The Revenge of Ebony Makepeace (Brad Culley Mysteries Book 3)

Book summary

Brad Culley's world unravels when his lover Ebony vanishes, taking millions and his uncle's assistant with her. Left to grapple with betrayal, Brad turns to friends and authorities, seeking justice as he uncovers the depths of Ebony's revenge-driven scheme—and his fading chance to reclaim what's been stolen.

Excerpt from The Revenge of Ebony Makepeace

My uncle left Sandy’s place, with the news of Ferdinand’s release and Phillip’s and Ebony’s disappearance, dangling in his wake. In his attempt to cheer me up, Sandy fired up the barbeque and threw on some sausages he’d thawed out in the microwave. He sliced up a couple of onions which he threw on the barbeque plate before the sausages finished cooking, and asked me to get a loaf of bread out of the freezer.

‘Do you live completely out of the freezer and the microwave?’ I complained when I realised the bread was frozen into a solid block. ‘I think your freezer is up too high. This will never thaw out.’

‘Have faith, my friend.’ He undid the tie holding the bread bag closed, and with a knife prized off the first slice, then the second, third and fourth. ‘See? Easy peasy.’

‘You’ve had lots of practise. You do remember I don’t eat meat anymore, don’t you?’

‘Bullshit. She’s not here. You can eat what you like. A couple of sausages won’t kill you.’ He lit the mosquito coils he had lying around outside and put the food on a large platter in the middle of the table. ‘Sit down.’

Obeying his orders, I waited while he walked into the kitchen to collect cutlery, plates, napkins, and two beers.

‘You forgot the tomato sauce,’ I whined.

‘And the butter. Be a dear and get them for me.’ Sandy set up the table while I collected the rest of the items.

‘I found cheese slices in the fridge. Brought those out too.’

Sandy was right. I didn’t know whether I was a vegetarian by choice, or because Ebony had almost bullied me into being one. I put a sausage in a buttered slice of bread with sauce and onions and a piece of cheese. It was gone in a matter of seconds.

‘Good?’ Sandy grinned while he opened the beer.

‘I’ve missed them. I used to go into Bunnings at the garden nursery end, if I went there on weekends, so I didn’t have to walk past the Sausage Sizzle at the front. You could smell the snags and onions all over the carpark.’

‘What would you ever need at Bunnings?’ Sandy sniggered.

‘I didn’t need anything, but Ebony would get in redecoration moods and change the cushions on the outdoor chairs, or want a new garden gnome, or new pots. She did a good job, I must admit.’

‘She did a good job on you, my friend.’

‘What will happen now?’ I finished my second sausage and bread, and drank the beer. ‘I can’t blame her for wanting to punish me you know, but I am struggling to come to terms with my gullibility: my readiness to believe she forgave me and could love me.’

‘The Fraud Squad will move their focus to Ebony and Phillip. They’ll do all the forensic stuff and if they conclude the two of them likely took the money from your trust fund, they’ll ramp things up.’ His eyes were glazed over when he looked at me.

‘Don’t you dare shed a tear for me, or what has happened,’ I snapped.

He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. ‘No worries.’

‘Should I contact Ferdinand?’ I asked, to change the direction of our chat.

‘If he suspects you knew they were going to charge him, he might not be receptive to your call. If he didn’t know, he might expect you to make contact. It’s a tough situation.’

We sat outside on Sandy’s dusty garden furniture until the mosquito coils finished their job and put themselves out. The first bites saw both of us pick up our crockery, cutlery, and the uneaten sausages and go inside. Sandy put the dirty dishes in the dishwasher. I would have washed them by hand, but he grumbled when I offered.

‘Besides,’ he smirked, ‘I have solar panels so I can put it on during the day and it costs next to nothing to run.’

Sandy lived in what, once upon a time, was a worker’s cottage. A single-fronted weatherboard house in Kensington ― between five and six kilometres from the CBD. The cottage he paid around $500,000 for ten years ago was now worth around 1.5 million. The front door opened onto a hallway that had two bedrooms on the left and then opened into a newly renovated back end of the property. Working within the heritage restrictions, Sandy had added a big kitchen/family room with space for a dining table, a new laundry, bathroom, and separate toilet. It was nice.

‘You can make the coffee if you like,’ Sandy said. ‘I’ll make up the spare bedroom for you.’

That was a relief. I didn’t want to go home. I didn’t want to be alone.

‘I’m taking you shopping in the next few days,’ I yelled out so he could hear me.

‘What for?’

‘You are buying a coffee machine that grinds the beans and has a frother built in or attached. I can’t do the capsule stuff any longer.’

‘You’re a bloody sook.’

Despite having a coffee later than I would normally, and despite the day I’d been through, I slept reasonably well in Sandy’s spare room and bed. While I lay in bed in the morning, trying to put the shitshow pieces of my life together in my head, I heard him boil the kettle and bang around in the kitchen.

He didn’t bother me. Didn’t knock on the door, didn’t call out to me. I lay in bed, dozing on and off, eventually reaching for the phone to check the time: 10.30. Panic set in. It had been many years since I slept this late. I pulled on my trousers and threw the jumper I’d worn yesterday over my head. I left the t-shirt lying on the bed.

‘Why didn’t you wake me?’

Sandy was sitting at the dining table reading a newspaper.

‘Why are you reading a newspaper? Who still does that?’

‘I do. Obviously. In answer to your first question: if you didn’t need the sleep, you would have been up before now.’

Every time I drove into the garage of my South Melbourne property, my skin crawled. I always pictured Steven sitting in my kitchen with a gun at the ready, waiting for me. It didn’t matter how many times I told myself he was in gaol ― I still got the creeps. But selling this place, or renting it and living somewhere else was not on the agenda. I loved this location.

Following the drama that was Steven kidnapping and torturing me, I had the house fitted with lights and window coverings that I controlled with a remote. I pressed a button before I got out of the car in the garage, and all the lights in the house turned on. I could isolate this to different rooms, of course, but having every light on while I went in and looked around gave me a semblance of security.

I forwarded the office landline to my mobile and stayed home for a few days. Before Ebony, I had a good fitness regime, but that slid into disrepair the more entangled in my brother’s schemes I became. Then, when my brother was out of the picture, Ebony kept me so busy I didn’t have time to go on a run or to the gym. That’s changed. These days I’m up at 6.00am and jogging the block from my house to the foreshore, where I run along the beach. Daylight saving means it’s really 5.00am, so the sun hasn’t appeared when I’m out and about.

***

The mercury was already at 32 degrees (Celsius) when I reached for the remote in my pocket and unlocked the front door after my morning run. Perspiration dripped onto my clean bamboo floorboards and when I bent down to wipe it off, more dripped onto the area. I pulled off my t-shirt and wiped my face and head so there’d be no more drips. Had I always been this pedantic? Couldn’t I walk in and then go back and clean the floor? That would make more sense. Perhaps the sun had cooked my brain.

The routine after my run was a shower, coffee, breakfast, then work. I heard my mobile ringing when I turned off the water and stepped out of the shower. It could ring. I didn’t start work until 8.30. Whoever was calling was persistent though, calling, hanging up, calling, hanging up at least five times. I answered the phone on my terms. Well, when I was dressed. My uncle’s name popped up on the screen.