'Mr White will need to be privy to all the information. He needs to know everything,' Mr Cavanagh said ominously.

Everything.

Simon took a chair, the three of them in a semicircle with Mr Cavanagh sitting behind his imposing desk. Joy shut the office door.

It was odd for Simon to see Jack Cavanagh this way. He had seen Damien's father in the flesh as often as he had seen him in newspapers or on the cover of business magazines. In the flesh he could often be found smiling. He was not smiling now. Mr Cavanagh and Mr White were both looking at Simon and waiting for him to speak, but Simon didn't know what he should say.

'Sir, may I speak frankly?' Simon began in his most disarming tone. He crossed his legs and gestured with one hand. 'I-'

'You had better,' Mr Cavanagh snapped back. 'Or you won't be speaking to my son again. Ever.'

That gave Simon pause. Was that a real threat? Would Jack really cut Damien off from him?

'Yes, sir,' Simon began again. 'Um-can I just say firstly what an honour it is to be invited here to speak with you. I only wish the circumstances were better.'

Mr Cavanagh narrowed his eyes. 'Cut the bullshit,' he said. 'Tell us about this man who tried to blackmail me today.'

Simon had to collect himself. This was all moving too quickly. Warwick had hung up on him and hadn't called him back or answered his phone. Damien was freaking out about his dad.

'Who is he?' Mr Cavanagh demanded.

Simon hesitated. 'I honestly don't know who contacted you, sir. I am not sure why you think I would be involved with something like that, but I am confident we will get to the bottom of it all.'

Jack leaned towards him. He was a man who liked to remain casual and personal, despite his great success and formidable influence. He was known to value professionalism, but honesty and mateship even more. He took his employees out on a boat once a year. He gave bonuses. He asked about people's families and took an interest in their health and wellbeing. But now he was not being low-key or disarming. Simon was getting a taste of the more formidable side of Jack Cavanagh. It was a darker side that journalists sometimes hinted at-a more ruthless side. Mr Jack Cavanagh clearly did not take threats to him or his family lightly.

'Don't fuck with me, Simon,' he said, swearing for the first time Simon had ever heard, and making the small blond hairs on the back of his neck stand up. 'I can make your life very different, very quickly.'

Simon believed him. If Jack Cavanagh cut him off from Damien, everyone in Sydney would know about it in a matter of days. Simon's connections would instantly fizzle. It would be a disaster-social suicide. Financial suicide.

'I mean no disrespect, sir,' Simon responded, trying to regain some ground. 'I just am not sure...I didn't mean...I found out about him through a friend...' he babbled. He took a breath and tried to slow down. 'Look, I came across this thing happening. I was, you know, shocked. And this woman was there filming it. I wanted to protect my friend. I know people, and I knew they could make this problem go away for Damien. I was only trying to protect him.'

The American, who up until now had not entered into the conversation, pulled his chair forwards and opened a notepad. He took a pen from inside his jacket pocket and, when he had it ready, his eyes met Simon's with a cool gaze. He said, 'What was the name of the woman who was doing the filming?'

'Um...she was nobody. Just a guest.'

'Name please,' Mr White said simply.

If he finds out the name, he will find out what's happened to her.

The American waited. Simon was too fearful of him to deny him an answer. 'Her name was, uh, Meaghan Wallace. She worked as a PA for Robert Groobelaar at Trident Realty. Robert's a colleague of yours, I think.'

Jack nodded thoughtfully. 'Robert has worked with me on some minor real estate.'

The American took note, but he was not finished with Simon's last statement. 'You ordered that something be done to silence this Meaghan Wallace?' he pressed. He must have noticed that Simon had spoken of the woman in the past tense.

Simon nodded sheepishly in reply to The American's brutally direct question, his eyes to the floor. The words sounded horrible: You ordered that something be done to silence this Meaghan Wallace? Had he done that? Yes, he supposed he had. But he had not wanted to-he'd had no choice. He'd had to have her taken care of.

'Okay. We'll get back to her in a moment,' The American said. 'You said you found this man through a friend of yours. I need to know the name of this friend.'

He waited for an answer.

