‘Aren’t you living in Melbourne now, Grant?’ asked Ines. Brooke had told her that he’d accepted an interstate secondment early in the year. Ines and Brooke had agreed this was good news. It was preferable ex-husbands left the state if not the country or the planet. So why was he lurking around Sydney?
‘Here for work,’ said Grant. He took a step closer towards her. ‘Brooke hasn’t been returning my calls.’
‘She’s got a lot on her mind.’
‘I know that! It’s just . . . I thought the police might have contacted me by now.’
‘Why would they contact you?’ asked Ines.
‘I was part of that family for a long time.’
‘Sure . . . but that was a while ago now.’
‘Not that long!’ said Grant. ‘I have information.’
‘Oh, please.’ Ines dropped all politeness in a fit of irritability. ‘If you’ve really got information, Grant, that might help the police find Joy, call them with it!’
‘I should probably do that,’ said Grant. ‘I just feel like I have a responsibility to make sure someone has told the police that Joy once . . .’ He licked his lips. ‘Had an indiscretion.’
Ines met her mother’s widened eyes. ‘An indiscretion?’
‘That’s right. It was many years ago, but obviously if Stan somehow discovered it, well, that might go to motive.’
Go to motive. The man was a geologist, not a lawyer.
‘I’m sure the family have passed on all the information the police need,’ began Ines.
‘Brooke is the only one in that family who knows about this particular incident, and she’s always been a Daddy’s girl. I’m guessing she won’t be telling the police.’
‘Right,’ said Ines. She felt sick. How dare he?
‘I mean, Brooke has her dad’s back and I get that,’ said Grant. ‘But I’m Team Joy, and if Stan hurt her, then I’m going to help put him behind bars.’
chapter thirty-eight Last October
‘Turns out your potential scammer is an actual scammer,’ said Simon Barrington to Amy as she sat at the dining room table rating the cheesiness of a new savoury cheese cracker.
Simon took a cracker as he sat down opposite her.
‘Cheesy,’ he said.
‘Overly so?’ asked Amy.
‘I’d say perfectly cheesy.’
His words penetrated. ‘Savannah is a scammer? Seriously?’
She noted that although her heart was definitely going over the speed limit, it was doing so in a controlled manner, staying in its lane. Her therapist, Roger, used a lot of car metaphors.
Simon opened a manila folder. ‘I did an ASIC search.’
‘Clever!’ Amy tried to remember what ASIC stood for.
‘Australian Securities and Investments Commission. She’s on the disqualified director list. Three years ago she was the director of a business that was selling fraudulent tennis memorabilia.’
‘Wait. Fraudulent tennis memorabilia,’ said Amy. ‘That seems –’
‘Like a big coincidence,’ agreed Simon solemnly.
Their eyes met. Amy thought of her father’s precious signed tennis ball collection. She’d always wondered if those players really had sat there and signed them themselves.
‘You think she deliberately targeted my parents?’ asked Amy.
‘I do,’ said Simon.
‘I think we should go over there.’ He held up the file, waved it. ‘Confront Savannah with this. See what she says.’
‘Well,’ said Amy. ‘I’m really grateful for this but –’
She wavered. This would be the second time he’d been to her family home. He was acting like a boyfriend: a sweet young boyfriend who deserved an equally sweet young girlfriend. She would break his already broken heart.
‘Okay,’ she said, because simply looking into his clear brown eyes was as cleansing to her soul and calming to her heart rate as half an Ativan washed down with half a glass of wine.
chapter thirty-nine Now
‘Three years ago, this Savannah Pagonis, who at one point went by the name Savannah Smith and may have other aliases, was selling fraudulent tennis memorabilia on the internet,’ said Ethan to Christina.
‘Okay then,’ said Christina. She sat back in her chair, tapping her pen against her teeth. ‘Tennis memorabilia. She clearly didn’t pick the house at random the way she said she did.’
‘She was trying to scam them?’ guessed Ethan. ‘Something to do with the tennis school?’