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“Tell me about your conversation with Ma and Uncle Logan.” Wiri savoured his toast, disappointed to look down and realise he’d eaten it all. He watched as Phoenix slid a diagonally cut section of hers onto his plate. “No, you need it.”
“I just want the egg.”
He jumped as something touched his calf beneath the table. Then he smiled. She hooked her toes around the back of his leg and continued eating. “I missed you, but it wasn’t just that. You sounded odd on the phone.” She tilted her head sideways to glare at him. “Now I know why, having seen your injuries. I wanted to buy something and post it to you, so I went to see Mac yesterday after school. I asked if he knew your address.” She waved her fork in the air. “He acted odd about it. Made excuses, which got me thinking.”
“Right.” Wiri exhaled. He lifted the donated triangle of toast in his fingers and bit into it. “And Phoenix Du Rose doesn’t like mysteries, so she started hunting.”
She shrugged, but didn’t dismiss his observation. “I waited until he took a shower and borrowed his phone.” Her lips twitched. “I don’t imagine my brother will leave such a simple code on his devices in the future.” She lifted her fork and peered at the cloud of egg pressed over the prongs. “I read your texts to Mac, got the address, and realised things weren’t as you made us believe. I tried to speak to Mama and Papa about it, but foolishly led with how I felt about you. That’s when it all turned to custard. So, I left. I used the GPS tracker once I got off the bus.” She gave a light shrug. “And here I am.”
Wiri couldn’t help the grin which spread across his lips. “And here you are,” he repeated.
They both jumped as Ted snorted and shifted on his elbow. He listed sideways as though about to pitch off his stool before righting himself with a grunt. Phoenix pressed her lips together to prevent the laugh escaping. Wiri glanced across at Mari and saw her shake her head, an irritated frown pulling her brows together. He exhaled and dipped forward to speak to Phoenix. “What do you think we should do?”
“About me, or about the man who died?”
A dimple appeared in Wiri’s left cheek as he tilted his head at her. “We both know what we have to do about you. No, I meant about Hendricks. How do I prove my innocence?”
“Can you leave town?” Phoenix pushed the fork between her teeth.
“Yeah.” Wiri turned down his lips into a nonchalant expression. “The cops only say that in the movies. They have no legislative power to prevent you from going anywhere unless they detain or charge you with a crime. If you’re under serious investigation, they might ask for custody of your passport to stop you from running abroad.”
“Do you have your passport with you?” Phoenix quirked her left eyebrow in surprise.
“No.” The curls of Wiri’s fringe bounced as he shook his head. “What’s the point? I’m not leaving you.” He winced and drew his phone from his pocket. “I promised Vaughan I’d contact Aunty Liza for him. He’s emailed through the contract, so I’ll forward it to her.” He finished the message and pushed his phone back into his pocket. “Hopefully she won’t contact Uncle Logan. I’ve asked her not to.”
Phoenix blew out a long breath and surveyed the cafe. Another group of farmers finished their lunch and departed. They’d left their gumboots under the porch outside and they chased them around with woollen socks on their feet before clumping away up the street. She turned to face Wiri. “We need to locate the tank maker,” she said, bouncing her fork above the plate. A bobble of egg tumbled onto the table. “Let’s start there. Didn’t Gareth say he lived locally? Perhaps someone here knows him.”
“Okay.” Wiri winced with discomfort.
“Are you in pain?” Concern darkened her features, and her stormy irises flashed.
“Yes, but it’s not that.” He drew his phone from his jeans pocket again and peered at the screen. His fingers shook as he turned it to face her.
“Oh.” She sat back in her seat and let her fork slide onto the plate with a clang. “They’re all calling you, aren’t they?”
“Yeah.” Wiri sighed. He examined the long list of calls and texts. “Logan, Hana, Nonie.” He frowned. “I’ve ignored three from David Allen.” His long fingers scrolled through the litany of messages, his shoulders rounding. “They’ve called the police, Phoenix.” He looked up at her and saw the fear in her eyes.
