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Tuesday, 9 July
Nico took the call on Tuesday morning. The latest victim had been found. It was now time to put his plan into action. The inactivity and the helplessness of it all drove him crazy. But another death brought him closer to catching the bastard. Relief that there was another body bothered his conscience, but the new body was necessary to his plan. He exhaled, grabbed his wrinkled jacket and walked out of the noisy police station, climbing into an unmarked white Nissan Almera.
The police radio buzzed with activity. A robbery was in progress in Sunnyside, also commonly referred to as Scumyside. Shots had been fired, and an officer was in pursuit of the suspects.
“Well, that’s nothing new,” he mumbled to himself.
Driving down Church Street, the morning traffic was moving in the other direction towards the heart of Pretoria. Most of them were probably government employees on the gravy train. Prostitutes stood on the street corners in miniskirts that could pass for belts. Beggars stood at traffic lights, in the middle of the road, brandishing cardboard signs, each one of them looking more sorrowful than the next. The irony was that they probably made more than he did. He had to laugh when he spotted a young white man brandishing a sign claiming to have three mistresses and a thirst to support. That earned the beggar a five Rand coin.
He drove past the Union Buildings and the Sheraton Hotel. He would never understand why they put a five-star hotel so close to Sunnyside. Just one road down and you were in crime central. The only thing the hotel had in its favour was the view of the Union Buildings. He always marvelled at the sight of one of the country’s most majestic Government buildings. It was one of the few buildings that made him proud to be a South African. People often took their afternoon siesta on the lawns in front of the building, which had caused a lot of controversy during the height of the Apartheid era. In the mid-eighties, the international press had reported that the men and women sleeping in the sun were actually dead bodies that had been left to rot.
He drove through Hatfield and turned left at the driving range and drove towards Queenswood. At the Kilnerpark Spar, he turned right into Lynette Street. He climbed onto the curb outside the green gate of the latest victim’s block of flats. Police cars were parked on either side of the narrow street. The all too familiar scene of blue lights flashing made his stomach pitch and yaw. He felt as though he were standing on the deck of a ship during a turbulent storm. Nervous excitement filled him.
Once on the third floor, he found his way to number thirteen. The barrier tape marked the scene in much the same way the flashing blue lights outside notified everyone in the neighbourhood that a crime had been committed. He looked around. The scene was an exact replica of all the others. They were all interchangeable. Thabiso was snapping away with his camera. Pete leaned against the wall having a smoke, waiting for him. He felt as though he was experiencing déjà vu. He experienced it a lot these days.
“I hope they’ve already dusted for prints,” Nico said to Pete when he reached him.
“Would you relax? Of course, they have. I’m not a complete moron, and besides it’s a pigsty in there, a little ash won’t make much difference.”
“As long as you don’t contaminate the scene I don’t really give a shit. Just remember to throw the stompie in the right bin,” he said as he went inside.
The scene in the bathroom differed from all the previous murder scenes in that there was vomit in the toilet basin and blood on the seat. Unlike the other victims, she had been killed in the bathroom and not in the kitchen. He made a mental note to remind the forensics guys to take samples to be analysed in the lab.
He truly believed that a large percentage of catching criminals was just plain dumb luck. He wished he could say all the bad guys he had put behind bars were there because he was a genius. The sad truth was that the criminals had made stupid mistakes. This killer, on the other hand, hadn’t yet. But he would, eventually, and Nico would be there. Waiting.
The victim was Tanya McKenzie. According to her neighbours, she was a notorious drunk. Her husband had left her for his secretary a few years ago and left her with just the clothes on her back, quite literally. She had found a friend in a bottle of vodka. Her neighbours had seen her leave late on Sunday evening, probably going on one of her usual binges. It was normal to see her stumble to her car with a bottle in hand and then take off, leaving most of her tyres behind. The rumour was that she went and harassed her ex-husband and his new young wife. No one bothered to stop her. One of the neighbours had tried the first time she had done it, but had been smacked over the head with her bottle of vodka and had his skull cracked for his trouble. No one had tried since and no one had seen her come home that night. Her car had been found outside the complex the next morning. A constable had found an empty bottle of vodka wedged under the driver’s seat.
