‘Seventeen,’ Clementine said, saving her from the maths.

  ‘So you’ve never been with anyone else?’

  ‘No,’ Clementine said.

  ‘I mean sexually,’ Felicity added.

  After a beat, Dom said, ‘There’s that sound again.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Felicity said. ‘It’s just … you must have wondered.’

  ‘Wondered?’ Clementine repeated.

  Cole flushed bright red.

  ‘What it would be like,’ Felicity said. ‘With other people.’

  Clementine had the unnerving sense that Felicity could see into her brain. Clementine sometimes regretted meeting the perfect man so early, before she’d had the chance to try out some imperfect ones. This might be why she’d secretly watched the video of Dom and Isla together.

  She quickly changed the subject. ‘You’ve done some modelling too, right?’

  Felicity looked mystified. ‘I have?’

  ‘Dom said you were a Target Girl when you were younger.’

  Felicity burst out laughing. ‘Oh! That wasn’t modelling. I was in the circus.’

  It was Clementine’s turn to be confused. ‘The circus?’

  ‘She was a clown,’ Dom said.

  ‘I was promoted to clown when the old clown left,’ Felicity said, ‘but before that I was a target girl. Meaning I’d stand with my back against a target, and the knife thrower would—’

  ‘Holy shit,’ Isla said.

  ‘She’s kidding,’ Cole said. ‘Right?’

  ‘It’s not as dangerous as it looks,’ Felicity said. ‘Ever played darts? Throwing a knife is actually easier, because a knife is heavier—a stray air current doesn’t send it off course. Being a clown was probably more dangerous. The old clown’s unicycle had been assembled wrong, and it fell apart, mid-routine. He broke his spine.’

  Clementine wasn’t sure whether to laugh. Surely this was a joke—a clown with a broken spine was exactly the surreal, morbid humour Felicity favoured.

  Felicity’s eyes twinkled mischievously in the candlelight. ‘I read this article about religious couples,’ she said. ‘Hard-line, not-until-we’re-married couples. Apparently the divorce rate is higher than you’d think, because they’re so sexually inexperienced that neither of them enjoys the act all that much.’

  ‘Not an issue for us,’ Cole said firmly, but Clementine wondered if he was telling the truth. He seemed most comfortable in a servile role, doing whatever she wanted—which was great, except that what she wanted was to make him happy. He was reluctant to articulate his own needs, in the bedroom or anywhere else, which sometimes made Clementine worry she wasn’t meeting them.

  There was a flash outside the window.

  Clementine leaped up so fast her chair fell over, hitting the tiles with a sharp crack.

  Cole bumped his glass, spilling red wine across the table. ‘What?’

  Clementine was still staring. ‘Did anyone else see that?’

  ‘See what?’

  She jabbed a finger at the glass. ‘Something moved.’

  They all got up and approached the window. But it was so dark they couldn’t even see the trees, just their own reflections.

  ‘I don’t see anything,’ Isla said.

  ‘Could have been a ’roo,’ Cole put in.

  ‘No. It was like a …’ Clementine already felt uncertain. ‘A bright flash.’

  Felicity looked horrified. ‘Like a camera?’

  ‘Or a torch, maybe,’ Clementine said.

  Felicity made her hands into binoculars and held them to the glass. ‘How far away?’

  ‘A long way.’ Clementine squinted into the night. ‘Just a tiny flicker.’

  ‘Probably just car headlights on the highway,’ Dom said.

  Cole frowned. ‘Can’t see the highway from here.’

  ‘Can’t see anything from here,’ Oscar muttered.

  Dom pointed back at the giant, spaceship-like oven. ‘It could have been a reflection from one of those blinking lights.’

  Clementine doubted that, but she said, ‘I suppose.’

  Oscar laughed nervously. ‘Well, nice to have a bit of excitement.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Felicity gave Clementine a thoughtful stare.

  ‘I’m not making it up,’ Clementine said.

  ‘Of course not!’ Cole sounded shocked. ‘No one’s thinking that.’

  But Felicity was. Clementine could tell.

  Dom clapped his hands together. ‘Cole—did I see you put a pavlova in the fridge?’

  For the rest of the night, no one mentioned what Clementine had seen. Thankfully, they didn’t bring up her sexual history either, or the lack of it.

