Cold Deception (2 page)

He sneered at her, all the time sliding his muddy gaze over her body, making her skin crawl.

But something else rose to the surface in her brain, something she’d not let herself have in all the long years of her incarceration. White hot fury flowed along her nerve ends, making her hands flex convulsively. She could almost feel the pudgy, slack skin around his neck, almost see her hands squeeze tighter and tighter …

“Is that so?” she said in a voice that sounded surprisingly calm even to her. “I guess that means the good people of the upper Blue Mountains don’t know about his other extensive entrepreneurial activities.”

The sneering smile disappeared.

“I don’t know what you mean,” he said. “Angus is a prominent business man up here. He owns the Chadbourne Hotel. Bought it when it was a moldering heap and turned it into a tourist draw card. It’s his life’s work.”

“And you’re his loyal assistant. How sweet. So those rumors I heard about his sales activities were just rumors? Did all those girls coming back from visits off their faces on pills get their stuff from someone else? ”

Randle paled then inched closer to her. She fought not to throw up as stale sweat and rank breath washed over her.

“Had a little help didn’t he?” she said. “Needed someone to turn the other way on visits.”

“I think you’ve got quite a bizarre fantasy going on there. Out for some revenge are you? I doubt a convicted murderer would have much credibility if she started making accusations about an upstanding member of the community, do you?”

“Upstanding? Yeah, right. You were both very upstanding the day you arrested me weren’t you?”

Her stomach twisted as the memory she’d struggled so hard to forget came flooding back. The cold, filthy cell, the sneering laughter, the fist …

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Randle said, a smile on his oily, knowing face. “You were processed by the book.”

She closed her eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. “Get away from me,” she said through clenched teeth. “Just go.”

“Not until you agree you won’t make any wild accusations about Mr. O’Reardon to anyone.”

“Or what?” Anger continued its long dormant flow through her body.

“Or something bad might happen.”

“Don’t fucking threaten me, asshole.” She stepped forward into his face. “I’m not a sweet little kid anymore. Leave me alone.”

He stepped back, a wide smile on his face and held his hands spread, as if to placate her.

“You’ve got me all wrong. I don’t want to hurt you. But just remember, that cute little sister of yours or your mom could run into some trouble if you make unnecessary trouble. Just say’n,” he said and ambled off down the street.

Fury engulfed her as she watched him climb into a big, shiny, tank of a car. Someone else was behind the wheel. Both men sat and watched her watching them.

Dee bustled out of the shop and thrust some paper bags into her hands. The car promptly did a U turn and screamed out of the village.

“Idiots,” Dee said. “More and more of them now days. Think their powerful cars mean they can drive like hoons. Get in the car. I bought you some food.”

Julia climbed in and fought to calm her beating heart. Not even an hour out and the past reared up to slap her.

“Come on. Eat up.”

She looked down at the bags in her lap.

“A sausage roll and a black cherry slice. You always liked them.”

Food was the last thing she wanted. But she couldn’t offend Dee so she opened the bag and started eating. And found anger made her ravenous.

Biting into the hot sausage roll, covered with flaky pastry and filled with spicy meat, she almost swooned with delight. This was the first non-prison food she’d had in years. She wouldn’t let Randle’s threats get in the way of this moment.

“Oh god, oh god, this is fantastic,” she said with her mouth full. Just this one moment of total piggery in the van with Dee and she’d be over it. She could appear in front of other people without being obsessed.

Dee laughed and they took off again. Julia hardly noticed the changes through Leura as she demolished her food. Not that she could see much anyway. The fog remained, if anything becoming more dense.

As they drove slowly down Leura Mall past Craigend St toward the escarpment, Dee cursed with irritation. “What does he think he’s doing?” She peered into the rearview mirror.

“What? What’s wrong?”

“That hoony car we saw at Wentworth Falls is following me. He’s about an inch away from ploughing up the back of me. For Christ’s sake!”

Julia turned and could just make out the shadowy vehicle behind them. It seemed to slow then speed up, looking like it would hit them, then brake just before impact.

“Pull over,” Julia said. “Pull over now.”

Dee glanced at her with fear. “What if they hit us?”

“They won’t.”

Dee slowed the car and swung it into the curb. Julia leapt out in time to see the big car swerve away and roar down the street.

