‘I’m not wearing a dress.’
The shout was loud enough to rattle the cups in the kitchen. It shook Astrid from her thoughts as Grace barged into the living room.
‘You’re going naked, Grace? I don’t think my heart could take that.’
Grace’s eyes flashed like lightning in the night. ‘You know what I mean. Why do you get to go to the party like that, and I have to dress up?’ She pointed at Astrid’s jeans and leather jacket. ‘I’m not a show pony.’
Astrid glanced over, the corners of her lips fighting a smile, her eyebrows raised. ‘Well, first of all, I don’t have a dress with me, and I doubt any of yours would fit me; and second, you’re the best distraction I can have in that mansion when I sneak off to find the video surveillance and anything else which might help us.’
Grace slumped into the chair, the ocean blue dress crawling above her knees; she dragged it down and shook her head.
‘That’s nice, calling me a distraction.’
Astrid stared at her. ‘Well, you’re distracting me now.’
The frustration seeped out of Grace. ‘I can’t remember the last time I had a night out.’ She appeared to have got over her irritation.
‘Are you booking us a taxi?’
Grace tried to cross her legs, but failed, then pulled at her dress to make it longer. ‘It’s okay; I’ll drive. It will be easier to leave Brady’s mansion if we have transport.’
Grace grabbed the keys and they left. Astrid watched her struggle to get comfortable in the dress as they got into the car, which amused her no end. Grace turned on the radio and settled for a jazz station. Something sounding like it was written for elevators screeched out of the speakers, a loud wailing cacophony which could only have been played on instruments dug up from Satan’s basement.
Astrid furrowed her brow and grimaced. ‘You don’t really care for music, do you?’
‘I know enough to recognise when someone is quoting Leonard Cohen to me.’ Grace reached over and flicked through the stations. ‘What would you prefer, Ms Snow?’
She bounced through rock, soul and country before Astrid stopped her on a channel playing eighties pop. The Go-Go’s sang about having the beat as they headed out of town.
‘This is why you need someone younger to teach you about good music, Grace.’
She ignored the jab. ‘What’s the plan once we get inside the mansion?’
‘Did you notice all the cameras when we were on the estate the other day?’ Grace nodded. ‘That much surveillance means there’s a control room in the building. Hopefully, they’ll have a digital record of everything they’ve filmed in the last week, and I can search through it for when Alex was there.’
‘Won’t that be dangerous?’
‘It is what it is. We won’t discover what happened to Alex without taking risks.’
‘As long as nobody gets hurt.’
They didn’t argue about it, travelling through Angel Springs as Astrid noticed the billboards promoting Bob Brady’s re-election had increased in number overnight. They drove past a large photo of him smiling over the town, his shining white teeth putting her in mind of someone who wanted to eat baby birds right out of the nest.
‘How come I haven’t seen any publicity for whoever Brady is running against?’
Grace stopped whistling to Bruce Springsteen to answer the question. ‘Brady is a shoo-in, so no pretender to his throne will waste money on ads when they know they’re going to lose, especially when he can outspend them ten to one.’
Astrid scanned the internet on her phone as the Boss gave way to Prince. ‘I guess his popularity knows no bounds in Angel Springs.’
Grace laughed. ‘Well, I’ve never voted for him.’ Their destination was no more than five minutes away. ‘I worked the police security details at one of his rallies a few years ago and saw what he was like backstage.’
‘Seeing a politician in the wild is never a pretty sight.’
‘I only got close to him for two minutes, but that was enough. When he didn’t have to put on a show for the public, being with him was like a trip through a sewer in a glass-bottomed boat.’
Grace approached the Brady estate while Morrissey sang about running down to the safety of the town. The car slowed as they acknowledged the security outside the grounds. It was easier getting into the compound the second time; no scowling youths waited for them as the iron gates opened and they entered. They parked in a different spot because of the circus attractions the Senator had organised to entertain his guests.
Stilt walkers garbed as flappers and Gatsby rejects lined the entrance as acrobats perched on the building’s railings, occasionally tumbling and falling between floors. An adult carousel was to the right, and servers attired as clowns wandered everywhere, handing out drinks and canapes. A group of teenagers dressed as cheerleaders led four baby elephants around the grounds.
