Wingnut

'Jesus fucking Christ,' Jason muttered. How stupid could the old Scotsman be?

Robbie continued. 'Jock heard her and came and asked what she was doing. Shelley grabbed a frying pan and cracked him over the head with it.'

'Killed him,' Quentin said regretfully.

'Intentionally?' Audrey asked.

'Of course not,' Quentin snapped at her. 'What are you, an idiot?'

'Don't speak to her like that,' Robbie snapped. 'She's not the one who's a murderous slut.'

'Oh, now we're going to be a big man, are we?' Quentin mocked the electrician. 'Now that there's a gun pointed at my head, we can afford to be cocky, can't we? You weren't like that when you realised Jock was dead, and two bullets from your rifle were lodged in his ceiling. You damn near shit yourself. But you still buried his body, didn't you? And you still took your cut of the money.'

Robbie didn't respond.

Quentin turned to Audrey. 'Your tough as guts fiancé started crying when he loaded Jock's body into his van and Jock's damn mutt came over to find out what was happening. I grabbed the dog. Robbie begged me not to hurt it.' He smirked. 'I heard bones break when I kicked it. It ran off.'

'You were begging to be let free twenty minutes ago,' Audrey replied coldly. 'At least Robbie didn't mean to hurt anyone. At least he was crying for someone else, rather than thinking about his own, selfish self.'

A sneer crossed Quentin's face, an expression that made Jason acutely aware that if it were just Audrey and Quentin in the yard, the enforcer wouldn't have any qualms about hitting the woman. A wife-beater from long back. No wonder he'd both gone to, and fallen in love with, a whore. A decent man might use a whore, but he wouldn't be foolish enough to believe she loved him.

The faint sound of sirens echoed through the night air.

'The cops are coming,' Robbie said. He started to sob. 'Oh thank fuck this over. Thank God this is finally, finally over.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The police and paramedics arrived just minutes later. Quentin was arrested and loaded into the ambulance. Robbie, Kyle, Audrey and Jason were instructed to make their way to the police station to be interviewed.

Later that night, Robbie was charged with a number of offences and Audrey surrendered her engagement ring, purchased with the stolen funds, to the police.

Kyle and Jason were finally allowed to go home at ten am the following morning. There were no charges to be laid against either, though police expressed surprise at the level of commitment Jason had shown towards trying to solve the crime.

'I thought I was a suspect,' Jason explained. 'I just wanted to clear my name.'

The cops stared at him as if he was crazy. He'd never been a suspect; just someone whose involvement in Jock's disappearance they'd had to interview. It was all procedure. That was all. Procedure.

The station was in Toowoomba. Both were a good way from their homes, though Kyle was further away than Jason.

'Want to get a Maccas breakfast and split a taxi?' Kyle offered. 'I don't know about you, but all I want to do is go home and stop thinking.'

Jason couldn't think of anything better. 'Sounds great,' he said. 'Sorry about bringing all the trouble to your farm.'

Kyle waved it away. 'It wasn't your fault. I just appreciate you knocking on the door and warning me. You could have just run away.'

'Nah, I like to have as many witnesses as possible when I try to outrun a bikie.' Jason said. 'Keeps the excitement up.' He paused. 'Out of curiosity, how bad was the damage to Erin's leg?'

'Twenty-three hundred worth according to the text I received half an hour ago.'

'And you're paying the bill?'

Kyle sighed. 'Yep,' he said. 'That I am.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Amanda fidgeted anxiously as the plane circled Brisbane Airport for the umpteenth time. She didn't want to fly over Moreton fucking Bay, she wanted to land, come face to face with her husband, and ask what the fuck was going on.

She suspected he'd cheated on her. Well, she'd been warned that would happen, hadn't she? When she'd been offered the job as assistant manager and they'd moved out of Brisbane so she could accept it, Jason had had to quit his well paid job and play second fiddle to her. His income had dropped through the floor. He could no longer work long hours because he needed to help with the day care drop offs and pick ups now that she didn't have the support of her extended family. Her career blossomed. His did not.