“What’s going on?” Dee yelled at her. “Should we call the police?”

Julia stood for a moment staring after the car as it disappeared into the fog. Cold rage settled in her gut. She climbed back into the car and turned to Dee. “No point. They’re gone now.”

“Who were they? What do they want?”

Julia grimaced. “Just some locals wanting to harass me. I guess they think a convicted murderer is fair game.”

Dee made a noise of protest, a look of distress and bewilderment on her face.

“It’s okay Dee. They’ve gone now. They won’t be back.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Julia stared straight ahead into the fog. “They won’t have any reason to.”

Julia got out of the car and stood staring up at the house. It was shabbier and somehow smaller than she remembered. The Virginia creeper climbing up the side of the house still had a remnant of autumn and the lovingly tended roses in the front garden had a last flush of blowzy blooms. But she was home.

Standing at the front door was her mother. Her crazy, infuriating, wondrous mother. She’d been in the news months ago after receiving the Order of Australia in the Australia Day Honours List. All her life Eleanor Taylor produced artwork that captured the mood of the times: fierce and scouring landscapes, sometimes tortured sometimes nostalgic. A perfect summation of her mind, Julia thought. Eleanor’s landscapes always depicted her mental state. She wondered what she’d see in her studio right now.

Eleanor had visited her a total of ten times in the last ten years. After the first time, when Eleanor found out Julia had been strip-searched before the visit, her distress was so great she told Julia she couldn’t be part of that again.

“I won’t assist the sexual assault of my daughter,” she’d said through enraged tears. Julia tried to convince her it didn’t matter, that her visits were important, so they compromised. Once a year only.

And every time, she looked exactly the same as she did now. Small, dark and petite, her almost black eyes burning with creative life that drew everyone to her like moths to a flame. And like a flame she could shed light on winding pathways or burn to the bone.

As Julia walked slowly toward her, Eleanor opened her arms. Julia rushed to her and was enveloped in her scent of rose oil and turpentine. Everything she told herself over the last few months, everything about not getting drawn into Eleanor’s orbit, not being seduced by her charismatic chaos, went out the window. This was her mother, the woman who led her life like one of her canvases. Bright, uncompromising, and messy.

“My darling,” she murmured into Julia’s hair. “My darling.”

In one moment, Julia was a child again living with an artist full of creative
joie de vivre
. All the magic of that time swirled through her head. Eleanor took her everywhere, to parties, openings, international film festivals, anywhere the famous name of Eleanor Taylor was requested. She pushed out of her mind the other Eleanor, the one she needed to protect herself against, and let herself remember the good times.

“Mama,” she muttered, holding her tightly, willing her to be okay and not crazy. “I’m home.”

Her mother laughed and drew back, holding Julia’s head between her hands. “I’ve been waiting for you for ten years. Ten long years. But that’s all over now. Now life begins again.”

For the first time since she woke this morning, the feeling of dread left her. She looked into her mother’s face and saw only joy and delight. No madness, no hurt, no calculation about how she could get Julia to do what she wanted.

For a long time Eleanor’s love was conditional, full of qualifications and other messy demands Julia could never quite work out. Even from her prison cell, she thought she could feel the pull of Eleanor’s desperate need for her eldest daughter to toe the line. Give her fealty and worship. For most of her life, Eleanor was a woman who needed worship.

Thank god she’d found Dee, Julia often thought, not unkindly. Dee’s total worship had taken a lot of the pressure off Julia when Eleanor demanded Julia put her mother’s needs first above all others, especially Julia’s own.

Maybe that was all in the past now. Maybe like her almost daily letters said, she really had changed and healed.

The slam of a car door had the three women turning to the house next door. Eleanor held up her arm in greeting. “June! Bill! Look who’s arrived home.”

Julia remembered her neighbors as being somewhat straight-laced and stuffy. Some things hadn’t changed. They nodded coldly to Eleanor, ignored Julia, and disappeared into their house.

Eleanor shrugged and turned back to Julia.

“They’ll come round. We’ll invite them to the party.”

“What party?”

“The party we’re having to welcome you home,”

Julia hesitated. “I don’t want a party, Ma.”

“Nonsense! The whole community wants to welcome you home.”

Julia’s heart sank. This was the old Eleanor, the one who insisted and couldn’t be reasoned with. A knot in her stomach twisted.

