Sharp Shooter (29 page)

‘Did they get me?’ I shouted at Wal as I ran a red light. ‘Wal?’

But Security Chief Grominsky had done his bit for Tara Sharp Consultancy today. He was asleep, head lolling against the window.

Meanwhile, Brains had climbed her way up the seatbelt and was calmly perched on his shoulder. I clucked my tongue to soothe her and she dropped a giant dollop that ran like a small lava flow down Wal’s neck. For some reason, that struck me as more funny than disgusting. I began to laugh and couldn’t stop.

By the time I reached Mr Hara’s cottage thirty minutes later and parked in the driveway, my nose was streaming. I couldn’t see anything for laughter tears.

Hysteria
, I told myself sternly.

And started giggling all over again.

Mr Hara tapped on the car window.

My giggling became hee-haws.

He opened the door. ‘Missy?’

I undid my seatbelt and fell out onto the footpath at his feet, still holding the marron plate – continuing to deliver my best hyena impression.

He left me there, and soon afterwards I felt a set of weight lifter’s arms lock around me and carry me inside.

Mrs Hara plopped me on the couch in the Wembley Ware room. As she removed the marron from my grip I heard her breath catch. She placed it reverently on the sideboard alongside the plasma, drew a blanket from somewhere and tucked me up like a rolled roast.

The world didn’t begin to right itself until I’d drunk half a scalding-hot cup of sugary tea and chewed my way through a plateful of minestrone thicker than pack ice.

Mrs Hara came and went from the Wembley Ware room, a worried expression on her face. Mr Hara sat opposite, fingers steepled together, legs crossed neatly, face serious, aura burning intensely.

‘Bird?’ I croaked at him.

‘Missy’s bird is in the aviary with the cockatiels.’

Brains would probably kill them all in an hour, but I couldn’t summon the words to explain.

‘Wal?’ I asked instead.

‘Missy’s friend is in Mrs Hara’s guest room, taking a nap.’

I nodded, relieved, and tried to sit up a bit straighter. My bread rolled off the tray onto the floor and under Mr Hara’s chair. At the sight of it disappearing, I burst into tears and sobbed for a while.

Mrs Hara did a sweep of the room, using the handle of a feather duster to retrieve the roll. Then she dropped a box of tissues on my knees.

I snorted and blew myself back into composure.

Mr Hara laid his arms along the armrest and stretched his legs out like Buddha unwinding from the lotus position. ‘Missy, tell me now?’

I nodded, and splurted the whole story out: Delgado, Viaspa, Tozzi – even the bit about the bonus.

He gave frequent little nods and his aura sped up when I got to the last part about Sam Barbaro and the shooting.

‘Very serious. Very bad. Missy go to the police?’

‘No,’ I said hoarsely. ‘No one believes me, least of all Nick Tozzi. It’s only because I can see things, that I know that the mining lease document is important, and that Lupi is somehow involved. I still can’t really prove any of it.’ Plus there was the added problem that I’d been trespassing.

‘See, see,’ said Mr Hara. ‘I fix it with Mr Delgado.’

‘No!’ I yelped. ‘H-he’s t-too d-dangerous, and this is m-my f-fault.’

Mr Hara jumped up and stood to his full tiny height, fixing me with a stern look. ‘No, Missy, not you. Mrs Hara has done something very bad.’

‘Oh?’ was all I could think to say.

The house phone trilled.

Mrs Hara answered it in the hallway. She spoke in Italian, becoming more animated by the moment.

Mr Hara listened intently to her responses. When she marched into the room her face flushed, neither of us had to read her aura to see something was wrong.

She and her diminutive husband exchanged rapid information. He wagged his finger at her and she bowed her head in guilt.

I wobbled to my feet, feeling completely at sea. ‘Trouble?’

‘Barbaro and Lupi are looking for you. It is safer that you stay elsewhere while Mrs Hara sorts things out.’

‘Mrs Hara?’ I squeaked. I mean she was scary, sure, but she didn’t carry guns, or work for a crime gang.