More warnings had come when her colleagues and friends had heard she was travelling to China for a whole month without Jason. She was told he'd resent her. He'd stray. She was being cruel, leaving him in Australia by himself. How was he supposed to clean the house and buy groceries and cook meals without her? She'd snapped furiously at the naysayers, reminding them that in between leaving home at sixteen and moving in with her at twenty-two, Jason had done a perfectly adequate job of caring for himself. He was a man, not a moron.

She'd been so confident he'd be faithful. So sure of his fidelity. He'd been her first lover and she was content for him to be her last, but she should have realised that he was a man, and men were different to women. She should have heeded the warnings. She hadn't, though, and even when his calls and messages to her while she was in China were short and abrupt and he sounded disinterested, Amanda had just assumed he was, as he claimed, tired and busy.

She'd only grown suspicious when he'd sent her the email, the one telling her he loved her and thanking her for everything they'd done together. After a day or two of mulling it over, she'd realised it was a farewell email. A good-bye. The email had been followed up by a message telling her he'd sold all of his machinery. His business loan had been repaid, and there was a decent chunk of money sitting in his business account. She'd realised he was finalising his life on the Darling Downs, and preparing to leave her and Devin.

The plane landed. Then it was through all of the usual controls. Picking up bags. Passport checking. Making sure every customs and quarantine staff member in the place heard her Australian accent so they wouldn't 'randomly check' her parent's bags and find the kilos of food they were bringing back into the country. Her parents were going to end up on TV one day, on a border security show, and she was going to be standing in the background, covering her face with shame.

Mercifully, two young Indian nationals who had been 'randomly selected' for a full check were caught with fireworks in their luggage, and Amanda and her family were ushered through with barely a second glance.

Devin caught sight of his father first. He yelled out 'Daddy' and launched himself at Jason. Amanda followed uncertainly, wondering if her husband would hug her or show any sort of affection. Once upon a time he'd been so accessible. She could cuddle him, kiss him and swat his – admittedly near non-existent – bum without a second thought.

Jason was squeezing Devin tightly, and when she approached, he grabbed her with his free hand and squished the three of them together in an awkward three-person embrace. She felt his lips on her forehead, instinctively raised her face so he could kiss him, and was horrified to find he was crying.

Jason never cried. Never. Not at their wedding, not when Devin was born, not even when he broke his arm so badly the bone was poking out of the skin. And yet here he was, crying. Not proper wailing, just a sniffling, quiet sort of cry, but it was still a shock.

Before she could say anything he clutched her head to his and told her he loved her.

'Daddy, Daddy,' Devin exclaimed, wriggling out of their arms. 'I have to tell you about the doughnuts we ate.'

Four weeks in his ancestor's native land, and the kid's fondest memory was about doughnuts. Yep. That was Devin all right. At least he hadn't changed over the past four weeks.

Her husband on the other hand seemed like a completely different man. He was still bald. He still had that horrible beard she said she hated but actually didn't. He was skinnier than usual, but he'd always tended to drop weight when she wasn't around, and she'd expected him to be a few kilos lighter. It wasn't the outside that had altered, but the inside. His whole persona seemed different.

Devin talked non-stop as they went out to their car. Jason just nodded and smiled, lugging their bags for them, and occasionally glancing at his wife with an expression on his face Amanda couldn't read.

It had been an overnight flight and she was tired. Her eyes were dry and grainy, and she felt dehydrated. She found an old bottle of water in the footwell of the passenger seat and sipped it, listening to Devin chatter brightly to a man she felt no longer loved her.

Somewhere around Ipswich, Devin fell asleep. Amanda didn't notice it herself; she was too stressed and weary to pick up on it, but there was a point where she realised she hadn't heard her son's voice in a few minutes. She turned around and saw him snoozing.

'He'll wake up when we get home,' Jason remarked.

'Probably.'

'You tired, Mandy?'

'Yep.' She sipped her water. 'Jase? What's going on? Why did you sell the machinery?'

'Like I told you,' he replied. 'The return on investment wasn't good enough. I'll pick up work elsewhere. Kyle's all but guaranteed it. You don't need to worry about money.'

'I'm not worried about money. I'm worried about you.' Tears began to seep out of her eyes, burning the delicate tissue. God, flying sucked. 'Do you want a divorce?'

'A divorce? Fuck no. Why would I want a divorce?' Jason seemed shocked. 'What on earth makes you think I want a divorce?'

