‘Okay.’ The younger woman’s face fell. Daisy didn’t have to pass the challenges because she worked for Nella. There were too many variables at play to establish an unbiased trial of loyalty (although that would have been Challenge 20 –Everyone has to learn to swim by themselves. You can guide your friends and help them float, but eventually you have to let them work it out themselves.
‘Everyone’s missed you, pet.’ Pearl clicked her tongue, returning to the keyboard, but Nella didn’t miss the way her eyes kept flicking up at her when she thought Nella had turned away.
‘Nella?’ Max said.
‘Right. Yep.’ Nella forced herself to meet Max’s gaze, mind still rushing with every word from the restaurant.Nella doesn’t care. You’re a Barbarani ... it’s your duty. ‘Make sure you don’t accidentally lock Clarkson in at the end of the day,’ she said to Pearl before shutting the door to Max’s office behind them.
The room was decorated exactly how you’d expect a private investigator’s office to look in a Hollywood noir movie. Nella had offered Max any colour (seriously, any!) for the walls and she’d chosenseafoam, which was just plain white. Photos plastered the far wall like a serial killer’s shrine. When she spotted crime-scene photos from the gala, Nella tried to blur her vision so she didn’t have to look at them but she caught a glimpse of the secret passageway she’d been held captive in, and the slumped body of one of the Barbarani security guards with a poisoned dart in his chest. The whiteboard Nella had given Max for, you know,writing on, was now a shrine dedicated to Max and Greyson’s main obsession: proving that Forrest Valentine, future in-law to the La Marcas, had poisoned a bottle of Barbarani wine to destroy their reputation six months ago. A headshot of his smiling, red-haired victim, Poppy Raven, grinned at Nella from the centre of Max’s murder board.
Fuck, Poppy. I get it, all right? I’m trying. I know it doesn’t look like it, but I’m trying.
‘So you’ve been relaxing then?’ Nella said. She licked her lips; there was hardly any air in here.
‘The CCTV footage of Forrest injecting the poison into the wine is unusable.’ Max twisted her long, braided hair around her wrist. ‘We pulled it from outside Liquor Paradise but he knew what he was doing – he’s wearing a hoodie and he keeps his face down. There’s nothing. We’ve been tailing him too, to see if he fucks up, but so far, he’s been a model psychopathic killer.’
Nella rubbed her forehead. ‘You’ve been tailing him? Shit, Max, the Valentines own, like ... all the mines. His family’s dangerous.’
‘Most of them are dead.’
‘Still dangerous.’
Max shrugged. ‘Are they worse than yours?’
‘No one’s worse than mine.’
Max blinked. ‘Nella, I didn’t—’
‘What exactly do you need from me?’ she snapped. ‘You need to be working on my cases too. That’s what I hired you for.’
Max held out a hand. ‘Whoa. If you’d been here, you’d know I’ve turned in every report and checked everything I’ve been asked to do for all your active cases. I don’t do the Poppy Raven case on company time.’
‘It’s not about the money.’
‘I know money doesn’t matter to you. But I sort of need it, so I do the job you hired me for, Nella. This case is important to me, but I don’t expect you to be persuaded by that. But it’s important to Grey too, and I think we can agree that you owe him that much.’
Owehim. Did Max really think Nella would only help Grey because sheowedhim? Nella and Grey had grown up together; he’d been her brother long before they’d found out the true nature of his parentage. She’d definitely known him a lot longer than Max had.
Nella closed her eyes. She knew what this prickling feeling was – she needed her migraine drugs. Which she’d left in a purple make-up bag in the Perth penthouse. She pressed her fingers to her temples. ‘What do you need, Max?’
‘I need DNA.’
‘All right, I’ll just pop down to the supermarket. What’s your bread situation like?’
‘I need a legal way I can get a DNA sample from Forrest without him knowing.’
‘Well, you haven’t done your homework, because that’s an oxymoron. For a DNA sample to be legal, you need informed consent.’
‘Surely you can find a precedent somewhere or ...’
‘Sure,’ Nella said, because that’s what would get her out of there the fastest, even if it did leave a lump of cement inside her. ‘I’ll see what I can find. I’ll email you when I’m back in Perth.’
‘Aren’t you staying?’
Nella shook her head. ‘All Tom needed me to do was sign a piece of paper. Jett lied to get me back here.’
The prickling sensation was getting sharper, and she could blame the incoming migraine for that strange note in her voice.
Max held Nella’s gaze through her dark strands of hair. ‘If Jett lied to you, he must have done it with your best interests at heart.’
