inside, she checked the small change jar in the kitchen. It was empty. Some part of her was relieved, but she hated to think of the poor little kid trying to keep alive on the hostile, predatory streets of Kings Cross. She had no idea of who or where his father might be, nor could she even remember his surname. And how dare he leave her house wide open like this?

‘Damn you, Ratbag,’ she said out loud. Somehow, the little fellow had weaselled his way into her heart, made her feel responsible for him, reminding her of Will at that age, and of herself, a lost and lonely child at boarding school. She tried to distract herself by looking in the fridge and found there was nothing left. The Ratbag had cleaned that out, too.

She felt too restless to stay home now. She could drive to the Cross, ask Kosta about the missing diary, do her shopping at the huge supermarket there, pick up her clothes from where she’d left them at the safe house and make enquiries about Shelly’s stepfather. No doubt the police would have contacted him by now. Maybe she would be able to pick up any news on the street about Steve’s dangerous target. And she could keep an eye out for a frightened little kid who had, by her reckoning, about eleven dollars in the world. She finally found Kosta’s number in an old diary and although he was surprised to hear from her, he sounded keen to meet up with her again.

•

She drove to the Cross, turning Meatloaf up loud to drive her gloomy thoughts away and sang along with him that ‘
Two out of three ain’t bad
’
.

In spite of everything, the lights and smell of the Cross lifted her mood. Maybe a drink in a bad dive would be fun later on. Just the one. Just to have a look around. Just a sniff of loud rock and bad company. I need cheering up, she told herself. Perhaps it would help dislodge the dark undercurrent that seemed to be undermining her spirits over the last month or so. She parked in a quiet cul-de-sac near the top of the Cross, did her shopping and loaded it into her car, and returned to the café on the corner where she’d arranged to meet Kosta.

She took a table against the back wall and was wondering whether to order now or wait till Kosta arrived when she heard a couple arguing near the entrance. She looked up and then froze as Steve, gorgeous in black leather, halfway through the door, met her eyes. It was an electric moment and he broke the connection immediately as he swung around to the blonde woman behind him.

‘No, Lorraine,’ she heard him say in his authoritative voice. ‘Not this place. Come on. Let’s go.’

Gemma looked across to the black glass counter that ran half the length of the café. In its mirrored surface she could see that Steve was hustling the woman behind him, steering her, arm around her waist. Gemma’s heart started beating hard. She could hear the woman protesting, complaining at this sudden change of plan.

‘But why? Just tell me why,’ she demanded, turning to look back into the café, as if trying to see what the problem was, knowing intuitively that there was a reason why Steve was making them go somewhere else. But Steve was adamant and Gemma knew that mood, too. Part of her understood exactly why he would do this. She would do the same thing in the same circumstances, pleading anything—bad vibes, a headache, anything— rather than enter a place where someone familiar was already ensconced.

But the woman with him was not easily persuaded. As the couple walked past the glass wall that separated the café from the street, Gemma took a chance and looked straight at them. The woman with Steve was not fat and fifty. She was probably less than half that age. Lorraine Litchfield was deadset-film-star-knock-your-eyes-out-drop-dead-gorgeous. Then, in a split second that Gemma would forever regret, her eyes and those of the blonde locked. Gemma looked away quickly, pretending her glance was casual, but it was too late. She’d broken one of the commandments: never make eye-contact with a target. Gemma cursed herself. From the corner of her eye, she could see Lorraine Litchfield trying to push past Steve and return to the café. But Steve was blocking her, steering her backwards, his gestures conciliatory. Finally, they started walking away. But Lorraine Litchfield kept turning her head back towards the café.

Gemma waited till they were out of sight, then jumped up and went to the front of the café, pushing aside the waiter bringing her a jug of water. She waited, peering cautiously round the door, watching as the couple crossed the road heading north towards Macleay Street. Gemma hated seeing Steve’s arm around the blonde’s narrow waist. How could I have made such a mistake? Gemma wondered, as she hastened across the street, ignoring an angry driver who’d had to brake suddenly in front of her. She remembered the newspaper and television images of the family at the funeral and Mrs Litchfield, her corseted body and face congested with anger, swearing at the photographer. Mrs Litchfield
senior,
mother of the murdered crime boss. The woman Gemma had presumed to be Litchfield’s daughter or daughter-in-law was in fact, his wife, now widow.

Gemma ducked into a shop entrance as she saw Steve turn round to check behind him. She was sure he hadn’t spotted her. But she hurried after them, always keeping a lot of people between herself and her quarry for cover. Suddenly Steve beckoned a cab and she watched as her lover helped the other woman into the back seat, sliding in beside her and the cab took off.

Gemma stood in the doorway, heart racing, trying to calm down. She started walking quickly, the pain in her ankle temporarily forgotten, not caring where she went, just wanting to keep moving, keep the anxiety at a bearable level. Why had Steve lied to her about this job? She went over their conversation in memory. She could feel her hackles rising and the beginning of raw anger. A few things fell into place. That odd pause in the conversation when her joke about Steve’s interest in an older women had fallen flat. No wonder he hadn’t laughed. There
was
no joke. He wasn’t involved with an older woman at all. No wonder the atmosphere around her remark had been so charged that Gemma could still feel it now, mixed up horribly with all her present feelings of anger and jealousy. Steve had his chance to correct her right then and there and he hadn’t done it. Now Gemma had to ask herself why. Her anger grew. She wasn’t watching where she was going and almost tripped over. Was it just a lazy male thing? Easier to stay silent and let the assumption remain rather than create a fuss and the potential jealousy that the truth might bring?
Bastard,
she thought to herself, if that was the case. And if it wasn’t, and he genuinely had something to hide about this relationship, then things were far worse than she’d imagined.