  After the drinking, the dessert, the drinking, the clearing of plates, the drinking, the loading of the dishwasher, and the extra drinking, Clementine announced, ‘I’m going to bed.’

  ‘Already?’ Dom said, his voice too loud in the room, like the alcohol had half-deafened him.

  ‘Yes. We only have three days here—I don’t want to be tired the whole time.’

  Cole squeezed her hand. ‘I’ll be up in a minute.’

  She kissed the top of his head, then walked out.

  ‘I’m going to the bathroom,’ she heard Felicity say, then the younger woman followed her into the corridor.

  Clementine walked a little faster. Felicity breezed past the bathroom and caught up to her at the bottom of the stairs.

  ‘Wait up,’ she said.

  Clementine sighed. ‘I don’t want to talk about this.’

  Felicity lowered her voice. ‘You could borrow him.’

  Something prickled at the back of Clementine’s neck. ‘Sorry?’

  ‘My husband,’ Felicity said. ‘You can’t keep him. But if you wanted to try him out for a night, he’d be keen. And I wouldn’t mind.’

  She turned away and strutted towards the bathroom. Clementine gaped after her.

  Felicity looked back, and winked. ‘Everyone should try a man like that, at least once,’ she said, and slipped through the doorway, out of sight.

  NOW

  KIARA

  It’s Saturday morning. Elise has thrown some clothes into a battered suitcase with no apparent consideration for the weather, and left to take Guppy to the kennel. Kiara stands in front of the wardrobe, a hanger in each hand.

  This was supposed to be a relaxing minibreak, so she’d like to take her hiking clothes and walking shoes. But she’ll need at least one suit, because she’ll have to drive straight to work after dropping Elise off on Monday morning. And Elise made it clear that visiting a crime scene isn’t her idea of a holiday. She only agreed to come because Kiara needed help with the case. That makes it a work trip, so she should only pack suits. Sighing, Kiara puts the walking clothes back in the closet—then changes her mind and packs them into the suitcase. Defiantly, she adds an avocado-green scarf. She still can’t find her lucky ring, but she puts on a couple of silver bangles for extra sparkle.

  Kiara makes a cup of tea while she waits for Elise to return. As the kettle hisses, she picks up an Aldi catalogue off the bench, then tells herself she doesn’t need a standing desk or an electric bike and tosses the catalogue into the bin.

  Moving the catalogue has revealed one of Elise’s bank statements on the bench. Elise is like that: she leaves jumpers on the couch, reading glasses on piles of books, and coffee mugs everywhere. This isn’t always unpleasant—even when she’s not here, Kiara feels surrounded by her.

  As the rumble of the kettle becomes a roar, Kiara’s gaze falls on a particular line. Cash withdrawal. $800. That’s the largest sum Elise’s bank will dispense from an ATM in a single transaction.

  On a hunch, Kiara turns the page and sees another eight-hundred-dollar withdrawal from the previous week. And then another, the week before that. Has someone stolen Elise’s card? But no—the other transactions are legit. There’s her hairdresser, and the pet store, and the meal they shared at Kingo’s.

  Kiara remembers seeing Elise walk past the real estate agency when she was supposed to be at the hospital. There’s an ATM nearby.

  She thinks of the mysterious calls to Elise’s phone. Kiara has been assuming it’s the sort of harassment Elise is often subjected to, but what if it’s not? What if someone in town is blackmailing her?

  Kiara checks Elise’s account balance. She had less than four thousand left in savings when this statement was printed. In Kiara’s experience, blackmailers ask for more and more until their victim is cleaned out. Elise isn’t far off.

  The door opens. Kiara drops the statement and snatches up the kettle, so fast she burns the pad of her thumb.

  ‘Hey, babe.’ Elise comes in, brandishing a running magazine. ‘Got some holiday reading. Are you good to go?’

  Kiara looks for signs that Elise has been somewhere other than the kennel and the newsagency. She seems out of breath—why, if she drove? The newsagency and the kennel are in opposite directions, so maybe she dropped Guppy off, brought the car back and then ran to get the magazine. That would fit with the amount of time she’s been gone, but what about her sore knee? And why did she go to the newsagency before they left for the mountain, instead of making a stop on the way?

