Thrill City (26 page)
‘Open bar, dude,’ the barman said. ‘It’s free.’
‘Fucken bonus.’ The guy disappeared back into the crowd.
I froze. When the barman turned to me and asked what I wanted I couldn’t speak. Elvis Mask had smelled of bourbon, he’d said ‘fucken bonus’, and when the guy in the velvet suit pushed past me I’d smelled that same chemical sweat. It still lingered in the air.
I
snapped out of my inertia. Where the hell had he gone? Standing on the bar railing I hoisted myself up, craning to look over the crowd. Holy shit. He was trotting down the stairs. Victoria was down there. No. It couldn’t be. Nick hadn’t told me to warn her. She hadn’t been on the writers’ roadshow. It didn’t make any sense.
The barman, who couldn’t have been a day over nineteen, was looking at me funny, like he wasn’t sure he should serve me another drink.
‘Get security,’ I yelled over the sound of the crackers and the crowd.
‘What?’
‘Security!’
‘We don’t have any security. It’s a book launch.’
‘What about those big guys checking invites?’
‘They’re not on the boat.’
‘Jesus. Down on the bottom deck, there’s a guy who’s probably got a knife!’
He just stood there looking at me like I was mad. A few seconds before I’d been leaning on the bar, calmly watching the fireworks.
‘Call the water police, do something!’ I screamed, taking off after the guy. I didn’t want to go anywhere near him, but I couldn’t let him hurt Victoria. He must have seen the invite when he’d gone through my bag. I’d led him there. It was all my fault.
I pushed through the revellers, spilling drinks, calling for them to help me, shouting that there was a man on board about to kill Victoria Hitchens. Everyone looked at me like I was crazy or on PCP, but there was no time to explain.
Once through the crush I took the steps three at a time, looked around wildly for something to use as a weapon and spotted an extinguisher next to the fire alarm. I smashed the glass and a deafening bell rang out as I wasted precious seconds wrangling the device from the wall. People began to come down the stairs, looking for the fire, pointing at me.
I ran out to where I’d last seen Victoria.
I was too late. She was lying on her back and the guy was hunched over her like an evil gargoyle, hunting knife held high.
‘Hey, fucker!’ I screamed. I’d had an idea about spraying him with the foam but in my panic I didn’t have a clue how to work the nozzle so I rushed at him and smashed the extinguisher into the side of his head. The momentum carried me forward and I rolled on top of him. The knife clattered onto the deck. I hoped I’d knocked him out.
I hadn’t. Before I could get up he’d grabbed me and rolled me over so he was on top, then raised his right fist and smashed me in the face. Bony knuckles slammed into my cheekbone and my head was forced to the side. I must have blacked out for half a second, and when my vision cleared I realised I was lying next to Victoria and she was groaning and shuddering as a red stain spread across the front of her gown.
No.
The guy was still on top of me. I looked up. He’d retrieved the knife, and blood smeared the blade.
The fireworks reached their crescendo. Classical music boomed as giant flowers of light burst open behind my attacker. Below the mask his nose was long and narrow, deep furrows ploughed either side of his mouth, and he’d twisted his thin lips and broken yellow teeth into a cheap facsimile of a smile. He began to wave the knife back and forth in front of my face and his mouth was moving as though he was humming a tune, but I couldn’t hear it over the din. I was so scared my legs spasmed and my feet shook. I’d met some bad bastards but this guy was fucking crazy. You couldn’t reason with psychotic freaks. I started to wish he’d just get it over with, stab me instead of torturing me with the anticipation.
And then something hit him on the side of his head.
He shifted on me, looked back, and I saw the barman and a few of the waiting staff armed with brooms and mops. They were trying to whack him with the handles so they didn’t have to get close. He got up off me then, let out a roar and lunged at them and they freaked and ran back inside. I did the only thing I could think of: staggered to my feet, scrambled over the railing and threw myself into the Yarra.
Despite the summer heat the river was freezing. I gasped involuntarily as I went under and got a lungful of oily water, came up hacking and spitting and surrounded by voluminous skirts which had puffed up with trapped air. I tried to bat them down with my arms as I frantically trod water.
