Sleight Malice Read online

  She took a step toward Trent, her hand outstretched. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  He shook his head, not looking up.

  “Do you want to see Selena?” she asked, not knowing what else to say. “Would you like me to drive you to the hospital?”

  Another headshake, a flop of blond hair hiding his eyes.

  “I need to make a phone call,” Fergus said, his voice unnaturally loud. “I’ll just be outside if you need me.”

  Glancing over her shoulder at him, she mouthed a thanks. With Fergus out of earshot, Trent might be more inclined to open up.

  “Wanker,” Trent muttered.

  “Pardon?” she said, hoping she had misheard.

  He lifted his head, his dejected expression hardening into a bitter mask. “Your new playmate trying to play the big man.”

  She glared at him, any compassion she might have felt for him dissolving. “Why do I bother? Whenever someone tries to help, you lash out at them. You really are your own worst enemy.”

  His face slackened, his eyes and mouth droopy in self-pity. Before she could stop him, he grabbed her hands, clutching them to his chest. “Please, Des…”

  She wrenched her hands from his grip. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  He hung his head without answering, the grain pattern in the wooden floorboards evidently more compelling.

  “What is it you want from me, Trent? I gave you everything I had when we were married. I don’t have anything left to give.”

  “We all make mistakes.”

  She sighed. How many times did they have to go through this charade? “Yes, but some of us learn from ours.”

  “I can change, Des,” he said advancing toward her. “Let me prove it to you.”

  She backed away, her hands palm out in front of her. “No. You can’t come running to me every time something goes wrong in your life.”

  He scratched his stubbly chin, surveying her face.

  “Now,” she said, “do you want that lift to the hospital or not?”

  “She told me it was mine, but you and I both know that’s impossible. She’s carrying another man’s baby, Des.”

  So neither of them had been honest with the other, Desley thought. Trent had obviously neglected to mention the small matter of his infertility when he asked Selena to marry him. She in return had cheated on him and tried to pass off the resulting pregnancy as his. Like attracting like?

  “Whose is it, then, Trent?”

  He blew out a mouthful of air and wiped a hand across his mouth. “I need a drink.”

  Following him into the living room, she realized not only had he broken into her house, he had helped himself to her liquor cabinet; not that a half bottle of Cointreau, a liter of duty-free Bombay Sapphire gin and a bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label – a gift from a client – constituted a bar. He upended what was left of the whisky into his glass.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll replace it,” he said, waving a hand over the empty bottle.

  She stayed standing as he flopped down onto the red leather couch, slinging one arm across the back.

  “Who’s the father of my fiancée’s baby, you ask? Well…” He paused, throwing back half the contents of the glass in one gulp. “I have my suspicions. Bastard takes what he wants, when he wants.”

  Sounded vaguely familiar.

  “Don’t look at me like that. I’m nothing like Ryan Moore.”

  CHAPTER 10

  “…Laura’s Ryan…” Fergus heard Desley say as he returned to the living room.

  He loitered in the doorway for a moment. Desley stood less than two meters away from him with one foot and her body angled toward the door, her head turned to the right. Her ex-husband lounged across her red couch as if he owned the place, his stocking feet crossed at the ankles on the giant dice coffee table. Neither noticed him.

  “Yep, one and the sa—” Trent spotted him, his eyes narrowing.

  Desley followed his gaze. “How much did you hear?”

  “Enough,” Fergus said, his voice gruff, implying he knew more than he did. He really had no idea what they had been talking about except it involved one of the missing couple. “Didn’t you know obstructing a police investigation is a criminal offence?”

  Desley’s eyebrows arched. “I’ve only just found out myself. Besides, you can’t seriously think Trent has anything to do with what’s happened.”

  “It doesn’t matter what I think—”

  “Hallelujah!” Trent dropped his feet off the coffee table and sat up, flicking the air with his hand. “Now be a good boy and run along home. Des and I have things to talk about.”

