29.

Monday 8 April, 9 pm.

Damien typed a couple of words into his essay, highlighted them and hit delete. f.u.c.k he had to spend more time on this s.h.i.t. You couldn't just fake your way through a paper t.i.tled Synthesis of Biologically Active Cyclic Peptides. He saved the doc.u.ment, closed the file and opened another Free Cell card game. With two fingers, he searched mindlessly for an easy game; his other hand raked through his blond hair. He exhaled noisily. The place stank of cat p.i.s.s, an after-effect of the last meth cook.

He could just pack up and leave here any time; G.o.d knew he had the money now to rent somewhere else. When he'd told Byron earlier that he was having trouble burning through all the cash, he hadn't been joking. He had more than a hundred grand right now sitting in a safe deposit box in Martin Place. What the h.e.l.l could you do with that sort of money? Plenty if it was legal. It would be a good deposit on a house.

But unlaundered drug money? Good luck with that. Damien wasn't stupid. He wasn't going to create any kind of goods or paper trail that could link him to this enterprise should it all go south. And that meant no cars, boats or Rolex watches. He could spend it on holidays yeah, when? Between the drug shop and uni, he didn't have time to s.h.i.t unless he took the trip with a textbook and a highlighter pen.

Whitey was churning through a bit on hotels and wh.o.r.es, but Damien couldn't get into it. A couple of times he'd been to Whitey's favourite ma.s.sage parlour, but on both occasions he'd found himself speaking to the girls about how they'd ended up doing work like that. He couldn't force a girl to have s.e.x with him, and, paid or not, it didn't seem like the staff at Sultan's Court had really had a lot of choice in how they ended up in their so-called chosen profession.

No doubt about it, life was becoming seedier by the day, and he was over it. What had started as an experiment to make some high quality happy pills had become nothing more than an immoral way to make too much money. Damien was a scientist. This wasn't the way he saw the rest of his life going.

His mouth twisted. It felt as though a hand had grown inside his gut and was squeezing it periodically; he just knew this thing was going to end badly.

And it seemed like this was the beginning of the end. He didn't want Kasem Nader to have any idea who he was. And now this guy wanted to go into some sort of business with them? Nope, not going to happen. Damien would speak to Whitey tonight about shutting up shop. And if Whitey didn't like it, fine. He had plenty of cash, knew the recipes; he could get a new cook and move on with his life. Just not in this house.

Damien closed the card game and tried to get back into his essay.

30.

Tuesday 9 April, 12 pm.

Having the car was great, except that Jill woke up to find that everyone in the houso block suddenly needed a ride; had an errand they had to do today that couldn't wait. She needn't have worried about them not buying her story that her ex had given it to her, trying to win her back; apparently c.r.a.p cars were an acceptable make-up present around here. Frankly, she didn't think they gave a toss where she got the car a car was a car. She fobbed off half of the requests, but was happy to pick Jelly up from his unit in Merrylands and then drop him, Ingrid and Mrs Dang off at Westfield Parramatta, promising to pick them all up again in an hour.

She needed fresh air. She headed over to Parramatta Park, pulled in under a tree and hit the bike track. She ran for thirty minutes and got back to the car, winded. As she bent over the bonnet, she felt as though she was going to heave. You're out of condition, she told herself. The late nights and smoke-choked rooms were taking a toll. At two this morning, sitting on the side of her bed, waiting for it to stop moving, she'd looked down and found a roll of fat creased above her underpants. That had never been there before. But then, she'd never drunk sugar-soaked cask wine every night before either.

At least with the car it would be easier to get away to exercise, she thought. In this world, that was another behaviour that could put a target over your head. Exercise wasn't a high priority for most people around here, although Jill thought it should have been for most of her neighbours.

She took her mobile from the glove box and re-locked the car. She spotted a seat in the sun and made her way over. Although her body still thrummed with heat from the run, the days were shortening, and the shadows held their chill around the clock.

She scrolled through her stored numbers, wondered whether he'd answer. She hit the call b.u.t.ton and waited to find out.

