‘Yes, please.’ Savannah moved deftly behind her to pick up the salt and pepper grinders from the sideboard.
‘This pasta looks delicious, Savannah,’ said Stan. He would never have said, ‘This looks delicious, Joy’ about something Joy had cooked, although occasionally he might grunt, ‘Looks good’ as he picked up his fork. Stan’s formality was just like the good crockery and cutlery. It added a nice sheen to the night.
He winked at Joy – just a loving, husbandly wink without subtext – and she thought about his hands on her body last night, his voice low in her ear, and as the first notes of Neil Diamond’s ‘Sweet Caroline’ filled the kitchen, Joy let any thoughts about Harry’s memoir and her worry about Brooke fade away as a deep sense of contentment spread throughout her body, as blissful as a fast-acting paracetamol.
chapter fourteen
Now
‘Did you kill your wife, Mr Delaney?’
‘Eh?’ The old man, huge and hunch-shouldered, with reddish thumbprints under his eyes, lifted his bald head, seemingly bewildered by the question. ‘What’s that?’
The baby-faced journalist in a natty suit and tie shoved a chunky microphone towards his mouth. ‘Did you have anything to do with your wife’s disappearance, Mr Delaney?’
The old man stood on the front lawn of his suburban house, shoulder to shoulder with his four adult children, surrounded by a semicircle of journalists and camera operators. The journalists were all young, in smart-casual brightly coloured clothes, no patterns, solid colours, sharp shoulders, their faces smooth and opaque with make-up. The camera operators were older, all men, with ordinary, impassive faces and weekend hardware shopping clothes: jeans and polo shirts.
‘Mr Delaney?’
‘That is defamatory. Get away from him, you parasite!’ It was one of the old man’s daughters who spoke. She slapped the microphone. A swift, smooth backhand. She was a tennis player, apparently. They all were.
One of her brothers stepped forward, a protective arm in front of his father’s face.
But the other two siblings said and did nothing; they appeared instead to take tiny steps away from their father, and the internet saw.
Minds were made up. Two of his children think he did it.
chapter fifteen
Concerns are growing for a Sydney woman who has not been seen for ten days. Police have today launched an appeal for information on the whereabouts of retired tennis coach Joy Delaney.
The 69-year-old was reported missing by her adult children, and officers have been unable to locate her. Family members say they received a text message on Valentine’s Day described as ‘out of character’。 It is believed that she may have been riding a green bicycle with a white wicker basket.
A search of local bushland and bike tracks involving more than one hundred volunteers from the local community has found no sign of her. Police are requesting that anyone with CCTV or dashcam footage in the local area please come forward.
A silver Volvo has been seized as part of the investigation and will be tested forensically over the next few days.
Investigators are keen to talk with a former visitor to the family home, Savannah Pagonis, who may have important information. Police have stressed that Ms Pagonis is not a suspect or a person of interest. ‘Any piece of information, no matter how small or seemingly trivial, could prove crucial at this point,’ said Detective Senior Constable Christina Khoury.
The missing woman’s husband, Stanley Delaney, is helping police with their investigations.
‘Helping police with their investigations,’ murmured Teresa Geer as she carefully cut out the article from that day’s paper with the big kitchen scissors, as was her habit, even though her children teased her for it. It was strange how everyday habits like clipping newspaper articles had suddenly become antiquated.
She couldn’t decide if she would show this clipping to her daughter when she got back home from her appointment. Obviously Claire would have already heard that her ex-husband’s mother had gone missing.
It would be worrying and confusing for her. There was nothing worse than having to feel sorry for people who had wronged you. You don’t want lottery wins for your enemies but you don’t want tragedies for them either. Then they got the upper hand.
Damn those Delaneys. Teresa had once been fond of the Delaney family, but that had all changed in an instant five years ago. She would never forget her daughter’s shattered face when Claire told her what Troy had done.
Not only had he broken her heart, but it was all Troy’s fault that Claire was now married to an American – a nice American, but an American who lived in America.