  Fergus snorted. No more Mr Nice Guy, he thought. “I bet.” Turning to Desley, he said, “Ask him where he was the night of the fire.”

  “She doesn't need to. Des knows I was right here,” Trent said, patting the leather beside him, “sleeping on this very couch.”

  Desley’s face blanched. She tried to conceal her surprise, but not before Fergus saw it. He felt her tension, sensed the internal debate raging behind those dark-lashed hazel eyes. Loyalty or truth?

  “Like you were earlier today.” Fergus couldn’t help himself. He had to make her see her ex for what he really was. “Right, Trent?”

  Trent rolled his eyes.

  “What’s going on?” Desley asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “What haven’t you told me?”

  Trent propped his feet back up on the coffee table, and crossed his arms. “As I said, get rid of him and we’ll talk.”

  “No, Trent.” She shoved his feet onto the floor, the dismay on his face gratifying Fergus no end. “Whatever you have to say, you can say in front of Fergus. I’ve had enough of your games.”

  Silence.

  “I’m waiting.”

  “All right, all right. I told the cops I spent the night here. No harm done.”

  “You expect me to lie to the police?”

  Trent scraped his fingers through his tousled blond locks. “You have to understand, I had to do something to get them off my back. They weren’t going to let up until they either had a confession or an alibi.”

  “And what about the truth? Did that even cross your mind?” Desley tapped her forehead with such ferocity Fergus feared she would leave a dent. “You’ve implicated me in something I want no part in,” she continued. “How dare you.”

  Fergus watched, bemused as Desley continued to berate her insolent git of an ex-husband. He half-expected claws to spring from the end of her fingertips. He didn’t feel one iota of sympathy for the man. It had obviously been a long time coming.

  “A man is dead, Laura and Ryan are missing and all you’re worried about is copping a bit of flak from the police. If you don’t tell them about Selena’s fling or whatever it was with Ryan, I will.”

  “What? And give them more ammunition?”

  Desley threw her hands up in the air. “Tell him, Fergus…”

  He started to call him mate and stopped himself. Trent gave him a baleful stare. Regardless of what he said, Fergus knew it wouldn’t make the slightest difference to Trent. The man clearly resented what he perceived as nothing more than meddling interference from Fergus. That and old-fashioned jealousy, of course.

  “If you’ve done nothing wrong, you have nothing to worry about,” Fergus said, giving him the old dutiful line. “All false alibis and concealing information do is make you look more suspicious in the eyes of the law. Come clean while you can.” He might as well have been speaking to a mannequin for all the good it did. “If Desley means anything to you at all,” he continued, “you wouldn’t do this to her.”

  Trent downed what was left of his whisky and stood up. “Are you quite finished?”

  “I have but you haven’t. DI Grant Buchanan is on his way over now. You can stay and talk to him like the responsible person you are or you could walk away, leaving Desley to fight your battles. Your choice.”

  Trent grimaced at Fergus, his lips parting as
if he were about to say something. Then, without a word, he marched off in the opposite direction of the front door.

  Desley gave a gentle sigh. “Thanks, Fergus. Alcohol makes him belligerent.”

  He raised an eyebrow.

  “But I’m not making excuses for him,” she quickly added.

  A toilet flushed somewhere down the hall. Then Trent reappeared, still in the throes of zipping up his fly. “Coffee, white with three, if I’m going to face the interrogation squad,” he said to Desley. “Can’t have them accusing me of being half-cut on top of everything else, can I?”

  She glanced at him as he flopped back on the couch, but said nothing, continuing to clear the empty Johnny Walker bottle and dirty glass from the coffee table.

  Fergus followed her into the kitchen. “I’ll make it if you like.”

  She switched the espresso machine on to heat.

  “I promise not to put cyanide in it,” he added. “You can supervise.”

  A tiny smile tweaked the corners of her mouth. His heart lifted at the breakthrough, small as it was. The disappearance of her best friend seemed to have sucked the life out of the vivacious woman he’d first met. Not that it wasn’t perfectly understandable. Having an ex-husband like Trent could only add to her burden.