He went down to the ground floor and had a look at her car. It was a battered old Ford held together by the rust marks. The tow truck driver was manoeuvring it onto the back of the truck. He watched the tow truck drive off and thought about her last few hours on this earth. In her drunken state, she must have been an easy target. The inebriated condition made a thought buzz in his mind. Something bothered him about the murders, something he had missed. It was like an itch in one of those hard-to-reach places. He wanted to scratch it but could never quite find it. All the murder scenes flashed through his mind. He thought about the empty vodka bottle in Tanya McKenzie’s car and the brandy bottle in Theresa van Wyk’s dustbin. He realised this was the connection between all the victims. They were all drunks. Well, they were according to their neighbours. He smacked his palm to his forehead.
“Idiot,” he admonished himself. “Why didn’t I see it before?”
He turned around and walked back towards the building when he spotted Pete walking out of the glass door towards him. An idea started to take shape in his mind.
“Howzit, Doc,” he said, once the doctor was within hearing distance. “I have a little theory I need your help with.”
“Okay, what do you want now?” the doctor asked.
“Would you call the Government lab for me?”
“Why? Don’t you remember how to use a phone any more or do I look like a fucking secretary to you?”
“Ummm, come to think of it I can definitely see you in a tight skirt and heels,” he said grinning. “But seriously, would you do this as a favour? I have a shitload of stuff to take care of, and it’s just one little phone call.”
“Fine – on condition that you stop picturing me in a skirt.”
“Consider it done. I need you to ask them to check the blood work from all the victims. The lazy bastards haven’t come back to me about any of them.”
“Have you forgotten about the backlog at the lab?”
“I keep hoping for a miracle and that the lab would just once be able to get me the results when I need them, without screwing them up or taking years to do them. Is that really asking too much?”
“I think you may be asking a bit much, but is there anything specific you want the guys at the lab to look for?”
“Ja, I want to know what the alcohol level was in all their bloodstreams.”
“Come to think of it, that’s a good idea. It’ll certainly confirm my suspicion that he targets drunken women. And then I think we should issue a press release and let them know the victim profile.” Nico frowned. “Look, I know how you feel about issuing the details, but we have a responsibility to let women of a certain age know that they need to be aware of the goings on around them.”
“Fine, but we need to be careful about the wording. I don’t want a full-scale panic from all the alcoholic old women out there. We have enough crank calls on our hands as it is.”
“I’ll word it very carefully. I promise.”
“You’d better and don’t forget to call me once you get the results from the lab.”
Nico, still frowning, walked back towards the building leaving Pete delighted with himself for persuading Nico to agree to release some information to the press. But he wasn't all that sure how Colonel Moses Molwedi would feel about it. The big man might not be all that thrilled with Pete's idea or Nico's consent, especially after the whole Helen debacle.
*
NICO WAITED FOR EVERYONE to leave the scene. He watched the forensics’ van drive around the corner and disappear down Lynette Street. He parked his car in the parking lot across the street and made sure he had a perfect view of the entrance to the block of flats. Fortunately, there was only one entrance to keep an eye on. This was probably where the killer had waited and watched. He wondered what the killer had done to pass the time while he stalked his victim. Had he listened to Radio Jacaranda or 5FM? Did he drink coffee or tea or a beer?
The winter morning sun rose higher in the sky. It began to get hot in the car, and the damn thing didn’t have aircon. He switched on the car radio. Some woman was reading the news on Radio Jacaranda. She gave an update on the Bathroom Strangler case, letting the general populace know that there'd been another victim. Kurt Darren took over and a local Afrikaans singer he'd never heard of before and whom he hoped he'd never hear again, moaned through the speakers as his cell phone started ringing in his jacket. The speakers in the back of the car objected to the interference caused by the incoming call. He turned down the volume and answered it.
“Hi, Doc. What have you got for me?”
“They all had alcohol content in their bloodstreams except Theresa van Wyk. She was the only sober one at the time of death.”
“Why the fuck wasn’t the blood tested before? What’s the point of taking a sample of the victims if they aren’t going to test it?”
“Nico, I’m sorry. The lab is snowed under and besides, didn’t we have this conversation just a short while ago?”
“I don’t care if we have this conversation a hundred fucking times.”
“Hey, don’t shoot the messenger. You can vent with the guys over at the lab as much as you like. Don’t take your shit out on me.”
Nico could hear him sulking through the phone.
“Look, I’m sorry. I’m just frustrated.”
“You aren’t the only one. Don’t you think I want to catch this guy as badly as you do?” Pete took a breath. “I know this brings back memories of what happened to your mother, but you have to realise that you aren’t alone in this.”
