The Girl in the Yellow Vest (39 page)

Charlotte was so angry. Her skin literally tingled with it. She knew it was irresponsible of her to walk off the job. But
really
. She wasn’t even supposed to be there. She was the part-time counsellor, for goodness sake. He’d put her there to annoy her. The truth was she knew none of the answers to the questions the media were asking her. So when Em had offered to take over so that she could run back and get a Panadol for her ‘headache’ she’d jumped at the chance.

She just needed some space. Never in all her life had she met a man who infuriated her more. And yet . . .

Why did she feel so sad? As if she’d just shot herself in the foot for turning him away. Was it wrong of her to want more from a potential mate than insults and jibes?

A date with Caesar? The thought was laughable.

And yet strangely . . . erotic.

She arrived back at the Barnes Inc office in a frenzy of emotion and actually did need that Panadol, which she gulped down with a glass of water as she sat at her desk. With the door shut, the office was quiet. Everyone was on the wharf. She began to relax. With a secret smile curling her mouth, she mused how long she could stay holed up in there. Would anyone miss her?

Caesar might
, a small voice muttered in her head, which she vehemently ignored. A few days earlier, when he had been on leave, his absence had literally filled her head. How many times had she wavered between confronting him and not confronting him about that kiss they had shared?

But as soon as he returned, unchanged and unmoved, so did her senses. He didn’t mention the kiss once, so she thought her feelings were unreciprocated. That is, until today when he’d asked her on a date almost as though the request had been torn from him under the lash of a whip.

His manner, his behaviour, his attitude towards her were twisted to say the least. And to make matters worse, she felt like his dead wife’s ghost loomed over them, judging every mistake she made. Was this the kind of relationship she wanted to enter into?

Suddenly there was a knock at the door and her eyes automatically flicked to her desk calendar. It was blank. Belatedly, she remembered that of course she didn’t have an appointment that day. The shiploader was being installed.

‘Er, come in,’ she called out croakily.

And then as though in slow motion the door opened and a figure appeared. A figure so nondescript, so ordinary and so
recognisable
. All her senses came crashing to a halt as her heart jumped into her mouth, causing her head to throb.

She stared at the man she had only seen in photos, mouth agape, frozen in the moment.

He smiled at her.

She had never thought she would find a smile so grotesque.

‘Hi, I’m Dennis Mayer.’

‘I know who you are.’ She was surprised to hear her own voice as the rest of her body couldn’t move. If he was here to rape her, which surely he wasn’t, given his MO was crowded bars and drug-induced stupors, her physical defences against him were shot to pieces. ‘What are you doing here?’

He didn’t immediately answer the question but simply came into the room, shutting the door behind him. This time she did stand up, scooting around her chair and holding it in front of her like a barrier between them. Again he smiled. He was in no hurry as he clasped his hands in front of him. ‘Are you Charlotte Templeton?’

‘I am.’

‘I’m here to see your mother. I hear you manage her affairs.’

‘My mother has no wish to see you,’ she spat.

‘Your mother has no choice, given the crime she has committed against me.’

‘
What did you say?
’ This was too much. ‘You raped my mother, you fuckin’ bastard. Get out of my office and my workplace.’

‘I’m afraid I can’t do that.’ That horrible smile just wouldn’t leave his flakey face and she could feel fear beginning to seep up her legs from the vinyl floors. ‘Not until justice has been served.’

‘Then go back to jail!’

‘I’ve served my time,’ he folded his arms, ‘though I’ve always maintained my innocence and will continue to do so to my deathbed.’

She wanted to vomit.

‘And should your mother wish to accuse me falsely of rape, that’s her prerogative. Though with her mental incapacity, I wouldn’t advise it.’

He took another step forwards and she stepped back, dragging the chair with her.

He laughed, a horrible sound that grated on her ears like a garden rake on the back of a steel shed. ‘Why are you afraid of me?’

‘I’m not
afraid
of you.’

He spread his hands. ‘I am an upstanding moral citizen and have been for the last two years. I’m not here to hurt you. I just want a little understanding.’

Yeah right!
‘What sort of understanding?’

His face hardened slightly. ‘Understanding for a father who has already lost fifteen years of his child’s life.’

Her hands went to her throat as it closed to suffocate her. ‘Leave Zara out of this.’

‘How can I leave her out of this, when she is precisely why I am here?’ he mused at her complete lack of comprehension.

She couldn’t speak; she couldn’t think. She could barely hear what he was saying.

‘Your mother’s concealment of the truth left me unaware that I had a daughter until now. I was unable to know her, be a father to her. But now all that’s going to change.’

‘Like hell,’ Charlotte choked. ‘You stay away from her. You stay away from all of us. We don’t want you here.’

