The hungriest were up quickly, but I was happy to sit for a minute. Now that we’d set off, the spell of the journey had taken hold of me slightly. Watching the chicken-wire fences of Berrimah terminal trundle past, replaced by pristine blue sky and vibrant monsoon-season-flourishing greenery, underpinned by the click-clack of the wheels rolling over the tracks beneath us and piping-hot coffee in hand, I had to admit to feeling the magic. I felt, well, posh.
In fact, I was so charmed, it took me at least another fifteen minutes to remember to ask Juliette what exactly she was hiding from me about Wyatt Lloyd.
Chapter 6
“One star?!”
I almost flung the phone across the table, as if it were a hot coal superheated by the incriminating internet browser I had just opened. On-screen was the Goodreads page for my book, Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone, where a new review had been posted. The review had a little red star. Just one.
“One bloody star?! Where the hell is he?”
“Ern,” Juliette said gently, “I think you might be overreacting.”
I looked around. A few heads had turned from their breakfast at my outburst. The restaurant carriage was fitted out with a dozen or so four-seater booths with flip-down seats. Pristine white tablecloths and polished silver cutlery glinted in the shafts of sunlight shining through the panel windows, and jade-green strip lights lined the roof. I spied Henry McTavish dining in the far corner with Wyatt and—and this incensed me further—Simone. They were all leaning forward, shoulder blades hunched like vultures’ wings. That’s a posture exclusively reserved for scheming.
I made to stand, but Juliette put a hand on my arm and gave a pointed cough. I followed her gaze and was surprised to see my left hand had curled around a knife. It was more of a reflex, grasping something nearby as I went to stand, but it surprised me enough that I dropped it with a clatter.
“A bit of the old Cunningham family blood still in me,” I said with as much lightness as I could muster. I put the phone down, and Juliette flipped it screen-to-tablecloth so the red star wasn’t staring me in the face. She needn’t have bothered; it was seared into the back of my eyelids.
Today’s date. A single red star. One word underneath: Ghastly. Author of the review: Henry McTavish.
Wyatt’s apology ran through my memory: I mean, it’s not polite. But it’s not really something we can police, you agree?
“Maybe his finger slipped,” Juliette suggested.
“Ghastly is a seven-letter word.”
“I meant the star rating.”
“So he’s capable enough to log in, type in the name of my book, pull up the page, enter the review field, and type his review, and then he fumbles on hitting the five-star button?” I stared back at McTavish’s table. What the hell were they talking about? How could my agent buddy up to them after this?
“Ern?” This time Juliette snapped her fingers in front of my nose.
Cynthia heard the snap and interpreted it as a summons, which made us feel both classist and apologetic as we ordered our pancakes and scrambled eggs.
“Sorry,” I said, after we were alone again. “I’m just . . . processing. Has it been up long?”
She shook her head. “I don’t think so. I only saw it in our cabin, just before we left for breakfast. I didn’t want to freak you out. I wasn’t, like, deliberately hiding it.” Her lips tightened in an appeal for understanding. I remembered her telling me to forget about petitioning McTavish.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”
“It’s fair enough. Although”—she looked at the table setting— “in retrospect, I probably should have told you when there weren’t knives to hand. Just remember, the only people who read reviews are the authors themselves, and other writers.”
“That’s what I’m worried about,” I said, then admitted, “I was hoping I’d fit in a little better.” It sounded childish, but I’d been worried about it since the invite. All the other invitees had published multiple books or had multiple accolades; they were writers. I’d simply been at a place where a bunch of people had killed another bunch of people and been the one to write it all down. I’d already felt like an imposter; now I knew for sure that at least one of my contemporaries considered me one. I figured it wouldn’t be long before the others joined the chorus.
“You haven’t even met everyone yet—”
“I don’t . . . I don’t know if I deserve to be here.”
There was more to it than that, of course, but that was the best way of saying both of my concerns in the same sentence. It was about as much as I was ready to admit to, in any case.
“Hey! Your book’s just as good as any of theirs. Besides, we’ll be out of mobile reception in a few hours. No one is even going to see—”
“Copped a pasting from the old Scot, I see.” The man in rainbow suspenders whom I’d suspected of being Alan Royce stuck out a hand and proved me right. “Alan Royce. Mind?”
He didn’t wait for an answer or a shake, wriggling his way into the seat across from Juliette with a grunt. His blocky frame did not sit comfortably in the little table booth. His bulbous ears had more hair than his head, protruding antennae of such length that I decided he could hardly be unaware of them and likely they served some function similar to a cat’s whiskers, considering his peripheral vision was reduced by his tiny teddy-bear eyes. When he got himself settled, he looked around, or perhaps his ear hair thrummed, and he snapped his fingers at Cynthia. Embarrassment flooded through me: now she’d definitely think we were a table of snappers.
While he ordered, I noticed he’d placed the little notebook he’d been carrying around open on the table. It was a cluttered mess of notes, but I caught that he’d written in all caps: KEEP THE MURDERS TO A MINIMUM and next to it the word TITLE? Underneath that was a list of names, including both mine and Juliette’s, and dot-point descriptions. Next to my name he’d written: cherub-esque face: wide-eyed, often confused, unacademic. Next to Juliette he’d written: out of his league. This is probably why I’ve focused so much of my own description on his ear hair. Authors are a petty bunch. He also had a list of notes about the train, which you’ve already read in my own descriptions. There are only so many ways to describe the carriage: emerald-green carpet; in case of emergency, pull here; axe; barramundi = 75 kgs. He’d even nicked Juliette’s joke, having written: fuel coupon.
He caught me reading and flipped the notebook over. Authors are a protective bunch, too.
“You write forensic thrillers, don’t you?” Juliette attempted to change the topic away from my review.
“My protagonist is a forensic pathologist, if that’s what you mean. Dr. Jane Black: eleven books, three novellas.”
“I used to love CSI,” I said.
Alan rolled his eyes. “I prefer to think that I write novels about society, depravity and humanity, and the crime itself is just the engine for a more . . .”—he paused in obvious affectation—“enlightened conversation around some real-world issues. I find all that CSI stuff quite”—his lips curled into a cruel smile as he deliberately chose his next word—“ghastly.”