Simon was panicking inside. He had not found Warwick through a friend, but how would it sound to Mr Cavanagh if he admitted he was the sort of person who knew people like that personally? Still, he was afraid to lie to The American. Warwick had done odd jobs for Simon before. If Simon gave them a false name, he felt sure he would be found out. Simon knew that just by looking at him.

For the first time in Simon's life, truth seemed like the best policy, and his only option.

'Um, I approached the man directly, sir,' he admitted.

The American wrote something on his small notepad. Jack Cavanagh was grim-faced throughout, but said nothing.

'The man's full name?'

'Warwick O'Connor.'

When Warwick had run a few errands for Simon in the past, they had mostly been for buddies in need. His price was $15 000 to take care of someone like this girl they had been having trouble with. It was a good price: competitive-cheap, to be exact. Warwick had been paid half in advance. Simon wondered if Jack already knew that his son had actually paid Simon an accumulated $50 000 to take care of the problem, no questions asked. Simon thought of the extra as a kind of administration fee, but Jack might see it differently, especially given how things were turning out. He wondered if he should give back the latest $35 000. He didn't really want to do that.

Simon would tell only what he had to.

'You dealt directly with Warwick O'Connor,' said The American.

Simon nodded.

'And Damien?'

'Damien has never met him.'

'Good,' Jack Cavanagh interjected. 'There are no other loose ends to tie up with regard to the hiring of this lowlife? Just you and this man, Warwick-no one else?'

Simon felt uneasy about the way he'd said 'loose ends' but he nodded his head.

The American stepped in again. 'What was the recording device used by the woman?'

Simon looked shocked. 'I have never seen a video. I didn't think there was one. But, uh, she was using her mobile phone at the party and I caught her recording. That could be it.'

'Good. Let's hope that any recording is of low quality. Do you remember the make and model of the phone?' The American asked.

'Uh...no.' Simon did not take note of things like that. At least, not in those circumstances.

'We will need to find the phone. Do you know where it is now?' The American asked.

Simon bit his lip. 'I broke it. When I saw her recording I took the phone off her and stepped on it.'

The American kept taking his notes. 'And then what happened to the phone?'

'It was broken so I threw it out,' Simon explained.

The American looked at him like he was a moron. 'So you saw this woman making a recording at the party and you "stepped on" her phone. Did you check to see if there was anything damaging on it before you threw it out? Did you check to see if there was any recorded material on it, or if anything sensitive had been sent to anyone?'

Simon felt the blood drain from his face. 'No, sir. It was broken. I just got rid of it.'

'Where did you dispose of it?'

'In the wastebasket at the house.'

Jack Cavanagh slammed a fist down on the desk, making Simon jump with fright in his chair. His heart began pounding even harder. He felt like a man staring at a noose that was made for his neck alone.

'Has the rubbish been collected since the party?' The American asked Jack.

'Yes. Estelle, the maid, cleans the rubbish out daily. It would be long gone,' Mr Cavanagh said, sounding very displeased.

'Is there any chance she, or another of your staff, might have seen something?'

'No, no,' Simon tried to reassure them. 'The phone was in pieces, I swear. No one could have used it.'

'We need to find out what was on it,' The American said. 'And if anything sensitive on it was sent to anyone else.'

'But I don't know how,' Simon pleaded. 'The phone was wrecked. I just didn't think-'

'No, you didn't,' Jack Cavanagh hissed.

'Let me take care of that,' The American said.

Mr Cavanagh was clearly livid now. He sat behind his desk, seething. Then he pointed a finger at Simon. If it were a gun he would have pulled the trigger, Simon felt sure.

'Because you failed to come to me when there was an issue concerning the protection of my family, you will now have the responsibility of seeing that things are made right,' Mr Cavanagh said darkly. 'This is an opportunity to regain my faith, Simon.

'There will be a man arriving this weekend from Mumbai. He will have the relevant details of the situation and he will contact you. Bob here will make sure you are ready for him when he does. Everything-and I mean everything-you know about this Warwick O'Connor who has come to blackmail this family, you are to tell Bob. Everything. Everything you know about this video, the people in it, how they came to be in it and how the video came to be in someone's possession, you will tell him. You will tell Bob everything about these people, and everything about what my son has been getting into.'

