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On Friday afternoon, I packed a change of clothes, a razor, and deodorant into an overnight bag, and booked the cheapest room I could find in Sydney. I made a sweeping pass of my galley kitchen, picked up my laptop, said goodbye to my flat for the night, and drove north on the Princes Highway.
I arrived in the CBD of Sydney just before eight, parked the ute at the Domain parking station, and walked across the parklands to The Pavilion on the Domain. I found it tucked away in a corner of the parklands, nestled in amongst Moreton bay fig trees planted in the late eighteen hundreds.
The white cement-rendered building had large glass windows facing the city skyline, and a crowd of people enjoyed thumping music and coloured lights. A gold-lettered sign on a pedestal advertised the launch party for ‘Peekaboo.’ At the entrance to the main building, two bouncers, a Maori, and a short man with stubble and an extremely protruding chin, wore tuxedos and monitored those going in.
The guy with the stubble looked me up and down as I approached. ‘Evenin’, sir. I see your invite, please?’ He had a British accent.
‘Unfortunately, I don’t have one,’ I said. ‘Mr. Lyons invited me personally. He said to mention him by name.’
He scoffed. ‘You and a hundred other geezers. And you are?’
‘Matt Kowalski.’
‘Don’t ring no bells. Invite only. Sorry buddy.’
The Maori turned slightly. ‘Gav, leave it out, man.’
‘Am I fucking talking to you, bra?’
The Maori turned back and faced forward.
Gav snapped his eyes back to me, and I made sure to hold his gaze. He was over a foot shorter than me, and radiated a coiled, barely contained anger.
I spoke slowly, as if to a child. ‘Mr. Lyons hired me to investigate a personal matter.’
‘You taking the mickey out of me, cunt?’
I gave him the Kowalski stare. ‘I need to get inside.’
He said, ‘Right,’ and went to grab my arm.
I pulled away, and he eyeballed me intensely. It suddenly felt as if we were strange dogs in a new neighbourhood, sniffing each other out.
When a smiling, well-dressed couple distracted Gav, I made the most of the opportunity, and took ten paces back and left him shaking and breathing hard through his nose. I called Lyons’ mobile and told him the situation.
Soon Gav’s mobile rang. He snatched it out from the inside of his jacket and listened with a red face. Once he hung up, he eyed me and muttered, ‘You’d better get in there, then.’
Inside, three large flat screens flashed a pink and black graphic on a loop, which read ‘Peekaboo,’ followed by a package of images and footage of mostly American content. I found Lyons at the long, curved bar.
He beamed when he saw me. ‘Help yourself to a drink. I need to take care of a couple of things. Evelyn’s over there.’ He pointed to a tall, thin, curly-haired woman at the end of the bar, and immediately made a beeline to a couple dressed as if they were fresh from the golfing range.
Before I could move, a tall woman no older than twenty, wearing a black baseball cap and a pink jumpsuit with the font zipper dangerously low, slid next to me. Her perfume hit me a second later. ‘Say goodbye to Netflix. Peekaboo offers three exclusive channels devoted to the finest of adult entertainment, including a twenty-four-hour channel featuring AVN award-winning features, a niche channel devoted to selected fetishes, and a retro channel showing classics from the seventies, eighties, and nineties. For tonight only, we are offering twelve months risk free. Sign up online to access your obligation-free account.’ She handed me a pink and black card with the Peekaboo logo on it.
‘Thank you.’
The cocktail of sweet shampoo, freshly soaped skin, and perfectly lacquered lips were indeed a strong force to work against. She smiled, then moved onto the next man.
I noticed many other young, lithe women, dressed the same, posed with middle-aged men for photos, and wondered why they were attracted to this sort of work. Were they drawn to the highlife and the rich? Did they like profiting from their feminine wiles? Maybe it was just a job.
I navigated the crowd toward Evelyn, and as I approached her, I was struck by her height. She wore high, tight pants, which exaggerated her thin waistline and her hips, what she had of them. Bony décolletage and a delicate silver necklace showed through a white camis tank top, and her slender feet sported open-toed silver shoes. Her bright red lipstick was astonishing next to her milky white skin, and her curly, thick hair was shiny and parted in the middle.
I had a sudden urge to bury my face in it.
She seemed relieved when she saw me. ‘Thanks for arriving at short notice. Simone’s had an anxiety attack and can’t work the bar. Okay if we sort out the particulars end of shift?’
It wasn’t the first time someone mistook my black wardrobe for a wait staff uniform.
