Limbo (31 page)

So Hailey had still been breastfeeding in some form when she’d died?

He dialled Joy’s number with a smile on his face.

‘Hello?’

‘Hey. It’s me,’ he said frowning at the background noise. It sounded like she was standing in the middle of a cyclone. ‘Where the hell are you?’ he asked.

‘I’m in the shower.’

The smiled slid right off Dash’s face. Great. So she was naked. And wet. Possibly slippery. Maybe there were soap bubbles clinging to her nipples.

Yep, he could picture that. His dick already had.

Crap.

‘I’ll ring back.’

‘No. Jesus. I’ve been waiting to hear from you for two hours. Just…wait a sec…’

The noise shut off. It didn’t help. Because she was still wet and naked. Even if she was grabbing a towel —
please dear god let her be grabbing a towel
— she’d still be wet and naked under it. Her hair dripping water down her neck and shoulders. Drips running into that little valley —

‘Okay. Shoot.’

Dash shut his eyes. ‘I can ring back. Go and get dressed. You’ll…catch a cold or something.’

Mainly it was the
or something
he was most concerned about. Like maybe he might just be tempted to see how far she’d be prepared to go if he suddenly asked her to touch herself while he listened. He’d never had phone sex but he was mighty tempted to try.

She snorted in his ear and even that was a turn on.

‘While the bacteria count in the rest of this one-bedroom shit hole I live in is in plague proportions I’m pretty sure I’m safer in here where the temperature is currently about seventy-five degrees thanks to my excellent hot-water system. The only thing my asshole landlord did not skimp on.’

So it was hot and steamy in there with her as well. God, didn’t he know how that felt. It was pretty damn hot and steamy inside his underwear at the moment too.

Fuck
.

‘If it’s all the same to you I’d really rather not have this conversation when one of us is naked.’

‘I’m not naked. I’m wearing a towel.’

‘
Mostly
naked then.’

‘Hey I’m willing to wait while you slip into a towel.’

Dash shook his head.
Jesus
. Didn’t she realise he was hanging on by a thread here? He’d managed to go all day ignoring the constant backbeat in his head.
Kiss her. Kiss her. Kiss her.

There was a long sigh in his ear, which was
not
good for his equilibrium. ‘Just tell me, Dash.’

‘Hailey had high levels of prolactin in her blood when she died.’

‘That’s a lactating thing, right?’

‘Yep. It’s the hormone women secrete when they’re breast feeding.’

‘So…Hailey
had
been with Isabella for those six months?’

‘Yep. Well…she was definitely still producing breast milk anyway. I guess she could have been kept somewhere separate to Isabella and been made to express? I’m not sure. I think it might have something to do with it though.’

‘Another piece in the puzzle?’

‘Yes.’

‘What about the plates?’

‘Nada. They were clean.’

There was silence on her end then and he wondered what she was thinking about.

‘How are the fish?’

He shut his eyes on a groan.
Great
. Just when he’d stopped thinking about sex for a second. He glanced over at them. ‘I think they’ve finally worn themselves out.’

‘It had to happen sooner or later. No one could keep that up.’

Dash could. Right now he was pretty damn sure he could fuck for hours. ‘Anyway,’ he said, brutally pushing the thought aside. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow at eight?’

‘Yep. Okay. Goodnight.’

‘Goodnight.’

Goodnight?
He pushed the end button in disgust. Nothing
good
ever came out of being this wound up. But at least he knew how to take the edge off.

He headed for the shower.

Can’t beat ’em? Join ’em.

On Friday afternoon Dash was parked at the curb outside Katie’s school waiting for the bell to ring and the mass exodus to begin when his phone rang. It was Jean. ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘Please tell me you have something for me?’

His search yesterday of Gerry’s home hadn’t revealed anything significant as far he could tell. No hidden one-year-old, that was for sure. No cot. No toys. No photos on the fridge. No tins of baby food or packets of disposable nappies anywhere. No papers to suggest he was stashing Isabella somewhere else. No extra property receipts or travel documents. Nothing Steinbeck-related lying around.

Nothing looked suspicious at all — as far as he could tell.