“Please, don’t pull your head-shrink stuff on me.”
“Nico, you need help.”
“Okay Doc, I’ll promise to get help after the case is over if you promise to leave my mother out of this.”
“Fine, but when this is over, I’m going to check you into therapy myself.”
“Okay, Doc. Whatever you say, but can we please get off my problems and back to the case.”
“Sorry. Now, where were we?” Pete asked.
“The fact is that if I’d had those test results, I could have made the connection between the victims earlier.”
“That they were all drunk the night they died?”
“Yes, well all of them except Theresa van Wyk.”
“But she was also a heavy drinker according to her neighbours. So the connection still stands. They were all full-blown alcoholics.”
“Another lead to follow up. I'll have someone check out the liquor stores in their neighbourhoods. Maybe somebody saw someone watching the victims. He has to find them somewhere; maybe he uses the bottle stores to find his victims. It's one of the best places to find an alcoholic.”
“Good idea and at least it’ll keep you busy and out of trouble.” His voice faded, and Nico could hear someone else in the background. The doctor’s voice came back. “Sorry, Nico, but I have to go. I’ve got to check on something for another murder case.” The line went dead. Another piece of the puzzle found, but he didn’t know where it fitted.
He needed the toilet. One of the many drawbacks of doing a stake-out alone was the difficulty of taking a leak when required. Maybe he should have asked one of the women at the station to back him up. None of them would have had the strength to garrotte someone and therefore couldn’t be included as suspects. Come to think of it maybe one or two of them could: Mavis was a big girl, and he wouldn’t want to meet her in a dark alley. But if things became dangerous, he would rather be alone than have an inexperienced woman guarding his back. If Janet had any clue how he felt about women in the police force, she would have his balls in a sling. His bladder started to pull. Maybe he should have trusted Pete. The doctor was a good guy, and if he trusted Pete, he wouldn’t have to sit here trying to control his bladder. He shouldn’t have had that last cup of coffee this morning and, to make things worse, he was thirsty.
Think of the desert, he kept telling himself, don’t think of water. Whatever you do, don’t think about water. Except trying to tell himself not to think about water and needing to empty his bladder only made him more desperate for the toilet.
He opened the glove compartment and found an empty 500ml Valpré bottle. Someone had probably left it behind on a previous stake-out. It must have been missed during the car's weekly clean out. Nico didn’t really care where the bottle came from: all he cared about was that he could urinate in it. He unzipped his pants. The urine hitting the inside of the empty bottle was the most heavenly sound Nico had heard all day. Relief flooded over him. If he trusted Pete, he wouldn’t have to piss in a bottle.
The Afrikaans singer was, thankfully, replaced by the Red Hot Chili Peppers, who were in turn replaced by Nickleback. He drummed his fingertips on the steering wheel in time with the music. Time ticked past and the radio's appeal started to wear thin. He just wanted the killer to hurry up and make his appearance. He watched a police car drive past slowly. He gripped the steering wheel and wondered if this was it, but the car kept on driving. He sat back in the seat and prepared himself for another long wait. The wind started to pick up. Red and brown leaves danced across the parking lot. Sheryl Crow was crooning something about soaking up the sun when the police car returned.
He watched the police car drive past again slowly and do a U-turn at the corner. His heart pounded. The police car, a white Citi Golf with the usual police insignia on the door and blue stripe, pulled up onto the curb. A young man in the standard dark blue police uniform with black Magnum boots got out of the car. He was too far away for Nico to make out his rank. He also managed to keep his back to Nico so he couldn’t see the man’s face. Nico waited for the cop to go through the pedestrian gate before getting out of his car and followed him. Nico stopped at the white Citi Golf with the intention of taking down the number, but the licence plate had been removed.
“Shit,” he said under his breath, scratched the back of his head, and looked in the direction the suspect had gone. He picked up his feet and ran or rather jogged in the same direction.
He pressed the button for the lift. It took too long to arrive, and he decided to take the stairs up to the third floor instead. He took them two at a time and was breathing heavily when his right foot touched the landing. He bent over to catch his breath and turned his head in the direction of number thirteen, in time to glimpse a blond head popping out of the door of Tanya McKenzie’s flat.
“Hey, you,” he shouted as he power-walked towards his suspect.
The man didn’t miss a beat. He turned in the opposite direction and ran down the passage towards the fire escape.
“Damn! Why do they always have to run?” he grumbled as he ran after him.
