Secret Kill

Chapter 2

I was walking into my office when Celeste, my PA, motioned me over. ‘There's someone here to see you,’ she said in a low voice. ‘She wouldn't tell me who she is or what she wants. She says it's urgent.’

I looked over into the small waiting room. A young woman perched on the edge of an armchair, legs pressed neatly together and hands in her lap. Her long dark hair was messy, not in a fashionable way, but as if she’d just got out of bed. Her eyes, brown and deep-set, held my gaze; the look in them saying, 'I won't take no for an answer.'

Occasionally I had women try to see me to ask for a job or to sell me something, thinking that if they went straight to the boss, they'd have more of a chance. It never worked, of course. But this woman didn't look like a businesswoman; she was dressed in jeans and jacket and flat shoes. And although she was sitting perfectly still, I sensed she was nervous.

I'll admit it would have been easier to send her away if she was plain, but she was striking in a way I couldn't describe. And I was curious.

I gestured to her. ‘Come in, Ms. ...'

‘Frida.'

I opened my office door and stood aside as she entered, handbag over her shoulder. She was thin, the tight jeans emphasising her lack of curves. I sat at my desk and she sat in the chair opposite, hugging her handbag to her chest. It was good quality leather.

‘What can I do for you, Frida?'

‘I'm your daughter.’

Whoa! I hadn't seen that one coming. ‘I'm sorry, you're mistaken. I don't have a daughter.’

Frida opened her handbag, rummaged around in it and drew out a crumpled piece of paper. She handed it to me. It was a birth certificate. Frida Joan Shipp, born 6th June 1997 at Liverpool Hospital, Sydney. Mother: Carol May Shipp. Occupation: Artist. Age: 22. Father: Jack Arthur Forbes. Occupation: Labourer. Age: 24.

That was my name, except for the Jack instead of Jackson. And I had lived with Carol Shipp for a couple of years in my early twenties. I checked Frida's date of birth again.

She was 21. When did I leave Carol to move to Melbourne? It was before 6 June 1997, but how long before, I couldn't remember.

Frida was watching me, leaning forward, her shoulders tense. I handed her back the birth certificate. ‘That means nothing. Carol could have put anyone's name on it.'

She rummaged around inside her handbag again, drew out another piece of crumpled paper and handed it to me. It was a charcoal sketch, a side on portrait of a man staring into the distance. Stubble on his chin and a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. I knew it was me and that it was Carol's artwork even before I saw her signature at the bottom of the page. She'd made me look more glamorous than I was, had given me an enigmatic Humphrey Bogart air. I couldn't remember her drawing it—we were both probably off our faces.

I handed the drawing back to her. 'It still doesn't prove anything. Not meaning any disrespect to your mother, but Carol wasn't fussy about who she slept with.' Especially when she needed money for drugs. None of us were, to be fair. We were young, and this was the 90s—grunge, share houses, share drugs, share women.

‘I know you're my father.’ Her brittle tone failed to hide her desperation. ‘Ever since I can remember, my mother told me you were dead. Then about six months ago she admitted she'd lied to me. She said she didn't know where you were, but it was quite possible you were still alive.'

‘Why did she tell you I was dead?’

‘She was angry at you for leaving her; you were the only guy she'd been with who hadn't beat her up or r***d her. She said she didn't want me wasting my time trying to find you, that you didn't deserve to have a daughter.’

It was true that Carol hadn’t wanted me to go to Melbourne. She begged me to stay. I asked her to come with me, but she refused. All her friends were in Sydney, that's where the art scene was happening. She’d had paintings in a couple of exhibitions. If she could just keep her s**t together and stay off the drugs she could make a go of it.

But I knew that if I didn't leave, I'd never get my head straight. She must have found out she was pregnant after I left; if she'd known beforehand, she’d have used it as a lever to persuade me to stay. It was convenient for her to put my name on the birth certificate, I wasn't there to protest and would be none the wiser.

Could Frida possibly be my daughter? She had the same shaped face as me, long and angular, and I also had brown eyes and dark hair, now streaked with grey. She certainly didn't take after her mother who was fair-haired, with large, pale eyes that always had a startled, anxious look about them.