Grace whistled as they stood and admired the spectacle. ‘The Senator spared no expense for this.’
Astrid gritted her teeth. ‘I’ve always hated circuses.’
And she had good reason. Her parents had organised a trip to a visiting circus for Courtney’s tenth birthday. Her sister was unusually friendly towards Astrid that night, holding her hand as their mother and father ushered them between the attractions. Astrid remembered it being the last time she’d believed her family was doing something nice for her, even though it was for Courtney. She’d enjoyed watching the Cirque du Soleil on TV, but this wasn’t that: it was all clowns and animals.
After the horse dressage and acrobats, Courtney sneaked Astrid away from their parents, and they ducked into a small tent for what her sister described as a special present for Astrid. It turned out to be a group of jokers with painted-on evil faces and fake axes covered in blood. They jumped out and howled at her. She fell to the floor, her screaming only stopping when her mother picked her up and laughed at her. That’s when she discovered it was her parents who’d set the whole thing up as a gift for Courtney. All her sister had wanted was to humiliate and terrify Astrid, and her parents were all too willing to organise it.
She pushed the memory into the shadows as they strolled into the mansion. A wall of glass hid the grand hallway, not ordinary mirrors, but ones that twisted and distorted your appearance. She lifted her hands towards them, the reflection altering her fingers so they looked like long, withered branches on a skeletal tree. As she stared at herself, it reminded her of what she’d witnessed in the river earlier, when her shadow had transformed into a mangled, painful vision of Olivia. She stuck a fingernail into her palm to get rid of it.
The distorting glass hypnotised Grace, her body shrinking inside it. ‘I guess I finally look normal.’
Astrid stood at her side, so they resembled a human salt and pepper set. ‘There’s no such thing as normal in this world, partner. People who think like that, who adhere to outdated societal modes of what’s acceptable and what isn’t, are too vanilla to appreciate the real beauty of life.’
Grace held a finger to her face, the two of them watching it twist like liquid flesh until it didn’t appear to be part of her anymore.
‘What do you mean by vanilla?’
Astrid took Grace’s hand. ‘Vanilla is boring and bland.’ She squeezed her partner’s arm. ‘It’s better to be exotic and unusual rather than that.’
As Grace laughed and her face contorted in the mirror to resemble something from Picasso, other guests followed in behind them, the mirrors becoming one heaving mass of warped human beings. Up ahead, the wall of glass parted into the banqueting area of the mansion. A great banner proclaiming the re-election of Senator Brady stretched across the ceiling. He stepped out and addressed the gathering crowd.
‘Welcome, friends, to my humble home.’ He extended his arms like Christ on the cross. ‘Please eat and drink until you can eat and drink no more.’ Out from behind him sprang a glitterati of costumed performers, jumping and tumbling into the room and between the startled masses: grim-faced clowns, agile acrobats, scantily clad females and muscular he-men, and many others. ‘Follow and enjoy my entertainers and make sure you contribute to my campaign wholeheartedly.’
As he grinned, streamers burst from above, and party music blasted through the mansion. Astrid watched the people behind her disappear in the twisted mirrors, replaced with the family she wished she’d never known. Lawrence pointed at her while holding a whip, slapping it against his leg, each whack increasing the width of his smile until it threatened to slip from his face. Her mother, Gloria, sucked on a bottle of booze as if it was an umbilical cord as she wrapped herself in a Union Jack. Courtney stood between them, cradling a baby who could only have been Olivia. She ogled Astrid, her eyes telling her sister she had something she’d never have.
As Astrid continued to stare at them, Grace whispered to her.
‘This is great; you’ve got an excuse to go in every room now if you say you were only following one of these performers.’
Astrid gazed at a distorted version of Courtney sneering at her, transferred from her memory and into the mirror.
‘I need alcohol first.’ She seized a glass of champagne from a server dressed as a southern belle of the Civil War.
Worry lines appeared across Grace’s face. ‘We have to keep a clear head, remember.’
‘I have to blend in, partner.’