Nico chased him along the passage and down the stairs. His breath came in gasps. His suspect was fast and unfortunately in a lot better shape than he was. The suspect took the stairs three at a time and jumped the last four to the landing on each floor. Nico tried to do the same but managed to trip on the ground floor and sprawled, face first, on the ground where he landed. Tyres squealed. Nico raised his face from the ground to see the white police Citi Golf screech its way down the road.
“For fuck's sake! You fucking bastard!” he shouted as he got back on his feet. He kicked the air in frustration and wished he could be kicking the suspect’s arse. He wasn’t sure who he wanted to kick more, the suspect or himself. He bent over and put his head between his legs to quieten his laboured breathing.
“I really need to join a gym,” he mumbled as he made his way back to his car. As he walked he dusted himself off. His grey slacks were now a dusty brown all the way down the front and his once-white shirt, where it wasn’t a muddy brown, was soaking wet.
“Oh, well,” he thought, “at least now I can take a proper leak that doesn't involve a bottle.”
*
“YOU LOOK LIKE HELL.” It was the first thing Nico heard when entering the noisy charge office of the Pretoria Central police station. Builders in blue overalls were busy building concrete benches in the entrance and the smell of cement mingled with that of sweat, urine and blood. Startled by the closeness of the voice, Nico looked to his left to discover a bored-looking Louis leaning against the wall. There was something about the way he was leaning that struck Nico: it was catlike and stealthy, almost as if he was ready to pounce. He realised that everything about Louis could be described in that one phrase. The way he moved, the way he spoke, every action he made was feline and predatory.
“What are you doing here?” Nico asked him, struggling to make himself heard above the voices of people waiting to report a crime.
“I caught this idiot trying to boost a car with a flat battery,” he said, crooking his thumb over his shoulder at a dejected-looking boy, not more than thirteen, sitting on his haunches in the corner, staring at the handcuffs binding his wrists, “but as you can see the system’s a bit busy today.” He raised his eyebrows and tilted his head in the direction of the lines of people waiting their turn.
“It always is, but it gets there eventually. It grinds slowly but finely,” Nico said and looked at the boy in tattered jeans and muddy jersey. “He’s just a scared kid.”
The boy had street child stamped all over him: probably addicted to smoking glue. He wouldn't survive much longer on the streets. Nico had seen so many of them slip through the cracks and found their bodies in the mortuary.
“Okay. Then I’ll let the little shit go.” Louis turned around and unlocked the handcuffs. He dragged the boy to his feet by his left arm.
“Go on, scram,” he said, as he kicked the boy’s arse, “get out of here and don’t get caught again.”
The boy looked at him with a look of total and utter shock. A smile then broke out across his emaciated face, lighting it up. He turned tail and ran through the door.
“Why did you do that?” Nico asked, with as much shock on his face as the boy’s.
“I thought that’s what you wanted.”
“What I wanted?”
“Ja. What was all that ‘he’s just a poor kid’ stuff?”
“It was an observation, not an instruction to let him go.”
“Oh.”
“What do you mean ‘Oh’?”
“So the kid gets a few more days of freedom, big deal. He’ll be back.”
“That’s the problem ... ag ... forget it.”
“Already forgotten. Now that that’s out of the way, what happened to you, or shouldn’t I ask?”
“I tripped and ate some pavement.”
“Sounds painful. I was going to ask if you wanted to join me for a beer but I don’t know if I want to be seen with you in public, looking like that.”
“The beer sounds good, and it’ll wash the pavement taste out of my mouth, but I don’t know if I want to be seen with a guy in a rent-a-cop uniform.”
“Are you mocking the uniform?”
“Me? Mock the uniform? Never!”
“So ... Tell me the truth, were you stuck in a dumpster all morning or something?”
“No, I’m just way too old and too fat to be chasing some guy who is probably ten years younger than I am.”
“So you thought you could still keep up with the young studs of today’s criminal association?”
“Yes.”
“And ended up with your face in the dirt – very clever.”
“Thank you. What can I say? I do try.”
“I think you deserve that beer for the attempt.”
“I don’t think I deserve it; I might need it, but I don’t deserve it.”
“Okay, so the fucker got away from you. You’ll get him next time.”
“Ja. Next time,” Nico sighed and dropped his head. He felt drained and angry with himself. Because of him, another woman would be dead in a few days.
“Hey, snap out of it, bro. Tomorrow’s another day and things will look a whole lot better after a few beers.”