‘Missy, Mrs Hara misled Mr Viaspa and Mr Delgado. They employed you because they thought you would sleep with Mr Tozzi and learn his secrets.’

‘What-at?’ I gasped, my voice cracking over the word. My mind cracked a bit too. ‘Why would Mrs Hara do that?’

He sighed and his aura reddened. ‘I told you, Missy. My wife is a jealous woman.’

‘I know she was pissed over the chocolate thing but why would she be talking to the likes of –’ ‘Mrs Hara is good friends with Mr Viaspa’s older sister.’

I sat down again. Had all the air been sucked from the room? And here I’d been thinking the fact that Wal lived near Sam Barbaro was ridiculous.

A slamming life lesson, Tara Sharp: don’t get mixed up in small-city crime.

‘They went to school together.’

Well that explained, at least, Delgado’s attitude towards me – looking my legs up and down. He thought I was a hooker.

‘C-can Mrs Hara get Barbaro to leave me and Wal alone?’

‘You lay low for a few days, Missy. Mrs Hara try and fix through her friend.’

I nodded. ‘OK. I’ll stay with my aunt. She’s in security apartments.’ I pictured Wal asleep, drooling on one of Liv’s Persian rugs. ‘At least, I think she’ll let us stay. Can you keep the bird for a few days?’

Mr Hara nodded. ‘Sure, sure. Wasser name?’

‘Brains. She likes peanuts and vanilla slice.’

Chapter 44

A
UNT
L
IV
–
BLESS
her beautiful tangerine aura – was a trooper. She opened her door to Wal and me like we were invited guests, and told us we were welcome to stay as long as we needed – although she did make Wal push the fold-out bed into her sumptuous laundry. ‘It’s only proper,’ she told him. ‘In case people call in.’

Wal didn’t bat an eyelid.

In fact from the moment Liv opened her door, dressed in a black silk shift with her hair piled high off her lovely pearl-encased neck, he’d acted as dopey as a newborn lamb. Even his aura changed from smoky grey to something much bluer.

I didn’t think my mind or stomach could handle the way his lips were trembling, so I excused myself and had a long, cleansing shower.

Liv left a voluminous Hawaiian muu-muu on the spare bed for me and I emerged clean and slightly more composed. She handed me a cup of herbal tea and curled up on the couch next to me.

‘Wal?’ I asked.

‘I sent him to the corner shop to get wine and cheese.’

I stared at Liv in amazement. She’d always had a knack with men. And she knew a
lot of men.

That prompted a thought. ‘You’ve met plenty of government types through your art, haven’t you Liv?’

‘Don’t remind me, darling,’ she drawled. ‘I’ve been to more fundraisers and white-collar do’s than you’ve done scatterbrained things.’

I grinned. Coming from Liv it sounded like a badge of honour. From my mother it would have been a cry of despair. ‘You haven’t heard about anyone who might be in bed with Johnny Viaspa?’

She shook her head, but her eyes began to sparkle. ‘Supremo Crimo? Ooh, but I
love
the smell of corruption.’

‘This guy was overweight and wearing a suit. He acted nervous. Glancing around, hurrying.’

‘You were spying on him?’ She sounded quite breathless.

‘Liv,’ I said sternly. ‘Of course not. I happened to be watching some premises and he happened to be there with Viaspa.’

‘Hmmm. Well, you’ve just described half the politicians in the state,’ she said. ‘Overweight and sweaty.’

I sighed. ‘That’s what I thought.’ I was starting to get a major headache. ‘I think I’ll sleep on it.’

She patted my arm. ‘Good idea. You look a little peaky.

There are some painkillers in the bathroom.’

I yawned and headed for the bedroom, raiding the bathroom cabinet on the way. Sleep claimed me as soon as the pills hit my stomach and my head hit the pillow.

I momentarily surfaced a while later to the sound of Led Zeppelin and clinking wine glasses, and hurriedly resuccumbed.

When I finally roused properly it was 2 am, according to the digital clock in Liv’s spare room. I swallowed down some water and sat on the side of the bed listening. Everything was quiet other than Wal snoring on his bed in the laundry.

