Sharp Shooter (10 page)

The sharks exchanged looks and left.

Bligh unfolded her arms and slipped a knapsack off her shoulders. Her immaculate bun was dishevelled and she was sweating slightly herself. ‘What on earth are you doing here, Tara?’

I swallowed. ‘Bad luck I think. And . . . well I can
tell
you, I wish I wasn’t.’

‘You kill a Chinaman or something?’ She took a box out of her knapsack and pulled some rubber gloves from it. ‘If not, you want to think seriously about staying in at night for a while. Sorry, but I’m going to have to do this.’

Another person entered the room. ‘Tara Sharp?’

‘Hi Bill,’ I said. ‘Please tell me Whitey’s not here.’

‘He’s out in the wagon,’ said Bill Barnes.

‘Come on, let’s get on with it,’ said Bligh, kind of tetchy. ‘Bill, send Constable Lund in.’

Another female cop took Bill’s place while Bligh did a perfunctory frisk. She didn’t poke too hard anywhere, and afterwards, Bill returned and ran an explosive’s detector over me.

‘Thought you were looking for drugs?’

‘Terrorism’s a big thing these days.’

‘Me. A terrorist? You’ve got to be kidding.’

‘Bill!’ Bligh’s voice held a stern warning note as if he’d said too much. She began rifling through my handbag and pulled out the white dollar-filled envelope. ‘Explanation?’

‘Just got paid,’ I said truthfully. ‘I can give you my client’s name. Haven’t had time to bank it.’

‘Cash, Tara? Hope you’re going to declare it.’

‘Of course. My accountant is anal. He never lets me slip up on details.’

She sighed. ‘Ms Sharp, you’re free to go home. However, officers may call on you again for further questioning.’

I nodded meekly and went to follow Bill Barnes out of the room.

‘And Tara?’ I stopped at Bligh’s stern voice and let the door close behind Bill, leaving Bligh and me alone. ‘I’m surprised to find you here. I hope you’re not thinking of keeping the wrong company,’ she said.

‘You know I don’t take drugs.’

‘I’ve only got your word for that. And things can snowball when you get seen in the wrong places. You don’t want to run into Cravich and Blake again.’

‘The sharks?’

She nodded.

I sighed. ‘OK. Thanks.’

She gave a small grin then. ‘The wagon’s on the south side of the road. If you turn right out of the gates Whitey won’t even know you’ve been here.’

‘Won’t he read the reports?’

Bligh walked passed me and opened the door. ‘Whitey? Read? When hell freezes over.’

Chapter 15

I
RANG
B
OK
as soon as I got home and told him the whole story, including the part about Peter Delgado working for Johnny Vogue.

He was kind and sweet and comforting. Not. Actually, he told me what an idiot I was.

‘Johnny Vogue, T! What were you
thinking
?’

‘I didn’t know the job was for him.’

‘Did you ask who it was for?’

‘Delgado isn’t the kind of man you ask anything.’ Besides, I was deaf because the words retainer and BONUS were ringing in my ears.

He made an exasperated noise. ‘I hereby put you on probation. You’re not to go out without Smitty or me until this whole drug stuff has cooled.’

Smitty knew every damn person in the western suburbs, and their pedigree – legacy from her time as a Silver Chain Nurse doing home visits. No one quite like a grandmother to blab the family secrets. Smitts wouldn’t be happy that I’d been to a party at Johnny Vogue’s house.

‘How long will that be?’ I asked miserably.

‘Let me see . . . in the papers tomorrow, and then again in a few days when they lay charges, and then again when they go to court, and then –’

‘In that case,’ I interrupted huffily, ‘you’d better cancel your plans for tomorrow night. I have another job.’

‘But it’s Saturday night.’

‘You made the rules. Saturday is date night for Smitty, so she won’t be able to come.’ Married couples had to do that sort of thing or they never got to have sex – or so Smitty said.

He took forever to reply, and I thought I’d cracked him with the ‘Saturday night’ thing. But he stumbled over the finishing line with a long-suffering sigh, muttering something like, ‘For the good of all’ and then louder, ‘What time shall I pick you up?’