'How did you find me?' I asked.

'It was hard at first, because I was looking for Jack Forbes. Do you know how many Jack Forbses there are in this country? Mum said you'd gone to Melbourne but you could have been anywhere by now. Then on the internet I saw a newspaper article about Jackson Forbes, some charity you were involved with, and I wondered if Jack was short for Jackson. Then I looked on LinkedIn and found your date of birth and it matched. As soon as I saw your photo I knew you were my father.'

I had to admit, her story made sense. Carole had only ever known me as Jack; I'd never told her it was short for Jackson, because I hated the name. When I moved to Melbourne, I resurrected Jackson as a way of separating my old life from my new.

‘Frida, you may well be my daughter. I'm not denying that. But I need to know for sure. The only way to do that is to have a DNA test.'

'There's no time for a DNA test. I need your help now.’

Here we go. The sob story about needing money.

‘What sort of help?’

‘I have...' She took in a breath and swallowed. 'I killed a man. He was about to r**e me so I shot him and now Teff McGill is after me and probably the cops as well."

‘You shot a man?’

I've always considered myself a good judge of character. It comes from having lived on the edge; that survival instinct has never left me. If you'd asked me ten minutes earlier if this girl was capable of killing anyone, I'd have scoffed.

'And why is Teff McGill after you?’

Teff McGill was a notorious crime boss, one of the few who'd escaped the Melbourne Gangland Wars in one piece. He was often in the news, usually to do with allegations of serious drug offences that never seemed to come to anything. Hence the nickname Teff, short for Teflon—nothing stuck to him.

‘Because the man I killed was one of his heavies.'

'Jesus.' If she was involved in some way with McGill, I didn't want to know any more.

‘Even if what you're telling me is true, there's no way I can help you.’

Frida opened her handbag again, whipped out a pistol and aimed it at my chest. ‘You have to help me.'

Instantly I broke out in a sweat; my mind jumping back to the last time I'd had a gun pointed at me. Frida's hand trembled almost imperceptibly, but there was a determined set to her jaw. She shot a man in self-defence, but was she capable of shooting someone in cold blood? I doubted it, but then my judgment about her not being a killer had been incorrect.

‘Put the gun away. I can't help you if you kill me.’

She slowly lowered the pistol, but kept it in her hand, resting it on her handbag.

‘I have a board meeting after lunch and I'd like to talk to Carol. Give me her phone number.'

I pushed a pen and piece of paper over to Frida. She wrote down a phone number and handed the paper back to me.

‘How is she, anyway?’ I asked.

Frida's eyes flashed. 'What the hell do you care?'

‘Don't give me that bullshit, there are reasons I left that neither you nor Carol are aware of.'

Frida shrugged. 'She's okay. She does really well with her art until she gets on the drugs and then she's hopeless. She's been in and out of psychiatric hospitals for the last few years.'

‘She still into the smack?’

She nodded. 'I think the mental problems have more to do with the acid.’

We all did acid now and then, but Carol must have really got into it after I left. She always said she did her best paintings when she was on a trip. If Frida was hanging out with Teff McGill's crowd, it was more than likely she was doing drugs herself. Apart from her thinness, though, she didn't have the appearance of an addict. Her hair was glossy and her skin and eyes were clear.

'There's a hotel two doors up, The Regency. I'll meet you there in the lounge bar at five o'clock.'

She looked at me warily; I could see she was thinking that I wouldn’t turn up and this was my way getting rid of her.

'I promise I'll be there’ I said.

'I need money. I've been on the run for the last three days and I've used all my cash. I haven't eaten since yesterday.'

I took out my wallet, slipped out a fifty dollar note and handed it to her. I was half-expecting her to wave the pistol at me again and demand that I give her all my cash. But she put the note and the pistol in her handbag and stood up, with the sulky look of a child who's been told to run along and play because the grown-ups want to talk about adult things.

If she disappeared I was only down fifty bucks. But something told me she wouldn't.