Cold Grave (38 page)

Anya believed that’s why they hadn’t been flagged on the surveillance footage. Laura would have identified Lilly by her long black hair and red shirt. A hoodie would have covered them both.

‘They said they tried to throw her over the side. Then she made some noise. They nearly wet themselves. Turns out she wasn’t really dead. They said they tried to wake her up by throwing a leftover beer in her face. She moaned. They got one of the hoses the cleaners use and sprayed her with it.’

‘You mean the high pressure ones?’

‘That’s what they said. The guy who put it there went off to do something else. When they saw him coming back, they shoved her into a cupboard and ran. They went to sleep and we all thought she’d be fine. Next thing we hear, she was dead.’

More bells went off and they could hear loud cheers from inside the casino. Someone had just won the jackpot.

‘I have one more question,’ Fitz calmly asked. ‘How would you feel if someone did that to your little girl?’

Berry began to cry. At first softly, then uncontrollably.

Fitz shoved a hanky in his direction and led him away from the casino entrance. Berry took it and wiped his face.

‘What happens now?’ He sniffed.

‘For one, I have to tell the Chan family. The authorities will take it from there.’

‘I need to ask something.’ Anya moved in front of him. ‘Have you seen or heard of a woman – late twenties, long brown hair. Pretty, about five foot four. Nuala or Mishka?’

‘There are a lot of girls on board who look like that. Name doesn’t ring a bell.’ Berry ran the hankie across the tip of his nose. ‘Then again, Genny and Bull aren’t big on finding out names.’

Anya could feel the heat of FitzHarris’s stare but did not look at him.

‘I need to get this guy’s statement,’ Fitz said. ‘But I want to talk to you. Straight after.’

Anya walked away. Maybe Mishka’s disappearance had nothing to do with ESOW. She could have been at the wrong place, wrong time and run into any of the bowling men. If they’d spiked her drink and something went wrong . . . They had already been in trouble because Lilly was found. If they had succeeded in throwing her overboard, there would be nothing to tie them to her. They may not have made that mistake a second time.

39

The following morning, with Ben happily spending the morning at the kids’ club with his new friends, Anya returned to the suite and removed the contents from her bedroom safe.

Between Wesley and Martin locating College Girl, and FitzHarris interviewing Gus Berry, there had been no time to go through the papers Mishka had hidden. The night before, exhausted and drained, Anya had climbed into bed in her clothes, and woken up in time for breakfast.

She put the files into a pile on the floor downstairs, curled up on the lounge and began to read. Something in here had to explain what had happened to Mishka. A myriad of newspaper clippings had been stuffed into a folder. They might as well be where she started.

Martin appeared through the door, half wet and bare chested. Glancing up, she couldn’t miss the six pack in front of her and didn’t take her eyes off quickly enough. He patted his abdomen. ‘The water is gorgeous.’

A towel was wrapped around his waist, over his board shorts. Or so she hoped.

‘You should grab your suit and go in.’ His hair was damp and the waves had shrunk it into soft fair curls. He inclined his head toward a shoulder and patted the outside ear. Something he always did after showers, surfing and swimming. It was then the other ear’s turn. It used to irritate her, but for some reason, now, it was almost endearing.

‘It’s as if we passed through a weather warp. Not a cloud in the sky.’ He wandered over and opened up the balcony doors. A gust of wind blew a number of papers across the floor. He turned back and chased the loose sheets, like he was after a moving chicken. ‘What are these?’

Anya hadn’t yet explained about Mishka’s locker. She deliberately omitted the scene outside the change rooms with the men. Martin didn’t need to hear any more about their behaviour. Besides, no one had harmed her.

‘Why didn’t you tell me? I would have helped.’ His eyelids creased at a slight angle, as if he were wounded. ‘But that’s what you always do. You still haven’t learnt that you don’t have to go through all this on your own.’

In some ways, it hadn’t occurred to Anya to enlist Martin’s help. This felt like work and she functioned alone most of the time in her job.

‘Annie, no one expects you to be a superwoman.’ He slapped the papers on the coffee table. ‘No one that is, except you.’ He grabbed his novel and headed out to the balcony.

She hadn’t even registered the change in weather until he’d mentioned it. On a cruise. On their holiday. Squeals, shouts and laughter drifted in through the open door. From the sounds, holidaymakers were making the most of the sun and warmth. She glanced out the massive windows – the sky was perfectly clear and a deep blue. Martin was right. In the latter part of their marriage, she had been so busy working to support the family, she had disconnected from the people in it.

Putting down the file, she walked out onto the balcony. The grey, rain and wind had been replaced with the vibrant colours of swimsuits and clothing. Families frolicked and fathers splashed with their children in the pools. She breathed in the fresh sea air.

‘If you’re interested, I’d love some help sorting through the information.’

‘Honestly?’

She nodded.

‘Where do you want me to start?’

Inside, she handed him a file. He lay on the floor, while she sat cross-legged on the lounge. To begin with, they each read in silence.

Not surprisingly, the news clippings and print-outs were about the cruise industry. A couple on holiday reported plastic bottles and cans being discharged from the back of a boat along the east coast of Canada. They were informed by crew that international maritime regulations permitted dumping of rubbish beyond twelve miles from the coast. There was a denial of any wrongdoing from the company spokesperson, and an investigation was looking into a faulty release lever on the ship.

‘Do you mind if I put on some of my music? It’s a compilation.’ Martin switched on the CD unit and Dire Straits played. ‘This reminds me a bit of when we were at university. Remember?’