  She handed him the tin of ground coffee, a mischievous glint lighting her eyes. “Cyanide.”

  He laughed. “One or two scoops?”

  The doorbell rang, wiping the smile from her face. “That’ll be the KGB,” she said in an obvious reference to Trent’s ‘interrogation squad’ comment.

  Perfect timing as usual, he thought as Desley left to answer the door. Why was it that every time he felt he was finally starting to get to know her, something or someone would intervene? Opening the dishwasher to look for extra cups, he realized he knew his way around her kitchen a lot better than he knew her. Having an ex-husband lurking in the background hadn’t surprised him, the idea Trent still held so much power over her did.

  Hearing Grant Buchanan’s gravelly voice and Kim Mitchell’s more dulcet tones in the hall, he was reminded of the way Desley had refused to be intimidated by the detectives. Not that he would have ever said it to her face, but she came across as having balls: a strong-willed woman who knew her own mind and stood up for her beliefs. So what was it with her ex, then? Emotional blackmail of some sort?

  He heard Desley offer the detectives coffee.

  “Thank you, but we need a few words with Mr James first. Where is he?” Grant rounded the corner, his eyes creasing in wry amusement. “You have your PI well-trained—”

  “And I do party tricks, too,” Fergus interjected. “White and strong? Like your men, if I remember correctly.”

  Incomprehension fleeted across Desley’s face, followed by realization. She blushed, looking everywhere but at Grant.

  Fergus almost laughed out loud. What was it about gay men that attracted women? In Grant’s case, it certainly wasn’t his sensitive side. If the macho detective had one, it wasn’t evident.

  “Your Mr James is in the living room,” he said, going to Desley’s rescue. “And good luck – you’ll need it.”

  He put an arm out to stop Desley following the detectives, ushering her to the other end of the kitchen instead. “Not yet. They’ll want to talk to him first without you…” He corrected himself. “…us present. Besides, I’ve found you learn more eavesdropping. If we hinder Grant and Kim at this stage, they’ll just take Trent to the station and then we’ll really be in the dark. Do you want that?”

  Shaking her head, she crept with him to a position where they couldn’t be seen by, or see, those in the living room. His pulse quickened at the light spicy overtones of her perfume as she stood, her body almost touching him. Her warm fingertips brushed the back of his hand and for a moment, all he heard was the thudding of his own heart.

  Oblivious to the effect of her close proximity on him, she leaned forward, her left ear cocked. He swallowed, straightening his body and stretching the distance between them. He forced himself to focus on the voices coming from the other room.

  “I had to say something. If I hadn’t, I would still be sitting in that bloody room answering your incessant questions over and over. There’s only so much a man can take. An innocent one at that…”

  “Mr James – Trent – telling us what you think we want to hear doesn’t help anyone. Least of all you.” Kim’s voice stayed low but in control.

  Fergus heard a sigh and assumed it was from Trent. “What the hell do you want me to tell you then?”

  “How about starting with your whereabouts and movements on the night of 30th June this year, the night of the Lydia Street fire? The truth this time, please.”

  “What’s the point? You’re not going to believe me anyway.”

  “Try us.”

  “I was at home alone, in bed and fast asleep. Satisfied? No, I thought not.”

  “Can anyone verify that?”

  Silence.

  “I’m trying to help you here, Trent. Work with me. Where was your fiancée? You do live together, right?”

  “Do we? You tell me.” Another sigh. “She could’ve been in Timbuktu for all I know. The story she fed me was she was going on a girls’ night out and she would crash at one of her friend’s places for the night. Ask her.”

  “Did you take any phone calls at home that night?”

  “Not that I remember. See, I told you it was pointless. Why don’t you just stick the handcuffs on now and get it over with?”

  Fergus grabbed Desley as she lunged forward, about to burst into the living room. She looked at his hand wrapped tight around her arm, then up at his face, her eyes wide. He shook his head. “Wait,” he mouthed.

