A Place to Stay

by Jennie Jones

  She’d stabbed Fletcher. That’s what she hadn’t been able to tell him. That’s why she was evading him, because she thought she’d done wrong. Imagining Fletcher taking hold of Rachel packed a more powerful punch than remembering the pictures of her all beaten up. Because it could happen again.

  He texted Jack with the information, which now connected Fletcher to the attack on the sergeant and would bring to an end any thoughts the operation might have about Rachel being the offender. He added her fear that Fletcher might be looking for her. It put Rachel out of the realm of suspicion. And wholly in the line of danger.

  So many questions. So much to worry about. When he next spoke to Jack, he’d demand that Wiseman’s associates in Perth—the building firm—were brought into the investigation. They had to be part of the money-laundering and drug mob.

  He called Will.

  ‘Is it Lake Laura?’ Will asked, his voice groggy.

  ‘No. Sorry to wake you a few hours after you hit your bed, mate, but I need you to drive out to me. No uniform. And use your own car.’

  ‘Actually, I only just got into bed. Been looking for Billy—no joy there yet. I’ve got the patrol car out on the highway and one of the arrest vans out looking for him elsewhere. What part of the scrubland are you in? Presume you’re still at the Laurensen house.’

  ‘The corner opposite the side of the house. I’m in the troop wagon.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘No headlights, Will.’

  ‘Be there in thirty minutes—if I can find my trousers.’

  Twenty-five minutes later Will was unscrewing the cup from the thermos he’d put on the bonnet of his car. ‘Nice evening for a stake-out,’ he said as he poured coffee. ‘So give me the lowdown.’

  Luke brought Will up to date on the last of the text messages between him and Rachel. He also told him about the builders he believed were here to get her—or to get Fletcher through Rachel. Then he spoke about whatever it was that was bugging Jack.

  ‘The problem is, I have no idea what’s going to happen before we get to the after party.’

  ‘Talking about parties—’ Will cocked his head to the house. ‘I heard it was quite a big argument you and she had at the barbecue.’

  Luke glanced up, his eyes narrowed. ‘How do you know about that?’

  ‘Small town, detective. Word of a relationship split does the rounds as fast as a hint of rain.’ He put a flask on the bonnet of his car. ‘Understand you got real cuddly on the range. Then you argued and she stormed off. Then you made up behind the club house and then you cocked it up and she stormed off again.’

  ‘How the hell do you know we went behind the club house?’

  ‘Barbara got a call from Louise from the mothers and toddlers group. Louise had just spoken to her friend Sandy who’d gone to the barbecue with some bloke and she said she saw you kissing …’ He paused. ‘I think it was Sandy. Anyway, Sandy called Louise who called Barbara—’

  ‘Okay.’ Luke cut him off with a raised hand. ‘I get it.’ He looked up at the blackened sky while hauling in a breath, putting his mind on more important things. ‘The guy Tani says is looking for me. I keep thinking about him.’

  ‘About what in particular?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just wonder if it’s the guy from the warehouse bust. The guy who stabbed me. Sounds crazy, I know, but I never heard anything about him again, even though I’d given my statement. And I was more or less told to get out of the Drug Squad and go back to Homicide. That’s odd, wouldn’t you say?’

  Will pulled his mouth to one side as he considered. ‘Would you know him? If you faced him?’

  ‘Maybe. I’d get a sense, at least. When he stabbed me, he apologised. And when he left, he told me he’d find me and I’m pretty sure he apologised again.’ Luke shook his head. Maybe his memories were tangled about that. But the guy had something about him that didn’t ring true. ‘The guy who blackmailed Wiseman and asked about Rachel apologised too.’

  ‘Whatever you need from me,’ Will said, ‘you’ve got it. You know that, don’t you?’

  ‘Never doubted it,’ Luke said. He got into the wagon. ‘I won’t be long. I just need to shower and change. If she leaves the house, call me. And follow her. But for the moment, don’t use the police radio.’

  ‘You’re looking fractured there,’ Will said. ‘Go do whatever it is you have to do. I presume you’ll be coming back to talk to her? Once the sun’s up.’

  ‘Even if I have to bust in through her front door.’

