by PJ Vye
That was the plan. It would take a life sentence to be sure. “I understand,” Mataio said.
Satisfied with the answer, Kimbo dropped the pieces of book into Mataio’s hands. “The letters. Who are they from?”
Mataio caught his reaction in time. Just when he thought he had the anger thing pegged, one word and he was right back to where he started. He wouldn’t fight to protect himself, but how far would he go to protect her? The idea tormented him.
When Mataio didn’t answer, Kimbo got up in his face again and repeated, dangerously quiet. “Who they from, Fuckface?”
“My lawyer.”
“Bullshit, Brinn.”
“It’s my lawyer,” he repeated.
“You get them every week, so someone cares about you. Who is she?”
Mataio needed this to be over. “It’s a bill, asking for payment.”
“With a fuckin’ handwritten address?”
Where did Kimbo get his information? One of the guards, probably. “I have a cheap lawyer. Can’t afford labels.”
“Is your lawyer’s name, Sunny?” Kimbo smirked.
Gravel crunched and another inmate, Jerry, appeared with one of Mataio’s newspapers tucked under his arm—probably heading to the same warm spot in the north yard where Mataio had been planning to sit. Jerry stopped abruptly at the sight of the men and couldn’t decide whether to turn around or continue past. Fear etched his face. No-one wanted to witness anything that might jeopardise Kimbo getting out in two months.
Kimbo gave Mataio a shoulder shove and walked away, banging the metal building loudly as he passed.
Jerry jumped a foot in the air at the sound. Mataio didn’t flinch.
“Morning Mat,” said Jerry, laughing at his own reaction.
Mataio didn’t answer. He was concentrating on counting his breaths to stop the sudden urge to pound Kimbo to the ground for mentioning Sunny’s name.
Chapter Nine
Sunny had seen a list just like this before—Mataio had written one the day he confessed to the murder. Tulula had found it and given it to her in an envelope when she boarded the plane to Samoa.
This list was different. There were only ten rules. She turned the page over in her hand and back again—dated two years before she’d met Mataio.
1. No Social Life - Rule Achieved
2. Protect The Family - Rule Achieved
3. Eat To Survive - Rule Achieved
4. No Money, No Possessions - Rule Achieved
5. Never Tell - Rule Achieved
6. No Fun - Rule Achieved
7. No Sex - Rule Achieved
8. No Freedom - Rule Achieved
9. No Vacations - Rule Achieved
10. Community Service - Rule Achieved
There were at least a half dozen more envelopes in Laurence’s hand. “Where did you get these?” she asked.
Laurence kept Atali distracted with the blocks as he answered. “From a post office box in Melbourne.”
“Did he tell you about them?”
“Yes.”
His answer evoked a huge sob from her chest. Atali looked up suddenly and Sunny threw on a fast smile to reassure her. Atali turned back to her toys.
“Why would he tell you, and not anyone else? He’s spoken to no-one. He won’t say why he did it, what happened, nothing. Yet he tells you everything? I just can’t believe it.”
“He needed some help. I provided a service; he provided information.”
Sunny would have sold a kidney for Mataio to talk to her. Instead, he talked to a stranger.
“What service?”
“Huh?”
“What service did you provide, for him to give you these?”
“He didn’t give them to me. He told me where I’d find them.”
He’d redirected his answer, but she let it go. “How many envelopes are there?”
“He said he wrote one a month, for twenty years.”
“Do you have all of them?” She looked hopefully at his bag but there only seemed to be the ones in his hand.
“I do, but not here.”
What she’d give to see the one he’d written after having sex with her. Was that the first rule he’d broken in twenty years? “Can I see them?”
He didn’t answer, distracted with a game of peek-a-boo. Atali threw her hands up and giggled every time he peeked. She’d only met this guy less than an hour ago and already she’d bonded. Atali seemed to love easily. Like mother, like daughter.
Laurence returned his attention to Sunny. “Why did he write these, do you think?”
Sunny knew why, but with Laurence keeping so much to himself, she wondered if she should keep something back of her own. “Why do you think?”
“He’s some kind of control freak. That’s for sure. I’m guessing he tried to live by these rules.”
She nodded.
“Did you know?”
Not at the time, but on some level, she knew. Mataio had the self-discipline of a major-general and she had the self-discipline of a hungry rat. No wonder she never felt good enough around him. “I knew he lived with some kind of agenda. He stayed on the outside of everything. Never talked about himself. He was a hard man to get close to.”
“Did you?” He studied her reaction, then clarified with, “Get close to him?”
She gave her usual, well-practiced response. She’d been asked this question before. “Mataio saved people. That’s what he did. How do you not like someone like that?”
“He didn’t save La’ei.”
“No.”
“Why make rules?”
“I’m guessing it was the closest way to living a prison life, without actually being in prison.”
“Who does that?”
“He was an ethical man.” She recognised her use of past tense, but didn’t correct herself. He was past tense to her now.
“Why didn’t he just turn himself in after he did it?”
“I don’t know,” said Sunny, and then it occurred to her Laurence might know that too. “Do you?”