The American sat quietly with his notepad.

'I do not want or need to know the details. You tell Bob everything, and you listen to what he says.'

'Um, yes, sir,' Simon replied nervously.

'I will arrange for money and instructions to be made available, and you will deliver them to him personally. Bob will oversee the transaction to make sure there are no mistakes. Is that all clear?' Simon did not answer. 'I said, is that clear?'

'Um, yes, sir, it is clear. But...what does he look like? How will I know-'

'I want no questions from you-just answers. You give Bob all the information he asks for. I do not need to know any more of the sordid details of this mess you and my son have made. I will leave you two to discuss this further.'

Jack Cavanagh stood up from behind his massive mahogany desk.

'I am very disappointed, Simon. Very disappointed. I don't want this situation spoken about to anyone, ever. Not even to me, unless I ask you directly about it. Is that clear?'

Simon nodded. 'Yes, sir, it is.'

'If I discover that you have not been truthful with me or with Mr White here, or that you mentioned this conversation to anyone at all...Well, I know my son will be very sad to lose his friend.'

Simon accepted his orders, and Jack Cavanagh left him with The American, his notepad, and the certainty that this was indeed serious. Simon would have to tell it all. No amount of charm would get him out of this one.

CHAPTER 14.

At eight o'clock, Mak was still sitting in the childhood bedroom of the deceased young Meaghan Wallace, talking with her bereaved mother and being shown album after album of family photographs. She found herself being sucked into the woman's raw grief. Seeing all these photographs of Meaghan when she was a baby and a toddler, and going to school for the first time-it was not helpful. Things had gone completely off track, but Mak found it difficult to break away. This woman seemed to need her there. She just wanted someone to listen to her stories about her daughter. She wanted someone to see the albums and the memories, and see Meg as she did.

Mak looked over at a bedside clock and saw the time.

Damn.

She and Andy had an eight o'clock dinner date at Icebergs restaurant. She would be at least thirty minutes late now, and she still didn't have what she needed. She had to wrap it up.

'Um, Mrs Wallace,' Mak started.

'Call me Noelene.'

'Noelene, may I use your bathroom?'

'Oh yes. Yes, of course.' Noelene closed the album she was showing Mak and put it lovingly back into its place in the stack on the bedroom dresser. She pointed the way and Mak walked out of Meaghan Wallace's bedroom and down the hall to the toilet, feeling relief in having escaped the room.

Oh God, poor woman. Poor woman.

Makedde flicked the light on. The bathroom was wallpapered with teal flowers; the towels were all in the same shade. Mak closed the bathroom door behind her and snatched her phone out of her pocket. It had a number of voicemail messages and missed calls. She had switched it to silent so as not to disturb the Wallaces.

Mak didn't bother to check her voicemail messages. Instead, she called Andy right away. He was probably waiting angrily in the living room for her to return, or worse-he might be at the restaurant sipping a drink by himself while she stood in a sea of teal in a bereaved stranger's bathroom.

'Flynn,' he answered.

'I will be there in twenty minutes. I'm so sorry,' Makedde said in an apologetic whisper.

'Why are you whispering?' he asked.

'I can't explain right now. I'm in someone's bathroom, but I'll be there as soon as I can.' She cupped her hand around the phone to further muffle her talking.

'Bathroom? I'm not at the restaurant yet. The reservation isn't till nine. I couldn't get us in until then. I'll meet you at the house at quarter to-I'm still with Jimmy,' Andy said.

He's still at work? Suddenly Mak didn't feel so bad.

'I'll be home in half an hour, tops,' she told him. 'I love you.'

Mak hung up and tucked her mobile phone away. Before she stepped out, she caught a glimpse of herself in the bathroom mirror. Her eyes were red, and there was an unmistakable sadness in them. Mak noticed some vague similarity between herself and the photos she had seen of Meaghan. It was far from a strong resemblance: Meaghan had been shorter, younger and more of a yellowy blonde, but perhaps Noelene was opening up to Mak in part because she was a young woman a bit like her daughter.

What would it be like to lose a daughter? She knew what it was like to lose a mother.