  * * *

  Luke was gripping the steering wheel, staring out the windscreen at the dust now tightly packed in rivulets on the glass. He flicked the wiper and watched the water fan across the screen as the wiper blades squeaked.

  His head pounded as though he had a headache—worry for Rachel.

  She’d always be Rachel to him. In his heart. But how had she coped with all those different personas? Would she leave Rachel behind now and become somebody else? He hoped not. She’d said his job was the heart of him. But the one love in his heart was being knocked to the side to make room for another.

  In a flash he changed his mind about the direction he was heading and hit the brake. The vehicle skidded. He controlled it, then turned west down the lane that led to Solomon’s stables.

  He left the wagon parked outside the shut gate and let himself into the property, fixing the chain over the post and securing the gate. Solomon was up, sitting next to his ute, which was parked at the end of the stable block. A tin pot sat at his side, steam from the spout curling into a stream of light from a stall, illuminating the middle-of-the-night shadows. Luke settled himself with his back against the stable wall, sitting with his knees bent and his boots planted on the earth.

  Solomon poured coffee and handed him a tin mug. ‘I came back for a few supplies,’ he said. ‘Then I’ll get out there again.’

  ‘I’m heading home for the same. Will’s out at the Laurensen house.’ Luke sipped, grimacing at the strength of the brew.

  They sat in silence, listening to the brush around them whisper with the sounds of wildlife going about their business, with no intent to interfere with the humans. A horse whinnied, followed by another responding in kind.

  ‘You ever get a horse that was so skittish it didn’t know that your care of it, or your attention to it, was meant to help, not harm?’ Luke asked, looking out over the darkened paddocks.

  ‘All the time.’

  ‘That’s what I’d thought you say.’

  ‘So why ask?’ Solomon said. ‘You ride. You know horses.’

  Luke wrapped his fingers around the warm mug. ‘I’ve overstepped a mark I didn’t take any notice of.’

  ‘Then it isn’t a fault, it’s a reason.’

  He should have had the sense to think harder about what he’d discovered about Rachel. About her undoubted innocence. And most importantly, about the way he’d handled this mess.

  ‘You can’t always see everything coming your way,’ Solomon offered.

  Luke’s mouth curled with a hint of a smile. He leaned his head against the stable wall, never quite used to Solomon being almost as intuitive as Tani. ‘I should have looked deeper. Before I moved in.’

  ‘So stand back awhile. Let the horse come to you. Sit close, and wait.’

  ‘Sounds reasonable. Except I’m not talking about a horse.’

  ‘Same with people,’ Solomon said.

  ‘You ever been in love?’ Luke asked.

  ‘With more than life itself? No.’

  ‘Reckon you’d like it if it happened to you?’

  ‘Can’t tell. It hasn’t happened yet.’ Solomon laughed quietly. ‘So what exactly did you do wrong regarding your brunette?’

  Luke roused himself and stood, knocking the dirt off his backside with a brush of his hand. ‘Too much and not enough.’ He threw the contents of his mug onto the bush in front of him and put the mug down. ‘I’ll figure it out,’ he said.

  ‘Luke.’ S
olomon stood. ‘It’s not about revenge. The guy after you.’

  Luke took a breath. Perhaps he was too tired to think straight but it was eerie to contemplate some guy from his past when he’d been thinking it was some guy from Rachel’s.

  ‘Then what the hell is it about?’

  Solomon lifted a plastic water container onto the tray of his ute. ‘Tani says there’s a change in the air. There’s bad and there’s good out there.’

  Fletcher was out to get Rachel because she’d spoken to the cops and she’d divorced him. He wouldn’t have liked that, regardless of dumping her years ago; he’d want her still on the chain. If Fletcher was the bad—who was the good guy? Luke stared at the paddock, his eyes darting across the shadowy landscape. ‘My worry is that the builders are the Serenity money launderers, now also running drugs, and that they’ve got Rachel in their sights because they’re waiting for Fletcher to come for her. But I don’t know why they’d be looking for Fletcher unless what Jack said is right—that he’s gone feral. Done them some harm or hurt their business.’

  ‘I guess we’ll find out,’ Solomon said.