“Now I’m really in trouble, aren’t I?” She drew her elbows to her sides as though to make herself less visible. “Mac won’t hold out forever.”
Wiri shook his head. “He’s loyal, and he approves of us. Logan can’t read him like he can everyone else.” He blew out a breath. “At least they can’t demand his phone because you have it. But it also means I can’t tell him you’re okay.” He pushed the last corner of toast into his mouth and swallowed before speaking. “We need to protect him from the Wrath of Logan once we make contact.”
“Plausible deniability?” Phoenix grinned. “No one plays dumb with as much skill as my brother.” She inhaled. “I’ll face the music, apologise to Mac in front of everyone for borrowing his phone, and accept being grounded for the rest of my foreseeable future.”
Wiri’s complexion paled, and he set his cutlery on his plate. “They’ll get into your phone,” he whispered, “the one you left at home to stop Logan tracking you. What if they read the texts or find we’ve called each other?”
Phoenix shrugged. “I’m not stupid, Wiri. You only left last weekend, and I deleted the texts in both the sent and received folders. It doesn’t matter if they see we called each other because it’s not possible for them to get transcripts. What’s the problem, anyway? Aren’t we coming clean about everything?”
Wiri nodded. “Yes, but you’ve jumped the gun and I’m expecting Logan to march down here and take my head off without asking questions.” He cocked his head and frowned. “That reminds me, Larry took the gun back to his place. I need to find out what he did with it.”
“And to ask him about his dead brother.” Phoenix wrinkled her nose and squeezed his ankle between her feet beneath the table. “We can go there soon if you like?” She tugged at the hem of the borrowed tee shirt. “Can I go clothes shopping first, please? I’m struggling to keep my pants up.” She giggled. “Make that your pants. Either way, they’re going to end up around my ankles.”
“Hold on to them then.” Wiri grinned and pushed his chair back from the table. Ted jerked on his stool and woke at the screech of wood against tile. He turned and glared at them before shoving his newspaper across his counter towards the window.
Phoenix rose and tucked her chair beneath the table. She gathered their used crockery together and carried it in a pile towards the front of the cafe. Mari took it from her with a nod of gratitude. “You want a job?” she asked, dumping the stack in front of the cash register.
“Maybe.” Phoenix shot Wiri a sideways glance. For a moment of bliss, he imagined setting up home in the rental house, him working on the farm and Phoenix making coffee for Mari. And then reality reminded him she was still only fifteen, clever, and destined for greater things than he could offer. Dismay shrouded him as The Plan faded into the background of the looming fight with Logan. He closed his eyes against the thought of facing Hana and witnessing her disappointment. Focussing on his inner pain, he missed Phoenix’s next sentence and struggled to understand Mari’s reply.
“Oh, you need to see Ted,” she said. “He knows everything.” She dipped her frail body to see between them, her gaze raking the vacant corner where they’d left Ted sitting. “Oh. Where’d he go?”
Phoenix spun on her heel, staring up at the bell over the front door. “I didn’t hear him leave.”
Mari wrinkled her nose. “He’s gone to the bathroom,” she said, as though following him in there engendered painful memories. She widened her eyes and wafted her hand in front of her nose. “I’d leave him for now. If you need the bathroom, there’s a public one near the police watch house. No one blocks my toilet as regularly as that old man.”
They left the cafe, surveying the sheets of rain covering the main street. It formed rivulets of order, each drip building with a universal purpose to reach the storm drain and the river beyond it. Like a mission.
“Here.” Wiri called over the sound of the deluge hitting the roof of the overhang. He slipped his arm around Phoenix and tucked her against him, guiding her to a nearby clothing store. The wind attacked them, darting around the parked vehicles to snatch at their legs and buffet them against one another. They entered the store giggling and flustered.
Phoenix took longer than Wiri anticipated. She leafed through the racks, growing more discomfited with every turn of a coat hanger. He checked his text messages again, following behind her as though tethered but paying no attention to her choosing. A desperate plea from Hana begged him to get in contact. A threat from Logan made the blood run cold in his veins.