The fireworks had finished and the air was full of a burned-out, gunpowder smell. I caught sight of the
Neptuna
, moving away from me towards the docks. The barman was yelling something from the deck and pointing. He threw a life ring but it was too far away. My heart was up in my throat, and I swivelled my head. The Yarra was full of boats, mostly big passenger vessels. They wouldn’t see me. If I got hit or dragged into propellers . . . The shore was about ten metres away and I started swimming but the dress was dragging me down and then something else was too.
Someone had grabbed my foot.
I tried to swivel but it was impossible in the dress and then Elvis Mask was on me, scrambling up my back like a rat, pushing me under. River water flooded my mouth and nose, scalding my sinuses, gushing down my throat. His hands were all over my back and neck and his fingernails were scratching me, and the more I struggled the further down I went.
I went limp. There was no air in my lungs and my dress was saturated so I sank rapidly, taking the bastard down with me. He quickly let go, floating up, and I opened my eyes to coloured lights shafting through dirty water. Boat engines emitted muted clanks and I felt strangely calm—until my chest started burning and every cell screamed for oxygen. I kicked up, surfaced, gasped and he grabbed me again, this time around my hips, fingers clenching the skirt. I kicked again, slowed by the water, but when my foot hit his body I thrust forward. As he yanked me back, the Velcro connecting the skirts to the bodice ripped free and I was released from the sodden material, heading for the riverbank, swimming for my life.
I
sat in the same grey interview room at the police complex, dried off, hair still damp and stringy. The police had taken away what was left of Porsche’s dress and given me a dark blue tracksuit with a Victoria Police logo to wear. Sipping a cup of soapy instant coffee I couldn’t stop shivering, even though it was warm in the room. Probably still suffering from shock. My cheek throbbed where I’d been hit, and although the ambos didn’t think it was broken, they wanted to take me to hospital for an X-ray to make sure. I’d refused and insisted on St Kilda Road and Detective Talbot. I had to stop the madness once and for all.
Dianne Talbot looked like she’d just come from a New Year’s Eve party. She wore smoky eye makeup, gloss over the usual plum lipstick, and her bob was kicked out at the ends. A sleeveless little black shift dress showed off her sinewy arms, and silver heels made her calf muscles stand out like tennis balls.
‘The attack on Victoria Hitchens is connected with Nick Austin,’ I said.
That got her attention.
‘But I’m not saying anything until you do something for me. I need my mother and brother, and my friend Chloe, in protective custody and I need to know that Sean is safe. The same with Liz Austin and her mother and brother.’
‘What’s this about?’
‘I’m not saying anything until I know they’re alright.’
An hour later Talbot was back, telling me that Jasper and Peta were with the Byron Bay coppers and Chloe was at the St Kilda Police Station on Chapel Street. Sean was on his way. Liz had refused to leave her flat, so was under police guard. No one was happy about it, apparently, but I didn’t care.
Talbot and her offsider, the paunchy Jefferson Archer, sat in front of me. Talbot had a file with my name on it that appeared to be even fatter than the last time I’d seen it. The video camera was in the corner, red on-light an unblinking eye.
‘How’s Victoria?’ I asked.
‘In surgery. Looks like she’s going to make it. The bones in her corset stopped the knife from penetrating her heart.’
Relief flooded my chest. Thank god.
‘Have they caught the guy who attacked us?’
‘No.’
‘Found his body?’ I asked hopefully.
A headshake.
‘How’d he get on the boat?’
‘Mugged a guest and stole his clothes and his invitation. The man’s at the Alfred with head injuries.’
‘You ready to talk?’ Archer growled. ‘You said the attack had something to do with Austin. Was he there?’
‘No, I don’t know where he is. But the guy who stabbed Victoria is the same one who killed Isabella. He and his cronies set Nick up for the murder and are demanding he pay out a large amount of cash. I don’t know what they’ve got over Nick, but they’re also threatening to kill Nerida Saunders—aka Desiree—and a performance poet slash uni lecturer called Jerome Jones, from Adelaide. Desiree and Jerome were on a writers’ travelling roadshow thing with Nick and Isabella a few years back. That’s the only way I can connect them. Victoria wasn’t, so why she was targeted I don’t know. I also don’t know why they want to kill me.’
