Forgotten (11 page)

“You talk such crap, Ethan.”

“
Course I
do.” Ethan shoved his spotless plate forward. “So, this Cabriati
fascination of yours, are you going to show me the info or not? Am
a very, busy man, you know.”

***

Once in the office, Ethan headed straight
for the chess game, clasped his hands in a prayer-like position and
pressed it against his day-old, stubbly chin. It took him only a
few seconds to judge the state of play. “What’s this?”

Reardon noted Ethan’s gobsmacked expression
and took major delight in it. He casually sauntered to his desk.
“Checkmate.”

“Impossible.”

Reardon gave
a small, informal shrug and smiled. “What can I say, it’s all there
in black and white.” He collected a few sheets from his printer and
handed them to his friend.

Ethan
chucked him a twisted smirk. “You’re such a funny man.” He dropped
into the sofa and began flipping through the sheets.

Reardon crossed his arms and mentally
reviewed the fresh information he had just given Ethan. It was a
phone transcript between a notable federal MP, Senator Carlos
Macey, and a man named Colt, dated a week before Christmas.

And it was
definitely interesting.

“Where the hell did you get this?” Ethan
said.

“
Can’t
answer that or I’ll have to….”

“
Yeah, yeah,
kill me right? It’s a wonder you don’t have a ton of coppers
beating down your door.”

Reardon chuckled. “I have the actual
recording. Want to hear it?”

“As long as it doesn’t involve a jail term.”
Sloane stood and shifted closer.

Reardon half-turned and clicked the mouse.
“The first person you hear is the Senator.” He then began the
recording.

***

“Yes, Angela.”

“
There’s a
Mr. Colt on the line. He says it’s urgent and that you
would
speak to
him.”

A small pause.

“Put him through.” The senator’s voice was
sturdy and even toned. In fact, both voices were extraordinarily
clear for a recording.

A couple of clicking noises followed, then a
low, crusty voice. “It’s me.”

“
I’ve told
you before. Don
’t call me on this
phone.”

“
I do
apologize,
Senator.” Said with
unmistakable sarcasm. “But you’re not answering your other
one
.”

“I’ve been busy. What do you want?”

“What do I want? Haven’t you been following
the news?”

“And?”

“Stop playing games. You know exactly what
I’m talking about and… I’m… worried. We all are.”

A longer pause.

“
I don’t
want to talk about this now.” The senator’s voice had changed, more
hushed, more ruthless.

“Then pick a time.”

“I’ll call on my other phone and arrange
something.”

“
When? I
told you, we’re all rattled.”

“Soon. Just keep your nerve. All of you.
Understand?”

Colt mumbled
an agreement, but Reardon couldn’t mistake his reluctance, or the
edgy tremors in Colt’s next words.

“
Do you
think… that Claudia Cabriati has remembered?”

***

Reardon
stopped the recording, deliberately allowing the question to
suspend in mid-air,
deliberately waiting
for Ethan’s reaction. It came fast, Ethan’s expression an
impressive level of shock and confusion. “Told you it was
interesting,” Reardon said.

“What on earth would a Federal Senator have
to do with Cabriati?”

“
Good
question and not one I’ve discovered the answer to yet. But,
there’s more.” And Reardon continued the recording.

***

“
How the
hell should I know if she has remembered?” It was
Senator Macey. “And even if she has, she isn’t
going to say anything, not publicly anyway.”

This time, Ethan’s look was brimming with
questions and no doubt, the same questions that Reardon had already
considered.

Colt cleared his voice. “One more
thing.”

Macey groaned.

“We’re also wondering if….”

Colt went silent. Reardon suspected it was
due more to Colt’s apparent nervousness. Macey’s verbal impatience
spurred Colt on.

“
If you had
anything to do with…
Alice.”

The
Senator’s reaction was immediate. “Are you completely mad? Of
course, I didn
’t.”

“It just seems too coincidental.”

“Well, if it’s such a bloody coincidence
then maybe it was one of you.”

“
We
wouldn’t! I… wouldn’t….”

The Senator
cut Colt short. “I’ve had enough of this shit,” he said. “Just wait
for my call.”

“Soon then.”

And with that, the recording ended.

***

Ethan
grabbed his red cricket ball from one of the sofas. He began
pitching it between alternate hands as he insouciantly paced the
floor. Reardon went and stood by the glass doors, inhaled the
soothing, peaceful beauty of the jade-
colored hills and waited.

Time passed with every slow, silent sway of
nearby ghost gums.

“
Okay, you
win, buddy,” Ethan said. “My interest is piqued.” He stopped the
pacing, instead rested against the mini-bar. “So, have you found
out anything more about this Colt character or what Macey’s
connection with him is?”

“Not yet, but working on it. It’s obvious
both knew Polinski.”

“And Polinski’s death? Reckon the Senator
had anything to do with it?”

Reardon shrugged. “He sounded genuinely
shocked.”

“He’s a bloody politician. They make their
career on sounding genuine!” Ethan chucked the ball back into the
sofa. It landed with a splosh and stilled. “This is crazy stuff.
Who is this Cabriati woman?”

Precisely what Reardon had thought when
first hearing the conversation. “Someone whose name keeps cropping
up in the most unexpected places.” He stared blindly through the
sun-struck glass.

“You still think she may have some answers
for you.”

Ethan
sounded
concerned. And why wouldn’t he?
Ethan knew Reardon’s past, every inconceivable, nightmarish detail
of it.

“That she will give you some clues.”

To the
whereabouts of those - as Ethan elaborately stated - ‘psychotic
deadheads’ that Reardon still searched for? He was certainly
beginning to believe so. Or maybe it was nothing more than sheer
desperation on Reardon’s part.

