Leo's Spaghetti Bar was impossible to miss, with its huge red neon signage and tableclothed settings of chairs and tables spilling onto Fitzroy Street at St Kilda. As Loulou had promised, it was barely a block from Mak's hotel, so she was there in plenty of time. Loulou had helped Mak to pack up and had taken her overnight bag back to Drayson's place.

Now Mak was alone, just as Amy had requested.

Mak paused near the door and took note of the patrons dining outside. There was a pale couple with British accents wearing bumbags and sneakers; a skinny woman with bleached blonde hair bent over a coffee mug; and two men with leather vests and sleeves of tattoos. At the kerb was a black Mercedes, a beat-up Kombi van and a row of yummy motorcycles, none of them occupied. This inventory-taking was a subconscious and automatic response for Mak, something she had picked up from her father and his police colleagues.

No one at the outside tables seemed interested in returning her gaze, so Mak entered Leo's through a set of glass doors, hoping that this whole chase was not simply a waste of time. Amy had sounded a little paranoid in her message.

Who or what is Amy so paranoid about? Mak wondered, moving through the restaurant area inside.

Leo's had a busy bar area and dining tables that stretched deep into the back. The message had mentioned the back room at Leo's, so Mak made her way past the seated patrons towards the rear wall, quietly surveying the patrons and the layout of the restaurant as she did so. About a third of the tables were already filled, although it was barely three. As on the street, the clientele were a colourful and eclectic bunch-a man with a matted beard and a pierced nose sat alone at one table, and at the next a beautiful woman in a short dress was being fussed over by an attentive Italian waiter. A group of men in overalls were on a coffee break, their construction hats perched on the table. One long table featured a curious mix of intellectuals, debating animatedly over some obscure topic, fuelled by afternoon chardonnay.

Mak felt eyes on her and paused.

'May I help you?' It was a waiter.

'I am just looking for someone. Thanks,' Mak replied and moved on. She saw signs for the toilets, but no signs for a back room. She climbed a set of stairs and continued, again with the feeling that she was being watched. With a quick glance over her shoulder Mak saw that the woman with bleached hair had moved inside and was in a line by the bar. She didn't look up and catch Mak's eye, so Mak moved on to a hallway where she passed the toilets and found a door for a back room. She pulled on the handle.

It was locked. Stuck in the hallway outside the toilets, Mak detected the faint smell of disinfectant. It made her big toe tingle.

'Hey.'

She took a deep breath and turned around. It was the skinny blonde who had been pushing around a coffee mug.

'Are you looking for someone?' Mak asked.

The young woman nodded. 'Macaylay Vanderwall?' she said with hesitation, screwing up the pronunciation again.

Mak guessed that it had to be Amy. Now that she could see her face, the girl looked a bit like she had in the picture with Meaghan, although her hair was longer and stringier, and she had deep circles under her eyes. 'You can call me Mak if you like.'

'Amy.' The name came out in a tiny, bird-like voice; a quick, frightened chirp.

'It's nice to finally meet you, Amy. Thanks for contacting me.'

Mak looked up to find that they weren't alone. Larry Moon came around the corner, filling the hallway with his girth. He nodded. 'Hello again.'

'Hello to you, too.'

'Don't mind me,' he said and pulled out a packet of cigarettes. 'I'll be out front if you need me, okay?' he told Amy protectively.

Amy nodded, quivering like a nervous animal.

The narrow hallway by the toilets was not quite an ideal meeting place. Mak was pleased to follow Amy to a table near the back of the restaurant, where Amy sat with her shoulders snug against the wall, positioned to overlook the rest of the establishment. It was the 'Clint Chair'. The Clint Chair was the position Mak normally took in any given room. She had spent so much time with cops that she felt on edge in any other position. Eating a meal with her back to the middle of a room was unbearable. She needed a spot where she could see as much as possible: the cash register, and all entrances and exits in case of any number of possible emergencies. The spot Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry would have chosen. So was this young woman who called herself Amy sitting there out of habit, like Mak, or was she expecting an emergency?

'I thought that it was you, but I had to be sure you came alone,' the blonde said. 'You did come alone, didn't you?'

'Yes,' Mak assured her.

Amy seemed only slightly reassured. She nodded nervously and looked towards the glass doors at the front, obviously petrified of something-or someone. She was small and held herself even smaller, arms folded tightly across her chest. She looked to be no older than twenty, with shiny bare skin and large brown eyes.

'I heard you when you dropped by,' Amy said, keeping her eyes averted. 'Larry has been such a sweetheart, taking care of me. I told him I didn't want anyone to know I was there, you know. That's why he had to say I wasn't home. He did it for me.' When she looked to Mak again she gave her a quizzical look. 'He's right-you do look like a model. You're really a private eye?'