Anya did. Back then, she had moved to the mainland from Tasmania and for the first time in her life felt free from public scrutiny and town gossip. Her sister’s disappearance wasn’t as well-known in Newcastle, so she was able to study in relative anonymity. Martin lived across from her in Edwards Hall, the college residence. She had liked him from the start, and he had seen her around the hospital when he did his nursing practicals. His humour and kindness to patients drew her in. That was years ago.

‘Uh huh.’ She kept reading.

‘Do you remember going to that bowling club every Friday night?’

How could she forget? They could dance for hours to songs that became anthems and the drinks were the cheapest around. Music by the Angels, the Hoodoo Gurus, along with Madonna and Michael Jackson – before he became androgynous. Twisted Sister’s ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ was guaranteed to bring everyone to their feet.

‘And what about that awesome shaving-cream fight. The one that went for hours.’

‘The one you started.’ She smiled. It was difficult to forget. Half the residents became involved and the engineering students were masters at ambushes. It was the most fun Anya had ever had.

‘Was it really you who moved the entire contents of that poor guy’s room onto the oval?’ She had never wanted to know before now.

Martin gave a sheepish grin. ‘That poor guy pranked most of my friends, so you could say it was well deserved.’

The warden had tried to find the culprit. Until now, Anya had been unsure who was the brains behind the venture. Like magicians, practical jokers had a code of secrecy.

‘You know, we enjoyed ourselves but it was harmless.’ He returned to the floor, this time lying on his side, head resting on an elbow. ‘Sure we drank a bit, but we didn’t hurt anyone. I was sort of hoping this cruise would be a bit like that. But the world has changed – a lot.’

Anya had to agree. They had partied when they were younger but always knuckled down to study. At the end of a week, money would be short so they would play cards with their friends, pool what was left of the weekly food allowance and buy hot chips and white bread. Chip sandwiches washed down with gallons of water were filling and became a favourite treat.

‘Or maybe we all had to grow up.’

‘True.’

‘Here’s something interesting,’ Martin looked up. ‘A study of a hundred ships in Alaskan waters found all but one sample of ship’s effluent had faecal bacteria or total solids in violation of something called the Clean Water Act. This is scary stuff.’

‘That explains why the environmentalists wanted action.’ She recalled the conversation with Rachel about Lars Anderson’s plans for the company.

‘It sounds like the Alaskan authorities were pretty ticked off.’ He flicked to the next page. ‘Monitoring had been voluntary and the industry pretty much self-regulated until they made more stringent laws and started enforcing them.’ He sat up. ‘Listen to this, it sounds like ships are exempt from normal pollution and water laws. They are allowed to dump treated sewage less than three miles from shore and raw sewage just over three miles. Imagine if a hotel on the water did that? How many people have no idea they’re swimming or surfing in turds?’

He pulled a face. ‘If that isn’t offensive enough,’ he referred to the document, ‘untreated sewage contains pathogenic bacteria, viruses, intestinal parasites and by-products that could contaminate fish and shellfish, potentially causing major disease outbreaks and devastation to those local industries.’ He looked up. ‘Oh yeah, and that doesn’t include the harmful chemicals in faeces. Algae thrive on nitrogen and phosphorous. Deposits use up the oxygen in the water. That can kill off whole ecosystems, especially fish. You wouldn’t want to be a fisherman in that wake.’

That was different from the version Jeremy Wise, the environmental officer, told.

‘News clippings cite tens of millions of dollars in fines paid by cruise companies. It’s probably cheaper to pay them than invest in technologies like advanced water treatment equipment to do the right thing,’ Anya surmised.

‘Mind you, from what this report says, the industry reckons their sanitation devices produce drinking-quality water, but they don’t even use it for washing on board because apparently it discolours the whites. I’m thinking marine life may not be so thrilled with what is pumped into its ecosystems.’

In the pile, by the lounge, there were water sample reports from a laboratory in California. Some of the samples were 10,000 times the limit for coliform bacteria. Others were up to 150,000 times higher. The majority were described as being dumped between two and three miles from shore.

‘Carlos worked in the waste department,’ Anya commented. ‘Mishka could have been paying him for samples prior to the waste being jettisoned. Independent analyses show this company is consistently in serious violation of environmental standards.’

‘Maybe this is the leverage that was going to be used by Lars Anderson.’

Rachel had been adamant that the information they were gathering was for Lars’s report which he was using against his father and brother. Anya sifted through the pile and extracted the large envelope. The contents were the size of a manuscript. ‘Taking Anderson Lines into the future.’ By Lars Anderson. In the introduction, ESOW was acknowledged as the inspiration for making Anderson Cruise Lines the most innovative, energy-efficient company in the industry. A world leader. Just as Walt Disney had vision and embraced new technologies, it claimed, Anderson Cruise Lines could enhance their brand by use of clean energy and sustainable programmes.

‘Someone,’ Martin added, ‘went to a lot of trouble to blow up the Andersons’ yacht. Whoever that was sent a pretty powerful message to the family.’

Martin sipped from a bottle of water on the coffee table. Anya reached for hers, and he handed it across. She opened it and his bare torso caught her attention again.

Without thinking, she flicked the open bottle in his direction. He shook the water out of his hair. ‘What the—’

Anya began to laugh and something compelled her to do it again. This time, Martin leapt from the chair, wrestled the bottle from her and poured some down the back of her shirt. Instead of resisting, she buckled over and laughed, harder than she had in a long time. Martin joined her. Once he relaxed, she snatched the bottle back and poured it down the back of his shorts.