‘I’m sorry, I think there’s been a mix up. I’m Matt Kowalski, a private investigator hired by Mr. Lyons to find his missing daughter.’
Evelyn clenched her teeth. ‘Shit. Sorry.’ She offered a thin hand and I took it. ‘I’m Evelyn Turner, Mr. Lyon’s P.A. Welcome to the launch.’ Her hand felt delicate but firm in mine. ‘What do you think? Honestly.’
I looked around arbitrarily. ‘I’m no expert, but cheap and tacky comes to mind. Looks like something Richard Branson would throw.’
She returned a pained smile. ‘I didn’t know which way to go. The projected demographics were all over the place—married couples, young singles. What can you do, am I right?’ She scanned the room nervously, the stress lines apparent around her eyes.
It occurred to me then that she’d organised the party.
Nice work, Kowalski.
She turned back to me. ‘Um, private investigator? Really? I’ve never met one before. Um, Jeff didn’t tell me anything. Did you say Tamsin’s missing?’
‘Eleven days. He recommended I speak to you about it.’
Evelyn scoffed. ‘Jeff’s getting funny in his old age. He needs to let Tamsin grow up.’
‘You’re not concerned?’
‘She’s young, single, and free. She’s probably ignoring him. It wouldn’t be the first time.’
‘Mr. Lyons said she hasn’t been answering her phone. Have you spoken with Tamsin recently?’
‘I spoke to her last week. She’s fine.’
‘Little Bird’ by Annie Lennox came on, and Evelyn started to mouth the words.
I said, ‘He seems genuinely concerned.’
A beautiful woman with a tray of champagne appeared, and I took a glass.
Evelyn offered the woman a tight smile, and the waitress went on her way. Evelyn crossed her arms. ‘Jeff’s scared, Mr. Kowalski. He goes in for a quadruple by-pass in two weeks, and he thinks he’s not going to wake up. He’s convinced. The same thing happened to his father. He believes once you go into hospital, you never come out.’
‘He told you this?’
‘During one of his black dog days. The bypass is hanging over him in a bad way.’
I nodded as certain pieces fell into place. ‘I understand. He wanted me to talk to you. I think he needed you to convince me.’
She shook her head, but I raised a hand. ‘What I mean is... I thought he was a worried father, and he is, but to Jeff, this must be life or death. He needs to know Tamsin is okay for whatever reason—to make amends, to be a better father in his last days, to set her up financially. I don’t know, but I know it’s important to him.’
‘She’s just living her life out of her Daddy’s shadow.’
‘Do you know Tamsin’s current address?’
‘She’s dorming at the Queen Mary building in Camperdown, near the Sydney university grounds. I’m sure it’s nothing, Mr. Kowalski.’
‘If that’s the case, and I find Tamsin tomorrow at the dormitory, its case closed, and it’ll only cost him a few hundred bucks. I won’t charge him the retainer, will reimburse the difference, and we can all go on our merry way. He’s adamant in hiring me, Evelyn. I’ve got a copy of my contract, and he’s asked me to have you sign it.’
I took the contract from my pocket and passed it to her.
She put it on the bar and took her time reading it, then she asked the barmaid for a pen. ‘Can you write here that you’ll waive the retainer if it happens as I said?’
‘Sure thing.’
I wrote it, and she signed it.
I thanked her, finished the champagne, placed the glass at the end of the bar, and walked back out to my car. On my way out, as the machine ate my ticket and the gate saluted, I noticed a grey Toyota Fortuner in my right-hand mirror hastily skid to a stop. I couldn’t make out the occupants due to a windscreen tinted about twenty percent lower than the stipulated legal maximum darkness.
I pulled north onto Macquarie Street and deliberately kept it slow, scrutinising the rear-view mirror to see what the Fortuner would do. It soon emerged with a lurch and dashed into my lane, where it remained, three cars back. I had the fresh green at the next intersection, and turned left onto Hunter Street, where I got stuck behind a cabbie who rode his brakes. The three cars behind me made the green, followed by the Fortuner.
I turned south onto Castlereagh, gunned the ute past a slow-moving mini bus, and abruptly pulled in front of him. I got the horn and grimaced an apology. A lane appeared, and I made a fast right into it.
I shuddered to a stop at the end of a tight cul-de-sac, got out, and jogged back to Castlereagh at a half crouch. At the mouth of the lane way, I hugged the wall, carefully leaned out, and eyed the Fortuner farther south and stuck in traffic.
The driver sat low in the seat and turned his head left and right. The bald head and protruding chin were unmistakable.
I made a note of the make and model in my phone and filed it under ‘Gav’s car.’
