Chasing Summer

by Nicola Claire

  “Yeah. Why?”

  “Maisey told Mrs Lawrence who told Mr Huang who told Mrs Sargasso who told Suzy the Floozy who told me,” she paused for breath and to make a low growling sound, “that you got smashed at a corporate event last night and nearly cost Tammy Matthews the whole gig.”

  I stared at her, open-mouthed.

  “Get out of the car,” she snapped.

  “Are you mad at me?” I said, climbing out of the Micra.

  “I am so mad right now, but not at you. What was Maisey thinking?”

  I thought perhaps that Maisey was following her new boss’s request. Nothing beats gossip coming from the mousey little receptionist at the police station. Who would question that?

  “Don’t be too hard on Maisey,” I said.

  “You’re defending her?”

  “I was thinking of including her in Saturday Night Sangrias. We should really start that up again.”

  “Summer!” Tia snapped. “Suzy is having a field day with this.”

  Of course, she was.

  “It’s no big deal,” I told my BFF.

  “Suzy,” she spat.

  “Is a floozy and we all know it.”

  Tia studied me for a moment and then said, “Do you know what she’s calling you now?”

  Oh, here we go, I thought.

  I gave Tia a “tell me” signal with my hand.

  “Ginger Snap.”

  I started to laugh. It was an oldie, but a goodie.

  “You laugh!” Tia said in mock outrage. She’d started to smile too.

  “It fits,” I told her through snorts of air. Then I snapped my fingers in her face. “That’s what you get for pinching a ginger’s butt while she’s pouring a drink for you.”

  “Never underestimate a waitress’s ability to do two things at once,” Tia said.

  “Pour drinks,” I offered.

  “And pour them over your head,” Tia finished for me.

  We burst out laughing.

  “Donut?” she finally suggested.

  “I thought you’d never ask.”

  “Didn’t know I had to.”

  “There is that.”

  I followed her across the grass to the Cube and waited for her to enter and approach the counter. She was still smiling, and I was sad that I had to ruin that. For a moment, I’d taken her mind off her worries. But those worries were real, and we needed to deal with it.

  “Have you heard from Mikey?” I asked once she’d handed over a chocolate glazed donut. I had my priorities in order: Donut first and then wreck my best friend’s day.

  She sucked in a breath of air and then picked up a cloth and started wiping the bench. Vigorously.

  “I’ll take that as a no,” I said softly.

  “I was hoping you’d have something to tell me,” she murmured.

  “Does the name Rupert Carmichael ring a bell?” I asked her.

  She narrowed her eyes and cocked her head, but in the end, she said, “No. Never heard of him.”

  I ate my donut and contemplated the reason why Tia hadn’t asked who Carmichael was. Wouldn’t that have been the logical thing to do? You’re asked about someone, someone who may have connections to your missing brother, and you don’t know him; but wouldn’t you like to know who he is and how he is connected to said missing brother?

  “Tia,” I said, once the donut was finished and there was no chance of her snatching it back. “What’s going on?”

  She lifted her head and stared out over the top of mine to the carpark. There was nothing to see but the Mighty Micra, a rusted-out Honda Civic, and a couple of European sedans which screamed too-much-money.

  “I’ll tell you what I think,” I said, leaning closer and keeping my voice down. “I think Mikey was on a job for Darren. I think that job went south and Mikey hasn’t been seen nor heard from since. I think things are afoot in Northland. Specifically, in Doubtless Bay and it’s affecting Rika business. I think Mikey’s disappearance has got to do with that.” I took a breath and delivered the final blow. “And I think you know who Rupert Carmichael is.”

  She looked down at me then. I saw my friend, but I also saw a Rika daughter. A Doubtless Bay Daughter. Strength and dignity and bravery and passion.

  “Tia,” I said, half in apology, half a beg.

  “There’s competition,” she whispered. “Someone’s been encroaching on our turf.”

  Our turf. Not Darren’s.

  Crud.

  “Carmichael?”

  She shook her head. I shook mine in confusion. If it wasn’t Carmichael, then what on earth was he doing mixed up in all of this? And how did she know who Carmichael was, then?