She took a deep breath. 'Because you've been acting really strange. Your texts, your emails, the way you spoke to me on the phone. Did you have an affair?'

'No,' Jason replied.

He braced his hands on the steering wheel. He was nervous. There was most certainly something going on.

'No,' he repeated. 'But I have something to tell you, and I know there's a part you're not going to like.'

Jason launched into a story that she wouldn't in her wildest dreams have conjured up. When he was finished, and had apologised profusely for the interaction between himself and Shelley, Amanda started to laugh. Why? Well, because what else could she possibly do? He still loved her, he'd just... oh fuck.

'You're insane,' she said.

'Yeah, I know. I just panicked a bit.'

'No,' she laughed. Tiredness and stressed had morphed into a perverse sense of humour. Something that otherwise would have infuriated her now made her weep with hilarity. 'Two hours with a hooker? What the hell were you planning on doing? Eating dinner with her?' She wiped the tears that were a cumulative effect of stress, exhaustion, relief and fear from her eyes. 'Two hours. You find me a man who can fuck for two hours and I'll eat my hat.'

'I was planning on interrogating her!' Jason exclaimed. 'Not sleeping with her.'

Amanda giggled. She held up her fingers to signify brackets, a smile splitting her face in two. 'Interrogating.'

'Yeah. Interrogating.' Jason's cheeks turned red. 'And don't you laugh at me. You're the one who get jealous thinking I was sleeping with someone else.'

'I was jealous! I love you.'

The anxiety and troubled expression on his face disappeared.

Jason grinned. Amanda grinned. They exchanged happy, content, relieved smiles.