‘Call me or we’ll have a problem.’
‘Please contact us,’ Hana begged in the text which followed Logan’s. ‘We need to talk.’ He quailed against his betrayal. He needed to put her mind at rest about Phoenix’s safety. It would at first cause her extreme relief.
And then devastation.
Wiri shoved his phone into his pocket, his expression pained and tight. Phoenix moved to another rack of clothing and he glanced at his watch, realising yet another day had passed beneath him. “What’s wrong?” he whispered. “Just grab some jeans and a tee shirt. I’ll use my credit card.”
Phoenix leaned sideways to whisper to his biceps. He dipped his head to catch the last of her sentence. “Old people.”
“What?”
Footsteps sounded on the wooden floor as the elderly shop assistant moved towards them. “Can I help you?” She kept her tone level, although her gaze raked Phoenix’s haphazard attire.
“I just wanted jeans and tee shirts.” Phoenix’s voice lowered to an almost inaudible depth. “I don’t think any of these will fit me.”
The assistant sized her up and pouted. “We don’t have petite sizes,” she admitted. Two enormous bosoms wobbled behind an old-fashioned house coat, which bulged to reveal ordinary clothes beneath. She tucked a stray grey curl behind her ear and jabbed her index finger towards the back of the shop. “Let’s try the children’s section.”
Phoenix shot Wiri a look of disgust and he tapped his watch to tell her to hurry. She emerged from the changing room ten minutes later, wearing a set of clothes more suitable for a ten-year-old. The pink sweatshirt gripped her breasts in a vice, splatting a distorted kitten across her chest. The jeans hugged her figure hard enough to cut off the circulation.
“Perfect,” the shop assistant declared. “I’ll get the till ready to take your payment.” She made the comment sound like a threat with just the right inflection.
Phoenix carried Wiri’s borrowed clothes over her left arm. She moved towards him with difficulty, appearing unable to bend her legs from the knees down. “What shall I do?” she hissed. “She won’t take no for an answer.”
Wiri withdrew his wallet from his jeans pocket and pulled out his credit card. He struggled not to laugh as Phoenix spun in a circle to remove the seam from between her buttocks. He paid the shop assistant and hustled Phoenix outside into the rain. “It doesn’t matter,” he told her. “You’d look sexy in a sack.”
“I could sit down in a sack!” she grumbled.
Wiri ran into the rain to open the passenger door and Phoenix limped past him. She climbed onto the runner board and took her time sitting down on the seat. She kept her eyes closed as Wiri slumped into the driver’s seat and brushed his soaked fringe back from his brow. “It’s raining cats and dogs out there,” he said, borrowing one of Hana’s English phrases. He shook his head. “Larry only lives around the corner but we can’t walk in this weather.” He tugged on his lower lip with his finger and thumb. “I wonder what made Seline look inside the water tank. If she hadn’t, Hendricks’ body might have stayed there for months. Why her?”
Phoenix made a gagging sound. “Don’t. That’s disgusting. If that tank feeds your house, you’d have drunk eau de dead man for months.” She clapped her hand over her mouth. “Stop talking about it.”
Wiri’s finger played over the ignition button. “It doesn’t. Our water comes from our roof. That tank sends a trickle feed to the water troughs in the lower paddocks. The water would smell horrible, but the gasses would disperse outside in the open air. We might never have noticed.” He exhaled. “What if Seline thought the man on the phone killed Hendricks? She said something odd to him in the conversation I overheard. She thanked him for sorting out a problem. What if he left something behind and she rode up there to find it? She has a back door key to our place. What if she put my shirt in the tank to implicate me?”
Phoenix groaned. “I don’t know, Wiri. Can we hurry to Larry’s so I can stand up straight again?” She tugged the kitten away from her breasts and inspected it. “This is animal cruelty.”
“Nice shirt.” Wiri opened the wadded receipt in his hand. “You should treasure it forever. That old lady stung me for almost a hundred dollars for those two items.”