Laurence stood and rinsed their cups in the sink. He cracked his neck a few times as if sitting on the floor had messed with his alignment. “You want to know why he killed her?”
Sunny tried to make her answer sound casual. “Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” she breathed. She was fooling no-one.
He dried his hands on a towel. “Why didn’t you ask him yourself?”
Sure. Why didn’t she think of that? Just ask him herself. Hah. “He wouldn’t speak to me, after he was arrested.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know.” Sunny stared at her daughter, embarrassed to tell him Mataio wanted nothing to do with her. She didn’t know the reason for that, either.
Laurence looked like he might know something, but didn’t say.
“So, will you tell me why Mataio killed La’ei?” she tentatively asked.
“Yes.”
Sunny waited and when he didn’t continue, she asked again. “Well?”
“All I need is a blood test from Atali,” Laurence countered. “And a complete physical by a doctor of your choice. I’ll pay.”
“And then you’ll tell me why?”
“Yes.”
If Sunny could go see Mataio herself, face to face, he’d tell her everything. If Mataio was talking to this guy, he’d have to talk to her. “I want money, like what you’re giving Junior,” she countered.
“My entire budget has gone to Junior. I need him more.”
She couldn’t be sure if he was telling the truth—her radar on honesty and men hadn’t been all that reliable in the past. “Just to be clear, you’re only interested in Atali’s health because Junior is her father?”
“Junior is her father, right?” For the first time, he looked thrown. It was a chink he obviously hadn’t considered.
Did Sunny want the information or not? She couldn’t have this guy wandering around Apia telling people Atali was Mat
aio’s kid. It might be dangerous for them.
Sunny didn’t answer directly but gave a noncommittal nod. She owed this guy nothing, and he had no problems asking for what he wanted. Why shouldn’t she lie to get what she wanted, too?
“I also know how he killed her. Mat told me everything,” he said, as if she needed a little more convincing.
Sunny started to doubt this guy. He was trying too hard. Like he was as desperate for answers as she’d been. What did she know about him? He could be making it all up. Was she going to take his word for it that he’d visited Mataio in prison—and that Mataio had talked? Mataio hadn’t even told the court why he did it. Or the lawyers. So, why should Sunny believe this guy now?
But he had the letters. How would he even know about The Rules and the letters if he hadn’t spoken to Mataio?
She needed to see Mataio and ask him herself.
Atali began to pass out blocks, one to Laurence, one to Sunny, until their hands were full. Laurence continued the game of peek-a-boo with the blocks.
“I need some time to think about it,” Sunny said.
For a brief second, she was afraid he might throw the blocks at the wall. That’s what her previous boyfriend, Judd, would have done.
“Okay,” he said, and stacked the blocks carefully on the ground. Atali pushed them over with glee. “I understand. You have my card. Call me when you’ve made up your mind.” He rubbed Atali’s head and said goodbye, and she grabbed his leg in protest.
“More,” said Atali in her big voice. “More playing,” she said again and pointed to the blocks in case he didn’t understand the first time.
“Sorry, kiddo. I’ve gotta go,” he said. He looked a little sad about it.
Sunny put Atali on her hip and walked Laurence to the door. “I have your card. I’ll be in touch,” she said.
Laurence touched Atali’s cheek and said, “See ya, Pumpkin Head.”
Atali pushed her head against Sunny’s chest, and ignored him.
“Thanks for the coffee,” he said and turned to leave. “And the air-conditioning,” he added, as the Samoan heat hit him again.
Sunny prepared lunch for Atali and watched as her daughter fed herself. The learning was more important than the mess, she reminded herself. Every approach to the mouth with the overloaded spoon resulted in a fifty-fifty chance of making it. Atali didn’t seem to care about the spread of yogurt on her face or up her arms. She happily ploughed through it, her focus on the spoon.
Everyday Sunny questioned her choices. She’d agreed right from the start not to tell people Atali was Mataio’s daughter. Aunt Tulula had been right. The idea of Atali being hated for her father’s crimes was too much to even think about.
If she hadn’t given all of Judd’s money—her money—to Mataio for lawyers, she’d not be so stuck now. Saving money on a Samoan wage was near impossible and until she could afford a flight for herself and Atali back to Australia, this was where she’d have to stay. She had a job, a working visa, an apartment, a family. She had to leave Mataio behind. Let go of the past.
But the past would always haunt her. Atali would want to know her father one day, and while Junior had been a pal to play along, the secret wouldn’t do for Atali. She deserved to know the truth.
How many times had she thought about telling Mataio in a letter? No. If she couldn’t tell him face to face, she wouldn’t tell him at all.
She needed to see him. It was time. How could she move on without closure?
Sunny looked at her violin in the corner and considered her options. She’d paid twelve thousand dollars for it. She’d be lucky to get twelve dollars here in Samoa.
Tulula would arrive in an hour and she hadn’t prepared her afternoon class yet. Atali had finished the yogurt and now the bowl was on her head.
Sunny clicked her tongue the same way Tulula did and began mopping up the area, singing an improvised cleaning song as she worked. Atali loved it when she sang and she barely struggled when Sunny took the cloth to her face.