He reached over and squeezed her thigh. 'Love you too, Mandy. Love you too. But if that fucking kid of hours wakes up before I get a chance to fuck you, I'm going to scream.'

~~~~~~~~~~~~

It was Saturday morning, the day after Amanda and Devin had arrived back in the country, and four days after Robbie and Quentin had been arrested, when a radio news announcer advised that Shelley Rogers had been arrested in relation to the suspected murder of Jock Anderson.

Kyle and Wingnut were working on the farm. It was one thing for the registered owner of a firearm to use that firearm to defend someone against a genuine threat. It was quite another for a farmer to get sufficiently lax about locking sheds and storing fuel that someone could quickly and easily build a Molotov cocktail. Workplace Health and Safety had bounced into the property gleefully on Friday morning, pleased to have an excuse to prod around the scene of what had become quite a notorious crime.

Jason wouldn't ordinarily have worked the day after his wife had returned to Australia, but he felt a heavy sense of obligation. He'd dragged Kyle into this mess, and as reward for saving his life, Kyle had received a list of seven items requiring correction. None were major, but all were time consuming, which was the precise reason they hadn't been done earlier.

After working all morning, they were just about to break for lunch when a car approached the farmhouse.

'That'd better not be another reporter,' Kyle muttered. 'You want to keep going for a bit while I sort this out?'

'Yeah, no worries, mate,' Jason agreed.

Kyle wiped his hands on his jeans and went out to investigate who it was that had arrived, and what they wanted. It was a cold day, freezing in fact, a sign that winter was now nearly upon them. He'd hated this time of year as a child, but he no longer dreaded the dark, short days and frigid temperatures. The change of seasons now seemed profound, a sure sign he was getting old.

From the near-new red Alfa Romeo stepped an impeccably dressed woman. She wore black jeans, black knee high leather boots, a red mid-thigh winter coat and scarf, and had her dark brown hair pulled back into a messy bun. If truth be told, she was precisely the sort of woman he was attracted to, and a flicker of lust crossed over his face before he could stop himself. Within seconds all signs of sexual interest were gone, hidden away in the recesses of the mind, but not before Audrey had noticed.

She gave him a wry smile, acknowledging what she'd seen, but showing she wasn't offended by it. Kyle was glad; he'd meant nothing of it. It had just been a bit of uncontrolled sexual nature springing to the surface.

'Is now a bad time?' Audrey asked.

'No, no, not at all. How are you coping?'

'Oh, as well as can be expected,' she replied, another smile dashing to her lips, before quickly fading away. She couldn't keep up the pretence. 'How are you? How is your wife?'

'We're fine. Sam was a bit scared because of the children, but she knows it wasn't anyone's fault.'

'I'm sorry,' she said. 'I knew something was up with Robbie.'

'It's not your fault,' Kyle assured her. 'Neither Samara nor I blame you or Jason.'

'Still,' Audrey said.

They lapsed into silence.

'Is everything alright?' Kyle asked gently.

Audrey averted her gaze. 'I wanted to thank you,' she said. 'I should have thanked you years ago, but I couldn't find a way to say it.

You wrote a letter to me when everyone started gossiping about Irwin being charged. You left it in our letterbox. I wasn't the one who opened it; my mother did. She pretty much had me under lock and key, because she wanted to make sure I wouldn't do anything to further harm her husband's reputation.'

Kyle grimaced. He knew what the contents of the letter had been. 'I'm sorry.'

'No, no, don't be sorry,' Audrey said, her eyes darting to his. 'I remember Mum and Irwin talking about and reading lines aloud like it was some big joke. I never read the letter. I never even saw it. But what I heard... you gave me a lot of hope.'

'Not everyone thought you were lying,' he assured her.

'No, but they didn't bloody say anything, did they? They just sat back... Watched...' Audrey said, frustrated. 'I was seventeen. I was angry. I had nowhere else to go; my father was working in Papua New Guinea and the people from child protection were less than useless. And if I left home, if I went, what would happen to my sister? Who would protect her?'

The answer wasn't directed at him, Kyle knew that, and he also knew why she was angry and frustrated and bitter. He understood all of it. Every single emotion she was experiencing, he understood.

'I'm sorry,' Audrey said, her eyes red. 'I came here to say thank-you. I was on my way out...' She laughed humourlessly. 'I'm going to help Robbie pack up. He's going to live with me for a while. He'll be sleeping in my sunroom. Hopefully we'll work through things. I don't know. It's hard, but we won't know unless we give it a go. I just thought, while I was out here... I should speak to you.'

'I'm glad you came,' Kyle replied. 'I'm also glad you're taking him away. He needs to get out of this town.'

'God, don't I understand that,' she remarked. 'I hate it here. One day my mother will die, and her funeral will be the last day I step foot out here. My brother says the same thing. One day. One day it'll really be over.' She looked at him and smiled. 'Thanks for listening to me rant. I'll be off. I know you have better things to do with your time.'

He wanted to hug her, to show her everything would be okay, but he didn't know how to ask, and he didn't want to force it on her. He'd already noticed how far away she stood from other people, giving herself more personal space than other men and women her age. She was too careful, too thin and too angry.

'I hope everything goes well,' he said. 'If you ever need anything, you just let me know.'

'I will.' She wiped her eyes. 'Oh fuck, you're going to make me cry,' she half-laughed. 'Thank-you.'

Audrey went to her car and did a three point turn. Kyle waved good-bye as she headed down the gravel track, then went back to the shed where Jason was still working away.

'All good mate?' Wingnut asked.

'Yeah, it was Audrey. She just came around to say she's picking up Robbie and taking him to her place.'

'He should have moved in with her months ago,' Jason said. 'It would have saved them both a world of heartache.'

'But then Shelley would have escaped into the night, and nobody would have known what happened to Jock,' Kyle pointed out.

'True,' Jason agreed. 'Hindsight is twenty-twenty.'

'Isn't that the truth?'

~~~~~~~~~

Luke Wilms took a seat at the bar and ordered a pot of fourex gold.

'Busy day at the farmer's market?' one of the local farmers inquired, bemused.

Luke chuckled quietly. 'Very.'

The bartender gave Luke his beer. The parts interpreter sipped his beverage and mulled over the affairs of the last month. In time, Quentin, Shelley and Robbie would face Court. Erin would find a new home, likely with Kyle O'Sullivan who had footed the bill for her vet work. Jason would probably earn Kyle a lot of money, and get a fair clip of it himself for his endeavours.

Robbie had quickly told the police where the farmer's body was buried, and an exhumation was currently scheduled for early in the new week. As he drank his beer, Luke thought that it was vaguely ironic that the very sort of burial Jock would have preferred – a free one – would now be replaced by one that would cost the Scotsman's estate money.

Ah well. The mystery was over, and life could go back to usual.

The End.