'Yep.' He picked up on the first ring.

'Gabriel?'

'Jill?'

'Hi, Gabe. Ah, how've you been?'

'Is that why you called?' Gabriel. Straight to the point.

'No, not really,' she said. 'Are you busy?'

'Designing a website,' he said.

'Is that for work?'

'Nope. I'm between a.s.signments.'

'So what's the website for?' she asked.

A pause. 'Well, I don't know. Just thought I should see whether I could do it.'

As you do. 'Oh, okay,' she said. 'Listen, Gabriel, I wondered whether I could maybe get a little help with something I'm working on now. I wanted to get some advice.'

'Cool. I just put the lamb on. It will be ready about seven-thirty.'

What? She wasn't asking to come to dinner. 'Gabriel, it's twelve o'clock. How long are you going to cook the meat?'

'Seven hours.'

'What?'

'Seven hours. It's seven-hour lamb.'

Jill had forgotten their conversations had mostly been like this. She smiled and shook her head. 'Well, I guess I could come over if that's all right with you. It's probably better than talking over the phone. Thanks,' she said. A thought occurred to her. 'Actually, Gabe, that would be great. I know you've got access to a lot of databases. Would it be all right if I use your computers?'

'You can stay the night.'

Jill took the phone away from her ear, held it in front of her face. Stared at it. Hard. She brought the phone back to her ear.

'No. That's okay.' She spoke slowly, as though communicating with a lunatic.

'You're undercover,' he said. 'It'll be easier.'

Okay, first, how does that follow? And second, 'How do you know that?'

'We shouldn't talk about it over the phone,' said Gabriel, a little sternly, as if she had brought it up. 'So, I'll see you at seven.'

I give up, Jill thought. 'Great,' she told Gabriel. 'That would be great.'

'Don't forget your toothbrush,' he said. 'I've only got the one.'

Seren rinsed her hair a third time. Even though they wore paper caps, her hair always smelled like iron after work, the stench of blood and s.h.i.t permeating everything, even her cropped locks. She towelled it off and stepped out of the shower.

Pay day. Rent day tomorrow.

She stepped into knickers and a bra and then kneeled at the side of her bed. She stretched a hand underneath. Further. Her heart shot to her throat. Where . . . Her fingers finally found the edge of the box and she dragged it towards her.

Just a box. Well, it was the Louboutin s...o...b..x; the nicest box she'd ever seen, and in addition to that, it held her wages. She'd been told that the boss paid cash until you'd been there six months; eighty per cent of people didn't last that long, and that was all good to him.

Seren counted the cash. One more item of clothing was all she'd need to buy for herself, then she figured she could get the rest of her clothes free. After dinner with Christian at Alt.i.tude, she planned to hit him up for pressies. After all, he knew he owed her. He just had no idea how much.

Although it was only a Tuesday night, this was going to be tricky. Seren took eighty dollars from the box. That left just the rent. She prayed that Marco wouldn't need money for sport or an excursion this week. She mentally itemised the food she had for the week: potatoes and lettuce, flour, pasta, bread, cheese, eggs, b.u.t.ter, garlic, milk and Vegemite. That was it. So, sandwiches, omelettes, potato bake, pancakes, macaroni and cheese. Breakfast, lunch and dinner until next Tuesday. It would have to do.

She gnawed her lip. Was she seriously going to go and spend this eighty dollars on herself on new clothes for G.o.dsakes when she didn't otherwise have a cent to live on?

And what would eighty dollars get her anyway? Eighty dollars wasn't enough for a haircut in Christian's world; it was definitely nowhere near enough for a whole outfit.

Seren stood, and thought she caught another whiff of chicken blood. Maybe the stuff can soak into your skin, she thought, like a curse, a permanent reminder of the way she made a living the slaughtered chickens' last revenge.

She made her way back to the shower. She had to come up with something.

31.

Tuesday 9 April, evening.

'What would be nice with lamb?' Jill asked the man behind the counter of the bottle shop. She had no experience with wine of any quality.