  “You’ve got to understand, Summer,” Tia said low and urgent. “It’s a matter of pride. If we let them in, then no one will trust us.”

  Trust was a tricky thing. I knew all about it. And I also knew the type of trust Tia was talking about was the kind found at the end of a bong or a joint of weed.

  “I don’t get it,” I said, holding up a hand to stall her indignant reply. “What’s Carmichael got to do with any of this?”

  “Carmichael? He’s no one you need to worry about.”

  “Has he got Mikey?”

  She chewed on her bottom lip. “I don’t know.”

  “Then he’s definitely someone to worry about, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Summer. It’s not Auckland that’s a problem. It’s Kaitaia.”

  Kaitaia? Heat flushed my neck, swiftly followed by the chill of ice. Not ice as in a cube used to make drinks clink. But the kind of icy chill that feels like you’re being watched. For a second I couldn’t decipher what my body was trying to tell me, and then I smelled the petrol. If my abilities came with sound, I would have heard the roar of a motorbike engine. Instead, I just got a repeat performance of all the emotions I’d felt when Biker Brute had followed me, and then intimidated me, on the road back from the vets.

  “It’s another gang,” I said.

  “Yeah. They usually keep to the Far North and leave Doubtless Bay to us.”

  “But not anymore.”

  She shook her head.

  It wasn’t all of it. I could tell. Carmichael was linked. But Danvers had ID’d the murder victim on the wharf as someone out of Kaitaia. Which meant, Mikey had walked into a trap. Had he killed his opposition and then gone into hiding?

  Or had this rival gang taken him to threaten Darren?

  My neck buzzed. I let out a startled squeak. It felt like I was getting a close shave from Mr Parata at the Mangonui Barber Shop. He had a penchant for overusing his clippers; I never let him near my head if I could help it. I rubbed my nape. My hand felt wet. Not wet, I thought as I stared at it. It was perfectly dry, but still, I rubbed my fingers together. They felt oily, although you couldn’t see it. You could never see what I felt. Even I couldn’t. I sniffed my fingertips. What was that? I couldn’t quite place it. And then the buzz on my neck was replaced by something soft.

  Not linen. Not sheets. Or towels. But something fluffy.

  “Lanolin,” I said.

  “What?” Tia asked me.

  I looked up at her and blinked. Lanolin for sheep’s wool. The clippers for a shearing shed.

  I knew where I’d find Mikey. But shearing sheds were a dime a dozen in Northland. I needed more.

  “Tia,” I said, leaning forward and gripping her arm, “does the other gang own a farm?”

  “What?” she said again.

  “A farm. Sheep.”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Then give me a name.”

  She started shaking her head and pulled her arm back. Cradling it against her chest as if I’d burned her, she said, “No, Summer. You’ve done enough.”

  I hadn’t done anything. But Tia started putting lids on containers and switching things off, and before I could say triple-glazed-chocolate-donut-with-extra-chocolate-sprinkles-on-top, she’d closed up the Coffee Cube Shop.

  Chapt
er 19

  If You Didn’t Count The Spiders

  My first instinct was to run to Danvers and tell him everything. But I’d never been the type of girl to rush into things. Danvers was dealing with Big Wig. Who was definitely still tied up in all of this somehow. But, as yet, I didn’t know how. So, the detective finding that out was essential. Also, what I had planned was not something I wanted Danvers to see.

  Part of me thought he knew more about what I could do than I’d like to admit. But the stubborn, secretive, live-to-see-another-day part of me wanted to make sure he didn’t get a front row seat. Anyway, how could he know what I did? My entire life, I’d never met another person like me. But then, even if I had, would they have let me see what they could do?

  I certainly tried my best to hide what I did.

  Being the Doubtless Bay Daughter with kooky characteristics was better than being the Doubtless Bay Daughter who could feel things.

  I knew how those sorts of horror stories ended, and they usually involved a noose around someone’s neck or a burning pyre beneath their feet.

  Not my idea of a fun time.

