Dead Men Don't Order Flake (20 page)

I gave him a strained type of smile.

‘You're here alone?' He put his hand on the back of Leo's chair.

‘That chair's taken.' I spoke quickly, before he had a chance to sit.

‘Oh? Who are you here with?'

‘A friend,' I said through gritted teeth.

‘One of your…clients?'

Piss off, Bamfield. And it's none of your bloody business who I'm with. But it was obvious I had to give him a name if I had any hope of getting rid of him.

‘No. Leo Stone. He'll be back in a second.'

‘Oh. I didn't realise you were that sort of woman.'

‘Listen, I've had enough of your stupid jokes.' Possibly
not the smartest move for the Rusty Bore Takeaway's profit margins, but there's only so much a person can take.

‘Ah…actually, that's not what I was going to say.' He paused. Took off the hat. ‘Can I offer you some friendly advice?'

No, but it was clear he was going to anyway.

‘Well, it's more a question: are you really sure Leo Stone is the kind of company you want to keep?'

‘What the hell does that mean?'

‘Guns.' He gave me a significant nod.

Leo arrived, carrying two glasses of wine. ‘Peter,' he said, looking at Bamfield.

Bamfield gave him a strange look, then scurried off. Leo sat down and passed me my wine.

‘Here's to…us.' He smiled.

‘Cheers.' I took a sip. ‘So how do you know him?' I tilted my head at Bamfield.

‘Oh, everyone knows him.'

‘He gave you a weird look.'

‘No idea why.' He shot me the Leo Stone killer smile. ‘Anyway, we've got more interesting topics to talk about than Bamfield. You, for instance. And what you're doing for the rest of your life.'

Ha.

He reached out and took my hand. His touch sent a sizzle to my knees.

I looked around in an attempt to distract myself. One of the three women on the stage was playing a red guitar. Leo had a red Stratocaster, way back. He was in a band. Another reason why so many girls used to hang off Leo.

‘You still play that red guitar of yours?'

He shook his head; frowned; took his hand away.
Maybe he'd given up on the music. Well, we'd all given up on things we dreamed of in our youth. I cleared my throat. ‘Anyway, before we get into anyone's future, Leo, I could do with a little more information about your past.'

‘Which part? There was too much of it without you, that much I know.'

‘You could start by telling me what you've been doing all this time. And why you didn't tell anyone you were alive.'

He rubbed his face. ‘It's, ah, complicated.'

‘I'm listening.'

‘Why don't we order some food?'

‘You avoiding the subject?'

‘More like delaying the inevitable.'

What did that mean?

‘Let's eat. I'll tell you after that; promise.'

The menu options consisted of fifteen varieties of pizza. I ordered a medium Mediterranean and Leo went for a large Mexican.

‘Must be a bit weird being back after all this time?' I said.

‘Strangely enough, in some ways it's like I never left.'

‘I bet Showbag's pleased to see you.'

Leo shrugged.

‘Maybe he'll take you out in that speedboat.'

‘Ha.'

What did that mean? Was there bad blood between Leo and Showbag? A thought: that money Showbag inherited—was Leo due a share, now he'd sprung back to life? Showbag had bought the speedboat after a mysterious uncle died: I'd never heard of Showbag having an uncle apart from Leo's father, who died years ago. Maybe
this long-lost wealthy uncle was related to Leo too? And maybe Showbag wasn't keen to share.

Our pizzas arrived.

Leo forked in a mouthful of his Mexican; chewed and swallowed. ‘So, no more trouble from that bloke with the brown Fairlane, I hope?' A grim expression on his face.

‘No, thank God.'

He nodded. ‘How's the investigation going, anyway?'

I filled Leo in on the latest developments. ‘I'm hoping these documents Tina Galang's sending will make things a little clearer.'

He nodded. ‘Let me know what I can do to help.'

I smiled.

‘Hey, I'm not completely useless, you know. I learned a few things in the Congo.'

Well, I might as well ask, given that everyone was going on about it. ‘Anything about, ah, guns?'

‘Yeah, you pick up quite a bit about those in my line of work.'

‘And your work was…?'

‘Let's talk about you, Cass.'