‘Six pm. We’re just going to Club Eighteen. Don’t overdress.’

I hung up and stared at the ceiling. It was 1 am and my mind was a whirl. Nick Tozzi seemed like a nice bloke. Who was I kidding? He seemed a lot more than that. But he was married to a princess, and Johnny Vogue wanted to bring them down.

If I was a decent sort I’d contact Nick Tozzi and tell him what I’d heard. If I was smart, I’d lay low and hope Tozzi, Delgado and Johnny Vogue all forgot they’d met me.

Well . . . I already knew I wasn’t having a ‘smart’ night.

I rolled out of bed and stumbled over clothes to the couch where I burrowed for my laptop under two sets of bras and a pair of worn-recently running shorts.

Crap. Must do some washing tomorrow
.

As I waited for the LT to boot up, I thought about Fiona Bligh. Cravich and Blake hadn’t had pure thoughts on their mind. Her intervention had saved me something unpleasant – of that I was sure. I owed her, despite the scolding.

I typed ‘Nick Tozzi’ into Google and got nearly half a million hits. It didn’t take long to confirm he’d married Antonia Falk.

My JoBob implant went off
. ‘You know, Tara, there were five
original families in Perth: the Falks, the Poyntons, the Lathlains,
the Shentons and the Dewars (
uggh Phillip Dewar!
). You really
should be nicer to young Phil . . .’

Those five families were still Perth’s royalty – other than the odd rock star or actor who’d been ripened under the sun on Cottesloe Beach and sent off to ferment in Hollywood.

Google also told me that Antonia and Nick had been married for two years, had no kids, and took their holidays in either Mauritius or Vegas. Antonia had been to finishing school in Switzerland, uni at the Sorbonne and dropped out to model for a couple of years. Her modelling portfolio included a Victoria’s Secret catalogue cover.

I stopped reading then.
Victoria’s Secret
for crying out loud! That capped an already disturbing evening.

I hit the kill button and rummaged through my bedside table. Eye patches, ear plugs and a tablet I usually reserved for migraines. Next thing I was out cold.

The following morning was nearly afternoon, and I woke up feeling sluggish and pissed off. For a start I’d slept through my Saturday pick-up basketball game at the local courts, and secondly, I only had an hour and a half before ‘Social Skills Class’ with Los Trios.

I threw on cut-off tracks and a singlet and shuffled out the door to the gym, knowing I couldn’t handle Los Trios with my head full of cotton balls.

Rather Be Dead?
was the quaint name for a boutique gym tucked in a cul-de-sac that ran up near the highway. It was way too expensive for a girl with no income, but it was close to Lilac Street, and I’d been going there for several years and found the habit hard to break. Dad had bailed out my addiction with a twelve-month membership for my birthday. I had ten months to go. Surely I’d have some steady income by then!

The RBD kiosk sold killer muesli slice and freshly squeezed fruit juices, and Craigo, the lead gym instructor, was a shade over perfect: a sweet, patient man with SAS-type conditioning and a bundle of boyfriends. When he wasn’t strutting his stuff on the exercise mat he was on the phone arranging dates.

He waved to me as I walked in. I waved back and stopped to read the noticeboard in the hope he wouldn’t offer himself as a work-out partner.

Other than a flyer for an upcoming triathlon, the results of a raffle, and a photo of the fifties-plus fitness fundraiser team, not much else was happening around the traps. I had a bit of a snigger at the three rows of portly middle-aged men and then slunk into the weights room and commandeered the rowing machine.

Forty minutes later, I was back home with a clearer head and relief that blood might actually be flowing through my veins. I showered, dressed and ate dry toast while I shovelled all the clothes off the couch and onto my bed and pulled the screen across. That left me a few minutes to boot up the LT and re-read my notes from the previous sessions.

Los Trios arrived together, having met outside on the footpath. I’d told them it was better that way – much less inclined to send JoBob off on a ‘prowler alert’.

Enid and Harvey dutifully sat on their allotted cushions but Wal sprawled onto the couch leaving me a sliver of cushion on which to park my butt. I thought about telling him to move but he was showing far too much white around the eyes today for unnecessary conflict.

