‘I remember you, you’re the lady who talked to us at school the other day.’
‘That’s right.’
Emma could hear the smile in the woman’s voice. ‘Cool.’ ‘You’d better check with your parents then, make sure it’s okay.’
‘Sure.’ Emma put her hand over the receiver and left it there for a moment. Her mother got up from the table to make herself another cup of tea. Taking advantage of her turned back, Christopher took the paper and spread it open at the finance pages, now obscuring the headlines completely.
‘Yes, they said it would be fine,’ Emma said into the phone after a suitable lull. ‘When shall I start?’
‘Come over to my place after school today to meet Izzy, number 25 Hill View terrace. We can take it from there.’
Forgetting the disturbing newspaper headline for a moment, Emma gave an excited little jump, which neither of her parents noticed. Every job meant more money for Josef and the Cause, more freedom and another step towards getting away from this place. Her toast popped and she smothered it in butter and lashings of honey. She was ready to make her escape when her mother said, ‘You’re not going to school dressed like that are you?’
Emma shrugged, causing her toast to fall from the plate and land honey side down on the faux marble floor.
‘Please, let’s not start again, Miranda,’ Christopher said with a long sigh. ‘Just let her wear what she likes.’
‘But she dresses like that just to spite me, she knows it upsets me. She knows it, but still she goes to school dressed like a tramp.’
‘The way kids dress these days is no reflection on their upbringing. Everyone knows Emma comes from a good home, that I have money.’
Miranda’s sigh was worthy of Greek tragedy. ‘Well I certainly haven’t seen much of your money recently. Besides, this isn’t only about you, or only about money, Christopher.’
‘Don’t worry, Miranda,’ Emma said as she mopped up the honey from the faux marble tiles. ‘Not too many people know I’m your daughter—it’s not something I care to advertise.’
‘For heaven’s sake, stop calling me by my first name!’
Emma glanced at her father. He looked up from his paper, met her eye and gave her a wink.
The doorbell rang but no one moved to answer it. Julian Holdsworth, Miranda’s photographer, let himself in and wandered through the house to the family room just as Emma was making her way back upstairs. One glance at his beaming face and droopy blond noodle of a moustache made her quicken her steps. ‘How’s my gorgeous girl then?’ he called up to her. The look he gave her as she beat her retreat made her relieved she wasn’t wearing a skirt. She pretended she hadn’t heard him and closed her bedroom door.
The voices had long since gone from downstairs, her parents and Julian having left for work. Emma looked at her watch; she still had half an hour before she was due at school.
The breakfast table had been left in disarray for the housekeeper. The paper lay where her father had left it, the finance pages spread across the dirty plates. She stopped for a moment, not daring to touch it. As she downed the half finished glass of orange juice her mother had left she thought how unusual it was for Miranda to leave any. The pervert at the modelling agency and mention of the police must really have left her rattled. The slippery smart of the vodka gave her the courage she needed to turn to the front page of the paper: ‘Missing girl’s body found at Midland building site.’
Another victim, another miserable story and this one with an ending of the worst kind. She read on until her glasses misted, and she was forced to remove and clean them on her T-shirt. Her hands shook. Breathing deeply, she tried to pull herself together—this was not the time for tears.
Back in her room, her fingers flew across the keyboard with little conscious thought from her. Emma hated to be late for school, but today she would have to make an exception. She would tell the teacher there’d been a trauma at home. Her father had run over their dog in the driveway and they’d had to make an emergency dash to the vet. In the car she’d held poor Snuffy in her arms, one side of his dear little head caved in and covered in gore. The vet was going to wire the dog’s jaw and set his broken leg, but he didn’t think he’d survive the operation. The tears Emma had held back while she read the newspaper would be allowed to gush freely. Everyone would believe her and everyone would feel sorry for her. Emma Breightling was a good actor; Emma Breightling was good at everything she chose to do.
And she was also an exceedingly good liar.
8
CHAT ROOM TRANSCRIPT 100207
TIMTAM: did u get the pix of the mullets I sent?
ANGEL12: yeah thnx
TIMTAM: what do u think?
ANGEL12: squeeeeeee!!!!
TIMTAM: did they make u feel horny?
ANGEL12: ur baaaad lol!
Robert Mason had been denied bail. He would be held on remand at Hakea prison, pending trial.
‘The bus from Hakea will be here soon, but there’s a few more things we need to ask,’ Stevie said as a uniformed officer escorted Robert Mason into one of Central’s interview rooms.
She glanced at Tash and gave her a discreet nod. It would be interesting to see how she handled their pre-planned tactics, if she could strike the right balance in her ‘bad cop’ role. It would also be a good indication of how seriously Tash had taken her earlier warning. This was a fact-finding mission only and hard as it might be, it was paramount that they leave their personal prejudices outside the interview room door.
The uniformed officer pushed Mason into a chair and closed the door behind him. Mason leaned on the table and pushed his fingers through his spiky hair, looking first at Tash then at Stevie.
‘You two again?’ he whined. ‘I’ve admitted it, I’m gonna plead guilty, what more do you want?’ Swamped in regulation overalls, he looked ridiculously young, almost young enough to be a victim himself.
Stevie couldn’t have cared less.
‘Just a few more questions, that’s all,’ she said.
‘But shouldn’t my lawyer be here?’ Mason looked around the barren interview room as if his lawyer might appear out of one of the sludge green walls.
‘It’s okay, we’ve discussed this with him, it doesn’t involve your actual case.’
‘Then w-what...’
‘Cooperate with us now and I guarantee it will be taken into consideration during the trial,’ Stevie said.
He was interested; Stevie could tell by the way his deep brown eyes stopped flitting around the room to focus on hers. Tash had called them ‘gravy eyes’, but bottomless cesspools might be a more appropriate term, Stevie reflected, keeping her face blank.
He touched his brow. ‘I have a headache.’
‘I’ll get you something for it in a minute,’ she said. When she was ready to get him something, she would, and not before. To get the optimum amount of information from him he had to be shown that his every physical need was under their control.