  So, no. I didn’t rush to Danvers. But I did leave a rather cryptic cell phone message. I’m not an idiot. By the time I found this farm, I would need backup. I just planned on finding the farm first and then calling in the cavalry.

  I rubbed the back of my neck, but other than a vague sense of oiliness still present there, it didn’t tell me anything new. I felt a little desperate at that. That invisible clock I’d sensed when I’d first gone looking for Mikey felt like it had sped up and now the seconds were micro-seconds, and the timer was counting down in double speed.

  I reversed out of the Coffee Cube carpark, giving the shipping container that was the Cube one final regretful look. Tia had shut up shop all right, but she hadn’t emerged from the container yet. There were no windows for her to see outside of the thing when its sides were down like this, so I could only assume she was counting to a thousand or something, hoping I’d lose patience.

  It wasn’t patience I had lost. It was time. Mikey was in trouble, and I needed to find him. The cops wouldn’t be able to help. Even if Danvers could tell me the names of the members of the Kaitaia gang - which was doubtful - it would take too long to go through their property deeds the official way in order to find a needle in a haystack.

  Or a shearing shed in a country of seventy million sheep.

  But I had other avenues to explore before I tore off to Kaitaia with my nose hanging out of the Micra’s window hoping to get a hit off something.

  I took the first road into Stan’s subdivision feeling all kinds of hounded. Which was ironic as my own hound wasn’t with me. But I could have sworn I was still being followed. That icy feeling down the back of my neck hadn’t gone away, and it still wasn’t connected to a cocktail. I checked my rearview mirror, but no one was behind me, and the more I worked my way into the Watanabe’s subdivision, the harder it was for a tail to keep up with me.

  Of course, they might have just known where I was going and taken an alternate route.

  I climbed out of the Micra at the rear of Stan’s place and glanced in the bushes and rhododendrons. Nothing jumped out to get me. If you didn’t count the spiders. And I never counted the spiders. I straightened my spine and shook off the shudder-inducing feelings, then made my way to Stan’s shack.

  He peered out of the doorway, which was only partially open, and blinked owlishly at me through his inch-thick glasses.

  “Did you lose them?” he asked.

  Talk about shudder-inducing feelings. I stared at Stan and said, “Who?”

  “The Man. He’s still watching.”

  “Me or you?”

  He looked me up and down, but it wasn’t a leer or even a show of appreciation. Miss Piggy could have been doing a striptease with Kermit the Frog on my t-shirt, and he still wouldn’t have found my breasts interesting. Stan wasn’t like that.

  “Both of us now,” he told me.

  He opened the door and let me in and then shut it behind me. I heard the bolts sliding home, the locks engaging, and then the beep of a perimeter alarm. The LCD screens flickered in the otherwise dim light of the shed. Stan’s bed was in disarray, and his small utility bench was piled high with empty chip packets and soda cans. It looked like he hadn’t cleaned up in days.

  Perhaps, three going on four days?

  “Stan,” I said, turning to face him. He was standing in the corner of the room, fingers twisting together, eyes darting about the place. I shook my head softly. “Has your mum been in here lately?”

  “Won’t get her involved in this,” he said.

  “In what?” I asked gently.

  “The Man. The Man. The Man.”

  “You’re safe here; you know that, right?”

  He blinked at me. “Hello, Summer,” he finally said.

  “Hello, Stan,” I replied.

  “What brings you here?”

  “I need your help finding something.” If there were any way to keep Stan out of this, I would. But the Far North was pretty big and sheep pretty plentiful, and I needed a place to start. So, I was starting with Stan

  “I can do that,” he said and turned to his main computer screen. “Search parameters?”

  “Sheep farms in and around Kaitaia, possibly owned by gang members or associates of gang members.”

  “You’d be wanting the backcountry then.”

  “If you say so.”

  His fingers tapped away on the keyboard in lightning quick fashion.

  “There are 30 dedicated sheep farms in the Far North,” he announced a few minutes later. “And one-hundred-and-five sheep-beef farms. I’m eliminating those outside of a hundred kilometre radius of Kaitaia itself and running it through the police database for known criminal connections.”

  “You can do that?”

  “I can do anything.” I could practically see his superhero cape. I was pretty sure he actually had one, but Stan focused on the task at hand, becoming more centred and cognisant the longer the search went on.

  “I’m looking for a shearing shed that’s hidden enough that local police won’t see any activity going on,” I told him.

  “Shearing season is over,” he said.

  “Yeah, I don’t think they’re shearing sheep this time.”

  “You shouldn’t abuse your shearing clippers.”

  “I don’t think these guys care about that.”

  “Personal grooming is important.” I was fairly certain that was something Stan’s mother had repeatedly told him and repeatedly failed at teaching her son.

  My eyes darted to the empty food packets on his bench.

  The screen in front of Stan changed to display a satellite image of Kaitaia and the surrounding districts. Twenty-three possible locations had been circled with numbers beside them.

  “What are the numbers for?” I asked as he printed the image for me.

  “Start at number one and continue through two to twenty-three,” he said, turning around and handing me the sheet of paper. “I used a variety of algorithms to refine the search parameters you gave me to narrow the field down and categorise the relevancy. I think you’ll find your shearing shed between one and eight, but I’m being thorough.” He pushed his glasses up his nose and glared at me. “I am a very thorough being.”

  “Stan, you’re brilliant,” I told him.

  “I am that, too.”

  I gripped the paper and turned to the door, then paused.

  “You’ll lock this after I’m gone, won’t you?” I asked.

  “The Man won’t get me,” he declared solemnly.

  “Good,” I said, nodding my head and reaching for the locks.

  “But you, on the other hand…”

  He left that hanging.

  I let out a snort and said, “Catch ya on the flip side, Stan the Man.”

  “Hip, hip hooray for a hot summer day.” At least it wasn’t in a monotone this time.

&n
bsp; I exited the shack and waited to hear Stan lock the door again behind me. The locks engaged and I felt a little better. Not a heck of a lot, but enough to make it to my car before I felt that chill invade again. I twisted around and studied the road I was parked on. Nothing jumped out of the shadows, but that didn’t mean something - or someone - wasn’t still there.

  Stan was safe, I told myself. Then repeated it. It didn’t matter how many times I said it inside my head; I still felt like I’d led trouble to my friend’s door. I picked my cell phone up and dialled Mrs Watanabe. She answered on the first ring.

  “Hello, Summer dear,” she said.

  “Hey, Mrs Watanabe,” I greeted. “I’ve just visited Stan. I think it might be a good idea to get together tonight,” I said.

  “Oh, you think so?” She sounded sad and resigned in equal measure.

  “Yeah,” I said, sounding just as sad.

  “I’ll tell his father and sister, then.” Stan’s sister was married to a bruiser of a man. Kyle was as wide as he was tall and his fists were the size of dinner plates. If anyone could protect the Watanabes, it was him.

  “I think that’s a splendid idea,” I told Stan’s mum.

  She rang off to go gather the family together for what she thought was an intervention. Stan didn’t need an intervention - not this time - but he did need people around him. The more, the merrier.

  If I had my way, Stan would never need an intervention again. He was who he was, and I loved him. Mrs Watanabe tried her best to let him have his space, but occasionally the conspiracy theories got too much, and the matriarch sat Stan down for some good old-fashioned family therapy.

  Stan would suffer, just a little. But he’d hopefully be safe while she did it. Mrs Watanabe would be keeping a very close eye on her son for the next few days.

  It was the best I could manage.

  I pulled away from the curb and caught a glint of sunlight off metal in my rear vision. I glanced up at the mirror, but whatever it was had retreated out of sight. Part of me wanted them to follow me and leave Stan alone. Part of me wanted to lose them. But I slowed down, allowing my tail to catch up and trying my best not to feel like a hunted animal.

  Turning right at the end of their street, I hit State Highway 10. The satellite image of the Far North and the potential shearing shed locations sat face up on the passenger seat beside me. My stomach twisted when I glanced at it. One of those locations could be hiding Mikey. I wasn’t sure what would greet me when I found him. But I was determined to find him one way or the other.