‘’Cause you’re a pain in the ass,’ Archer suggested. Talbot shot him a censorious glance and he looked down and clicked his pen.
‘I started getting death threats just after Nick got shot in my flat,’ I said.
‘Why didn’t you report them?’ Talbot asked.
I shrugged. ‘I didn’t take them seriously at first. Thought someone was just trying to wind me up. But then I was attacked by the same guy who stabbed Victoria. He was wearing an Elvis Presley mask and he held a knife to my throat.’
‘And you didn’t report that, either?’
I hated Archer’s smug, jowly face. ‘No. He said he’d kill my family, Chloe and Sean if I talked to the police. Which is why I just asked you to protect them. He knew exactly where my mum and brother were, even though I didn’t, and he said,
Don’t think we can’t get to them
.
We
. That’s why I reckon he’s not working alone, plus he’s too fucking deranged to be organising the whole thing himself. Someone else has to be pulling the strings.’
‘How come you know all this about Nick Austin? Detective Talbot told you to stay out of it.’
Time for the ruse I’d made up in the hour they’d left me alone.
‘I was, but the timing of the threats made me think it was connected to Nick so I did a little digging around, trying to find enough information to protect myself. I wasn’t breaking any laws.’
‘Why’d you want Liz Austin in protective custody?’
‘I have reason to believe she’s in danger if Nick doesn’t cough up enough money.’
‘How did you find out this mystery . . . cabal are squeezing Austin for cash?’ Talbot asked.
‘Because the same person who told me Nick’s family were in danger also lent him forty grand to pay them off. Wasn’t enough, though. I think that’s why he won’t go to the police. He gives himself up, they don’t get paid, and his family and friends get killed in retribution.’
‘So who lent him the cash?’ Talbot asked.
‘Look, I promised I wouldn’t say.’
Talbot rolled her eyes, flipped through her file and scanned a printout.
‘We already know Elisabeth Austin withdrew forty thousand dollars from her bank account a week ago. Liz. That who it was?’
I shrugged. You didn’t break client conf identiality, especially when you were working illegally.
Talbot sighed. ‘We’ve had her under surveillance.’
Shit.
Archer piped up. ‘She wouldn’t have hired you to look for him, would she?’
‘My licence is suspended.’ I tried to look sincere. ‘That would be against the law.’
I was there for hours, being honest when it counted, telling half-truths when I had to, and refusing to answer the occasional question if I thought it might incriminate me. They kept trying to trip me up but I stuck to my story, refused to implicate Liz over the forty grand, and said I’d managed to slip past the party security without an invite.
I let Talbot know that Isabella had been acquainted with Lachlan Elliot, but if this news got her juices flowing, she didn’t give any sign.
By the time someone had formally typed up my statement, it was three in the morning on New Year’s Day.
A uniformed officer escorted me back to the same hotel on St Kilda Road that Sean and I had stayed in after Nick was shot in my flat. Sean was waiting for me, Chloe had the adjoining room and there were a couple of cops in the suite across the hall. You needed a swipe card to access specific floors so it was pretty secure, and would suffice while they figured out what to do with us. I wasn’t sure what was going on with my mum. It was too late to call so I resolved to ring in the morning.
I thanked the copper and used a card to get into the room, opening the door carefully in case Sean was asleep. I hoped he was so we wouldn’t have to have the ‘big talk’.
No such luck. All the lights were on and he was sitting out on the balcony. Gauzy curtains trembled and unfurled in the warm predawn breeze. I said hello, but he didn’t reply, or even look at me.
It could have been the same room we’d had before: identical beige stylings, fake mahogany desk, TV opposite the bed. My overnight bag sat on a chair. Sean must have gone home and packed it. He knew the drill.
I glimpsed myself in the mirror and saw that my hair had dried stiff and frizzy and my cheek was turning from red to purple, marking the spot where pain radiated out along the bone. The tracksuit wasn’t a real good look either.
I should have showered, but was too bone tired. I took a singlet from my bag and a pair of Sean’s boxer shorts from his, changed and pulled my hair into a ponytail. Stooping to open the fridge I plucked out a half-bottle of chardonnay and found a wine glass on a tray next to the kettle and the too-small coffee cups. Then I joined him on the balcony, the bad girlfriend, ready for my ear-bashing.
