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Sean snapped his phone closed and turned to Mick, who was negotiating the mess of impatient traffic and jay-walking tourists at a roundabout.
“Bill Cooper does have a connection to someone in the Queenstown force. He’s going to put out some feelers today, see what he can find out about the previous assaults.”
Mick nodded, unsmiling.
“And you’re just going to give your statement to the detective in charge of the case like a good, disinterested citizen, are you?” Sean asked obligingly, shooting him a look. “No attempts to check on the status of the investigation? No temptation to throw a little weight around?”
“There’s a temptation to throw a lot more than that around,” Mick said flatly. “The bastard should be down on his knees in gratitude for those iron bars.”
He looked at his knuckles wrapped around the steering wheel, wondering if his hands would still be shaking if he lifted them free. Last night had been an unwelcome return to a state of helpless rage that he hadn’t experienced for over a decade. Sophy had made a deliberately light-hearted, unconvincing remark about wishing he’d tossed her assailant into a pool table. He was only grateful now that it hadn’t been his hand that was closest to the broken bottles in that moment of red. The intensity of his fear for her had rocked him sideways. And unfortunately it had influenced his behaviour during the remainder of the night.
He had no desire to retract the sentiment behind his declaration and near ultimatum to her in the car; it had been true in every word. He damn well did regret the criminally bad timing. She had been in no state for anything close to that sort of scene. Christ, she’d been all but falling out the door in her haste to get away from him. A sudden instinct that he was on the precipice of losing her completely had resulted in his acting like a bloody fool. Every gut instinct had urged him to go to her this morning, but he was putting her first for once. She needed privacy; she would come to him when she was ready.
God, he hoped so.
“We’re playing this completely by the book. I don’t want that trash getting off on a technicality,” he said to Sean as he reversed into a park near the police station. “His lawyer isn’t going to have the chance to play a coercion and influence card.”
“Hmm.” Sean looked equally grim. He had been a godsend when Mick had arrived back at the hotel close to the midnight, after an unsuccessful attempt to walk off the edge of his anger around the lake. A battery of deliberate insults and catcalls had provoked Mick down to the gym, where they had lifted weights and engaged in unfriendly athletic competition until the exhausted early hours of the morning. All things considered, it had been a much healthier remedy for excess adrenalin than hitting a bottle of whisky or stewing over it all night. “Pity. Because I’m equally open to paying a short visit to the holding cells myself while you bat your eyelashes and flash a little leg at the coppers on duty.”
A reluctant smile crossed Mick’s face.
“Well, it’s always useful to have a Plan B.”
They were crossing the driveway into the station when Mick heard his name called. He turned to see Sophy’s father getting out of the cab of a recent-model ute. Gregory caught up with them and shook hands with both men, acknowledging the introduction to Sean with a quick dip of the head before his gaze tracked back to Mick.
“Are you here to find out what you can about the piece of shit who put his hands on my daughter?” he asked bluntly.
Gone was the amiable, distracted man of their lunch at the winery. Vengeance, thy name is an outraged father.
“I’m here to make a statement to the lead detective,” Mick said, holding his gaze squarely. “He won’t get away with it, Gregory. I promise you that.”
“No, he bloody won’t.” Gregory’s eyes narrowed. “Obviously we can’t interfere in a police investigation.”
“Not if we want the case to go our way in court, no.”
“But I imagine there’s nothing to stop a couple of…interested citizens with the ways and means of doing a little background research to then pass that information on through the official channels.”
Sean was smiling.
“No,” said Mick evenly. “I don’t imagine that there is.”
“Right.” Gregory gestured toward the sliding glass doors. “Then lay on, Macduff.”
***
Sophy set her chisel and mallet down on the floor with infinite care and got slowly to her feet. Absently, she pulled off her gloves, shaking loose a shower of stone dust.
“Dale,” she said quietly. “Of course it’s okay. Come on in.”
Dale came further into the workroom, still moving almost hesitantly, nearly unrecognisable without his characteristic cockiness. He looked very tired as he shoved a restless hand through his hair, dishevelling it into further peaks and waves. Having mastered the initial greeting and made it over the threshold, he didn’t seem to know quite what to do or say next.
Equally at a loss, she watched him prowl the perimeter of the room, apparently finding immense interest in the smaller pieces of completed work and the merest scraps of extraneous materials.
Coming to a stop, his shoulders hunching with a deep breath, he seemed to notice the half-formed Hades for the first time. He had initially avoided looking that way, as if it was somehow impolite to examine an incomplete sculpture, like walking in on someone in the process of dressing. His eyes were fixed on the carved features, their unmistakable familiarity.
His attempt at speech died in his throat.
They stood in fraught silence for some minutes, Sophy feeling almost desperately uncomfortable.
