27

The kettle was empty. Aidan was in the way of the sink, restacking the plates Brigitte had already loaded in the dishwasher. She drummed her fingers silently on the kettle while he rinsed the dirty dishes thoroughly and racked them according to height. What the fuck was the point of having a dishwasher if you washed the dishes first? Impatience, or caffeine addiction, got the better of her and she pushed past him.

He held up his hands and stepped aside. He looked tired, but gorgeous. Clean-shaven, hair damp, wearing charcoal trousers and a cream shirt with a tie. His suit jacket hung over the back of a chair.

‘Court today?’

He nodded.

She made coffee and sat at the breakfast bar.

As Aidan gathered his keys and wallet, a wave of sadness and regret washed over her. Don’t leave. ‘Poor Zippy.’ She looked at the jumbo bag of dog biscuits next to the door. She’d have to take them to Jeremy’s house for his dog.

‘Uh-huh.’ Aidan looked at his phone.

‘Will you be home for dinner?’

‘Dunno.’

‘Nice of Enzo and Grace to come to Papa’s funeral.’

‘They’ve always liked you.’

‘You OK?’

‘About Zippy or Eddie?’

Annoyance overflowed the sadness and regret as he scrolled on his phone. ‘Anything else you want to talk about?’ Colin, Connor, Carl, for example?

He stopped playing with his phone, and pulled his jacket from the back of the chair.

The awkward no-kiss goodbye. She looked at his feet. Were they new shoes?

‘Aid …’

‘See ya.’ He walked out, and she rested her head on the breakfast bar, until her phone rang. It was Tate, from work, asking how she was.

‘Been better.’

‘Have you read chapter fifteen?’

Like this was a fucking book club. How could he be so insensitive? ‘Cloud Atlas doesn’t have chapter numbers.’

‘No. Of Dead in the Water.’

‘What?’

‘The dog. Detective Moore’s dog is killed. With a knife.’

Ice water inside her arms.

‘You have to tell Aidan.’

‘You’re being hysterical.’

‘If you don’t tell the police, I —’

‘Stop it, Tate!’

He stopped.

‘There’s always stabbings in crime books. The police would laugh at you.’

After she’d hung up, she went into the bedroom and took out Dead in the Water from her underwear drawer. In chapter fifteen, Detective Robert Moore’s dog, Sally, was stabbed to death. The local vet performed an autopsy (how would the local vet know what to look for?) and recognised that the wounds appeared to have been caused by a knife, single-bladed, serrated — the same type of weapon used in murdering Deanna Moore before she was dumped in the lake. The vet also discovered on Sally’s fur a substance, of which he sent a sample to forensics. Brigitte flicked forward a few chapters. The sample matched the substance found on Deanna Moore’s body: linseed oil. Other similarities were identified, and, from the wound pattern, the killer must have been left-handed.

She flicked back to the start, to the first time Moore had fired a gun. Left-handed. Too obvious, Matt: Moore killed his own wife and dog. The kids would be next. And then he could be with Annaleah, but he’d get caught first.

Ella came in for a good-morning cuddle, and Brigitte returned the book to the drawer. Coincidence, coincidence, coincidence. She’d kill Tate if he told Aidan about this.

On the way to work, she took a detour past Jeremy’s house in Gravelly Point Road. It was indeed gravelly out there, and the X-Trail was covered in dust. She lifted her sunglasses and double-checked the address Harry had written on a scrap of paper.

Amid wild grasses, heath, and tea-tree, on a neat green clearing, stood a brown weatherboard house with white window frames, doorframes, and lattice. She’d had Jeremy pegged as a brick-house kind of guy, but she actually knew nothing about him. Was he single? Divorced? Or was there a wife or girlfriend — or boyfriend — to tend the pink flowers in his garden? Did he have kids?

She heaved the twelve-kilo bag of dog biscuits out of the car, bending her knees, careful of her back. She struggled up the path and dropped the bag on the doorstep. The doorbell wasn’t working, so she knocked. No answer. Jeremy must be working. No wife, girlfriend, or boyfriend home either.

She smiled sadly at the noise of a puppy yapping, but couldn’t stickybeak over the fence because a stack of broken plasterboard ceiling panels was in the way. It sounded as though the yaps were coming from next door anyway — perhaps the neighbour looked after his dog while Jeremy was at work.