My Island Homicide by Catherine Titasey Read Free Book Online

And?’
    â€˜And I’ve got a skirt like hers. She looks pretty good, even though she’s kind of old.’
    â€˜What do you mean?’
    â€˜To be wearing a short skirt. I mean, not old old . . . just not young old.’
    â€˜She looks fantastic, and once you hit late-thirties or so, you’ll understand.’ Shay was rushing to keep up with me as I raced to get to the station, grab the car and get around to Mrs Bintu. ‘How old are you?’
    â€˜Twenty-two.’
    I remembered thinking my grade 12 history teacher was old and she was 24. Of course, Georgia and I would seem ancient.
    â€˜Anyway, what do you make of Georgia and her story?’ I asked.
    â€˜I dunno. She’s angry with her husband. She should just leave him.’
    â€˜Well, things aren’t right between Georgia and her husband, nor Melissa and Robby. That’s part of being in a relationship.’
    Shay turned to me with a serious expression. ‘I would never let a man push me around.’ Her smooth skin and saucer-shaped hazel eyes exuded an innocence that told of inexperience in love and relationships. It was obvious she had yet to face heartache.
    I’d experienced more than my fair share of heartache during my disastrous three-year liaison with Mark. It all started with ‘that dress’ I wore to the courthouse Christmas party where I met him. My friend and fellow cop, Gio, a curvy Italian who looked gorgeous in uniform and had a sophisticated sense of fashion, put me up to it. She turned up at my place as I was getting into a pair of hipster jeans and one of Mum’s hand-me-down tops. Smart casual was the dress code. Gio convinced me to wear a slinky white dress that was more like a shirt.
    â€˜Gio, this isn’t me.’ It wasn’t me because the dress fitted like a glove, was way too short and the silky fabric was sensuous. Despite my concerns, I straightened up with the confidence the dress gave me.
    â€˜Whatever fun you have, court is in recess for Christmas so you won’t have to face anyone for ten days. Anyway, everyone will be too pissed to remember anything. Let’s go.’
    When we walked into the room, a man turned to me and I was stopped in my tracks by his gaze. It was the first time I had ever commanded, for want of a better word, the attention of a man. It wasn’t so bad.
    It didn’t take him long to appear at my side, his hand against my lower back as we went to the bar. My skin tingled. What wonderful cheek this man had. I was drawn to his confidence, his knowledge, his smooth voice and the intensity of his gaze. He had a cynical sense of humour that had me chuckling continuously. He was a barrister, commercial law, which explained why I’d never seen him. I did something I’d never done before: I went home with him that night, inspired by too much champagne. Over the next few months, we hooked up and eventually I moved in with him. The company was good and the attention was great. In the beginning, I liked the thrill of him adoring my body. He loved ‘that dress’ and insisted I either wore it or something equally short and tight. But that just wasn’t my style.
    I don’t know when because it was so insidious, but Mark started suggesting improvements I could make to myself. I should work out more, wear more make-up, dye my hair. Nothing about me was good enough for him.
    For the last six months, I kept asking myself why I stayed with him. And I kept coming up with the same excuses: he wasn’t that bad, I wouldn’t find anyone else, I needed to make more of an effort to socialise and spruce up my appearance, he was the clever one, relationships are never perfect, it could be worse. In the end I tried not to think about it and threw myself into work where I was successful. Obviously my self-esteem wasn’t healthy but it wasn’t so bad that I would tolerate infidelity. And now, at forty, I was certain I’d