Mak nodded. 'Technically I am a forensic psychologist, but I also work as a licensed private investigator. Here is my card.' She produced a business card from her wallet. 'If you ever need to contact me about anything, you can call me day or night.'

Amy read the card before putting it in her purse. She looked Mak over. 'You never thought about dancing?'

'No, not me,' Mak replied, discomfited by the statement. It seemed an odd thing to say to a near stranger. As a dancer, perhaps it seemed normal to Amy to comment on other women's bodies.

Meaghan had been sucked into that world. Likely this was the reason for the unexplained gifts to her family-wanting to show her mum she was doing all right but still not able to tell her what she was doing to earn it. All the while poor Noelene knew there was something her daughter wasn't telling her, but she didn't know what. Mak wondered if Noelene would want to know, and if she herself should tell her at some point, so that she was no longer in the dark about her daughter's career, or whether it was kindest to leave the grieving mother with her photographs and her memories.

'Thank you for meeting with me,' Mak said. 'Can I get you something to drink? Another coffee?'

Amy looked alarmed.

'I noticed that you had been sitting with a coffee mug before, that's all. But I didn't know it was you.'

Amy shook her head. 'No, thanks. I've had enough coffee...starting to get the jitters.' She did indeed look like she had the jitters. Badly. Mak had got Amy this far, but she could see that the rest wasn't going to be a cakewalk. Amy was a very jumpy young woman.

'What can I get you?' Mak offered again.

She shook her head. 'Nothing.'

'I'll get us some water, okay?'

Mak got up and went to the bar to ask for water, giving the young woman a minute or two to relax.

After she returned with two glasses of water they sat in uncomfortable silence for several seconds. At every noise Amy's red-rimmed eyes darted nervously around the room, with Mak unsure of how to move forwards without further spooking her.

'You haven't been in to work much since all this started?' Mak said to start the conversation.

Amy had acrylic nails, and one was broken. Long nails like those were usually an obsession for dancers, and kept well. Her hair was also unkempt, the dark roots starting to show. She guessed that this girl had not only been absent from work recently, but quite possibly had not left the house since her friend's death.

Amy nodded. 'I wasn't in last night. One of the girls told me you had been looking around.'

Mak nodded. 'Are you getting by all right?'

'Larry's a nice guy,' she said. 'He's just been taking such good care of me and everything. I didn't want to leave the house alone, so he came with me.' Mak could see Larry reading a paper and enjoying a coffee at one of the tables outside. 'Plus I have some savings,' Amy said with a flicker of pride, then looked down quickly.

'That's good,' Mak said.

Like young models, Mak supposed that only a few strippers were good at building solid savings before their lucrative years were up. The temptation of an expensive lifestyle was too alluring for many, and by the time the work began to dry up, it was too late. The ones who were smart with their money could own their own real estate by the time they were twenty, and set themselves up nicely. But Amy hardly seemed like one of those girls. She didn't look secure and pampered. She was pretty, but her eyes were tired and unstable-she was clearly a girl with a lot of late nights up her sleeve, and a lot of worries to keep her from being content.

'So tell me about Meaghan,' Mak said.

Amy looked around nervously.

'You worked with her at Thunderball?'

'Well, sort of. Megs only worked there a few times. She lived in Sydney but, like a lot of the girls, she came over for the Grand Prix weekend a few years ago. It's huge. There are about sixty or seventy girls who come to the club just for that weekend. Big bucks.'

'And you two became friends?' Mak prompted.

'Yeah. I moved to Sydney not long after that and we hung out a lot and worked in a few of the clubs together-Dancers, Legs, MG. But Meaghan wasn't really cut out for it.'

Amy began fidgeting with her hands in her lap, perhaps uncomfortable with what she had revealed. She needn't have worried: Mak, of all people, was not going judge her on her experiments in unconventional career paths.

'So you and Meaghan worked together and became friends.'

Amy nodded.

Okay, here goes...

'Amy, do you know a guy named Simon Aston? Was he a friend of Meaghan's?'

Amy's mouth formed a tight line. She didn't answer, but Mak could see that she knew the name.

Come on...speak to me.

Mak nodded to indicate that it was okay for Amy to go on. Then she tried a different tack. 'You must be upset over Meaghan. It's terrible, what happened to her.'

Amy nodded, eyes wide and mouth distinctly shut.

'If you have some information that could help bring justice for your friend,' Mak began as cautiously as she could, 'then you need to tell me. It is very important.'

