No name, but the girl would need ID’ing. No names anywhere.
Conway had been right about the photos: not fluffy kitties.
Chris:
Another girl we needed to find:
Chris:
Chris:
Chris:
‘Go Chris,’ Conway said. Wry, but the undercurrent made me look up. ‘He doesn’t just get his tit pics; he gets an apology out of her for not sending them faster.’
‘He was good, all right.’
‘Always got what he wanted, Julia said.’
I said, ‘He could’ve been telling this girl the truth, though. At least about keeping the pics to himself. Any of his mates mention them, last year?’
‘Nah. Like they would’ve? In front of Father Whoever? “Yeah, Chris was passing around underage tit shots, now please expel me and arrest me for kiddie porn thank you very much-”’
‘They might’ve done, if they copped that one of the girls could’ve killed him over it. Chris was their mate. Maybe they wouldn’t say it in front of Father Whoever, but all it would’ve taken was an anonymous text to you, an e-mail, whatever. And you said Finn Carroll was no thicko.’
‘He’s not.’ Conway sucked her front teeth. ‘And him and Chris were close enough that if Chris had been sharing the pics, Finn would’ve seen them. Why would Chris keep them to himself?’
I said, ‘Selena said he was complicated.’
‘Yeah, girls always think arseholes are sooo complicated. Surprise, kids: they’re just arseholes.’ Conway was flicking at her screen again. ‘If he didn’t pass the pics around, it wasn’t because deep down he was actually a knight in shining armour. It was because he figured the girls might find out, and his supply of wank material would dry up.’ She held the phone between us. ‘Here we go. Joanne.’
Joanne started the same way as all the others. Chris playing cheeky, seeing how far he could go, Joanne slapping him down and loving it. Lots of meetings. He got pics off her, but she made him work hard for them:
‘Fuck’s sake,’ Conway said, lip curling. ‘High-maintenance little bint. Why didn’t he give her the heave-ho right there? Plenty more tits in the sea.’
‘Maybe he liked a challenge,’ I said. ‘Or maybe Joanne was right, and he was genuinely into her.’
‘Right. Chris being sooo complex again. He wasn’t all that into her. Look.’
Pics, more flirting, more meetings, smoochy talk getting smoochier. Then Joanne started hinting hard about going public –
Joanne:
Joanne again: