“Sure,” she says. “Not like I’m rushed off my feet doing anything else.”
“Be good,” I tell Sunday, and he tilts his head as though butter wouldn’t melt.
Then I send a text.
MEET ME OUTSIDE MY OFFICE.
Quickly followed by another.
PLEASE.
Then a third.
AND HURRY UP.
I am aware that the last text I sent Carter was a smidgen rude, but I think it is important to start any working relationship the way you mean to go on. He pulls up outside the pub in his silly little police car a few minutes later. The thing is spotless, as though he just had it professionally cleaned. I’m sure it didn’t look like this earlier; I can even see an air freshener shaped like a tree dangling from the mirror.
“What took you so long?” I ask through the open window.
“Are you joking?”
“I rarely joke. And I’m not getting in this tin can. I’ll meet you up there,” I say, taking the Vespa keys out of my pocket.
“Meet me where?”
“Spyglass, of course. Do try to keep up.”
“You didn’t say… Never mind. You know that Spyglass is just at the top of the hill?”
“I do know that. I used to own the place, remember? Albeit briefly.”
“What I meant is that we could walk there just as quickly.”
“We could but we’re not going to.”
“I’ve already questioned Harrison Woolf—”
“Yes, but you didn’t ask the right questions. Think about it, Carter. Use that brain of yours. From what I know so far, we have a woman claiming she is the real Eden Fox who has now disappeared. And a woman who you say was the real Eden Fox, who hasalsodisappeared. One of them was lying, we don’t know why yet, but we do know that the common factor in all this is the husband.” I climb onto the scooter. “Meet you there.”
“Let me do the talking,” I say a few minutes later as we crunch along the gravel driveway toward the front door at Spyglass. I notice the bird-shaped knocker has been replaced with a shiny fox headone, and wonder what else the new owners have changed about the place. I feel a little out of sorts and off-balance again just as I’m about to knock on the door, but I do my best to hide it. I don’t know whether it is my health, this situation, or this house causing me to wobble. But I do believe Hope Falls called me back here for a reason. When nobody comes to answer the door straight away I knock again.
A man in his early fifties eventually opens it. He doesn’t look surprised—or happy—to see me. But people rarely smile when they find police officers on their doorstep. I know it’s Harrison Woolf without needing to ask—he looks exactly how I expected him to. I take in the expensive-looking suit, the black shirt and tie, the neat salt-and-pepper hair, the clean-shaven, chiseled chin. He looks well put together, confident, calm. Not exactly how you would expect a man who just possibly lost his wife to look.
“Hello, Mr. Woolf. I’m DCI Olivia Bird. I believe you’ve already had the misfortune of meeting my colleague, Carter, and I wanted to apologize for his conduct earlier today.”
Carter shoots me some serious side-eye, but I ignore him and his hurt feelings and continue with my prepared speech. “It was completely unacceptable for Sergeant Carter to question you the way that he did. I wanted to reassure you that now I am here, nothing like that will happen again. I understand what a difficult time this must be, and going forward we will be putting all of our efforts into finding out what happened to your wife.”
“Thank you,” Harrison says, already starting to close the door.
“Would it be okay if we came in for a moment?”
“I’m actually right in the middle of an important Zoom call for work…”
On the day his wife might have committed suicide.
“That’s okay,” I tell him, sidestepping my way into the house. “It’s a bit chilly out today, we can wait inside until you’re ready.”
He does a terrible job of hiding his irritation and I watch himwrestle with how to respond. Eventually he bites his tongue and says, “Of course. Come on in.”