Joy had been disappointed. So had he, and he was beginning to wonder about that wild goose chase again. There was only Ronald left before they were back to the drawing board and he really didn’t like Ronald for it at all.

‘How much do you love me?’ she asked.

Dash’s gut kicked a little at the note of triumph in her voice. Jean wasn’t one to get carried away about anything much. She was
always
measured. ‘You found something?’

‘I think I have.’

‘I hope so. Gerry was a bust.’

‘I spoke to that guy I was talking about, Kevin Scott, he’s in the Lismore office now. He knows Ronald Stewart quite well. Been his parole officer on and off over thirty years. Reckons he hails from the Murrwillumbah area but moved up your way about seven months ago to a place just near Gympie. He couldn’t remember the name of it but he said it was definitely a Mc name.’

Dash quickly wrote that down on an old receipt he had lying in the centre console. Mc. He circled it three times and put a question mark next to it. Dash knew Gympie was about a ninety-minute drive from Brisbane and traffic shouldn’t have been a hassle around the time of night the liquor shops had been hit.

So Ronald Stewart had moved to the state about the same time the hits had started to happen and was living a feasible distance to travel. Dash still wasn’t convinced and he had a feeling that Jean was sitting on something bigger.

‘He was obviously allowed to travel,’ Dash said.

‘Yep. He was free and clear. But Kevin was worried about him going. He was worried about Ron’s mental health.’

‘Any particular reason?’ Dash knew she was leading to something and the way she was enjoying the journey, he figured the payoff was going to be worth it.

‘Turns out Ron’s six-month-old granddaughter, Keisha, died a year ago while he was in prison. The coroner found it to be a case of SIDS.’

Dash sat up straighter in his chair. ‘Really?’

‘That just gave you a little bit of a P.I. stiffy, didn’t it?’

Dash could hear the laughter in her voice. ‘More than a little.’

‘Apparently Kev ran into Ron in Lismore a few days before the big move and he told Kev he and his wife and his daughter and her partner were all heading north to get away from the memories. That his wife had come into a bit of money and they were going to start again. That he’d let them down, that he wasn’t there for them when they’d needed him and he wanted to make up for that, go straight, provide for his family honestly for a change. Kev got the impression that Ron thought his granddaughter’s death was some kind of karmic payback. He apparently wanted to wipe the slate clean and get a fresh start.’

‘Well. Fuck me.’

Jean chuckled as things crystallised in Dash’s mind. He didn’t know all the hows and whys but he was suddenly convinced this was important. Their first true lead. He suddenly
liked
Ronald for this
a lot
.

His gut was working overtime.

Jean chuckled. ‘Kev had been touching base with Ronald every now and then when he was still down that way to check on how he was doing. If he was okay. Apparently he was put on suicide watch when he was in Goulburn jail after the death. His granddaughter was the apple of his eye, he had her picture up everywhere. He got a pass out to go to the funeral.’

The distant ringing of a bell mirrored the ringing of Dash’s heartbeat as his gut told him this was significant. Soon the footpath would be swarming with kids excited about the coming weekend and Dash was going to have to think about Katie and the next couple of days together but for now — he was convinced.

‘Thank you, Jean,’ he said. ‘This is…’

‘Yeah,’ she said, sounding suddenly gruff. ‘Just go get that little girl back, okay?’

‘You betcha.’ He ended the call, his mind boggled by Jean’s information.

Kids trickled out and Katie was one of the first. He waved at her as he spotted her through the windscreen. She barrelled towards the car, pulling the door open, her face flushed, her eyes glittering with excitement. He was a little taken aback that it was coming from his usually reserved daughter but right now he knew exactly how she felt.

His heart thudded hard against all his pulse points at the import of Jean’s words.

They were on to something big.

His ‘Hey sweetie’ was quickly cut off by Katie’s excited, ‘Dad-Rebecca-asked-me-to-a-sleep-over-at-her-place-tomorrow-night-could-I-please-go-
pleeease
.’

Dash smiled at her exuberance, pulling his head back into daddy territory. It was great to see Katie like this but it didn’t take away from the fact that, if he agreed, it would be the first time in three years Katie hadn’t been at his place on Saturday night. She’d never even asked to stay anywhere else before and he knew for a fact that not only had she had offers she’d rebuffed but she
did
go for sleepovers occasionally during the week on school holidays when she was with Liz.