“I’m just going to put on another shirt.”
“Let me guess ... you keep an extra shirt in the top drawer of your desk?”
“Wrong, it’s in my bottom drawer. You never know when you’re going to get covered in blood and shit on this job.”
“I’m glad I don’t have to do your laundry. Now hurry up and change your shirt. There’s a Black Label calling my name.”
Nico walked through the crowded charge office and into the office he shared with two Lieutenant Colonels from the Detectives division, Steven Maritz and Paul Lubbe. Steven, also known as Laurel, was tall and skinny whereas Paul, known as Hardy, was short and squat. Luckily they were off somewhere else, so he had his office all to himself for a change. They were only his superiors in rank, not in intellect. His desk was in the corner, opposite the window looking into the charge office. The office was a fishbowl. He closed the blinds on all windows so that neither insiders nor outsiders could see him. Opening his bottom drawer, he removed a plain, light blue, button-down shirt. He shook it out and examined it: wrinkled and frayed at the cuffs, but at least it was clean. He took off his favourite jacket and hung it on the back of his desk chair. It was navy blue. Janet had bought it in April for his birthday, the first present she’d bought him. He unbuttoned the dirty white shirt he was wearing. He sniffed it and crinkled up his nose. He needed some deodorant as well, but that would have to wait until he got home. He took off the shirt, crumpled it up and tossed it into the open bottom drawer, then kicked the drawer closed. Nico buttoned up the last button of his shirt and was tucking it in over his white vest when Louis walked in and surveyed the room.
“Nice view,” Louis said, moving the blind out of his way, peering through the gap to watch the comings and goings in the charge office.
“It has its moments,” Nico said, buckling his belt.
“So is this where you guys get together to hunt down that killer.”
“No, this is just my little fishbowl. The task team uses a boardroom upstairs. We converted it to look like a classroom. It suits our needs, and we’ve given some of the clerical staff a few extra duties like answering crank calls.”
“And I bet they just love you for it.”
“Absolutely.”
“So ... can I see it?”
“See what?”
“The operations room?”
“I'm sorry, but the ops room is off limits to civilians.”
“Come on. Can't you make an exception, just this once?”
There was something in the way he asked, the way he pleaded to see the room that made Nico wonder about his motives, it made those bells clang in his head. Maybe seeing Louis' reaction to the photos on the walls would answer a few questions he had about him.
“Okay, I'll let you see it, but it's our little secret.”
“Excellent.” Louis looked like an excited schoolboy who'd been granted access to an exclusive club.
Nico led him through the charge office towards the back of the police station. They walked up the dirty stairs in silence. The staircase smelt of urine and other body fluids that Nico didn’t even want to think about. The station was not one of the cleanest in the city. He couldn’t fathom why people used the stairs to take a piss when there were perfectly good toilets just down the passage. He only hoped that it wasn’t his fellow policemen using the stairs as a toilet. The task team's operations room was on the first floor.
Nico led Louis along a narrow passage. Instead of plastering the walls in the station, they had just painted over the brick, alternating between white and institutional-blue panels of paint. It was the same blue as the hanging files in his filing cabinet. There were dirty scuff marks all over the walls. Nico often felt that walking along these passages on his way to the operations room was, in a strange way, preparation for the grim task of facing the dead women whose pictures were stuck on the walls with Prestik.
The open-plan office outside was its usual hive of activity. The phones never stopped ringing. Young constables, fresh out of Police College, and the station’s clerical staff were assigned to answer the crank calls. Serial killers always managed to bring all the psychos out of the woodwork, wanting their piece of the action. He’d even had a few people claiming to be the Bathroom Strangler. Thank heavens he and Pete had kept some facts of the case out of the press. It was, as far as he was concerned, the best way of determining which were crank calls and which were legitimate.
The door to the operations room was made of thin pressed wood. It was the kind of door that if given a good solid kick, it would splinter and the offending foot would go right through it. Nico opened the door, and Louis pushed past him. The room was deserted. Only the victims’ ghosts were here. Nico watched Louis’s facial expressions change from curiosity to shock, then to what should have been horror but looked more like discomfort as he moved closer to the pictures. He couldn't help but wonder what Louis thought as he examined each of the victims. There was something in the way his eyes seemed to devour the images. It wasn't the reaction he'd expected. But everybody reacted differently to the grisly images on display.
