“Jago,” she said, “is a friend.”
“I got that much. I like the bloke myself. But you won’t catch me spending the night out there.”
“Are you actually suggesting…You know, you’re quite nasty, Cade. If you need the information, he came to tell me about Santo but he didn’t want to tell me at the bakery, so he took me home because he cared about how I was going to react to the news. He actually cares about me, Cadan.”
“And we don’t?”
“You didn’t like Santo. Don’t pretend you did.”
“Hey. At the end, neither did you. Or did something change? Did he come crawling back to you, begging forgiveness and declaring love?” Cadan hooted. Pooh duplicated the sound exactly. “Not bloody likely,” Cadan said.
“Blow holes in the attic,” Pooh remarked shrilly.
Cadan winced at the sound so near his ear. Madlyn saw this. She said, “You got drunk last night. That’s what you were doing in your room, isn’t it? What’s the matter with you, Cade?”
He wished he could have answered that question. He’d have loved to do so. But the fact was, he’d headed for the off-licence without thinking, and in the same manner he’d purchased the Beefeater and in the same manner he’d drunk it. He’d told himself that the fact that he was doing his drinking at home was admirable when one considered he could be out at a pub or sitting on a street corner or?worse?driving round in a car while pouring gin down his throat. But instead, he was being responsible: getting obliterated in silence within the four walls of his room, where he would hurt no one but himself.
What this was related to, he’d not questioned. But as his hangover subsided?a blessed event that did not occur till the middle of the afternoon?he realised he was perilously close to having to think.
What he ended up thinking about was his father, as well as Madlyn and Santo Kerne. But he didn’t like where his thoughts headed when he bunched those three individuals together in his mind because when he did that, the fourth thought that popped up like an unwanted uncle at Christmas lunch was the thought of murder.
It went like this: Madlyn in love. Madlyn heartbroken. Santo dead. Lew Angarrack…what? Out with his surfboard on a day when not a single wave was worthy of a ride. Missing in action and determinedly mum on the subject of his whereabouts. And what did those two considerations add up to. A daughter scorned? A father enraged? Cadan didn’t want to begin an extended consideration of that topic.
So he considered Will Mendick instead. Torchbearer of love for Madlyn. Unrequited love for Madlyn. Waiting to step in as chief comforter once Santo Kerne was finally dispatched.
But would Will have had access to Santo’s climbing equipment? Cadan wondered. And was Will the sort to go for such a crafty way to dispose of someone? And even if the answer to both of those questions was yes, wasn’t the real question whether Will was actually so hot for Madlyn’s knickers that he’d get rid of Santo in the hope of closing the deal with Madlyn? Did that even make sense? Why rid Madlyn’s life of Santo when Santo himself had already rid her life of Santo? Unless Santo’s death had nothing to do with Madlyn at all…And wouldn’t that be a bloody relief?