“
It’s why
you’re still hanging onto her.”

Possibly.
But, bugger, if there wasn’t something more, something he still
couldn’t quite finger. He spun to Ethan.

A
recogni
zably mischievous grin played
across Ethan’s face. “You could just interrogate her for answers.
You know rip out a few nails, bucket her with cold
water….”

“Could you be serious just for a
moment?”

“Thought I was.”

Reardon
ignored him, returned to his desk and sat down. “If we could just
convince her that she needs our help.”

“
Really.
An
d what makes you assume little Miss
No-Show even wants our help?”

“
I don’t,
but Claudia’s friend, Melanie Lloyd, seems adamant that she does.
She rang to apologize on Claudia’s behalf.”

“
Claudia?
Cabriati has now become Claudia? Shit, man, you have it
bad.”

“You can be a real arsehole, Ethan. Not
everything in this world is about sex.”

“
What? Are
you telling me my whole, adult life has not been…
everything
?”

The office phone shrilled. Reardon was
almost thankful for it. He swung around and picked it up. A
hurried, panicky voice responded on the other end.

“Are you sure no one has noticed yet?”
Reardon said.

An answer.

“And Claudia is nowhere in sight?”

A pause.

“Tony, can you hold off ringing the police
for as long as you can just until we get there?”

Another pause.

“Appreciate it. And if Claudia returns, keep
her away. Got it? ”

Reardon hung up, then grabbed his keys and
sunglasses from the side drawer.

Ethan
straightened. “Are you going to tell me where we’re going and why?”
He rested his De Laurent shades on his nose.

Reardon stood, strode out of the study and
down the short hall, with long, slow steps. “There’s been another
body.”

“What, in Cabriati’s complex?”

“You could say that, but with an added
personal touch this time.”

Reardon swung open the front door and
stepped out. Although the day was still young, the summer heat was
already taking its first, sharp bite on his skin. It certainly
wasn’t a good day to be wearing jeans. Nevertheless, he began to
make his way down the wide steps.

“
Personal in
the sense, that the body is in
her
car.”

December 26, 2010

7:05 am

MY HEAD!

I
could swear a pack of sadistic demolitionists
was operating jackhammers in it. I licked my dry lips several times
then shuddered at their foul taste.

Shit, how much had I drunk last night?

I was
getting pictures, not exactly flattering ones. Me dancing, me
singing, me being
exuberantly sociable
and poor Nate coming to my rescue… yet again.

I shook my
head and winced, deciding not to shake it again. I opened one eye,
was grateful for the heavy window drapes and instantly recognized
the enormous, blue bear eyeing me off. I had kept my promise and
stayed the night in my old bedroom.

But it
hadn’t been easy.

Nonno’s
bombshell had left me
confused, anxious and weighed down by an army of questions. The
fact that Nonno had again regressed, and
Milo had departed for another social event, left those
questions disturbingly unanswered. As for asking any one of my
family,
who was I to put a sudden blot on
the festivities with absurd, unexpected accusations of which I was
still unsure.
I recalled the unbearable
impulse I had to run away from it all. But it was Christmas.
Instead, I reached for the next best escape.

Alcohol.

And lots of it.

I clutched
my thick, soft pillow, inhaled its old, memorable smells and again
asked myself the same questions. Could there be any merit to
Nonno’s ramblings? Are there really people in my
family who had known Alice and not told me? Or was some Alice
Polinski paranoia tricking me into believing such a
conspiracy?

On the other
hand, hadn’t I already sensed that I knew Alice in some odd way?
Hadn’t I wondered how her cards made their way beneath my pillow
each year? Why then did I think it so impossible that someone in my
family could be involved?

I sat up. My head was still thunderous, not
just from the alcoholic indulgence but from a restless sleep. And I
didn’t even want to think about the reception I would get from my
family. Maybe I could just make a spineless exit through my bedroom
window. It wouldn’t have been the first time.

I went and
had a long shower and two Panadols instead. Dressed in the same
clothes as the previous day, I left to face whatever lay
ahead.

Enticing
smells of fried bacon met me as I entered the kitchen. The
censorious glare from my mother, the solemn disquiet from my father
and the annoying jeers from my brothers, didn’t ease my craving for
the best hangover food. I needed to feel better and quickly. As
soon as Nate took me home, my plan was to visit Milo as he had,
himself, suggested. I apologized to everyone for the previous night
and then tucked into breakfast.

“Claudia,” my father began. “We have been
talking….”

Uh oh,
here
we go
.

I wordlessly implored Nate for help. He
appeared too engrossed with his breakfast. I glanced at Marcus. He
seemed amused at the whole scene.

“We think that until you feel better, you
should be at home where we can care for you.”

I sighed, a
very profound, very exasperated sigh. I knew they loved me, I knew
they worried, but at times, it was all so tedious. “No, Papa,” I
tried to say in a strong, disciplined voice, yet the words
feeble
and
limp
came to mind.

I avoided
Papa’s worrying stare and turned to Mama. She was collecting dirty
dishes and cutlery, preparing them for the dishwasher. She was
strangely silent. Her face, however, spoke volumes. A little
irritation, a little concern, but a whole lot of something else.
Fear, perhaps?

My mother caught my eyes and then hastily
cut away from me. This family, I decided, was becoming more
peculiar by the moment. I blinked several times and then acting on
some bizarre impulse, I did the unthinkable.

“
Papa, did
anyone in our family know Alice Polinski?”

The effect was instantaneous.

My brothers
stopped eating, their cutlery absurdly suspended in mid-air. I
noted the frosty exchange between my parents. I noted my mother’s
fingers tighten against the edge of the breakfast bar. And then I
waited patiently for an answer from the man I knew would never lie
to me.