Gemma’s heart lurched and she almost cried out loud. Terry Litchfield’s widow was young, beautiful and very, very rich. Unconcerned passers-by bumped into her as she stood in the street, dazed. That heavy brassy looking zodiac charm had been her gift to Steve and Gemma realised now its heaviness was because of the amount of gold in it. In the same way that she’d known the photographs taken by Benjamin Glass of the naked woman in the black lace gloves had not been taken by a client but a
lover
, Gemma suddenly realised that the zodiac charm was of a similar order. Gemma knew this was a classic situation reversed—the crim, Lorraine Litchfield, had fallen for the middle-class man, Steve. She stumbled on, unseeing, uncaring about the other pedestrians who had to get out of her way. ‘
Steve
?’ her rival had called out when Gemma rang him, ‘
it’s some woman
’. And Gemma had found it faintly amusing then. But not now. Steve
said
that business was hotting up and he was under Fayed’s surveillance and forced to be scrupulously careful. But the fact was he’d dropped right out of her life over the last week. Could there be another reason, something else, something that chewed at her consciousness and worried at her heart?

She had walked almost to the El Alamein fountain before she became conscious of her surroundings again. A group of Koori kids sat in a silent row nearby. She sat too, staring sightlessly past the kids as they pretended not to look at her. Their silence was broken by whispered comments and laughter. Maybe about her. She didn’t care. She didn’t care about anything except one thing. She prayed that Steve was simply acting his role. Of course he’d put his arm around a woman’s waist in public if he was supposed to be her boyfriend. It went with the undercover script. But did the arm drop away once they were alone together? She prayed that Steve had not stepped over the line that kept him both professional to the job and true to her. Behind her the fountain hissed and tiny droplets chilled her face. Tears started at the very thought that she and Steve might be through. I need to get right out of here, she told herself. I need a drink. For a second, the petulance cleared and she had a detached insight into herself. Steve’s not the only one who might be acting unprofessionally, girl, she heard an inner voice say. Look at you, carrying on like a lovesick adolescent, not only interfering with an important police operation, but also endangering your man with your own unprofessional behaviour, making dreadful tactical mistakes just because you can’t handle the pressure. Gemma made a decision to maintain her standards, no matter what personal pressures bore down on her. As she moved to get up, her injured flank twinged savagely and she stopped, forced to stoop for a few long moments till the spasm passed. God, what a pathetic creature I’m becoming, she thought to herself. This time, she stood up slowly and squared her shoulders.

She walked over to the group of kids, reminded of the Ratbag’s predicament. They all looked away, hoping that she wasn’t trouble. Thinking of that little kid, and all the others alone in the world on the savage streets of Kings Cross took her mind off her anguish over Steve.

She pulled a twenty-dollar note out of her wallet. ‘Have any of you guys seen a young kid around, not Koori. About twelve, thirteen? Dark hair. Thick eyebrows. Worried look on his face. Wearing a green parka, pretty grubby.’

Two of the kids didn’t even turn at the sound of her voice; the others shook their heads. Gemma pulled out one of her business cards from the same pocket.

‘This is me,’ she said. ‘I’m not a cop or a social worker. I don’t want to make any trouble for you kids. But if any of you see this kid, or find out where he hangs, give me a call on this number and I’ll make sure it’s worth your time. Okay?’ She handed the note and her card over to the oldest girl. ‘Get yourselves something to eat, eh?’ she said.

The girl looked at the business card and then shoved it in a pocket. One of them jiggled his feet and they were silent. It was almost as if she didn’t exist, that she hadn’t just spoken to them, given them money.

‘Where are you kids from?’ she asked, suddenly touched by their youth, their lostness.

The smallest girl tossed her wild hair. ‘All over the place,’ she said. ‘Come from everywhere, us mob.’

‘You let me know?’ Gemma asked again. ‘If you see this kid?’

‘Your kid?’ the girl asked.

Gemma shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m just a friend. He’s run away from his mother in Melbourne. He doesn’t know anything about living on the streets.’

‘He’ll learn pretty quick,’ said one of the boys. The silence fell again.

Gemma walked back to the café, trying not to think of where Steve might be with that beautiful girl. She noticed two black Mercedes drive by and for a moment, thought some eccentric funeral was taking place. It was almost impossible to see into the interiors through the tinted windows. The two cars turned the corner and into Macleay Street, vanishing from her sight.

At the café she saw Kosta sitting morosely at the same table she’d vacated twenty minutes before. He’d almost finished a half bottle of red as Gemma approached.

‘I thought you weren’t going to show,’ he said, raising his droopy eyes to her. ‘Grab a glass.’

‘I was here earlier,’ she said, ‘but I had to leave. Something came up.’ She turned her glass over and he poured her some wine. Gemma tossed it down and felt the glow of it spreading downwards. It hit her behind the knees and she realised she hadn’t eaten for too long.

‘Trouble?’ he asked.

Gemma shrugged. There were more people at the tables than had been there earlier and as she looked around, she caught the waiter staring at her. Kosta looked heavier and more compressed than she remembered from the last time she’d seen him. She wasn’t sure how he supported himself these days but she knew he’d made a living of sorts in the past as a small-time dealer, buying several grams and cutting them to sell on. He had moved in and out of various rehab places, and generally made himself available to anyone who could use either him or his services. He’d tried to be a standover man, but as Shelly had told Gemma years ago, he just didn’t have enough mongrel in him for that. Even now, despite the bloating from too much beer and baklava, and the wear and tear of substance abuse, shreds of good nature still showed in his face.