Force of Nature (Aaron Falk #2)(36)

‘Look, to be honest, I don’t really remember much of it. I had a drug problem for a few years, since –’ She stopped what she’d been about to say. Ran a hand over her arm. The movement reminded Falk of her sister, picking at her bandage in the hospital bed. ‘Since my final year of uni. It was stupid. I was picked up straight away by the police trying to sell her stuff. I didn’t even know I’d hit her until my lawyer told me. I had a record by then, so I got sent away. It wasn’t Bree’s fault. Obviously. But I mean, she didn’t go to the police. She could have, no-one would have blamed her. A neighbour who saw us fighting was the one who reported it. Bree still won’t talk about it. She doesn’t talk to me much anyway. Most of what I know about it comes from the court documents.’

‘What happened to you?’ Carmen said.

‘A couple of months in a correctional facility, which wasn’t so good, then a bit longer in rehab treatment, which was better.’

‘They helped you recover?’

‘Yeah. I mean, they did their best. And I’m doing my best. Recovery is an ongoing thing, but they taught me to take responsibility for my choices. And for what I did to my sister.’

‘How are things between you now?’ Carmen said.

‘Okay. She helped get me this data job, which was great. I was studying computer science and technology before I left uni, so the BaileyTennants work’s a bit mundane, but it can be hard to find anything on probation so I’m grateful.’ Beth’s smile came out a little forced. ‘We used to be really close, though. We dressed the same every day until we were, like, fourteen, or something ridiculous. Way too long. Like we were the same person. We seriously used to think we could read each other’s thoughts.’ She glanced at the hospital door. ‘We can’t.’ She sounded a little surprised by that.

‘It must have been frightening for you when she got bitten,’ Falk said.

Beth’s mouth went tight. ‘Yeah, it was. I was so scared I was going to lose her. I’d got up early to go for a pee and just dozed off again when Bree came crashing in clutching her arm. We had to get her to a doctor, but bloody Alice had gone AWOL. We ran around like headless chooks trying to find her, but there was no sign.’ She ran a stubby thumbnail over her lips. ‘To be honest with you, I didn’t give a shit. I only cared about Bree. Alice could fend for herself, as far as I was concerned. We were just lucky Lauren knew how to navigate in a straight line, or we’d still be stuck out there. She kept us going north, got us to the road so we could follow it round. I’ve never been so happy to see tarmac in my life.’

‘Did you actually see Alice walk off?’ Falk asked, watching her closely.

‘No. But I wasn’t surprised. It was what she’d been threatening to do.’

‘And we hear she took the phone.’

‘Yeah, she did. It was pretty bloody selfish, but that’s Alice for you. Anyway, it didn’t really matter. It never worked.’

‘Never?’

‘No.’ Beth looked at them like they were slow. ‘Or we would have called for help.’

‘Were you surprised Alice wasn’t already at the meeting spot when you got back?’ Falk said, and Beth seemed to consider the question.

‘Yeah. I was a bit, actually. Especially as we were probably on the same track, only a few hours behind her. If we didn’t pass her, and she didn’t make it back before us, what happened?’

The question hung in the air. Falk could make out the sound of the police helicopter circling far off in the distance. Beth looked from one to the other.

‘Listen.’ She shifted her weight and her voice dropped a notch lower. ‘Was Alice up to something?’

‘Like what?’ Falk said, keeping his face neutral.

‘You tell me. You’re the AFP.’

Falk and Carmen said nothing, and eventually Beth shrugged.

‘I don’t know. But I told you she’d been requesting a lot of information from data processing. The thing is, she’d started to come and get the stuff herself, which was a bit weird. I only noticed because she used to send Bree down to get it, but then she began coming herself. And she was accessing the restricted items more regularly. It’s just now with her missing . . .’ Beth glanced past them at the hills towering in the distance and shrugged again.

‘Beth,’ Carmen said. ‘How sure are you that Alice walked away from that cabin of her own accord?’

‘Look, I am sure. Fair enough, I didn’t see her do it, but only because she knew we would’ve stopped her. She didn’t want to be stuck out there. She’d already tried to convince Jill to let her go back alone after the first night, but Jill said no. Then again at the cabin, the same thing.’

‘So there was some tension between them?’ Carmen said.

‘Of course.’

‘Because when we saw Jill Bailey briefly, it looked like she had a bruise on her face. Around her jawline.’

There was a long pause while Beth examined her cigarette. ‘I’m not quite sure how she got that. I know she tripped a couple of times on the hike.’

Falk let the silence string out, but Beth didn’t look up.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘So things weren’t great between Jill and Alice.’

‘Yeah, but that wasn’t totally surprising. Alice could start a fight in an empty room. And she was already pissed off, way before Jill did anything. Alice had been in a bad mood since the first night when she had her little heart-to-heart with Daniel Bailey.’