Phoenix blew out a breath. “Three items. I bought some knickers.” She raised her gaze to stare at the truck’s ceiling. “You think the jeans are hurting me, but you can’t imagine what havoc the underwear is wreaking.”
Wiri bit his lip as indecent images passed through his mind. Phoenix narrowed her eyes as she folded his discarded boxer shorts on her knee. “Underage girl here, buddy. Keep it decent.”
Wiri fired up the truck’s engine and backed onto the street. Headlights danced behind his vehicle, spraying up water as he waited for the other cars to pass him. Phoenix squirmed in her seat. “How far is Pastor Larry’s place?” she asked. “Give me exact minutes to hold on to. I need something to take my mind off my discomfort.”
“He lives next to the church.” Wiri made the necessary turn, driving less than a hundred metres from the cafe. “We’re here.” He pulled up next to the house and parked on the street. Then he turned to Phoenix with a frown. “I think you should stay in the car.”
Her face crumpled. “No! Why?”
Wiri shrugged. “I’m not sure. Instinct?” He second guessed himself, sifting through his concerns and finding them only marginally sound. “I don’t know,” he admitted, cocking his head. “He’s a Hendricks. Could you maybe do as you’re told for once?”
“Hell no!” Phoenix pushed open the passenger door.
Wiri shook his head. “You’re definitely your mother’s daughter,” he mused as she covered her head with her arms to avoid another soaking. He climbed from the truck and locked it behind him before following her up the porch steps and under cover.
“Will I need to take off my shoes?” she whispered as he rapped on the front door. Wiri cocked his head in confusion, not sure why the concept caused a dent to form between her brows. She jabbed a finger at her tight jeans. “I can’t bend down again,” she confessed. “I’ll puke up my breakfast.”
“Just let me do the talking,” Wiri advised. When no one answered, he turned to face the church. “He must be next door,” he said. “What does Pastor Sam do when he’s not at the church?”
“I don’t know.” Phoenix’s lips tightened and her terse reaction took Wiri by surprise. Phoenix had idolised Sam since she learned to walk and talk. He opened his mouth to question her, but jumped as the front door flew open to reveal Larry.
“Mr Kingii!” he said, throwing out his arms in welcome. “It must be my afternoon for guests.” His gaze turned to Phoenix and his lips parted in a wide smile. “And your delightful young lady.”
“Hi, Pastor Hendricks.” She held out her hand, and he engulfed it in his wide palm. Wiri looked for any sign of discomfort and saw none. His confusion grew.
“Why didn’t you tell me you and Donovan Hendricks were brothers?” Hostility entered his tone and Larry lifted his left hand and placed it behind his neck as though nursing a headache.
“Foster brothers,” he said. His tone saddened. “The same kind couple took us in and tried to raise us. They adopted me and gave me their name but Donovan didn’t give them the chance. He caused them much grief before running away. I didn’t realise until I arrived in town that Donovan changed his name by deed poll and just took theirs. He wasn’t my brother, but I should have mentioned it. I figured everyone knew about our connection.”
“I didn’t.” Wiri exhaled. He spun on the deck and surveyed the black clouds gathering overhead. He turned to face the pastor. “What did Tane say about Jet’s gun?”
Larry winced. He clapped a hand across his mouth. “Sorry. I’ve spent all day sorting out a crisis with the ladies of our parish.” He raised an eyebrow and appealed to Phoenix as Wiri glared holes in the side of his face. “It took most of the morning to soothe ruffled feathers after a mistake on the service roster.” He pursed his lips. “Then I married three happy couples, took two funerals and counselled a dying parishioner.” The back of his right hand strayed to his face, and he scrubbed at his eyes and stifled a yawn.
Wiri dipped forward, his chest bumping Phoenix’s shoulder. “But where did you leave the gun? Please tell me you locked it away somewhere safe.”
Larry flapped his hand. “I’ll do it right now.” He opened the door wider and beckoned them across the threshold. “Leave your shoes on. Perhaps you can show me how to make it safe.”
“What do you mean, make it safe?” Wiri’s shoulders tensed. “Jet made it safe before you took it.”