Fifteen minutes later, with the bottle and a block of dark chilli chocolate in hand, Jill pressed the intercom b.u.t.ton at Gabriel's unit block in Ryde, located in Sydney's northwest. The buzzer sounded and the door lock clicked without Gabriel asking who it was.

Sloppy, she thought. For a cop. A federal cop at that. She climbed the stairs and knocked on his door.

'That's a piece of s.h.i.t,' he said, smiling, when he opened it.

'Sorry?' she said. He couldn't mean the wine; it was in a brown paper bag.

'That car,' he said. 'What a s.h.i.tbox.'

Jill shrugged. 'What are you gonna do? Company car.' She followed the gorgeous smells into the apartment, placed her purchases on the bench and glanced through the kitchen window. While the balcony of this unit overlooked a grove of native eucalypts, the view here, from the sink, was of the visitors' car park. She pulled down the blind, shutting out the sight of her Magna, illuminated brilliantly under a lamppost. Gabriel had obviously seen her drive in.

'Where's your stuff?' he asked.

She flushed. 'Well, I did bring a change of clothes. I left them in the car,' she said, speaking fast. 'It is a bit of a hike back there to Fairfield, and I figured that I should make the most of the time I can spend with your databases.' She moved her eyes in every direction but his.

'I meant your files,' he said.

Jill flushed. Had he been joking about staying over? f.u.c.k! She felt like opening the sliding doors and scaling down the huge tree that mushroomed outside Gabriel's balcony. She couldn't speak.

'Ha! Just s.h.i.tting you,' he said. 'It's good you're staying. I'm bored. We can get a lot done. I've been looking into this Kasem Nader.'

'What?'

'Nader. We've looked at him before, but only in connection with some of his a.s.sociates. He's got some cousins hooked up with a group of gun runners from Melbourne and the UK.'

'How do you know Nader's part of my a.s.signment?'

'Superintendent Last,' he said. 'We keep in touch.'

So much for a secret undercover operation, Jill thought. Still, she wasn't terribly disturbed that he was aware of the a.s.signment. She realised that she trusted him. Wow. That brought the number up to around five adults on the face of the earth.

But trusting him didn't mean she felt comfortable.

She peered around the kitchen, looking for something to do, to fiddle with, until they could eat or start work. The bench tops were clear. She tugged at her top, a little unsettled with her uncharacteristic choice of clothing this evening. She wore a sheer black shirt over a black singlet. At the last minute, tired of the pants she'd been wearing most days since she began this a.s.signment, she'd changed out of her jeans into black tights and a snug black mini-skirt.

He watched her discomfiture; then added to it. 'You look like some kind of comic book secret agent,' he said.

Probably she should just go home.

'Not in a bad way,' he continued. 'Just the black clothes with your blonde hair; maybe it's more a ninja look?'

'You having fun?' she said.

'Yeah. A little bit,' he said.

'At least I don't spend time designing a website no one's ever going to use.'

'Have you ever designed a website?'

'No, but . . .'

'There, then.'

Jill laughed. You couldn't win an argument with this guy. She didn't want to right now. 'The lamb smells delicious,' she said.

It was. After they'd eaten, they carried their dishes to the sink and Gabriel began to wash up. His little grey cat, Ten, sat on the windowsill above him, performing her own ablutions. It seemed to be a well-worn routine. There wasn't a lot of room in the kitchen to help out, and they seemed to have it covered, so Jill hoisted herself up to perch on the benchtop. She picked up her gla.s.s of wine.

'You okay that I'm sitting up here?' she asked.

'Why wouldn't I be?' he replied, as though she'd asked if it was okay that she turn on a tap. 'So what've you got so far on Nader?'

'Well, it was just word on the street until today,' she said. 'Plenty of people throw his name around like he's a big player. So, I got close to a friend of his. I suppose you'd call him a friend.'

'What's this person's name?'

'Everyone calls him Jelly. I haven't gone too far into his background. He's not a target.'

'Jeremy Simons,' said Gabriel.

'Yeah?'