Silk Chaser by Peter Klein

Author:Peter Klein
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan Australia

12

After the races I dropped back to my flat, fed Che, changed out of my raceday suit and had a shower. Then I drove over to Maxine’s. When I buzzed her on the intercom, she chided me for not using the key she’d given me.

‘Sorry,’ I said, ‘force of habit.’

I still hadn’t used her key in the short time that I’d had it. I probably wouldn’t have needed a key to get into her place tonight anyway. A guy had left a telephone book jammed in the entrance door, and was ferrying groceries back and forth from his car out the front. I nodded at him as I walked in and he didn’t seem too concerned when I made my way up the stairs to Maxine’s. I’d rented an apartment once with a similar intercom system; pain in the arse they were too. People would come home late or drunk and forget their key, then buzz every intercom in the block until finally someone opened the door for them.

Maxine had left the door ajar for me. I called out to her and her head appeared like a jack-in-the-box from the bathroom down the hallway. She had a towel draped around her, obviously still getting ready to go out.

‘Hi sweetie. Fix yourself a drink and I’ll be out in a min. We still eating out at that seafood place in Middle Park?’

‘There’s a John Dory reserved with your name on it.’

‘Oh goody! Won’t be long, I promise.’

I helped myself to a light beer from her fridge. There was plenty to drink inside of it. Wine, a dozen or so chilled bottles; all premium brands. Tonic water, juices. Soy milk – yuck. Not a lot of food to be seen, though. I think Maxine preferred to eat out with the hours she kept. It probably explained the spotless kitchen. The sparkling European stove didn’t look as if it had ever been used, and I pulled the oven open to have a stickybeak. Sure enough, a couple of expensive-looking frying pans were stacked neatly on the oven racks. Costly sort of a cupboard if that’s all it was used for. I sipped my beer and took in the view from the back of her place. I hadn’t really noticed it before. All my previous trips to Maxine’s seemed to have been hit-and-run missions made in the dark. Both of us home late, the inevitable wild scramble in the bedroom, and then I’d scurry off at the crack of dawn back to my place. Her kitchen and lounge opened up to a smaller patio area which overlooked a communal garden down below. It was very peaceful; green manicured lawns lit by gentle spotlights. Attractive shrubs and bushes surrounded a feature waterfall and rock pool. I hated to think what the strata title fees in this place would be. Maxine had her own stairway leading into the garden and I took a couple of steps down, admiring the greenery. It was very pleasant, a warm night, gentle breeze.

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