Action

Jack flicked through the pages. It didn’t make sense. He was sure there’d be something.

“No record,” Andy said. “No dodgy associates. She’s been fired from a lot of jobs, but other than that, there’s nothing.”

“Maybe she had a drug habit that got in the way of work?”

“From what we found out it isn’t a drug habit, but an attitude habit. The last boss said she decked a customer for grabbing her backside. Apparently she’s got a thing for good manners.”

Against his will, Jack grinned. It was fleeting. Confusion had robbed him of his sense of humour.

“What else did you find?”

“She’s the daughter of a church pastor, her mother is a school teacher and her best friend is an accountant. She’s as clean as they come.”

Jack stared at the folder, while he processed the information.

“What about the brownie?”

Andy shook his head slowly.

“Just brownie. Apparently it had chili in it, but that was it. Nothing else out of the ordinary.”

“No dope?”

“No dope.”

The room began to close in on him. Jack walked to the window and stared out over the Brighton rooftops towards the sea.

“But the kid said they were magic brownies. He said he was getting paid in brownies.”

“Yeah,” Andy said. “It’s nuts, but it isn’t illegal.”

Jack turned towards his friend and felt sick as soon as he saw his face. He knew what Andy was thinking, that he’d done it again – found a crime where there wasn’t one.

“Maybe we overreacted,” Andy said. “The stuff we heard could have meant anything. You know how weird things get when they’re taken out of context.”

Andy was being generous using ‘we’.

“I get that,” Jack told him. “But this is different. I know she’s hiding something.”

Andy held his hands up. It was exactly the same gesture he used when he was trying to talk some lunatic down off a ledge. Great. Now he was the lunatic and his friend was trying to disarm him. Suddenly, he had clarity. People had been tiptoeing around him for months. They thought he was primed to blow.

“She could be hiding anything,” Andy said. “Maybe she painted the lounge bright pink, or knocked down a wall without telling you. It doesn’t need to be illegal for her to be worried you’d find out.”

Jack shook his head.

“She said she needed to get rid of equipment. She’s got people working for her.”

Andy looked around for an explanation.

“Well, maybe she’s running a gym without permission. Or a day spa – she looks like the spa type. It could be anything. Sure she doesn’t want you to see what she’s up to, you’re her landlord.”

Unfortunately, everything Andy said made perfect sense.

“Look,” Andy said as he rubbed a hand over his face. “This sort of thing is why you need to see the counsellor. You’re burnt out. You put two and two together and get five. You jump to conclusions and see trouble when there’s only odd behaviour. You need to get help, man.”

Jack turned away from his friend to look back out over the town. The rows of terraced housing were invisible to him. Could he have gotten it all wrong? Were his instincts that far off the mark? And if he was wrong on this, did that mean he was wrong about the Chief too? He could feel the blood drain from his face. If he was going to faint then he wanted to be alone. He walked over to the breakfast bar. Every step made him feel self-conscious. He wondered if Andy could read his mind.

“I appreciate you taking the time to bring this stuff over.”