  ‘What’s up?’ Elise asks.

  Kiara realises she’s been looking at her partner the same way she looks at suspects. She can’t go on like this.

  ‘Nothing.’ She pours the hot water into the travel mug. ‘Let’s go.’

  The mountain is formidable—Elise’s little Suzuki is unlikely to make it to the top. Kiara asks Elise to drop her off at the mechanic’s, waving as her partner zooms off to park behind the railway station where the car will be safe over the weekend. Or, at least, that’s where she says she’s going.

  ‘How’s my Navara, Bill?’ Kiara asks as she walks in.

  He holds out her key with oil-blackened fingers. ‘I have good news and bad news.’

  She isn’t sure she can handle any more bad news. ‘Go on.’

  ‘The bad news is that the Blu Tack didn’t hold.’

  ‘What Blu Tack?’

  Bill peers over his glasses at her. ‘Or chewing gum. Whatever it was you used to plug the hole in your coolant tank. It’s completely dry.’

  ‘I didn’t try to fix my car with Blu Tack, Bill,’ Kiara says.

  ‘Well, whichever clown you hired last time did. Next time, come to me, eh?’

  ‘What hole are you talking about?’

  ‘There was a crack at the bottom of the coolant tank. Could have happened a while ago, I suppose—you wouldn’t notice it if you were just driving to the shops and back. But I’ll tell you what, you wouldn’t have made it up that mountain.’

  Kiara’s heart sinks. ‘How did it happen, the crack?’

  ‘Beats me. You weren’t mucking around in there with a screwdriver, were you?’

  ‘No. Can you fix it?’

  ‘A part like that has to be replaced rather than fixed, and usually you’d be waiting a couple of weeks to get one. But that’s the good news—I had a spare tank on hand from a Nissan that was written off last Tuesday. It’s installed, filled, and ready to go.’

  ‘Wow. Thanks, Bill.’

  He looks pleased with himself. ‘No worries.’

  ‘How much do I owe you?’

  He smiles. ‘Nothing. Just promise me you ladies will have a nice time.’

  She opens her mouth to tell him she can’t accept that, because she’s a cop—and because it’s creepy. Then she hesitates. ‘You ever seen a cracked coolant tank before?’

  ‘After a crash, sure. But not in an undamaged vehicle. Why?’

  ‘And your first thought was that someone might have done it with a screwdriver? And then tried to fix it with Blu Tack?’

  ‘Well, yeah. That’s what it looked like.’

  ‘Can you show me the crack?’

  He leads her to a blue wheelie bin at the back of the garage. Rummaging through blackened paper towels, he eventually pulls out a plastic cylinder that reminds Kiara of the vaporiser her dad used to set up in her room whenever she had a cold.

  ‘See?’ Bill points to the crack at the bottom.

  She examines it. There are scratches on either side, as though someone stabbed it a few times before breaking through. ‘What’s right next to the coolant tank?’

  ‘The brake fluid reservoir. Why?’

  A chill runs down her spine. ‘Show me that.’

  He pops open the bonnet of the Navara, and points. The reservoir looks a lot like her new coolant tank. She can easily imagine someone trying to sabotage her brakes and wrecking the tank instead, particularly if they were working in the dark. But why would they try to fix it afterwards?

  Bill’s police training finally comes back to him. ‘You’re not thinking someone did this on purpose?’

  ‘That’s exactly what I’m thinking.’ Kiara is already running a mental list of recently paroled criminals. The home addresses of police officers are kept secret, but Warrigal is a small town. Her house wouldn’t be hard to find, and the Navara is usually in the driveway, unguarded.

  ‘Well, for starters,’ says Bill, ‘that would never work in real life. You’d notice the brakes weren’t working as soon as you backed out—you’d crash into your own letterbox at about two kilometres per hour, and that would be it. No one could kill you that way.’

  ‘Maybe it was a warning, then.’ Kiara peers into the engine, as though it’s a criminal’s brain. ‘Someone trying to scare me off a lead.’

  ‘Is there much mafia activity in Warrigal?’ Bill asks doubtfully. ‘Because unless you’re a major organised crime group, threatening a cop just gets you arrested quicker. It’s a dumb plan.’