The pictures reminded Nico of his failure that morning. He would be adding another set of photos to the grotesque collage when another body was discovered. He turned around and walked out of the room leaving Louis to stare at the dead women. He, on the other hand, couldn’t face them. He leaned against the wall and waited for Louis to finish his morbid viewing.
A door, two doors down from the operations room, opened.
“Van Staaden, get in here.” Colonel Moses Molwedi, Nico’s boss, stood in the doorway and waited for Nico to enter his office. Some of the constables and administrative staff stopped what they were doing. They always enjoyed it when someone else was in the shit with the Colonel.
“Yes, sir. What can I do for you, sir?” Nico asked, once inside his boss’s office and the door closed behind him. He had no intention of providing entertainment for the masses.
“You can tell me why we haven’t got a certain serial killer in custody yet?”
“I’m working on it, sir.”
“Work faster. Look Van Staaden, I know you like to pull the lone wolf crap, but if you don’t bring me a suspect soon, I’ll put someone else on the case who is a team player. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good. I want a briefing tomorrow morning, first thing, on what’s happening with the case and why we haven’t got a suspect in custody yet.”
“Yes, sir. Would first thing in the morning be my first thing or yours?”
“What, Captain?”
“Well ... Sir, my first thing is around six-thirty, and yours appears to be closer to nine.”
“Don’t get cute with me, Captain.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it, sir.”
“Be here at nine.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Now get out of my office.”
“Yes, sir.”
Nico turned and walked out of the room and bumped straight into Louis.
“Where’d you disappear to?” Louis asked.
“Sorry, but I ...” Nico’s sentence was interrupted by Molwedi.
“Who is this and what is he doing here?” he asked, as he poked his head out of his door.
“Sir, this is Louis Gouws. He’s a friend of mine and wanted to see where it all happens.”
“Captain, this isn’t Gold Reef City, and we don’t do tours. If you wanted to be a tour guide, you should have gone into tourism and not the police service. Now kindly get this civilian out of my station.”
“Yes, sir,” Nico waited for his boss to step back inside his office and slam the door. He turned to Louis. “I think that beer would go down very well right now.”
“Shall we go to that pub around the corner from here?”
“Ja, what’s it called?”
“I haven't got a clue. All I know is that they serve nice cold ones.”
“Then lead the way.”
*
THE PUB AROUND THE corner turned out to be called Mickey's. Louis and Nico crammed themselves in at the bar, next to a couple of bikers. Probably members of the Max Gang, Nico thought. A rougher crowd hung out here. He recognised a few faces: people who'd found themselves on the wrong side of the law.
“What'll it be?” the barman asked. Nico noticed that he had a tattoo of a spider on his neck.
“Two Black Labels,” Louis ordered for them.
He didn't know if it was the atmosphere in the bar, or Louis, or the fact that he'd just let a potential suspect slip through his fingers but Nico was on edge. Something wasn't sitting well with his gut. He watched Louis survey the room. There was something about Louis that he didn't like.
“How did you meet Natalie?” Nico asked, hoping to get to know this man, who'd been a part of Janet’s life since childhood. Maybe getting to know him better would silence his suspicion of him. Perhaps it was jealousy he felt. That had to be it, he thought, he was jealous of Louis. The realisation was not one of his proudest moments. He hated being jealous.
“We met at Clapham. It was the first day of High school. She was this little waif of a thing. She had orphan practically tattooed on her forehead, and some of the other kids picked up on it. Kids being kids, they picked on her, she looked so small and fragile. Janet stepped in, put her arm around her and led her away. Janet was always looking out for her. She was always classy like that.” The warmth in Louis’s voice when he mentioned Janet made Nico bristle. He wondered if anything had ever happened between the two of them.
“And where were you when this was going on?” Nico asked, instead of the question he was burning to ask.
“I wish I could say that I was as noble as Janet. I was one of the kids who sensed weakness and went for the jugular. Luckily she forgave me for being a dick. Nats had a really rough time at the orphanage. Janet convinced me to help mount a rescue operation one night, and after that, the three of us were pretty much inseparable.”
“And you and Janet never went out?” He regretted asking the moment the question left his mouth and dreaded the answer.
“Nah. She knew how Nats felt about me from the word go and would never do anything to hurt her.”
The answer stung. Was Natalie the only reason that they'd never been a couple? Fool! He admonished himself for worrying about something that had never happened. He and Janet were solid. He had no reason to feel jealous but, he still couldn't shake that gut feeling that something was not right. He'd have to keep an eye on Louis Gouws.