‘Hi guys,’ I said. ‘Let’s start with our homework. Ladies first, Enid?’

‘Lady!’ Wal snorted like a feral pig and laughed so hard he farted. The smell rose like a tornado, catching Enid and Harvey front-on. Harvey somersaulted backwards and ran to the door, gagging. Enid turned bright red from both the insult and from holding her breath.

I leaped for the ceiling fan and switched it on turbo. When the stink had passed and we’d composed ourselves, I turned it off.

‘Come on back, Harvey. Crisis over.’ I resumed my postage stamp-sized seat and motioned for him to sit on his pillow. He returned reluctantly, casting Wal annoyed looks through his unwashed fringe.

‘Wal,’ I said. ‘How do you think you made Enid feel with that comment?’

Wal shrugged, and slouched down further, forcing me up onto the arm of the couch.

‘Now Enid? How did you go with Count and Think?’

‘Well, I’m doing it right now,’ she said, glaring at Wal. ‘So I suppose it’s working.’

‘Err . . . great,’ I said brightly. ‘What about at work though?’

She ran her plump fingers through her shoulder-length brown hair and yanked the front of her bustier into place. Enid was a very well-endowed young woman poured into a silk bodice and velvet skirt.

Harvey goggled as the mountain of flesh rose, threatened to overflow and then settled. Even Wal was temporarily riveted.

‘OK. On Tuesday, Amy, my junior, stacked a whole box of slippery elm packets where the psyllium should be. I wanted to call her a “stupid mother-fucking cunt”, but I did the Count and Think thing, and instead I said, “Was your mother taking a bath in lead-based paint when she was pregnant with you?”’

‘That’s good,’ I managed to choke out.

Harvey clapped. ‘Bravo, Enid.’

‘Harvey? How about you next?’

Harvey dropped his head shyly so that all I could see was the sprinkle of dandruff along his hair part. He fumbled in his shirt pocket for his iPhone. ‘I wrote the list of things I could say to ask a girl out, like you told me to do. And I’ve been practising them.’

‘Great.’ Harvey was so earnest he kinda tugged at my heartstrings. I also wanted to give him a lecture on personal hygiene. ‘Go ahead. Let’s hear them.’

‘OK.
I’ve been watching you for a while and I can’t take my
eyes off you
,’ he recited.

I cleared my throat. ‘Not bad but could be creepy. What else have you got?’

He peeped up at me from under his lashes then hurriedly dropped his eyes again. ‘
I think about you when I beat the
meat
,’ he whispered.

I blinked. ‘What?! No, never mind. Ahmmm . . .’

To my towering relief the phone rang. I leaped up and grabbed it from my bag. ‘Just keep practising on Enid while I take this call.’ I dived out the door and took some deep gulps before answering.

‘Thank you, thank you
, thank
you, whoever you are.’

‘My pleasure, Ms Sharp,’ said a deep, unbelievably sexy voice.

A bolt of excitement shot down through my belly and out through my toes.
Nick Tozzi.
‘Whoever this is, I can explain,’ I squeaked.

Tozzi laughed. ‘I’m sure you can.’

I thought for a split second about continuing to act coy and tossed it. ‘Hi Nick, how did you get my number?’

‘Your mother – Joanna is it? – gave it to me. What a sweet lady. And so helpful.’

‘Isn’t she,’ I replied through gritted teeth.

‘I apologise for calling you out of the blue after such a brief acquaintance, but I was wondering if you’d have breakfast with me –’

My heart bounced.

‘–I want to ask your opinion about something a little sensitive.’

‘Is this about Johnny Vogue?’ I asked.

There was a longish silence while
he
decided whether to be coy or not. Like me, he opted for the straightforward approach. ‘Yes,’ he said, finally.

I liked straightforward.

‘Actually, I was thinking about calling you,’ I said.

‘Oh?’

‘Same reason.’

‘Oh.’ He sounded vaguely disappointed, though I might have been imagining it. ‘Well, how’s tomorrow morning? Seven-ish?’