Thank the lordey-oh!

I thought about eating something, seeing as I’d slept through dinner, but I didn’t have much of an appetite. Mrs Hara’s minestrone was still on the way down.

I picked my phone up off the side table. Three texts and two voice messages.

The first text was from Craigo, reminding me to be at the track by 8 am.

You’ll have to cancel, I told myself. Mr Hara told you to lay low.

But no one would look for me at a triathlon, I counter-reasoned, and even if they did, no one would dare do anything at such a public event. The tri would be quite safe. Besides, a whole day spent cooped up in Liv’s apartment with Wal would see me back in Betsy’s office, holding my hand out for a prescription.

The second text was from Edouardo – a sweet ‘hi’ and looking forward to tomorrow.

Dammit!
I wondered how Liv would feel about Edouardo lobbing over for dinner with Wal, her and me?

I formed a mental picture of beautiful Ed, and smiled.

Liv would be fine with it.

The third text was from Tozzi. ‘Tara, ring me straightaway, whatever time you get this.’

I hesitated. I was pissed with him. He thought I was a fruitloop. But even that couldn’t make my fingers stay off the call-back button.

‘’Lo.’ He wasn’t asleep but he sounded muzzy.

‘It’s Tara.’

‘Where are you?’ he asked.

‘Laying low,’ I said. ‘Some stuff cropped up.’

‘I need to talk to you – in person,’ he said.

‘What? Now?’

‘Yeah. Are you home?’

‘No.’ I hesitated, not wanting to bring Liv into this any more than I already had. ‘I’m . . . err . . . sleeping over at a friend’s place.’

‘Male?’

‘No. And so what if it is?’

‘Just asking,’ he said mildly. ‘Give me an address. I’ll pick you up.’

I gave him Liv’s apartment block address and told him to call me when he was outside. Then I snuck into the bathroom and freshened up: face wash, some of Liv’s gorgeous parfum, and a rub of toothpaste around my gums.

While I waited for him, I listened to the voice messages. The first was Lloyd Honey. ‘Ms Sharp, the only connection I could find between Nick Tozzi and John Viaspa was through their grandparents. Both were born in the same village in Sicily. In fact they lived in the same street. As for Nicholas Tozzi and his wife – no. Nothing significant in the familial sense.’

Interesting.

The second message was from Mr Hara. ‘Things not so good, Missy. Mrs Hara not able to help. Stay out of sight.’

I didn’t have much time to think on what I would do now, because the call came in from Tozzi.

Liv’s apartment was on the fifteenth floor. I stared out of her balcony window, but the only car in the spot lit by the faux door-torches was a white stretch limo.

‘What colour is your car?’ I whispered into the phone.

‘White. Limo.’

White limos were gangster cars. My paranoia did a flip. ‘You don’t drive a white limo.’

‘I borrowed it from a friend.’

‘Why?’

‘Anonymity.’

‘Well. OK,’ I said

I grabbed Liv’s door key off the coffee table and quietly let myself out. On the ride down to the ground floor, I somehow convinced myself that meeting Nick Tozzi in a limo at 2 am fell well within the parameters of
laying low.

I pushed opened the foyer door and did a quick reccy up and down the street. Claremont – even on a Friday night – was pretty quiet after midnight in the residential areas.

Edouardo was probably just locking up at the club, and I felt a pang of guilt about meeting Nick, in a car, in the dark. I quickly quashed it. I mean, it wasn’t like Edouardo and I were
together
. One eminently suspect date did not a relationship make.

The driver hopped out of the stretch and opened the passenger door for me. I looked in and to my relief it
was
Tozzi.

But the moment my backside hit the leather I knew I should have stayed tucked up in bed. His white business shirt was unbuttoned and his smile sloppy. Nick was pissed.

‘’S’up?’ I asked, nervously.

‘Jenelle said you called. What’ve you been doing?’

‘You know . . . the usual . . . running around.’ I ran my fingers through my hair.

Bad move.

He leaned over and tugged it gently. ‘Yeah, I’ve seen you running.’ His voice was so deep that I felt like I was wading in it.