The Alibi

THE ALIBI NIKKI LEE TAYLOR Magpie Creative Media Published by Magpie Creative Media ISBN 978-0-6484406-2-8 All characters and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Copyright © 2023 Nikki Lee Taylor The moral right of the author has been asserted. All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior permission in writing from the publisher with the exception of except for the use of brief quotations in a book Contents Dedication 1. ELLE 2. ANDREW 3. STELLA 4. LUCY 5. ELLE 6. LUCY 7. ANDREW 8. ELLE 9. STELLA 10. ANDREW 11. LUCY 12. ELLE 13. STELLA 14. ANDREW 15. ELLE 16. LAUREN 17. LUCY 18. ELLE 19. STELLA 20. ANDREW 21. LUCY 22. LAUREN 23. ELLE 24. ANDREW 25. LUCY 26. ELLE 27. LAUREN 28. STELLA 29. ANDREW 30. ELLE 31. LAUREN 32. LUCY 33. LAUREN 34. ELLE 35. ANDREW 36. STELLA 37. LUCY 38. ELLE 39. ANDREW 40. LAUREN 41. LUCY 42. STELLA 43. ELLE 44. LAUREN 45. LUCY 46. ANDREW 47. STELLA 48. ELLE 49. LAUREN 50. LUCY 51. STELLA 52. ELLE 53. ANDREW 54. LUCY 55. LAUREN 56. STELLA 57. ELLE 58. LAUREN 59. LUCY 60. ANDREW 61. LAUREN 62. LUCY 63. ELLE Epilogue Ready For Your Next Great Read? About The Author Let's Stay In Touch THE ALIBI Dedicated to the place I love most. My hometown; Newcastle. Then. Now. And Always. Chapter one ELLEThe call crackled in over a police scanner hidden on my desk somewhere beneath a mountain of council reports and old newspaper editions. All units. Human remains found in the south dunes of Stockton Beach. Access via Waterboard Road. Ambulance and emergency services are en route.I glanced over my shoulder, then leaned in and turned down the volume. If I was lucky maybe the other reporters hadn’t heard it. I glanced across to the centre cubicles, all allocated to senior reporters, and saw that my nemesis Willamina Fraser was not at her desk. With as little fanfare as possible, I slipped off my glasses and rose from my seat. At the end of the newsroom, stood the glass-walled office of our Editor-In-Chief, Henry Walters. He was a gruff, bear of a man who loved three things. The Newcastle Knights football team, a beer at his local pub, and shattering the dreams of reporters like me. I was a metre from his door when I caught sight of her heading in my direction. Goddamn it.I’d been given the role of lead crime reporter while Willamina was on sabbatical at the Sydney Morning Herald for the past three months. Now she was back and clearly thought her shit didn’t stink even more than she had before. When we reached the editor’s door, I was half a step in front.“I want it,” I announced, trying to elbow her out of the way. “Technically I’m here first and if it’s the body of Isabelle Cassidy then I deserve to cover it. It was my piece when she went missing.”Compared to Willamina’s statuesque frame I felt like a pipsqueak, but I wasn’t going to let her latitude, or my lack thereof, get in the way of being the lead reporter on what was surely going to be a front-page story. Especially if the body turned out to be my missing person.“You’ve got to be kidding, Nolan?” she scoffed, tossing back her mane of black hair and immediately reminding me of Cruella De Vil. “You filled in for a few months and didn’t fuck it up. Good for you. Now go back to your council meetings and wait your turn. Having a famous father doesn’t count for shit in the newsroom.” Certain I was firmly back in my place, she looked over my head toward our editor. “Boss, I’ve got this. I’ll grab a clicker and head out. Call you when I’m on the ground.” When Walters just nodded and looked back down at his sandwich, its filling spilling out across the paper bag on his desk, Fraser turned to leave. It was now or never.Newcastle might be the sixth largest city in Australia, but dead bodies on the beach didn’t come about all that often. Isabelle Cassidy had been missing for three months and technically it was my story. If I could follow it through to the end, then maybe it would be enough to get me off the council round - a job that for so many reasons, I needed out of. “Wait,” I announced. “Everyone, just wait a minute.”To my surprise, Willamina stopped and stared at me. Walters froze mid-chew. “I just think that… I at least deserve to be considered. This is my story. I’ve been on it since the day she went missing.”Willamina snorted, tucked her pen back behind her ear and planted her fists against her hips. “And I appreciate you filling in, Nolan, but like I said, I’ll take it from here.” She turned her attention back to Walters. “I’m heading out.”Again, he just nodded and looked back to his lunch.“Seriously? Not even a response?” I asked when she was gone.“She’s the senior crime reporter and you have a story on your desk that I’m waiting on,” he said in a bland tone. “Besides, there’s nothing to prove it’s the body of that missing girl. Could be a shark attack or a drowning. We don’t have any details. Don’t get so wound up, Nolan.”“But if it is her -”“Then Fraser will handle it.”I would not let myself cry in front of Walters, but the rest of what I wanted to say was stuck beneath a giant lump in my throat.Sensing my struggle, he pushed the air out of his nose, put down the sandwich and pulled some tissues from a battered-up cardboard box that had seen better days. “You need one of these?”