“That’s Tameka’s yoga studio,” said Fred. Kate noticed the gate in the wall at the bottom of the garden. Tristan noticed it, too, and glanced sideways and raised his eyebrow. It was the gate Famke had used for their affair.
Fred came over to the table with three steaming espresso cups on a little tray. “Tameka is an Ashtanga yoga teacher, and she does lessons from home.”
“Do you work now?” asked Kate, taking two of the cups off the tray and handing one to Tristan. “The case files say you were unemployed when Joanna went missing.”
“Yes, I work now,” he said with an edge of sarcasm in his voice. “I’m a website designer. We both get to work from home and share the responsibility for Anika.” He pulled a packet of biscuits from the pocket of his baggy trousers and opened it with his teeth, spreading out the plastic packet on the tabletop. The biscuits spilled out. “Damn, I didn’t think that through, did I?” he said. He went back to the kitchen and started searching through the cupboards to find a plate. Kate sensed that he was a stranger to food preparation and the kitchen in general. He returned with a plate and tipped the biscuits onto it. He then fussed around some more, clearing up the crumbs and then checking to see if any mess remained. Kate presumed that Tameka ran a tight ship.
“Right,” he said, sitting down opposite them. “Joanna . . .”
“Yes. Bev said she contacted you,” said Kate.
“Yeah. She sent me a text,” said Fred. “Do you think you’ll find her?”
“I hope so,” said Kate. “Do you support Bev’s decision to hire a private detective?”
Fred rubbed his eyes. “I’m not against it. I’ve mourned for Joanna. And I think I’m lucky that I’ve been able to move on. I had to, for my sanity. I think Bev’s still trapped in the same place she was the night Joanna vanished. Just talking about it again is giving me the shivers. Look at my hands—I’m shaking . . .” He held them out. He had long, thin fingers, but his fingertips were slightly bulbous.
“Is it difficult to still live here, in the same house where you lived with Joanna?” asked Tristan.
“I’ve only been back for three years. A year after Joanna went missing, I rented the place out and got a flat in Exeter.”
“Why did you rent it out?” asked Kate.
“I couldn’t afford the mortgage on my own. I had to rent it out. When people go missing, there’s no law in place to say what happens to their assets. We had a joint mortgage, but I couldn’t change it without Joanna’s signature. It wasn’t until eight years later, that we, well, I went to court so Joanna could be ruled as death in absentia. Presumed dead.”
His face looked pained at the memory.
“You said we and then corrected it to I?” asked Kate.
“Bev was against it. She accused me of giving up on Joanna, but in the end, she came around to it. We were able to get a death certificate, have a funeral. My marriage to her was annulled. I bought out what Joanna put into this house. I gave the money to Bev.”
“What did Bill think?”
“Bill tends to think whatever Bev thinks. He’s devoted to her . . . They look after each other. Bev had a bad time when she was with Joanna’s father. He was violent and controlling. Bill is the opposite of that—calm, dependable. But after Joanna’s dad, Bev vowed that she’d never get married or give up her independence to a man. I thought they might be married by now, after all these years. I suppose moving in together is a step in the right direction . . . Bill’s a good guy. He helped me out with money after Joanna went missing. And when they finally ruled Joanna as dead, he bought the plot of land in the cemetery next to Bev’s mum’s grave and paid for a beautiful headstone . . .” His voice trailed off. “We had a lock of Joanna’s hair interred.”
Kate thought back to when they’d met Bev and Bill, how Bev had spoken of Joanna like she still might be alive. She hadn’t mentioned any of this. Fred took a sip of his coffee and went on.
“I met Tameka six months after Joanna was ruled dead in absentia. I proposed six months later, and she fell pregnant. We wanted to live somewhere nice, and this is now a good area with a good school. We had this house completely gutted. New floors, roof. We added this kitchen on and two more rooms upstairs with an en suite bathroom. The garden was landscaped . . . It’s unrecognizable from before. Weirdly, it helped with the neighbors too,” he said.