‘I was hoping we could work this out amicably between us, like civilised human beings,’ he said grimly.

‘You can’t force me to let you see Zara.’ Despite her conviction she heard her voice shake.

He shook his head sadly. ‘But I can, you see.’

She did not see at all and her shoulders straightened as her confidence buoyed. ‘I’ll get a restraining order, I’ll double our home security, I’ll –’

‘You can do what you must, of course.’ He nodded. ‘But I’m no criminal and if you think I’m here to resort to violence you’re wrong.’

He opened his jacket and pulled forth a folded document from the inside pocket. ‘I’m suing for custody. Virginia is no longer fit to care for our child and I have been robbed of time with Zara from the beginning.’ He held out the document, which she refused to take.

‘Very well.’ He put the envelope on her desk. ‘Look at it later. But consider yourself served, Charlotte. You and your lying mother.’

The horror was more than she could bear. It was a nightmare so vile that it hadn’t even dawned on her consciousness that such a thing
could
occur till now. A rapist demanding custody of the child birthed from his crime? It was unconscionable. How did he even have rights?

‘You can’t do this,’ she whispered, her face numb with the absence of blood. ‘You’re a criminal: they will never grant you custody.’

His face hardened further. ‘I suffered through the system that punished me for crimes I did not commit. But that blight on my life is over. I am a new man now. I own my own business. I’m married with a stepchild already. Financially, I’m much better able to provide for Zara than you ever could. So don’t call me a
criminal
.’ He leaned forwards, both hands on her desk. ‘According to my lawyer, my case is very solid when compared, for instance, to yours. How many mortgages do you have on that dump you call a resort now, Charlotte?’

When she remained silent, he seemed to calm down somewhat and straightened, smiling again. ‘See you in court.’

And as he walked out, she wished that he had tried to attack her physically instead. At least then, killing him in self-defence might have been an option.

With Caesar having walked off the job, it was left to her to appease the media with reasons she literally plucked from the air at random. The truth was, no one knew why the project manager had left at such a crucial moment. All they could do was push through and hope that all the careful planning they had done beforehand paid off.

Luckily, it did.

The lift points they had chosen on the shiploader allowed them to bring the large structure down without it tipping slightly in the wrong direction and thus putting lopsided pressure on the bogies. If this happened it would bend them out of shape, which would be a colossal disaster.

The weather wasn’t an issue either, even though Spooks reported that the breeze was starting to pick up.

Unexpectedly, Fish calmed everyone down with his surprisingly good leadership skills. Perhaps the man just worked well under pressure. After a few nail-biting attempts they landed the shiploader back on its wheels and in good time too. The welding crew moved in to make the new position permanent.

It was a massive relief but also the point where the media lost interest. Fortunately, Dipper had returned with Will’s ute and Em was able to drive them back to the office in groups. Here, she noticed that neither Charlotte nor Caesar were anywhere to be found. Both their offices were empty. Not that this bothered her. There was only an hour left of the day and she was probably going to spend most of it thinking about how to orchestrate her master plan.

She went on the internet and Googled ‘flirting’, to get a few ideas to expand her dismal repertoire. Better to have a full arsenal if she was to do this properly. There were quite a number of good suggestions online that she hadn’t thought of already.

Apparently, emulating body language was a form of flattery. So was laughing hard at all his jokes. Listening attentively. Batting eyes. Innuendo.

And laying hands on him any chance she got.

Reading these naughty little instructions made her feel like a fourteen-year-old tossed in puberty. She wanted to giggle self-consciously at her own daring. But was any of this really going to lead to a kiss or should she just hand him a bottle of vodka and tell him to drink? It didn’t matter. She was going to try anyway.

Just before knock-off, she left a note on his desk.
Dinner, my place. 7pm. I’m cooking. See you there.

She spent a minimal amount of time on the meal. As far as she was concerned the actual food they ate wasn’t really that important. So her signature penne chicken pasta seemed like a good idea. She left it in a pot on the stove and then ordered a couple of bottles of wine from the Silver Seas resort bar. They brought them around while she was choosing something to wear.

Of all the preparation she was making that evening she figured this was definitely her priority. Normally when she spent a night in with Will, she chose loose-fitting, lounge-about-the-house wear. Today she put on the only dress she’d brought with her from Perth. It was short and sleeveless with a low-scooped neckline. She’d packed it for its versatility. It was her little black dress, though it wasn’t black but dark green.

In all honesty, it was probably a little over the top for pasta at home but she knew she’d definitely have a better chance in it than in trackpants that sported knee holes. Combined with make up and half an hour spent on her hair, she was very pleased with the end result.

Will certainly did a double take when she opened the door. His eyes dilated and made an interesting crawl from her feet to her lips and she wondered how she hadn’t wanted to revel in this sort of attention from him earlier.