‘Médecins Sans Frontières, didn't you say?' I couldn't see how that would involve guns.

‘Mostly, yeah.'

Mostly? ‘Leo, is there something you're not telling me?'

He wiped his mouth with a serviette. ‘Nothing important.'

I sat there a moment, toying with my pizza. Did Leo have some sort of…sideline in the Congo? A not particularly nice sideline? And maybe he still had it now? Christ, was Dean actually right?

Suddenly not hungry, I pushed away my plate. ‘Gotta get going.' I stood up.

‘Already? You haven't finished your pizza. Or your wine.'

‘Shop emergency.'

‘Surely it can wait until you've finished eating?'

‘Fast-food customers wait for no one.'

I hurried to my car and drove the hell out of there, just like the title of that old Meatloaf song.

33

The drive home was a blur of wheat paddocks and, I'll admit, the odd angry tear. I blinked them away. Did my best to focus on something, anything other than that lying gun smuggler. Bloody hell, Leo. I'd bet there was a wife over there in the Congo as well. Maybe more than one. I'm not up on the number of wives permitted in that part of the world.
Stone men, can't trust any of 'em
. Yes, yes. OK, Ernie.

Back in the day, before Ernie's little Stone-men briefing, Leo and me, we were going to travel around Australia. We had it all mapped out—first up, we'd go work on a melon farm in Rockhampton. After that, we'd see the world. We'd discussed it all in detail, the night we went to see
Grease
at the drive-in. That is, when we weren't focused on other matters.

There I was, seventeen, all full of plans and hope and trust. I told Ernie all about our scheme, of course. Ernie
was our guardian—after Mum died, Ernie looked after me and Helen. Dad had buggered off long before.

Ernie gave me a long look. Stroked his grey moustache with his dirt-stained fingers. ‘Gotta be honest with you, Cassie. And best you know this now. Leo's told at least three other girls that little plan. An early life lesson for you—on the topic of the untrustable fella. Still, it's in his family, so maybe he can't help it. None of those Stones has ever been any flaming good.'

A sleepless night. Was it true? Leo had said the big
I love you
. Was that just a bunch of words he told every girl? Should I bust up with him? The idea was a knife to the chest. And then, at 3am, I came up with a kind of compromise.

Next day I told Leo I needed a bit of time to consider that trip. Helen was quite impressed with that when I told her afterwards: she said it was surprisingly mature behaviour for a kid. She was an elderly eighteen and a half.

I would have been quite interested in further drive-in missions with Leo, while I considered our travel plan in more detail. But a couple of days later, the bastard nicked off to Rockhampton. Without me.

I swerved around a dead cat on the road.

It was definitely time I moved on. No more of this bloody nonsense, Cass. Who knows, he's probably involved with Serena as well. Why do I always have to get interested in blokes who can't stay loyal? And who can't stay within the law?

I whipped past the ex-solar power joint. There are a lot of ex-things around here. I sighed. Well, I was still alive, as Dean likes to remind me, so I guess I should be grateful for that.

My phone rang. I pulled over.

‘Mum, you OK?' It was Brad.

‘Just on my way home. Everything all right in the shop?' I said.

‘Yeah, good. We've had a bit of a run on sweet-potato wedges, especially with Claire's sour cream and lime dip. But we're managing.'

‘When did we start doing wedges?'

‘Ah, today.' His voice was casual.

You had to wonder if this was an attempt to divert the clientele into vegetarian slow food. Although maybe a wedge is too speedy to be genuinely classified as slow?

‘Dean get hold of you?' he said.

‘No.'

‘He was looking for you.'

Great.

‘He was pretty worked up, Mum.'

Even better.

‘Anyway, he said you have to stay away from Leo Stone.'

‘Right. Will do.'

‘Mum? You're not having some kind of mid-life crisis, are you? I mean, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Even chimps and orang-utans experience a bit of a slump in middle age.'

Thanks for that, Brad. Time for a change of subject. ‘Any progress with the book basher's phone?'

‘Yeah, I got into it. And, yes, it's definitely Morris Temple's.'

An
aha
moment, followed rapidly by a nasty thought. ‘You didn't mention that phone to Dean, did you?'

