BooksBarbecue
Back The Last Guests
Chapters (54)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Epigraph
  4. PROLOGUE
  5. PART ONE
  6. ONE
  7. TWO
  8. THREE
  9. FOUR
  10. DEADLY SAS RAID IN AFGHANISTAN UNDER SCRUTINY
  11. FIVE
  12. SIX
  13. SEVEN
  14. EIGHT
  15. NINE
  16. TEN
  17. ELEVEN
  18. TWELVE
  19. THIRTEEN
  20. FOURTEEN
  21. FIFTEEN
  22. SIXTEEN
  23. SEVENTEEN
  24. EIGHTEEN
  25. NINETEEN
  26. TWENTY
  27. PART TWO
  28. TWENTY-ONE
  29. TWENTY-TWO
  30. TWENTY-THREE
  31. TWENTY-FOUR
  32. TWENTY-FIVE
  33. TWENTY-SIX
  34. TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. TWENTY-NINE
  37. DANIEL MOORE: ‘A SINGLE BLOKE, HAPPY-GO-LUCKY, A BIT OF A DUNCE BUT WITH A GOOD HEART,’ BEST FRIEND SAYS.
  38. THIRTY
  39. THIRTY-ONE
  40. THIRTY-TWO
  41. THIRTY-THREE
  42. THIRTY-FOUR
  43. THIRTY-FIVE
  44. BREAKING: POLICE CONFIRM DANIEL MOORE ACTED ALONE
  45. THIRTY-SIX
  46. THIRTY-SEVEN
  47. THIRTY-EIGHT
  48. THIRTY-NINE
  49. SECOND ARREST MADE IN WESTAY HIDDEN CAMERAS CASE
  50. EPILOGUE
  51. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  52. Discover More
  53. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  54. Also by J. P. Pomare

I leave our clothes and things inside, but the police hand over my car keys, which were in Daniel’s pocket along with Cain’s phone. I take my phone from the glove box. Cain should be free to come home tonight or tomorrow morning. They’re going to scan his brain, observe him.

‘You go home to Auckland,’ he told me. ‘No point sitting around here, you need to rest. I’ll manage.’ I was too fatigued to argue with him, and I knew he was probably right. I did need rest, and I needed to get as far away from the lake house as possible.

The scene plays out again in my mind. Daniel with the shotgun, those fierce eyes, teasing at times, angry at others. When he found out I was pregnant there was a pause, something changed. Is that what kept him from really hurting me?

When I stop for petrol, I see it on the front page of the newspaper. If nothing else, the media is quick. The image is from the road, a long lens shot taken from beyond the police tape in the pre-dawn house: HOUSE OF HORRORS: HOME INVASION ON LAKE TARAWERA.

I turn my head and quickly look away.

‘Pump four?’ the attendant asks.

‘Yeah.’

I can barely meet the man’s eyes as I hand over my card and pay.

•

By the time I get home to Auckland the story is running on the midday news and the news sites. I sit on the couch in front of the TV as ‘New Zealand’s Mum’, Paula Cripps, stares down the camera to report that a home invasion occurred at a property in Lake Tarawera last night and one man is dead. I don’t know why my heart is racing, it’s as though I’m back in the house reliving it. While doctors gauze the cuts and salve the bruises on my husband, I’m morbidly running through each moment of that night in my mind. It comes in a rush. I can’t stop imagining the things I might have done differently. A shorter shower. I could have got my phone from the glove box. Maybe I didn’t need to pull the trigger, maybe Cain could have stopped him. Apprehended him. I mute the TV.

Cain has survived worse. He might have new scars to go with the others, but he’s alive. That’s the most important thing – I don’t know what I would do if he had died. When my mobile phone rings I almost leap out of my chair. It’s an unknown number. I answer.

‘Lina Phillips? Constable Stevens here. We met this morning.’

‘Hi,’ I say. Then before he can speak again, I add, ‘I’ve seen the news. It’s all over the media.’

‘Ignore them. It’s hard to keep things like this secret in a small town. Word was bound to get out.’