  ‘Well, I know some dumb crooks.’ As Kiara turns back to the broken coolant tank, something else occurs to her. ‘If they’d punctured the brake fluid rather than the coolant—’

  ‘They didn’t,’ Bill says.

  ‘Say they did. Would the Blu Tack have held?’

  ‘Not for long. We’re talking about a lot of pressure. If you were going slow and tapped the brakes you’d probably be okay, but …’ He seems to realise what he’s saying.

  ‘But if I was going fast, and braked hard?’

  Bill has gone pale. ‘You should call this in.’

  ‘Hi, Bill.’ Elise strolls into the garage, back from the railway station. She puts her arm around Kiara’s waist. ‘Call what in?’

  ‘Your girlfriend’s car,’ Bill tells her. ‘It’s been—’

  ‘Fixed,’ Kiara interrupts, slamming the bonnet. ‘Thanks, Bill.’

  Bill looks at the two of them. ‘But shouldn’t we—’

  ‘No.’ Ignoring Elise’s suspicious look, Kiara gets out a credit card. ‘How much do I owe you?’

  ‘Nicer than I expected,’ Elise says, getting out of the Navara.

  ‘What were you expecting?’ Kiara asks.

  ‘Dunno. Broken windows, cobwebs, maybe a weather-vane. A haunted mansion vibe.’

  Kiara is a little offended that Elise thinks she’d invite her to a place like that. Then again, ‘murder house’ would conjure that image for most civilians. Police know homicides happen more often than not in well-lit, friendly looking dwellings.

  Kiara can’t get the ATM withdrawals out of her head, but can’t ask Elise about them without implying she’s hiding something. Kiara spent the whole car ride up the mountain talking warmly about other things, hoping Elise might open up. But Elise seemed distracted, staring through the windscreen at the forbidding peaks ahead.

  ‘Guess we should take a look inside?’ Elise says.

  ‘Guess so.’

  Kiara slips past her to get in first. It’s cold in the hallway. One of the doors leading to the back deck has been left ajar, maybe to help flush out the odour. It hasn’t worked—Kiara can still smell death in the place. Maybe she’s imagining it. She switches on the extractor fan in the kitchen and runs to check the bedrooms. They’re clean, thank God. Jennings has collected all the evidence tags, and there’s no blood or fingerprint powder anywhere. The crime scene scrubbers did their job.

  Elise enters behind her, looking amused. ‘Clearing the rooms for me, Officer Lui?’

  Kiara smiles. ‘Of course, Madam President.’ She opens some windows to flush out the bad air.

  Elise crosses her arms. ‘Are you crazy? It’s freezing out there.’

  ‘It’s mountain air. It’s good for us.’

  ‘Even Canberra wasn’t as bad as this.’

  ‘Okay, okay.’ Kiara closes the windows.

  She paid for the same luxury package Dom did, so Basking’s cleaner was supposed to leave a welcome hamper on the kitchen bench, with crackers, olives and quince paste. But the bench is bare. Kiara pulls out her phone to call Basking about the missing hamper, then remembers there’s no coverage up here.

  ‘Do you have reception?’ she asks Elise, who’s with a different carrier.

  Elise checks. ‘Nope.’

  So Kiara can’t complain to Basking about his cleaner. She would feel bad about doing that anyway—during the interview, Chantelle seemed overworked, underpaid and exhausted. At least the black spot means Elise can’t be harassed over the phone, which was the point of the trip.

  They walk through the house together, Elise checking out the two downstairs bedrooms and the bathroom in between. A rat or a possum is scratching inside the walls. Kiara pretends not to hear, hoping Elise won’t notice.

  When they go upstairs, Kiara sees the door she kicked in has been fixed so perfectly that it’s as if she’s gone back in time. She has the surreal feeling that when she opens it, she’ll find Mrs Kelly pointing a knife at her husband.

  She goes in. The room is empty.

  On the night of their argument, Kiara realised that coming here might upset Elise rather than relax her. It’s only now dawning on Kiara that it might mess with her own head, too.

  She notices a faint whistling from the ceiling. Looking up, she spots the hole she thought was from a champagne cork. Now she sees a trailing wire—a light fitting must have been removed. Luckily, the big windows brighten the room.

  Elise admires the view. ‘Wow. How much of this is part of the property?’ She gestures at the endless expanse of trees.