‘Course not.'

‘Excellent. Listen, can you get into the phone log?'

‘Maybe. What do you want to know?'

‘Who Morris called, of course.'

‘Yeah, but when?'

‘Err, how about you start with Natalie's last day. The… twenty-eighth of January.'

Tapping sounds. ‘Five calls.'

‘Who to?'

‘Well, the last one that day says Andy, maybe that's Andy Fitzgerald? Morris called him at 9.04pm. There's another one to him earlier in the day, at 1.15pm. And Natalie called Morris at 3.25pm. A minute later, Morris called someone else. Looks like a Rusty Bore number, that one. And then he made another call, at 5.40pm. I'm guessing that one's in Melbourne.'

‘What about text messages?'

A pause. ‘None.'

‘What, he hasn't sent or received a single SMS? I find that hard to believe.'

‘Maybe he deletes them.'

‘Every single one? Seem a bit odd to you?'

‘Not necessarily. He might have good space hygiene.'

‘Sorry?'

‘You know, good phone practices. Keeps his storage of useless information to a minimum.'

‘Any chance you could find out who he called in Rusty Bore?'

‘How?'

‘Just go through the phone book. I've got one in the lounge.'

‘I'm not combing through the entire bloody phone book, Mum. I have a life, you know.'

‘Come on, Brad. There's only 147 people in the town. Won't take you long. And you can exclude me. That only leaves 146.'

34

Next morning, there was still no email from Tina Galang. Brad hadn't been through the phone book either. It was a busy day in the shop. With everyone demanding sweet-potato wedges, I didn't get a chance to check the phone book myself.

Finally, at ten o'clock, the queue died down. I closed the shop and headed out the back into the house. My phone buzzed. Another message from Dean.
Have you called a lawyer?
Bugger off, Dean. Three missed calls from Leo. And a text from him:
Whatever I said, I'm sorry. I just want to help. If you're ever in trouble, please—call me.

There were too many people I didn't want to talk to at the moment.

‘Brad?' I sang out.

No answer.

‘You still up?'

I headed down the hallway to the kitchen.

‘There's no wholemeal rice, Mum.' Brad stood, looking forlorn, by the pantry.

‘Listen, have you taken a look at the phone book yet?'

‘I'll do it later, I'm busy right now.' He filled a saucepan with water.

‘With what?'

‘I've got to write a submission.'

‘Is this a uni thing?'

‘Not exactly.'

‘Yes or no, Bradley.'

‘No. Look, if you have to know, it's about fracking. I promised Zac I'd do it.'

‘Zac?'

‘You know, Jessie's dad. He's campaigning over there in Perth. He's pretty much all the energy behind No Fracking Way.'

‘Jessie's dad?' As in Claire?

‘Yeah, Zac's a bloke with principles.' He put the saucepan on the stove.

‘Surely a bloke with any principles would be here helping Claire raise their child.'

‘Give him a break. He would, but Claire…well, she can't help it if she doesn't love him. She got involved with him when she was on the rebound.'

Claire's never really mentioned Jessie's father to me. I understood the concept of rebound-based decisions, though. Can be surprisingly significant, decisions made in that state. My life might have taken a very different direction if I'd headed off with Leo, as we'd planned. If I hadn't listened to Ernie. If I hadn't met Piero that night. If, if, if.

Yeah, I'd be saddled with a bloody crook with several
Congolese wives, that's what would have happened.

More interestingly, I sometimes wonder what life might have been like if I'd done what Claire did, post-Leo, post-Piero's burst of fertility. There's any number of places I could have turned up with my own overnight bag and baby bump. I could have travelled around Australia, maybe searched for my dad.

But then I would have missed out on all the joys of Brad. I gave him a smile.

‘Don't know what you've got to smile about, Mum. Now listen, I've got a proposal for you.' He stretched his long limbs. ‘It's high time you adopted Meatfree Mondays. I'll help you organise that.'

‘Monday's my day off, Brad. Shop's closed.'

‘Bloody typical. Well, eventually you'll run out of excuses to join the twenty-first century.' He stamped off to his room.

I turned off the saucepan he'd obviously forgotten.