She downed the drink and grabbed another one, the warmth of the booze chipping away at her hallucination until her family disappeared. She strode towards the table of food, grabbing a sandwich that wouldn’t have satisfied a tiny bird.
More people came into the mansion as the piped music dissipated and a band struck up some terrible jazz fusion. Astrid devoured the sarnie in a gulp before sticking a finger into one ear. She scanned the area, watching Brady shake hands and grin his way to adding more money to his re-election fund.
Grace tapped her on the shoulder. ‘Your friend and her partner are observing from the shadows.’ She pointed at Cope and Wylie, standing like grim statues in the far corner.
‘You distract them while I go upstairs.’ Astrid slipped away before Grace protested.
She dodged a couple of harlequins loping towards her and stepped into the room opposite, an impressive-looking library with entertainers dressed as famous fictional characters serving refreshments. She took a glass from Hamlet and turned on her heels. Further down the corridor, she peered into the rest of the rooms, ignoring the punters and the costumed servants.
A crowd surrounded an Egyptian sarcophagus, from which an exotic princess popped out as Astrid went upstairs to the first floor. It was more of the same, with staff in fancy dress and guests gazing at handsome men or scantily clad women. The surveillance room couldn’t be there; it had to be away from everyone and would probably be locked, so she searched for anywhere that was off-limits.
Astrid continued upwards and on to the next level. Gilded frames hung from the walls, unsmiling characters with a resemblance to Brady glared at her. Opulent soft furnishings lined the corridor, leading to the only room there. She marched towards it and tried the door, happy to find it locked.
She removed a paper clip from her pocket, bending it out of shape so it was stretched and pointed with small indents along the length. Astrid pressed it into the handle and wiggled the metal on metal for thirty seconds before the lock clicked open. She pushed at the door and stepped inside.
Apart from the humming computers and the barrage of screens exhibiting the building’s current events, the room was empty. She checked every monitor, ignoring most of them and settling on the sight of Grace speaking to the Detectives. Grace’s lips twisted upwards and there was a fire in her eyes as she appeared to be arguing with Pete Wylie. Cope stood there impassively and sipped on her drink. Astrid peered at the screen and raised one finger to her neck, touching the mark Julie had left there.
She was about to move away and search for the video footage when something caught her attention behind Cope. A man stared at Grace, the cut of his hair, his physique and his movement marking him out as ex-military. But he wasn’t just staring at her; he was scrutinising her as if she was the most important person there. The intensity of his gaze, even through the screen, made Astrid uneasy. Was he Brady’s security?
No, she’d seen them around the mansion, all of them dressed the same with earpieces and microphones, a physical presence for all the guests to see. This man was different; he was trying to be normal. There was something familiar about him, but she couldn’t place what it was.
Astrid checked all the cameras, looking through the other rooms, and found three men of a similar disposition. If they weren’t Brady’s private security, perhaps they were secret service operatives. Whoever they were, they just added to her problems if she got caught poking around the mansion.
She turned from the screens and headed for the closest computer.
Let’s see how lucky I am.
She clicked on the keyboard, and the screen lit up. She was fortunate; no password required, and there was a prominent folder named SURVEILLANCE VIDEOS on the desktop. She opened it, flicking through the files to find the date she wanted. She was blessed again because each clip was divided into hours, with twenty-four segments for each day.
Astrid located the clips for the morning Alex was supposedly set free from the compound, fast-forwarding through one before watching the teenager walk out of the gates just after nine. Alex strode into the woods, her movement telling Astrid what she’d already surmised: the girl hadn’t been broken by what these people did to her; she was defiant and determined.
She calculated the time it would have taken Alex to get to Manny’s place, linger there, and then return to the compound. Astrid went through every video taken from eleven until midnight, getting more and more frustrated with each one. There was no sign of Alex or a vehicle to pick her up on any of them. Could she have been wrong about the teenager returning to the mansion for a phone?
Astrid was about to go through the clips from after midnight when the wood creaked behind her. She twisted around in time for a fist to brush her head and thump into the desk. She fell to the floor and rolled into the wall, her shoulder throbbing as she hit the concrete. From downstairs came the sounds of laughter and music, of people shouting and enjoying themselves.
She stood and looked into the face of a giant.