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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

‘She might have been pushed or hit.’

‘Hit,’ he says, and the word tumbles into incredulous laughter. He’s a bit off today. If we suspect domestic violence, we have a duty to report it. Even if it turns out not to be the case. ‘He’s a politician, Lina. He’s a good guy and there’s nothing to suggest he has hit her.’ He has an odd, serene smile – is it possible I’m overreacting? ‘Come on, Lina. I’d be the first one to phone it in, you know that, but there’s no real evidence of abuse here.’

He can’t be serious. The guy who’s called the cops on every potential domestic violence situation we’ve seen. But those cases were almost always lower socio-economic homes. The violence was obvious. Children with black eyes. Women with cigarette burns. Scotty knows this man.

I shrug. ‘I’ve got to ring it in. If there’s nothing to hide, it won’t hurt them at all.’

He touches my arm as I reach for my radio. ‘Let me speak to him, please. I’ll get to the bottom of it.’

‘Scotty, no,’ I say. ‘We don’t warn them, we don’t let them get a story straight. That’s how men like him get away with it.’

He pulls his hand away, shows me his palms as if to say, your call. ‘Alright. Can you wait until we’ve wrapped it up at least?’

‘Okay,’ I say.

Scotty goes back inside to finish the report. When he comes back, I add to it. Noting the bruises, the wife’s demeanour. Police don’t need the wife to confess to what has happened, they need only to suspect abuse before they intervene. The eleven-year-old son probably called 111 before he knew what he was doing. How will that man punish the kid if that is the case? Or it could all be a mistake. Those finger bruises could be from some adventurous role-play. Or a judo class she takes. There’s no certainty, just a balance of probability. Scotty is at one end of the scales and I’m at the other.

Rick comes out to the ambulance. ‘What’s going on?’ he asks, that smile gone now. ‘What’s taking so long?’

‘Nothing,’ I say. ‘We’ve almost finished up the paperwork here.’

‘Right.’ He looks to Scotty, raising his eyebrows as if this is one of those women things. Thoroughness, am I right?

‘Sorry,’ Rick adds now, zeroing in on me. ‘Have we met before?’

‘Me?’ I say. Feeling a sudden flush. ‘No, I don’t think so.’