Part 17 (2/2)

'So you do this on a voluntary basis?'

'Precisely. It's more selfish than it sounds-in my line of work, I can't have him swanning around looking like a dag.'

'What's a dag?'

She pointed at Luke, his spilt-spaghetti tie glistening beneath the studio lights.

'Do you choose Max's ties?'

She nodded.

'He's lucky to have you. Maybe you could consider giving Luke a bit of pro bono guidance.'

Di charged into the room, returned from the stalker confrontation. 'I'm f.u.c.king irate,' she yelled. 'Where's Luke?'

I pointed to a coffee machine in the corner where he was expertly frothing milk in the middle of an animated phone call. Di approached him and whispered something in his ear. I saw him turn pale.

'We need a minute with Max,' Luke said to the make-up artist, who was grooming Max's eyebrows with a toothbrush.

'Almost finished,' she said perkily, oblivious to the mounting tension.

'A minute,' Luke repeated, but she ignored the cue.

I stepped in. 'Amanda, isn't it?'

'Armada,' she corrected. 'Like the Spanish one.'

Max bit his lip to squash amus.e.m.e.nt.

'What a lovely name.' I imagined a flotilla of her clones making their way across the Pacific Ocean. 'Armada, before you do anything else, we need your advice on ties.'

'Of course,' said Armada, liberating Max, who went with Luke and Di into what looked like a storage room. A minute later Max came tearing out, gasping at air. 'I think I'm going to be sick,' he said, scanning the perimeter for a bathroom.

'Come on, darling,' said Milly, 'come with me.'

'Did he eat the California rolls?' asked Armada, patting her stomach, 'cos I'm feeling a bit funky too.'

I found Di prostrate on the floor of the storage room.

'What on earth is going on?'

'Remember the story for the Sundays?'

'Yes...'

She sat up and ran her fingers through her hair, letting her forehead rest on the heels of her hands. 'It's not about the preselection. It's far worse. When Max was serving in the Persian Gulf, one of his subordinates a.s.saulted an unarmed civilian. The victim suffered serious head injuries.

'Max was the officer in charge of reporting the incident and disciplining the perpetrator, but he never did anything about it. The man has given an interview to the Sunday, saying that he can no longer live with himself and feels duty-bound to talk about it. He has post-traumatic stress syndrome. They also have interviews with the family of the victim, who has since died.'

She handed me her BlackBerry. There was an email from a journalist outlining a series of allegations against Max. He had already dubbed the scandal Slaughtergate. We had until 4 p.m. to comment. My palms grew clammy. 'c.o.c.k,' I said. 'How can I help?'

'Work through the allegations and develop an exhaustive list of questions that Max might be asked at a press conference. We're going to prep him in half an hour. We need to deal with this head-on. I'm working up some messaging for him and Luke's trying to work through the facts with Max.'

'Does he deny it?'

Di shook her head.

Outside the storage room, Armada sailed towards me. 'Um, I need to like finish his make-up now.'

Tully joined us, imperiously clapping his hands. 'So, where's Max? We'll do a run-through in five.'

'Sorry, I don't think that's going to happen. You'll need to talk to Luke.' I looked around the studio for somewhere to sit and think.

'Babe,' Tully said, 'you're not suggesting we won't be filming today, are you? We've got a cast of thousands here. Unless we get the three ads in the can by this afternoon we'll forfeit our prime-time slots.'

The babe bit made me wince. 'I understand your frustration,' I said politely as my hands formed fists, 'but I don't have any answers for you. Could you or your staff find us some desks to work at and give us a bit of privacy? We're attending to an urgent matter.'

'Me too, sweetheart. It's called an election campaign.' He etched inverted commas in the air with four puny digits. The veins in his neck looked like an embossed road map. 'Right now, all we've got are a couple of billboards and a f.u.c.king website.'

His face was so close to mine that the brim of his hat touched my forehead and I could make out the borders of his porcelain veneers. Scanning the room for potential weapons, I fixed my eyes on Milly's shoes and wondered if she'd let me borrow one for a little bludgeoning.

'Back off, mate,' said Luke behind him, tapping him on the shoulder. 'n.o.body speaks to my staff like that.' There was molten fury in his eyes.

'Look, Harley, this bird doesn't seem to appreciate what we've got to achieve here today.'

'Ruby is not a bird, Tully. She's a policy advisor and has a far greater appreciation of the complexities of this campaign than you will ever have, as was all too evident from the script you wrote.'

'Settle down, Luke. We're all on the same side here, mate,' Tully tried.

'Don't tell me to settle, you numbskull. I'm your client, not your underling-you'd do well to remember that.'

I fantasised about spitting in Tully's ridiculous hat and putting it back on his head, but he'd already left.

'You okay, Roo?' Luke put his hand on my shoulder. His tie was all higgledy piggledy. It was spaghetti bolognaise: a photograph of the stuff printed on the cheapest satin.

'No, actually, I'm not okay,' I said, straightening his tie. 'I'm bitterly disappointed to have missed the opportunity for a bit of good old-fas.h.i.+oned Australian dispute resolution.'

'You could've taken him.'

'Definitely.'

I didn't feel up to the task of preparing my boss, the Leader of the Opposition, for a press conference on a scandal big enough to derail his campaign. But there wasn't time to be spooked. Under the hot studio lights, I got to work.

Catch Twenty-Loo.

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