Medea's Curse (9 page)

‘What does his mate say?’ Natalie asked Damian before she left.

‘That he came over, they had a few beers and watched football. His girlfriend and
two other guys confirmed. He arrived before the game and left straight after.’

Natalie wondered if they were now cruising in cars heckling them. The Travis that
had married Amber was a bully. She guessed his friendships weren’t likely to be deep.

Damian couldn’t resist a parting dig. ‘Enjoy dinner.’

Chapter 9

Liam was at the guesthouse reading the
Australian
when she returned.

Natalie flopped into an armchair opposite him. They had the living room to themselves.
‘I take it you never intended to be in the interview?’

‘I’m not allowed if I want to try the case. Australian law keeps things separate.
I can’t even be briefed by the police; one of my colleagues in the office will be.’

Natalie looked at him sharply. What game was he playing? ‘But let me guess, you expect
me to tell you what happened?’

‘I don’t want details. Impressions might be helpful.’

‘Talk to Damian,’ said Natalie. ‘You might have paid for a room for nothing.’

Liam grinned. ‘That remains to be seen. Drink?’

She watched him, wondering what the hell she was doing there. She wasn’t sure anything
she had seen would shed light on what happened to Chloe, or help Amber. More to the
point, Liam didn’t seem to care and the cops hadn’t wanted her there.

The more she thought about it, the more this was
looking like an excuse for Liam
to even the score for the humiliation she had inflicted on him; even if it had been
Amber who had suffered most from the court steps debacle.

The fridge had only Crown Lager; she nodded when he waved a bottle in her direction.

‘By the way, I like the outfit.’ He levered the cap off the beer and handed it to
her.

Natalie was wearing the little black dress she always travelled with. She didn’t
want him to think she’d gone to any trouble, and travelling by bike limited the bag
size. This dress didn’t take up much space.

Perhaps Liam was having second thoughts too. He poured himself a scotch and for the
next half hour, directed conversation towards work, not pushing for information on
Travis.

‘I’m involved in another case you might be able to help me with.’

Natalie thought this unlikely.

‘I’m part of an investigation into a paedophile ring.’ If he noticed her lack of
enthusiasm he pretended not to. ‘We’ve got a couple of minor convictions against
a few people downloading, but we want the guy behind it. Thought we had him once,
but had to let him go.’

‘And I can help how exactly?’

‘The early stuff in particular, we are sure originated in this region. The girls
would now be grown up, and from what I’ve been told, as victims they’re going to
have much higher chances of psych illnesses, as well as ending in prison. Am I right?’

‘True,’ Natalie agreed, ‘but I don’t see how that has us working together.’

‘We need one of the victims to testify, or at the least give us some more information.’

‘Uh huh.’

‘You see abuse victims and prisoners…’

‘You think I’d turn them over to you to have the media splash their lives all over
the papers and some lawyer grill them till they break down?’

‘Identities are protected. You know that. I’m just asking you to keep your eyes and
ears open. Particularly for anything to do with pink bunny rabbits. Seems to be what
they entice or reward the girls with. Tell me if you hear anything I might be able
to use.’

She hoped her look conveyed how likely that was going to be. Her patients struggled
talking to her about this type of issue, let alone to police and the O.P.P.

By the second beer she remembered why she found him so sexy. His outward respectability
barely cloaked his edginess and the combination was compelling. She wondered what
it was about her that was attractive to him. Just settling a score? Bored with a
middle-class lifestyle? She started to wonder if he went for a certain type—if she
was like other women he’d had affairs with. She stopped herself. She didn’t want
to know. If something happened tonight it would be a one-off.

‘Dinner?’ he asked as their second drink was nearly finished.

‘Not hungry.’ Not for food at least.

Liam raised an eyebrow.

Their eyes locked and the brief glimpse behind the surface rattled her. She was a
psychiatrist for fuck’s sake. Why was she letting him get to her?

As soon as the door closed in his room she knew why. Liam worked hard on hiding what
was beneath his veneer but in the bedroom, or at least in the bedroom with her, it
unleashed. There was a hunger in him that took her breath away, anger and passion
that she hadn’t felt in a lover before, and she knew it wasn’t him she feared as
much as her own response. If it had been ignited by a need to prove his dominance,
the same need was continuing to fuel it.

They didn’t speak.

Liam pushed her firmly against the door, his mouth hard on hers. He tasted of scotch.
Natalie pulled at his shirt as his hands pushed her dress up and went under the waistband
of her tights. They half-walked, half-fell across furniture, pulling at clothing,
knocking the lamp to the floor, bumping against the walls. Naked in the dark on the
bed, Natalie could feel his cock hard against her as his tongue was in her mouth,
then her ears; then he was biting her nipples. When he had pushed her need to a level
where she would have given him anything he had asked, he entered her. She came almost
immediately, and Liam followed only moments later.