Dash knew she felt protective of him, that she worried about him being alone — hence Ralph. But it wasn’t her job. It was her job to be a kid and it was good to see her being completely egocentric for a change.

‘Don’t I even get a kiss first?’ he teased.

She rolled her eyes but leaned in and gave him a quick peck, obviously impatient for his answer, and something twisted hard in the area of his heart. Thoughts of Ronald Stewart and Isabella Richardson left his head as Dash calculated how much that ivory tower would set him back.

This was the beginning. She’d be a teenager soon and either think him terribly daggy or not give a crap about his loneliness.

‘Can I, Daddy?’

‘Let me check with Mum and Rebecca’s mum but if they say yes then it’s fine with me.’

Her excitement just about hit the stratosphere and she launched herself at him, her arms clamped tight around his neck. ‘Thank you, thank you.’

Dash held her tight. He was going to keep holding her tight for as long as she let him.

***

Joy had a ball of butterflies playing tag in her belly on Friday evening as about a dozen choir hopefuls shuffled into the Good Shepherd. Not even the sign that towered above tonight:
TGIF
—
Thank God I’m Forgiven
had relaxed Joy.

She hadn’t been sure this whole concept would even get off the ground when Stan had floated the idea but now it was she wanted it to triumph. To her this
was
outreach. It was her kind of
Christian
.

She may not have believed but she couldn’t help but think if this whole God thing was actually true then what Stan was doing — showing compassion, building community, breaking down barriers — was what it was all about.

She’d hoped there’d be a higher turnout but Rome wasn’t built in a day, right?

From somewhere Stan had produced a vat of soup with chucky slices of bread, which was attacked with gusto, and the steaming-hot urns of tea and coffee had been similarly taken advantage of.

When everybody had eaten Lance got up and introduced himself and then introduced Joy and they’d explained about the informal audition. ‘This isn’t X Factor,’ Joy joked. ‘There’s no numbers to stick on your clothes. No judges. You’re amongst friends here. There’s no music. Just you and your voice. This isn’t slick and professional. This isn’t about perfection, it’s about community.’

Tense faces, thin and aged beyond their years, seemed to relax a little at the assurance and Joy hoped they’d been put at ease. God knew, she understood how difficult it was to stand up in front of a bunch of people and sing and she’d had a good solid background behind her. People who’d loved and supported her.

‘How about we just start here at the first row and work our way along?’ Lance suggested to those who were gathered, and there was general head shaking.

And so the auditions got underway. The first one up was a man who could have been aged at anywhere between forty and sixty. His step was slow and unsure as he made his way up to the front.

‘Hi,’ Joy smiled. ‘What’s your name?’

He glanced at her nervously. ‘I’m Robert.’

‘Okay Robert. What are you going to sing for us?’ Joy was hyper aware that she sounded like a judge on
The X Factor
— maybe a grungy A-cup version of Danni Minogue. But she’d been to enough auditions in her life to know that this
was
how they went.

Robert shifted from foot to foot. ‘Hallelujah,’ he said and Joy groaned inwardly. ‘By Leonard Cohen.’

Joy perked up.
Helz yeh
. ‘I love this song,’ she said, beaming at him, and sent a short hypocritical prayer up —
please let this be good.

And then Robert pulled his worn-looking beanie off his head to reveal thinning rumpled hair, shut his eyes and turned his face to the ceiling as Lance had done that first day she’d met him and Margery had done that day she’d sung ‘Jesus Loves Me’. His body swayed from side to side for a few beats as he centred himself and then he opened his mouth and completely slayed her with, ‘I heard there was a secret chord…’

Tears slammed into her eyes and she felt Lance reach for and squeeze her hand.

At the end there was a moment of stunned silence, then everyone got to their feet and clapped and Joy was damn sure tears glistened in Robert’s eyes as well. And the calibre continued. Margery sang ‘From Little Things Big Things Grow’ and Joy doubted there was a dry eye in the house.

About half way through Joy looked up and noticed Eve walking in with Katie and a young skinny blonde in a miniskirt and a faux-fur-trimmed, silver lamé jacket.