‘Nah, mate. Don’t even know her.’

Wozza laughed good-naturedly. ‘Mate, you just pick random women and hide in their sheds?’

From my position on the other side of the curtain, Matthew Bunting didn’t sound like the sharpest tool in the shed, no pun intended. So what the hell had he been doing in my shed and who were the ‘they’ he’d referred to? And what was his connection to Noah Shepherd?

‘So, you’re a bouncer in the city? What’s that like?’

‘Good job, mate.’

I heard the slurp of a straw and guessed Bunting was enjoying a drink while he spoke. He didn’t sound curious about how Wozza knew he was a bouncer.

‘Funny coincidence,’ said Wozza. ‘The nightclub you work at was the scene of an assault and Senior Detective Pollard worked that case. Small world, isn’t it? I thought things like that only happened in country towns like this.’

Silence.

Then a sullen grunt. ‘Noah never did nuthin’. That bitch pointed the finger at him and he did nuthin’! That copper dragged him through the mud.’

‘Mr Bunting—may I call you Matty?—if I were to, say, check your bank records, would I see a payment from anyone who shouldn’t be there?’

More mumbling, sounded like denying.

‘Because, if you didn’t know the copper whose shed you were hiding in and you’re connected to a club where she worked a case, I’m gonna jump to some pretty big conclusions here.’

‘Can’t say, mate,’ said Bunting.

‘I’ve seen it before,’ said Wozza sadly. ‘Bloody rich people paying regular blokes like you to do the dirty work. And where are they now? Probably in the city eating their caviar and drinking lattes’—Wozza drew out the word so it sounded like laaaah-tays—‘leaving you alone to face the music.’

A grunt. A click. And the sounds of a game show theme song came through the curtain. Sounded like Matthew Bunting had said all he was going to for today.

On the way back to the police station, Wozza and I discussed his impressions from the side of the curtain that contained Matthew Bunting and from mine that didn’t.

‘Is it possible this Noah Shepherd paid him to attack you?’

I considered the question. ‘After everything that happened, it’s hard to believe. Surely, after Gemma, they would’ve just retreated back into their own world. Why would they come after me now?’