“I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”

“Why not? We need to celebrate.”

“I don’t want to celebrate.” She could feel the old threads of obligation and demand weaving their way toward her. She’d been momentarily pulled into her mother’s fantasies. Not again. She wouldn’t be dragged into her crazy world.

“Ellie. Get a grip. She’s just got home. Give it a rest.”

Eleanor turned toward Dee with her mouth open. Julia knew she was about to launch into a tirade. But she snapped her mouth shut and smiled.

“You’re right. It’s too soon. Come inside. Did you pick up the cake, Dee? Yes? We’ll have some tea and a quiet day.”

Julia watched her with suspicion. She didn’t normally acquiesce without a fight. When Julia raised her questioning eyebrows to Dee, the other woman just smiled and said nothing. She picked up her bag and followed her mother into the house.

*

She walked.

Through streets, past comfortable houses and gardens, down fragrant bush paths into the valley then up steep rock steps, not satisfied until her lungs burned and her legs quivered from exhaustion. Even when the frost was brittle and slippery on the ground, she walked as if each step took her further away from…

From what? The past? That wasn’t possible. The past would always be with her. Always floating at the back of her mind in a red mist, red like blood, pools of blood. So much, shining and flowing, all over the floor, all over…

She’d shake her head, shake out the red memories and walk home, silent and worn, only wanting the oblivion of sleep.

Two days. Two days of freedom and all she wanted to do was walk. Walk and sleep.

No more. She had to do more with her life. Julia knew she was in danger of falling into that terrible hole of madness she’d dropped into when she was first locked up. Change and memories. She had to deal with them.

This morning she was determined to get on. Start something. As she sipped on her breakfast tea, she vowed to snap out of her gloom.

“Blossom should be arriving soon.”

Julia’s head shot up from her cereal bowl. “What?”

“Your sister. She’s coming up today with her boyfriend.”

Julia stared at her mother while her stomach did a painful and dizzying roll. It had to come sometime. She had to see Blossom again. Not that she hadn’t seen her regularly all the time she’d been inside, but this time would be different. This time it was all over.

The sun poured into the kitchen, touching the golden wood of the solid but worn table. Everything was beloved and familiar but suffering from ten years of sadness. It was as if the sorrow of Eleanor and Dee had leached into all the objects in the house. Even the cup Julia held, her favorite, hand painted by her mother with a jaunty mermaid smiling up at her, suffered with fine cracks across the glaze.

Beautiful and sad.

Now tea sloshed down the face of the poor mermaid as Julia’s hand shook.

“Why? Why is she coming here? Isn’t she studying? She doesn’t need to come here. I thought she’d moved to Sydney permanently.”

She could hear the panic in her voice while her mother drew back in shock. This was not good. She had to keep it together. Staring at her mother and Dee, she realized they were watching her like she was a wild animal about to lay waste to the kitchen. Since she’d arrived, they tippy-toed around her, trying to give her space. Every time they spoke to her, they were optimistic and upbeat about the future and her place in it, while all she could do was either be silent or growl at them.

They were desperate for everything to be okay. She wasn’t sure it ever would be.

Stop it. Stop it. Breathe.

She would make everything okay. There was no reason for it not to be. If she wasn’t careful, she was in danger of frightening two of the people she loved most in the world. She let out a deep breath.

“I’m sorry, Ma. I was thinking about something else.” She scrubbed her hands over her face and smiled at her mother. “So what time will she be here? What’s her boyfriend like?”

They both assumed an air of impassive unconcern. While half listening to the familiar husky voice of her mother, she wondered what they were up to.

At the moment Eleanor was painting soothing water scenes full of intricate detail and glorious colors. Julia knew she was happy. Happy with Dee, happy her daughter was finally out of jail and happy that she’d reached some long-term stability in her life. If she was going through one of her manic phases, she’d start painting deserts. Harsh, bleached but still brilliant, the bleakness of the landscape belying the chaos of her mind. At least there was a warning. When aged seven she noticed her mother veering towards desert work, Julia knew it was time to find a responsible adult.

There weren’t many around in the North Coast commune where they’d lived. When it was particularly bad, she’d call her grandmother in Leura who would contact the local doctor. He’d rush out with an injection and a prescription and things would settle for a while. Until the next time Eleanor decided to stop taking her medication.