Amy responded by frowning and crossing her arms again.

'It can be hard to be caught up in something like this. I know how you feel. I really do,' Mak said, imploring her to tell all.

'Ha! Like you would know how it feels!' Amy blurted, her words catching in her throat.

Mak gave her a moment to calm her anger before speaking. 'I'll let you know something personal about me. Five years ago my best girlfriend was murdered. She was an orphan. I was the closest person to her; I felt like her big sister. When she was killed I believed I had to take care of things. I took it upon myself to make sure her killer was caught.'

Amy's mouth hung open, and her brown eyes fixed on Mak, listening carefully.

'It was a great responsibility. But I had to do it. I loved her as a friend and I needed to know the truth.' Amy's eyes were widening, her brows turning up at the centre. She was finally connecting with Mak. 'I know how wrong it is when something like this happens. People should not assume the right to kill one another. Your friend's murder is an injustice, and the person who did it should pay.'

Amy's lower lip quivered, those big brown eyes glassing over before she looked away and began madly searching her pockets for something-perhaps her packet of cigarettes, which Mak could see were right in front of her on the table. The search of her pockets became desperate, and tears sprang from her eyes. Mak pushed the cigarettes towards her silently, and when the girl noticed them she opened her mouth to speak but said nothing. She picked up the packet, shaking, but before she could bring the smoke to her lips, she broke down again. She sobbed quietly for a few minutes, holding her face in her hands, mascara-stained tears streaming out from beneath her fingers.

'You can tell me, Amy.'

'No-no...Simon...wasn't a friend of Megs. But I know who he is. Everyone knows who he is. His friend...it's his friend...'

'What friend? What do you think happened? Do you think the police-'

'Toby didn't do it,' she blurted. 'I know it wasn't him.'

There it was again: that certainty that Tobias was not the one, just as Mrs Wallace had.

'Why do you think that?' Mak asked.

Amy didn't answer. Her face was lined with streaks of wet mascara. She began puffing on her cigarette eagerly.

'Tell me, Amy.'

But Mak could see she had clammed up again.

'Do you know Tobias?' Amy had called him Toby, with a familiar tone. She had to have known him.

'A little,' Amy admitted. 'I met him a couple of times. Megs used to talk about him a bit. He was, like...I dunno, her pet project or something. She wanted to help him. He wouldn't...he wouldn't hurt her. That would make no sense.'

'How do you mean, "pet project"?' Mak asked.

Amy leaned her head to one side, her stringy hair falling with it. 'Well, he was living on the streets. Did you know that? Megs felt sorry for him because he was her cousin. She had a soft spot for him, I guess.'

Mak took mental notes. She didn't want to write anything down in case it made this nervous young woman stop talking. Mak had learned that the hard way in the past, and had developed the skill of sharp memory recall to help her with her work.

'What sort of things did she used to do to help him?' she asked Amy.

'Aww, well she used to give him some money all the time. They had this kind of routine where she would give him cash when she got paid each fortnight.'

Mak began to tingle-this was something. She was actually getting somewhere.

'Do you happen to know which day of the week she got paid?' Mak asked.

Amy frowned. 'Um, Thursdays I think. Doesn't everyone get paid on Thursdays? I dunno. Something like that. Yeah, Thursdays.'

'So he came over every second Thursday,' Mak confirmed.

'Right.'

Meaghan had been killed on a Thursday night, and Tobias had been there. Had one of their usual meetings gone horribly, violently wrong for some reason? Or did someone who had known he would be there set him up?

'How about any other times? Do you know if she saw much of him?'

'I don't think so. It was like he only ever came for the money and she knew it, but didn't care. I think she believed he would change,' Amy said.

The thought made Mak sad. Here was this young woman who had a soft spot for a cousin she used to play with as a kid. Enough of a soft spot to let him into her house every fortnight and give him money out of her own pay cheque. If Tobias really had killed her, it made the act even more heartless and terrible.

If? Mak herself had obviously grown sceptical about his guilt.

'Why do you believe Tobias didn't kill her?'

Amy's demeanour changed. She sat upright and squinted into the distance, thinking hard. She was struggling with something internally, some decision. Mak thought that the girl seemed so unstable that she was afraid to say anything further to her, in case it set her off. So she just waited until Amy eventually pulled a crinkled piece of newspaper out of her leather purse. It was the front page of the Melbourne Herald Sun. She unfolded it.

'Him,' Amy said, pointing to a young man in the newsprint photo, posing in a suit with several other business-suited men. 'He's the guy.' She wiped under one eye, only succeeding in smudging her make-up even more.