CHAPTER 40

Inside, as the day began to fade, Barb made a cup of tea, warming herself after the frosty end of their conversation. She hoped it would be soon forgotten. She was just being honest, but perhaps there were times when you shouldn’t be, even with your crime-fighting partner.

Of course she didn’t think Seb killed Joe.

She raised her cup to her lips, but stopped halfway. But what if he had? She took her mind back to when she had first shared with Seb her theory that Joe was murdered. Initially, Seb had been unwilling to help. Wasn’t it only when she told him she would approach Homicide that he had changed his mind? What if the reason he was running this investigation was not to discover who had killed Joe (because he already knew), but to keep an eye on her progress? And if she got too close … what then?

Surely not. She was getting paranoid. Or was she? That was the trouble with paranoia. You could never tell how much of it was real. She did get the feeling Seb was holding things back, though. When he had described what happened on Sal’s last night in Sydney, she had got a strong sense he was wasn’t telling her everything.

She slumped into the couch. Who knew what went on between other people’s ears? She had been completely blindsided when Dennis told her he was having an affair. Looking back, however, there were signs. Working late, Saturday afternoon drives on his own, less chatty, never leaving his phone in the living room, experimenting with moussing his hair.

Oh my God! That’s why he had bought new underwear! It was virtually a confession.

She hadn’t wanted to see the signs, hadn’t wanted to believe he was drifting away.

Goodness, the house felt empty. You only really noticed it when you stopped. She had always considered the quietness of Bullford Point a blessing, but when your husband has just left you, some peripheral noise – neighbours, traffic, a plane overhead – wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world.

She would start feeding the birds again. Rosellas provided a lovely soundscape, and looked beautiful. She used to put out seed, and had only stopped when cockatoos started gate-crashing, and Dennis got irritated by their squawking. Well, he wasn’t here to be irritated now. She got up and found some seed in a kitchen cupboard, went outside and spread it on the deck’s wooden railing.

There was no escaping it, she still missed him walking through the door each evening just before six. She was mainly fine during the day, but when it started to get dark … Well, it was natural to feel someone’s absence when you had lived with them for so long. Even when she and Dennis didn’t have anything of great importance to say, which, to be honest, was usually, it was still nice to have someone to say it to. When they weren’t talking, which was also quite often, now she came to think of it, the silence as they ate, read and watched television had always been a comfortable one. Or, at least, it had been to her. Had he found it uncomfortable, even awkward? Had he gone searching for someone else with whom he could share silences of greater comfort?

Her job had always been part-time, dictated more by volume of work than a conscious lifestyle decision, and every week she’d spent plenty of time alone. She had never minded before. Even when the house was empty, it never used to feel empty, not when she knew that just before six he would walk through the door.

She wondered what she really missed – was it Dennis walking through the door every evening just before six, or just knowing that he would?

She wondered what he was like with the new woman, Ellen. Did they bring out the best in each other? Did they have interesting, energetic chats about everything all the time? Were their silences golden? Did they make each other laugh and laugh, like they lived in a sitcom?

Had she and Dennis ever been like that, even in their early days? He had been the accountant who did her first tax return. The day after her appointment she had sat by the phone, trying to think of an excuse to ring him. Eventually she had gone with, ‘Will you be needing the receipt for my bus pass?’ Answer: ‘No.’

Once the return was lodged, she had been ecstatic when he had asked her out. They had got on very well, and more dates followed. He was friendly and good-hearted, the between-the-sheets business worked, and in all the intervening years she had never questioned their relationship, and not once even considered being unfaithful.

Of course they had arguments, but she always knew that soon things would be back to normal and they would be sitting side by side on the deck, sipping tea and reading books, her a murder mystery, him a history of international financial systems. She knew he wasn’t the most interesting person in the world. He was an accountant, for goodness sake. But together they worked.

Or so she’d thought. He obviously had questioned their relationship. In fact, he’d gone beyond asking questions, to finding an alternative answer. With a start, she wondered if he had secretly found her dull for years. You don’t just leap into an affair. Surely they only grew out of months, even years of dissatisfaction and frustration, of wondering whether you might be with the wrong person.

If Dennis wasn’t that interesting, and he had got bored of her, what did that make her?

She shook her head. ‘Enough.’

She got Joe’s laptop and set it up on the coffee table. The next sound file was ‘Sal’s Last Night In Sydney And After.’