Long-familiar resentment caught in Julia’s throat. Sure, she loved her mother but that didn’t mean she’d forgotten the years of neglect and the nightmare weeks in foster care. Years before Dee arrived she’d tried to be the parent while Eleanor was the rebellious child.

Julia forced herself to pay attention, noticing the frown on Eleanor’s face.

“Sorry. I drifted off for a minute. What did you say?”

“Blossom mentioned she might drop out of university for a while.” Eleanor glanced at Dee whose face was unusually blank.

“Why does she want to do that? I thought she liked architecture.”

Dee shifted in her chair. “Her boyfriend, Rez…” – she spat the name – “wants to do some traveling. Go up north. Find some land. Grow things.”

Julia stared at the two women, as if they were speaking a foreign language. “She can’t do that.”

“She’s eighteen. She can do what she likes,” snapped her mother.

This was not the plan. This would not happen.

“We’ll see about that.” Julia scraped her chair back and moved to clear her breakfast dishes into the sink. But when she caught the look of relief the two women exchanged she stopped and took a deep breath.

Two days. Two days was all it took and she was right back where she was before that night. She wouldn’t do it again. She wouldn’t take charge and make things better.

She’d speak to her sister, but if she was determined to fuck up her life, Julia would not stand in her way. Not again. She didn’t have the energy or the will. If ten years in jail taught her anything, it was she could only be responsible for herself. Not for anyone else, no matter how much she loved them. She’d done enough.

She busied herself at the sink staring out the window to the heart-stopping view of the Jamison Valley. The sheer red-gold walls of Mount Solitary never failed to calm her. Her first act on arriving home had been to race to the end of the back garden and just stand there, feeling the cold air against her skin, and watch the black cockatoos wheel and swoop, their mournful cries cutting into some dark frozen place in her soul. She’d cried then, just for a few minutes, cried for everything she’d lost. But tears wouldn’t help. They hadn’t ten years ago and they wouldn’t now.

“Will you go into Katoomba today?”

Julia heard the hope in Dee’s voice and her heart sank. She didn’t want to go anywhere. If she could just stay in this kitchen or her bedroom, gaze out at the valley and drink endless cups of tea, she’d be fine. No need to make an effort, no need to feel the curious stares of people she hadn’t seen in years rub across her skin like sandpaper. No sense of panic and shame when she entered anywhere with more than a handful of people.

She couldn’t understand it. Jail was crowded. Sure, she had a slot of her own, but that was all. Other women crowded her space most of the day. But when they’d taken her to the nearest shopping center a month before she’d got out, fear bloomed in her gut like a poisonous night flower. She’d begged them to take her back.

“You have to deal with this, Jules,” her case worker said. “You can’t stay out of the world forever. What about getting a job, seeing your friends? They won’t always come to you. You’re young. Get back into life.”

The choice, the color, the smells, the horrible music skittered around in her brain. Bile rose in her throat. “I have to go. I can’t…”

She’d stumbled back to the car, while her case manager frowned and shook her head.

Now she couldn’t put it off. The world awaited her. She could either take some control of her life or slide into passive depression.

“Why don’t you come over to the shop and help me out?” Dee offered.

Julia smiled crookedly. “Do you think that’s such a good idea? I don’t think many of your customers would be thrilled at being served by a convicted murderer.”

Eleanor jerked in her seat and snapped at her. “Don’t call yourself that. You did the world a favor. That bastard—”

“Stop, Ma.” She held up her hand, not wanting an Eleanor tirade. “Let’s not go there. It doesn’t matter what you think, I am what I am and people won’t forget that.”

“Of course they will. People are bigger than that. The people who matter are bigger than that anyway. What the others think isn’t important.”

Julia leant back against the sink, frowned at her mother, but kept her mouth shut. This was the old Eleanor, the one who could always be relied on to discount any harsh reality that didn’t fit her world view. She usually demanded total agreement and loyalty and wasn’t above noisy arguments when she didn’t get her way.

Although, to be honest, Eleanor hadn’t been unreasonable and demanding for years. She assumed that was because even Eleanor realized Julia needed support while in jail, not emotional manipulation. Jail had succeeded in achieving what Julia has always wanted. Distance.