chapter fifty-two
‘Thank you for coming in today, Mr Delaney,’ said Christina.
Ethan noted that her manner was businesslike: not at all aggressive. She seemed to be speaking with the friendly detached authority of a medical specialist who has asked a patient to come back in for a serious follow-up appointment. ‘You know Constable Lim, of course.’
She indicated Ethan. Stan looked over at Ethan and nodded, folding his arms across his barrel chest. ‘Yup.’
Stan Delaney’s wife had been missing now for nineteen days. The scratches on his face were completely healed. Ethan noted that he’d shaved for this interview and dressed in a business shirt. No tie. The shirt was ironed. He looked like a respectable member of the community. He had no legal representation. It was difficult to imagine this man having anything to do with that blood-soaked t-shirt.
They were in the small windowless ERISP room at the station. ERISP stood for Electronic Record of Interview with a Suspected Person, and it meant that this entire interview was being recorded on both an audio and video disc. Ethan sat in one corner, observing and keeping an eye on the recording equipment.
‘You really want to be a cop?’ his brother had said to him when he first mentioned going into the police force. ‘Directing traffic?’
Ethan’s brother was an actuary. He was sitting in a city office right now solving mathematical equations while Ethan was helping solve a possible murder, and his brother thought he’d made the better choice of career.
Christina did something quick and complicated with her hair to make it tighter at the back. She said, ‘Mr Delaney, I’d like to go through the timeline one more time.’
‘Okay.’ Stan nodded. He sat up, uncrossed his arms and placed closed fists on his thighs. Bring it on, he seemed to be saying. ‘What do you want to know?’
‘Stan Delaney is formidable on the court,’ one of his fellow club members had told Christina and Ethan, a man who was keen to let them know that he believed Stan had buried his wife’s body under their tennis court. ‘He’s ruthless. Calculating. Ferocious. He gets this look on his face that makes your blood run cold.’
Christina looked down at her notes as if to check them, although Ethan knew for a fact that she knew the timeline by heart.
‘You woke up that morning – Valentine’s Day – and you didn’t see your wife?’
Ethan had been intimidated by Detective Christina Khoury when he first started working with her. He thought she thought he was a moron. She had a way of looking at him as if she were sizing him up and finding him wanting. But he’d got used to that look now. She gave the same look to her morning coffee each day and she loved her coffee.
（Ethan’s aunt said that he and his brother were intimidated by women because they were subconsciously terrified of displeasing them due to the fact their mother had walked out when they were little kids. Ethan and his brother both agreed that was total crap. They didn’t say this to their aunt’s face, of course.）
‘We were sleeping in separate rooms.’ Stan answered Christina’s question with steady eyes.
‘Was that a new development?’ asked Christina.
‘Relatively new, yes.’
She checked her notes. ‘And you went out to buy milk first thing in the morning?’
‘Yes,’ said Stan. ‘We were out of milk. I also bought the paper.’
‘Right,’ said Christina. ‘And you came home but you didn’t see Mrs Delaney.’
‘Not right away. I was reading . . . something in my office.’
That was new. Reading what?
Ethan leaned forward. So did Christina. ‘What were you reading?’
‘Just some paperwork.’
‘What sort of paperwork?’
Stan shrugged. ‘Nothing of importance.’
Ethan saw the lie and he knew Christina saw it too. He watched her wait. She was still. He wondered if her heart was racing like his. Stan said nothing. Perhaps his was the fastest racing heart in this small room.
‘Right,’ said Christina after a moment. ‘So you were reading this “paperwork” and then you heard the front door.’
‘Yes,’ said Stan. ‘I don’t know where she’d been. But I heard her come in. And then I went to talk to her, in the kitchen. She was drinking a glass of water. She seemed . . . worked up about something.’
‘And that’s when you argued.’
‘That’s right.’
‘About what?’