Read Bali 9: The Untold Story for Free Online Page A

needle,’ Bob recalls. ‘I said, “You’re not supposed to touch that!” and I smacked her…and she cried and cried and cried. She cuddled up to me and said, “You’re not supposed to smack me”, and I said, “Why’s that?” and she said, “You love me”.’
    Renae was three at the time but already she ruled the house. It was only a handful more years later when, on the brink of adolescence, Renae moved in with her father. From day one she had him wrapped around her little finger, controlling what, how and when they did things. Bob was strict—really strict—in a protective sort of way, but Renae got what she wanted most times. ‘If I had a lady friend and she didn’t like her, that was it,’ Bob says by way of explanation. Given that, it was just as well that Renae took a shine to Bob’s second wife, Jenny, from their first meeting.
    All kids have a passion, and Renae’s is obvious from the moment you take the lid off the olive green shoe box brimming with photos and memorabilia. ‘For the best Fisher Man in the world’, the card reads. ‘For you dad cause you’re the best and only dad anyone would want and have.’ You can’t miss the big fish that acts as the focus of the card, and it’s not the only clue to Renae’s first love. Photographs of Renae fishing dominate her teenage years; it seemed to be everything to her. She loved getting dressed to go fishing, carefully packing her rod and tackle, setting out for the adventure, and beating everyone else to the catch of the day. At the annual local junior fishing championships, she would take home the trophy on more than one occasion, even beating the boys. When Renae cast her rod into the water, the whole world stopped. She belonged.
    Often Bob and Renae would set off together, rods over the shoulder, to try their luck, leaving Jenny behind. At other times Jenny would tag along. ‘We’d go out weekends,’ Jenny says. ‘I’d go out on the boat but they’d fish all weekend.’ Renae’s relationship with her stepmother was good right from the time they met. Bob had taken his daughter down to the local club for a cheap dinner. Renae would tease her father about Jenny, who also clicked quickly with the tomboy by her father’s side. Soon the three of them got on like wildfire, the two women in the house plotting and planning to get their own way. And they always did.
    Renae loved animals, especially dogs. One day she decided she wanted a pet dog, and with Jenny onside Renae fronted her father, who was working in the family garage. He agreed, suggesting that it should be a border collie. Renae knew immediately that she had won and, minutes later, she and Jenny were back, car keys at the ready. They’d found a pedigree border collie advertised in the local newspaper—just the one Bob had wanted, they said—and it was only up the road. Misty joined the family the same afternoon.
    It was that love of animals and fishing that served as the bedrock of Renae’s adolescence. She spent time with both her families—her father and stepmother, and her mother and stepfather—and the small circle of friends she had made at her local high school. They were friends who understood that her passion for school started and ended with soccer and woodwork. Most of the other classes failed to capture her interest, with some people believing she battled academically along the way.
    After school, and on weekends, all that was forgotten and Renae Lawrence would spend most of her time at home, rarely out of her father’s sight. And that’s the way Bob liked it. Although dollars were stretched and holidays not common, every now and again they would get away, and it was on one of those trips that Burubi Beach won Renae’s heart. She bought a T-shirt there and wore it day in and day out, to the exclusion of all the others in her cupboard.
    Cars were Renae’s other passion, and from the time she could walk she could be found wedged under one of the cars her father,