  Luke slapped the back of the ute. ‘Take it easy,’ he told him. ‘By the book, remember. Christ—how could I forget? Billy. Went missing yesterday evening when Hugh took him off for a birthday drink. Will’s got a car out looking.’

  The natural furrow on Solomon’s brow creased even more. ‘I’ll look for him. You go watch your brunette.’

  Luke raised a hand to acknowledge his friend, then returned to the gate, his boots making a soft thump on the packed earth and the bushes around him still whispering secretive sounds.

  Eighteen

  ‘Anything?’ Luke asked when Will answered his call.

  ‘Nothing. Still only the lamplight in the front of the house. She’s probably asleep. Where are you?’

  Luke turned the wagon into his driveway. ‘I’m home now. I stopped off to see Solomon—he knows everything we know. He’s out looking for Billy.’

  ‘Good,’ Will said. ‘Take your time. Get a couple of hours’ sleep.’

  ‘No,’ Luke said. ‘I’ll be back in half an hour.’ And he’d be waking Rachel up and taking her to the station. She’d be safe there. Even if he had to bust down that front door, keep her handcuffed in the back of the troop wagon and lock her in a cell, he was taking her.

  He pulled up on the packed-earth driveway. The sun was on the horizon now and he couldn’t help but note that he hadn’t done any weeding in a long time. Not that much grew except the toughest weeds, mulga shrub and a few large palm and gum trees. The owners hadn’t bothered with a watering system. No point, until they got the area in front of the house sorted into some sort of shape. The old station master’s place had been a pretty big spread years ago. The land had since been sold off and Luke had lived in the house with its surrounding five acres since he’d moved to Mt Maria.

  He locked the troop wagon and made his way up the wooden steps. There was a decent-sized verandah running along all four sides of the stone house, with an excellent view of his five acres and the rest of the country at the rear, including the unused railway line, although that was overgrown now. The back verandah was normally his relaxing spot. A cold beer and plans in his head about the house and his life while the wildlife bounced along at the end of the unfenced section, or grazed lazily as dusk fell and the heat of the day weakened. A peaceful and endless patch of his own. Maybe he’d advise the owners not to bother landscaping the back. It was beautiful enough as it was.

  He stepped inside the house and coolness shrouded him, soothing the back of his neck but doing nothing for his mind. He sorted the alarm, threw his keys onto the kitchen benchtop and stared at them. He wanted Rachel sitting on the back verandah with him right now. Or any time. Some time. After they’d talked. After he’d explained. After this was over.

  He wanted to hold her hand as they sat on a double swing seat, his thigh touching hers, the sun sinking in front of them. Followed by a night of lovemaking, soft and warm, with nobody in trouble.

  He considered the renovated kitchen he’d had a hand in remodelling. It looked fabulous, but the house unexpectedly felt like a shell, devoid of atmosphere. He glanced around the spacious open-plan living area and imagined the sort of knickknacks and coloured cushions Rachel might introduce to his bland, devoid-of-décor house. From what he knew of her, it wouldn’t be bright and snazzy. It’d be comforting. It’d be a home. And he wanted to share that with Rachel.

  He put his hands on his belt and sighed. So—this was love.

  * * *

  Luke took a quick shower, shaved fast then wrapped a towel around his middle before dumping the clothes he’d worn yesterday and overnight—the shirt that still held the fragrance of Rachel—into the laundry hamper.

  He couldn’t bear these new thoughts. His home wasn’t his home. His mind wasn’t his own—not the one he recognised. Nothing was real. Not without Rachel. Who the hell would have thought it? He’d been stricken by the love-thunderclap whether he’d wanted it, expected it someday, or not.

  Their situation wasn’t ideal, but love wasn’t supposed to be ideal, was it? As far as Luke had seen, it was supposed to be full of complications. Probably the reason he’d avoided the whole issue to begin with. Now he wanted not only intimacy, but commitment. The entire, consummate love.

  Christ, if that wasn’t talking about his feelings, what was?

  He picked up his phone, checking to see if there was anything from Jack.

