The Grotesques Read Online Free

to her own ears she sounded tired, defeated. One day soon she was going to cave in and be done with clinging to whatever shreds of dignity she had left.
    “Just get me the story. For Pete’s sake, woman, six girls missing, one with a severed torso and the latest . . .” He broke off. “Things could hardly get—”
    “The latest what?” she interrupted.
    “—more sensational than that.”
    There was a pause as she waited vainly for an answer.
    “Listen, Jerome,” and his tone was more sympathetic than she imagined possible from him, “we both know you don’t belong on this rag. I’m giving you a chance to restore your reputation, maybe a shot at a job interstate. Do a good enough job on this and the Sydney Morning Herald might take you on.”
    Alarm bells started ringing in Ella’s head. She didn’t believe in second chances. Journalism was a cut-throat business, and she had sure had hers slit. “The latest what, Phil?”
    “Get to the conference and make up your own mind. I want a clean story—” she coughed but he continued glibly over her, “—so I’m not about to say anything that could bias you against doing this properly. You’ve got thirty-five minutes.” At the other end, the receiver clicked.
    Ella fell back onto the pillow and stared at a daddy-long-legs on the ceiling. She suppressed a shudder as it started to crawl and glanced at the clock. Ten-fifty-four. Despite her burgeoning curiosity, pulling back the covers and swinging her legs out of bed required a colossal effort.
    Her clean clothes weren’t ironed. She settled on a navy skirt and rumpled white blouse and threw her raincoat over the top. Casting a longing look at the kettle, she downed a glass of water and stuffed an energy bar into her pocket.
    A scratching at the screen door turned her spine cold. Her hand froze over her keys. Involuntarily, her mind returned to the square with its eerie stillness. Then her brain kicked in and, stilling her shaking hands, she strode over to slide the door open.
    “Hey, Tilly,” she said, grabbing the box of cat biscuits and pouring them into the plastic bowl on the kitchen floor. Her petite, tabby boss stretched one socked hind leg out, then blinked her demand for a morning pat.
    Eleven-oh-three. Bunching her hair into a makeshift bun, Ella grabbed an old bag, tipped the contents of the torn tote into it and rushed out the door. She made it to the station with a couple of minutes to spare and the worry of a speeding ticket she couldn’t afford on her conscience.
    The sergeant rolled his eyes at the press tag she was pinning to her coat, the Informer printed in embarrassingly large letters. He gestured her into a room crowded with journalists with a flick of his head. She pushed her way forward, head down. Too bad Adelaide was such a small place. She copped several stares and caught the occasional snide whisper that placed her name and the Informer in the same sentence.
    Hush descended on the room when a detective walked to the podium. Ella put a hand over her face and inched back as far as she could. When she next saw Phil, she was going to kill him.
    “Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Detective Robert Hamlyn.” His serious brown eyes regarded them over the rims of his bifocals. His forehead was creased into hassled wrinkles, many more than she remembered. He lifted a page and began to deliver the morning’s headlines. Ella tried to blot out her personal life and concentrate. It was not that easy.
    “At around six this morning, part of the body of a young woman was discovered by a jogger along the Port River. The corpse has since been identified as belonging to twenty-two-year-old Melanie Denham.”
    Struggling to place the name, Ella listened to the frantic murmurs that broke out around the room. The detective cleared his throat, restoring quiet.
    “Melanie was reported missing by her family twenty-four hours ago after failing to return home from a night out with