Free Good Money by J. M. Green Page B

done round the eyes, distinguished grey hair at the temples. Crystal was somewhere between fifteen and sixty, blonde bun, thick black eyeliner, false lashes. From her bony frame, sheathed in gold lamé, sprouted improbably large breasts. Nature had not fashioned those, nor maternity neither. Old-school vulgar rather than fashion victim.
    â€˜Let’s see what Bruce makes of it,’ Phuong was saying.
    â€˜Bruce Copeland?’
    â€˜Yes.’ She put the phone down and started a furious minute of typing on her tablet, finishing with a hard final tap. ‘Is that it? You’ve told me everything now?’
    â€˜Yes. I only just found out about the Brodtmann thing myself.’
    â€˜She is estranged from the family?’
    â€˜Given she changed her name and moved interstate, that’s a fair guess.’
    Phuong seized another morsel and guided it to her mouth. ‘She’s worth God-knows-how-much but chooses to live in a tiny, nondescript flat on the other side of the country.’
    â€˜Hey. They’re nice flats. Great location.’
    â€˜I’ve seen where you live,’ said Phuong. She pushed her bowl away. ‘Right. I’ve filed the missing persons. Bruce is in the loop, there’ll be the leg work, cops going to her home, her work. They’ll take it from there.’
    She was on her feet, fished a twenty from her bag. ‘You need a lift home?’
    â€˜No.’
    She left and came back. ‘Stella. It was Jacob, the man. The way he treated you. Not the fact that he was married. You know?’
    â€˜Right. I see that now,’ I lied. How quaint her version of history was.
    She gave me a quick hug. ‘Let’s catch up soon, okay?’

9
    I SAT there while a waitress cleared the table. She worked briskly, getting on with it. I felt almost guilty, I had things I should have been getting on with too. I opened my bag to find my wallet and saw Adut’s book. The idea of burning it was starting to seem wise.
    I paid the cashier and asked for takeaway boxes and a plastic bag. Ben would get his damn vegetables tonight. Outside, the sun had come out and I wandered along Irving Street to the end of Nicholson Street. People were sitting outdoors in spite of the cold. Well-dressed men in suits: ‘Do you have something for me in that bag, girl?’ Tall, elegant women in printed dresses and headscarves walked in groups, some with babies in slings. Herds of school-aged girls were heading to the nail salon, others were hanging around the bakery. I turned right at Paisley Street and crashed into an A-frame signboard in the middle of the footpath. I cursed and clutched my knee. Public hazard, those signs. I dragged it to one side, reading the words: The Narcissistic Slacker Art Gallery . An arrow pointed up through a doorway between two shops, which was open and led to a wooden staircase.
    Art gallery. That could mean anything: a pile of old junk, a grainy video, or stuffed dead animals. I thought of the Blackman in Tania’s flat. I liked it. I liked paintings. But who was I kidding, I didn’t have the money for art. I’d had money once, ill-gotten lucre, and I’d put it all on my mortgage. It would never happen again. Never would I let myself succumb to temptation like that again. And besides, dead junkies didn’t just leave bags of money lying around every day of the week. The very idea induced a galloping heartbeat, shallow breathing, dizziness, trembling, and constriction in my muscles. Drug money, how could I have been so stupid? Whoever owned it, sooner or later, would come for it. For me. And I wouldn’t see it coming. Death, execution style. I looked around the street, to the rooftops, for an assassin.
    The thing to do was run. Start a new life, maybe in Fiji. Live in the tropics, eat bananas, and become an artist, a modern-day Gauguin. I’d always had a vague ambition to be artistic. If I had only chosen that path back then,