This Laurence guy probably had more resources than he admitted to, so there was no point making an enemy of him. She needed another job–one that wouldn’t impact on her time with Atali. But a job like that would be hard to find.
Atali put out her hands to be cleaned and Sunny continued the song, the tune responsible for her daughter’s cooperation.
Sunny wondered if Mataio might need a song. Maybe if the words “you have a daughter” were set to a catchy tune, he might even listen.
Chapter Ten
Laurence walked into his hotel room and went straight to his backpack, pulled out the two thick wads of Mataio’s letters and ordered them by the postmark date.
When he’d retrieved the letters from the Melbourne PO box—exactly where Mataio had told him they’d be—he’d spent an hour or so, opening them at random. They’d all said the same thing. Rule Achieved. He’d opened less than half of them, got bored with the result and didn’t bother to open the rest.
Something about the way Sunny reacted just now, made him think they might not all say the same thing. Like she’d seen one of these letters before.
Had Mataio broken one of ‘The Rules’? And if so, which one?
Laurence wasn’t sure why it mattered—but intuition told him it did.
He checked his notebook for the date when Sunny moved into Mataio’s aunt’s home, then opened each letter from that date, one at a time. There were three. He chastised himself for not thinking of it sooner. The first envelope was the same as all the others. Ten Rules. All with the same affirmation—Rule Achieved. The handwriting in the second last envelope looked less ordered than the previous lists. He’d pressed the pen harder as he’d written them down the page. Still, each one listed the same outcome—Rule Achieved. The handwriting on the last envelope was barely recognisable. Messy and inconsistent. But despite some difficulty reading the script, the message was very clear.
Mataio had broken a rule.
Rule Number Seven—no sex. Broken.
Who did Mataio have sex with? And when?
Laurence checked the envelopes. There were sixteen days between this letter and the murder confession.
What tipped Mataio over the edge? What happened in the days leading up to the interview that made him give up twenty years of self-inflicted penance and break one of ‘The Rules’, and then decide to confess to the murder anyway?
Was the sex so bad, he’d decided he needed another twenty years of abstinence?
The man was a mystery and definitely worth the time Laurence had put into the research.
Mataio was an inventor who publicly donated the most influential formula since penicillin, then confessed to murder.
He could have owned the world, and walked the streets a hero—been hailed a superstar. Instead, he chose to rot in a medium security prison for the rest of his natural life.
The man was more complex than the formula he’d created. If Mataio had broken a rule after twenty years of not breaking rules, it would have been a big deal.
Laurence took a photo of the last letter, then wrapped them all in a band and stacked them away.
Could Mataio be Atali’s father?
According to the accounts of one of the health care workers employed to transport Junior and Tulula back to Samoa, Junior had been unable to walk long distances because of his excessive weight. Could the man really have fathered a child at that time?
And if Junior wasn’t the father, then testing Atali to find evidence against the drug was pointless.
He needed a paternity test first. Or he could just ask Sunny again and observe her reaction more closely. Would she tell the truth?
Laurence began to flick through his emails, just as his phone rang.
The caller ID showed a private number but he guessed who it was. He considered not answering, then thought better of it.
“Simon. Just getting to your emails now.”
The voice on the other end of the line didn’t care much for s
mall talk. “I just heard from Godfrey you want to extend the deadline again. That’s a firm no, Williams.”
“Not even a hello, then?”
“Don’t play with me, Williams,” said his editor-in-chief. “I’m already out on a limb with this one. We can’t afford to wait.”
“The story’s evolving. I just need a bit more—”
“You always want more. We’ve haemorrhaged way too much on this.”
“If I prove what I think I’m gonna prove, you’ll sell m—”
“I’m gonna cut you off right there, Williams. We’re not interested in what you think happens next. All we care about, is why he did it. That’s it. Write the fucking article.”
The connection cut and Laurence dropped his phone on the bed.
The Conservator wouldn’t be interested in the story he really wanted to write. And it was no fault of Simon. He had a newspaper to run—a newspaper aligned with corporations and pharmaceutical companies who had deep pockets and loads of influence. They’d never agree to the actual story—the real reason he was here.
Laurence knew Simon Pierce would cut him loose eventually.
Although he still had some leverage.
Laurence had the exclusive on the story. For some reason—one Laurence didn’t even know himself—Mataio had spoken to no-one else but him. Not even his lawyers knew why he killed his cousin. The Conservator would wait, but their patience had a limit.
Laurence wasn’t particularly interested in the why’s and the what for’s of a man on the brink of insanity. His curiosity rested somewhere else entirely.
He had a theory, and he was determined to prove it, before it was too late. But no-one was listening. His allies were considered extremists and conspiracists. When the approval came through for his documentary, he’d drop The Conservator and go freelance. Until then, he had to play the game.
He’d written most of his article already. Now all he needed was a finale. Something big. Junior was the key. A long-term health threat would be ideal, but impossible to prove in the foreseeable future. So far, Junior was showing excellent health.