17 Years Later by Pomare J. P

Author:Pomare, J. P. [Pomare, J. P.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Suspense, Thriller
ISBN: 9780733649653
Publisher: Hachette UK
Published: 2024-07-30T14:00:00+00:00

BILL

IT WAS THURSDAY. Simon had not gone into the office and his ultimatum was set to expire in a few hours, at which point he said he would fire us all and involve the police. As lunchtime approached, there was no sign of Tate.

I returned to the cottage, found the bag I’d arrived with, stuffed all of my clothes inside it.

The cottage phone rang. Fleur answered it.

‘Yes,’ I heard her say. ‘Okay, we will come over.’

We lined up once more before Simon, only three of us this time.

‘It seems,’ Simon said, ‘Tate has disappeared and, with him, I assume the comb is gone too. I have contacted the police and I’m sure they will catch up with him, but until they do, I’m asking you all to let me know if you see him anywhere near the house or around town.’

We all nodded.

He cleared his throat. His eyes settled on me for a beat.

‘Alright, back to work.’

Fleur marched from the room without looking back. I could see an incandescent glow on the back of her otherwise pale neck. Simon’s eyes stayed with her for a moment before turning back to Shirley and me.

‘Chop chop.’

‘I’ll get into my whites,’ I said, following Fleur to the cottage. Unlike me, she had not packed her things. She must have known Simon wouldn’t fire us all, that it was all a bluff. But whatever rapport we had built up had evaporated the moment that comb went missing; our banter was gone and Fleur was a different woman. Quiet, more serious. There’d been a few nights that she had not returned to the cottage until late, creeping in during the small hours.

‘What did you do with it?’ she asked me, facing me with wet eyes.

‘The comb?’ I said. ‘Why would I steal that?’

She huffed, shook her head. ‘I’m not an idiot. It obviously wasn’t Tate.’ She drew a breath. ‘They wouldn’t fire you. Gwen would have understood but you were too cowardly to put your hand up.’

‘What’s going on, Fleur? You’ve changed. The last few weeks, you’ve been different.’

‘What do you mean? Maybe you just didn’t know me before. Now you know.’

‘They wouldn’t be happy with you sneaking around,’ I said, giving her words back to her from months earlier, when I had Maia visit.

‘I don’t care what they think.’

‘You don’t like any of them?’ I asked. ‘You really don’t?’

‘And you do? Maybe you hide it from yourself but it’s bubbling away – every time they lord over you, make demands of you, mispronounce your surname and disrespect your culture. If you don’t feel the rage now, you will eventually. But we all do strange things for money.’

‘It’s a job. No one likes their boss.’

She shook her head. ‘You had so much potential, Bill. I thought you were different.’

I don’t know why, but that stung. I felt anger swelling but the phone rang before I could respond. I reached to answer it.

Without missing a beat, Fleur said, ‘Chop chop,’ the words slow, soaked in sarcasm. I scowled at her and picked up the receiver.

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