  Nothing. Where the hell was Jack? Either Peter Fletcher was out there looking for Rachel with intent to harm, or Peter Morrison—who had to be involved with the builders somehow—was keeping an eye on Rachel, with intent to harm Peter Fletcher if he arrived. In which case, Rachel was in double danger because those guys wouldn’t stop to make sure they didn’t hit her if she was in the way of their main target. Chances were both men were after her. Each for different reasons.

  As he pulled the towel from his waist, the phone vibrated on the sink benchtop. He reached for it. How the hell had he turned the ringer off?

  ‘Where’ve you been?’ Will demanded.

  ‘Shower. What’s happened?’

  ‘She left fifteen minutes ago.’

  ‘Why didn’t you call me?’

  ‘I did.’

  Luke held the phone between his ear and shoulder as he pulled his trousers on. ‘Where is she going?’

  ‘I’ll leave this one in your hands now. I’m off home to get into uniform.’

  ‘Will—where the hell is she?’

  ‘You’ll find out in about three seconds.’

  Luke only had time to frown before someone rapped on his front door.

  ‘Okay, I’m here.’ The rapping on the door continued as he unlocked it. ‘Hi.’ His breath caught at the sight of her, even though Will had warned him she was on his doorstep.

  Her lips parted. She glanced at his bare chest, then quickly away, as though the movement had been involuntary and not where she’d expected her gaze to go. He was only wearing his trousers, but he couldn’t do much about that at the moment.

  ‘This is a surprise,’ he said. He couldn’t tell if the lie came out with a truthful tone or not.

  ‘I know.’ She stepped inside and walked past him.

  He locked the door and followed her to the kitchen, an eye on her back, trying to work out what she was thinking and how this was going to play. ‘Coffee?’

  ‘All right.’ She put her bag on a stool. It looked fuller this morning. He didn’t ask if she was intending to leave; he’d let her lead this unexpected visit wherever it was she wanted it to go.

  He grabbed a couple of mugs from a cupboard, got the coffee makings together and concentrated on holding back the urge to take her in his arms. Then couldn’t resist a quick peek while she wasn’t looking at him. The short shorts she wore would mesmerise any man and he was one man who’d spent a considerable amount of time thinking about her: in her shorts and out of them. T
he pale, shell-pink colour of her lightweight cardigan suited her complexion. Her hair had more than the usual wave in it and her eyes appeared greener than he’d ever remembered them being. The simplicity of her beauty startled him. He dropped the spoon and coffee granules spilled over the benchtop.

  ‘If you knew—why didn’t you just ask me?’ she said, throwing him even more off guard with the direct approach.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ he replied. He spent the next minute of silence pouring coffee. ‘Milk? Sugar?’

  ‘I don’t care. I’m not going to drink it. I’m just giving you time to gather your thoughts.’

  He had to smile at that. He left the mugs where they were and came around to her side of the counter. ‘So what are we going to talk about?’ he asked as he shoved his hands into his trouser pockets then realised his fly was still half undone and fixed it. ‘Sorry, I’m not dressed yet.’

  ‘I thought you’d stop me leaving my house,’ she said, her tone still wary but more determined. ‘I thought you were out there watching me.’

  ‘You weren’t alone, Rachel. Not for a moment. Will was there. He followed you here.’

  Her eyes widened and she blinked. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I would never leave you alone,’ he assured her. ‘I came home for—’ He paused, then decided upon absolute honesty. ‘For a shower, a change of uniform and a chance to figure out how big an apology I needed to make for kissing you in the middle of a serious situation. I should have thought deeper about how it would affect you, but I didn’t.’ He hesitated. She was blushing. ‘I ran the check because I was worried for you,’ he said. ‘I thought you might be in trouble. And truthfully, I ran it for me too. Because if you’d been involved in anything criminal, I’d have had to back off from a personal relationship. No matter how bloody hard that would have been,’ he added, hoping it would soften the blow. ‘I’m sorry I kissed you—not for kissing you, but for the way it happened.’

  Her face was still set in a mask of caution, but something had lessened the concern in her eyes. ‘I asked you to kiss me,’ she said. ‘You don’t have to apologise.’ She took a breath. ‘I’m sorry I left the way I did.’