Her arousal had left no room to consider anything other than her own pleasure. But
afterwards it was not the physical gratification that she recalled, either then or
during the repeat performance in the early hours of the morning, but rather, how
he held her after they were spent. In those minutes was a lingering memory of what
was absent: the tension that infiltrated every part of her and had been there for
as long as she could remember. Without it, she was left unsure of who she was, and
for a moment believed that this was who she wanted to be.

On Monday morning, Jessie was ten minutes late. The honeymoon was over already. She
slumped into the chair without speaking, still wearing her sunglasses.

‘Tell me what made your week so bad.’

Jessie stared at her sullenly. She clearly wanted to talk but she’d spent a lifetime
learning it was dangerous to trust.

‘Everything.’

‘Hannah?’

‘Same stuff.’

Natalie waited.

‘I got a call about my father.’

‘Your father?’

‘He’s in hospital. Second time in a month.’

Natalie underlined this in her notes. Was this why Jessie was now turning up for
therapy?

‘The hospital rang me as next of kin. They thought I should take him home with me.’

‘Did you?’

Jessie bit her lip, and angrily wiped a tear out of her eye. ‘Why should I? Bastard
preferred the bitch to me, never thought about what
I
wanted.’

‘You presumed my response would be that you should have taken him home.’

‘He certainly did.’ Jessie was lost in her thoughts for a moment.

She was too young to shoulder adult responsibilities for the man who raised her,
Natalie reflected. Particularly with so many unresolved issues between them.

‘Did they tell you his prognosis?’ Better to deal with the here and now.

‘Yeah. Shit.’ Jessie looked up at her. ‘Dying. The grog’s finally getting him. Just
not fast enough.’

‘So where is he now?’

‘Jay found a nursing home. Same town we grew up in.’

Natalie processed this. Jessie might well feel alone, but there was family around
to help when they had to.

‘Shit place.’

Natalie wasn’t sure if she meant the town or the nursing home. ‘Bad memories?’

‘And some.’

More silence. Her father’s illness had brought up things Jessie wasn’t in any rush
to share, and it was too early in therapy to open them up. Natalie concentrated on
helping her cope with the here and now—which for Jessie was going to be hard enough.

‘Sounds like he’s somewhere where he can get care and you can visit. Write down your
feelings when they come to you,’ said Natalie. ‘Then bring them here so we can talk
about them.’ Where it was safe.

Some fathers, Natalie mused as the session ended, had a lot to answer for. Liam’s
da’, whose example had been rejected. Or her own: her mother refused to tell her
anything about him except he had left when she was a toddler and, Natalie could only
assume, traumatised them both sufficiently to not even feature on her birth certificate.

She was certain Jessie’s had been worse than both, though the details had yet to
emerge.

‘It’s Morecombe Legal Service on the phone.’

Natalie was in her office writing a letter when Beverley called her. ‘Did they say
which lawyer or which client?’

‘No, hold on.’ A moment later Beverley was back. ‘Barrister called Jacqueline Barrett.
About Georgia Latimer.’

‘Put her through.’

Ms Barrett was straight to the point. ‘Your name has been suggested as someone to
monitor my client if she gets bail.’

Who by? Not someone from Morecombe, because she’d never heard of them.

‘Is she likely to?’

‘We have an excellent case. Are you able to see her?’

‘That depends,’ Natalie said.

‘On what?’

‘Whether your client is prepared to see me.’

‘Exactly the point,’ the lawyer said. ‘Georgia will do what the court instructs,
but she is worried you are not sympathetic to her.’

‘If by that she means I question what she tells me, she’s right,’ said Natalie. ‘If
she would prefer to see Professor Wadhwa—’

‘No,’ said Ms Barrett almost too quickly. Had Wadhwa managed to piss them off somehow?
More likely they thought that Natalie, younger and less experienced, would be easier
to play. Perhaps they just needed a female on side? It was no coincidence that the
barrister was a woman, Natalie was sure.

‘She wants you, but she wants to be certain you are open to her side of the story.’

‘I’m always open to the truth,’ Natalie replied. ‘In all its strange presentations.’

‘Good,’ said Ms Barrett. ‘I have to tell you, we are looking into her husband. I’ll
be in touch. If you can get me a report as soon as possible that would be helpful.’

With that she hung up, leaving Natalie wondering, not for the first time, about Georgia’s
husband
.

When the mail came, there was another red envelope. With another USB stick.

Natalie felt a surge of adrenaline, almost immediately followed by anger. She had
put the last message to the back of her mind and her preoccupation with Liam and
Travis and Amber had allowed her to forget it. Stupid. What was this about? She opened
it on her computer.

Getting close can be dangerous for your mental health.

Vague. A threat all the same. Her mind raced. Why had the first letter been handwritten
and the subsequent ones so much more calculated? All three had arrived on one of
the two days she worked at these rooms. She thought of Travis’s flash of anger; wondered
if he wanted to get at her for taking him on before Amber’s court case. He wouldn’t
have enjoyed cowering before someone thirty kilos lighter than him, and a woman in
particular. It was on national television news and then again in the documentary;
some of his friends might have seen it.