Exiles (Aaron Falk #3)(15)

“Let’s keep moving,” Raco said and, perhaps feeling a little guilty, thrust a couple of his own leaflets at a passing group.

“So, that’s him, is it?” Falk glanced back at the teenage boy. “Zara’s key witness?”

“Yeah. Joel Tozer.” Raco gestured for them to step off the path and cut down the side of what seemed to be a very popular shiraz tent, and they emerged into a different zone of the grounds, this one a maze of fairground rides. Up ahead, the ferris wheel dominated the darkening skyline. “Although, I dunno. Are you still technically a key witness if you reckon you didn’t see anything at all?”

Falk gave a small smile. “Where exactly was he stationed?”

“I’ll show you. It’s up here, we’ve got to go past it, anyway.”

They were nearly at the ferris wheel now. It had stopped to take on passengers, and Falk looked up as they walked by. At first glance, the very top carriage looked empty against the last light of the day, but Falk could see it tilting a little to one side, so someone must be sitting inside. A moment later, he caught a flash of movement behind the colored bars as the occupant shifted in their seat. Back on the ground, the stroller bay nearby was once again packed with buggies, bikes, and scooters. There was an attendant on duty now, though. Something else that was new since last year.

Falk watched the crowd loosely gathered near the base. Some were lining up for a ride, while others waited for friends to come off. A lot were simply chatting and catching up. Either way, it was a busy intersection. Falk tried to pick out the spot where he himself had stopped twelve months earlier as the fireworks had been starting. He couldn’t be sure. It all looked a little different a year on.

“Nearly there now,” Raco said as they navigated their way through the rides. It was a younger demographic around here than back at the food and wine tents, Falk noticed. Mainly teenagers or families with kids. Even they started to thin out, though, as he and Raco approached the eastern boundary of the site, and the attractions made way for admin and support tents. The lights and music were mostly behind them, and the track ahead, Falk knew, led nowhere but the reservoir trail. He thought about that for a moment. It was a faintly odd and lonely sensation to leave the bustle and noise behind.

“So if Zara doesn’t think Kim went down to the reservoir at all,” he said as they walked on, “what does she make of the shoe they found in the dam filter?”

Raco shook his head. “Lots of things. It’s not her shoe, someone dumped it, Kim dumped it herself—” He smiled without humor as he saw Falk’s expression. “No, I know. Zara tried arguing for a while that it was a coincidence. That the shoe could be anyone’s. It’s the most commonly sold women’s size in that brand, apparently. Zara told me that herself. Do you know how many of those exact pairs were sold in Australia last year?”

“No.”

“Me neither, but Zara knows. A few thousand, I think, but she could tell you exactly. She contacted the distributor and found out.”

“Enterprising.”

“Yeah.” Raco looked sad. “That’s one word for it. Anyway, it was Kim’s shoe. Definitely.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. She’d dropped a cooking fork off the outdoor grill a couple of months earlier and scorched the side of her shoe. There are photos of her wearing them, and you can see the mark. It’s distinctive, not just a smudge. I’ve seen the images of the shoe they pulled out of the filter. Size, brand, whatever, is one thing—fair enough—but the scorch mark’s right there. The shoe’s hers.”

“What’s Zara’s answer for that?”

“She doesn’t have one. I mean, there isn’t one, really, is there? It’s her mum’s shoe, and on some level Zara knows that. But, at the same time, she’s grieving. Makes people selective in what they want to see, don’t you reckon?”

“Yeah,” Falk said. “Sometimes.”

The stalls had completely thinned out as they neared the eastern perimeter, and Falk fell quiet now, keeping half an eye out for something he felt pretty sure was around here somewhere. He was starting to wonder if he’d lost his bearings when he saw it ahead of them as the path curved around. The headquarters caravan.

It was a large retro van, parked in a secluded spot across a stretch of grass under a huge tree. Falk guessed in the daylight the leaves offered shade, but now its branches glowed with lanterns. A small folding table and chairs had been set up outside.

Falk remembered them from the previous year. He had been walking alone back then, heading over to find this very caravan with a couple of sheets of signed paperwork in his hand that Charlie had needed to be delivered. Falk had volunteered for the task, and Charlie, cheerfully distracted by the demands of the stall and still nearly three hours away from learning that his ex-partner and the mother of his child had gone missing, had been grateful.

Falk had wandered through the festival grounds for the first time then, soaking it all up with fresh eyes, and stopped when he’d found the caravan. As he’d crossed the field, he’d already been watching those windows, looking for a hint of movement inside. It hadn’t been easy to tell either way, even as he’d gotten close, ducking under a low-hanging branch and stepping around the table and chairs. He’d had his hand up, poised to knock on the door, when he’d heard a voice behind him.