  “And wait for him to confess to something he didn’t do?” she whispered.

  Before he knew it, she had slipped from his grasp.

  “Coffee anyone?” she announced loudly from the doorway.

  Grant gave her a dirty look, but continued speaking. “…let’s move onto this morning then. Besides Desley, do you have anyone who can vouch for your whereabouts since 8 p.m. last night?”

  “What the fuck are you on about?” A vein pulsed above Trent’s left eye, his face beyond red. He stood up. “What unsolved crime are you trying to pin on me now? Don’t you think if I had known I would need an alibi, I would’ve made damned sure I had one?”

  “Please sit down, Mr James. Or perhaps you would prefer to continue this at the station.”

  Like a sullen schoolboy, Trent hesitated for a few seconds before he saw the error of his ways. Desley’s couch had to be a better proposition to the austere and impersonal environs of a police interview room. Slouched on the couch, his open legs at odds with his crossed arms, he looked across the room at Desley.

  Returning his gaze, her eyes sent out a message in a code Fergus didn’t understand. A lover’s language that only they understood? Was it possible that despite her protestations, Desley still loved her cheating ex-husband? Or was it something deeper? A secret they both shared?

  CHAPTER 11

  She scraped the tarry, black spread across the thick slice of wholemeal bread and dropped it into the toaster. The strong smell of roasted Vegemite soon filled the kitchen. Breakfast Desley style.

  Starting with an appetizer of two women’s multivitamins, she waited for the toast to pop and the coffee machine to heat. She needed the boost. Her mother wouldn’t have approved, but the last thing on Desley’s mind had been eating properly. Sleep hadn’t figured high on her priority list either.

  Not that she hadn’t tried. Most nights she lay awake in her bed, staring into the darkness. Her body craved sleep, but her overburdened mind refused to co-operate. Her frustration with the police over their apparent lack of progress in the investigation didn’t help.

  And why had she nearly gouged Fergus’s eyes out when he intimated that when it came to her ex-husband her judgment might be clouded? Perhaps, she told herself, because it’s closer to
the truth than you’re willing to admit.

  The toaster popped. She juggled the hot toast onto a plate, leaving it to cool before she buttered it.

  Yawning, she rested against the granite bench, her elbows propped on the chill surface. Her head drifted down until it rested in her hands. Horses could sleep standing up; perhaps she should give it a go. She closed her eyes.

  A jarring peal immediately dismissed all concept of sleep from her mind. Groaning, she trudged off to see who the inconsiderate person ringing her doorbell was. God help you, Trent, if it’s you, she thought irritably. It had taken her long enough the evening before, after the police had released him, to get rid of him.

  “You do believe me, don’t you, Des?” he had asked as she pushed him out the door.

  “Yes, yes, yes. Now go home. You need your beauty sleep. It’s been a long day for both of us.”

  “God, you can’t think I’m the only person with a grudge against Ryan—”

  “Bye, Trent. Don’t keep your taxi driver waiting.” Before he could object, she had shut the door, closing him and the night out.

  For all she knew, he had spent the intervening hours passed out on her doorstep, only now waking cold and hungry, but she doubted it. More than likely, he’d snored his way through the night in the comfort of his own home, if not his bed. And knowing him, he was back at her door nursing a massive hangover, looking for painkillers and more sympathy. Neither of which she had any left to give.

  Hardening her resolve not to let the man inveigle his way back into the house, she threw the door open, a few terse words at the ready.

  “Fergus!”

  He handed her a bulging brown paper bag. “I promised you breakfast from Bert’s, and breakfast from Bert’s it is.” Shoving his hands into the deep side-pockets of his bulky tan-and-black windcheater, he produced a jar of jam from his right and a tub of butter from the other. “I came prepared.”

  Desley didn’t know what to say. Thinking back, she vaguely remembered a mention of Bert’s and something about breakfast. However, she didn’t recall them being in the same sentence.