“You shouldn’t. You were a mate, and I… I didn’t mean to make things with you and Tabby worse. I’m sorry.”
“How is little Tabitha?” Maisy asked. “Toby’s been worried sick about her.”
Scott and Noah exchanged another pointed look, and Toby guessed what they were thinking. “Anything you want to say to me, you can say in front of Mais,” he said. “She’s family.”
“Thank you, dahling,” Maisy said, re-filling her champagne flute. “But from what I know about your family, we can do better. So where is Tabitha?”
“No idea,” Scott said heavily. “She’s, uh, missing.”
Toby shoved his chair back so fast that Mopsy barked. “What the fuck? Where?”
“We don’t know?—”
“Why didn’t you fucking say something when you first got here?” he shouted. “We need to be looking for her right now!”
He headed for the stairs. He’d get dressed and go find her this instant; he’d call in every favour he had with every rich cunt he’d ever spoken to and get helicopters in the air; he’d rally his podcast listeners, get them to ostrich march their way from the top of Victoria to the bottom and back again to find her?—
“Stop,” Noah barked, a little of the enforcer returning to his tone. “She’s not in trouble as far as we know. She left a note for the girls saying she needed space and was going to the beach for a while.”
“The beach? Where?”
“We don’t know,” Scott said. “She didn’t say, and her phone’s turned off. She left the morning after she returned from what we now assume was a visit to see you.”
Toby felt his face grow hot. Scott had known all about his crush on Tabby, and despite the tension of the moment, it was still a little embarrassing to have his ex-manager knowing that they’d hooked up.
“We didn’t… nothing happened,” he said, flushing harder. “She was really out of it. Not drunk or anything, just strange. Staring like she couldn’t actually see anything.”
“I believe she was in shock,” Scott said quietly. “She, Sam, and Nicole had just given their mother documents requesting that she not contact them again. Deborah eventually signed them, but she said many things in the interim. Things that seem to have left significant scars on all three girls.”
“Mothers,” Maisy sighed into her champagne. “They do that. Did Tabitha pack much before she left?”
“No. She took off around 3 a.m., sneaking out of her bedroom window, and then she got a cab or an Uber. She and Nicole had a… well, they fought earlier, and things were all rather rushed and heated.”
Noah made a low grumbling sound, and Toby sensed there was something they weren’t saying. Something big. He looked across at Maisy, who narrowed her eyes. “What was the fight about?”
“I don’t think it’s appropriate to discuss that at this point,” Scott said, pure finance PR.
Toby paced across the room. “Did she book a flight? Is she still in Australia?”
“We think so. Sam found her passport in her room. Although knowing Tabby…”
Toby’s stomach twisted. Yes, knowing Tabby, having a fake passport, or leaving behind a fake passport as a decoy wasn’t out of the question.
“Which is why we’ve come to see you,” Scott said. “Well, one of the reasons. We assume you’re not hiding her under a dresser somewhere?”
“No,” Toby said heavily. “I haven’t seen her since that night.”
“Yes, we thought so. And do you have any idea where she might be?”
“She was talking about… Colombia,” Toby said. “But that was a while back, and if she doesn’t have her passport?”
“I don’t think she’s left the country,” Scott said. “It’s just a feeling, but it wouldn’t be like her to vanish. Obviously, it would in some regards, but not to leave her family in such a state with no intention of returning. No, I think she’s by a beach in Victoria somewhere. New South Wales at the furthest.”
“Right,” Toby said, his head heaving with possibilities. Most of Victoria was bordered by coast. She could beanywhere.
“We found this,” Noah said, showing him a photo on his phone.
It was an image of a yellow notepad covered in doodles. There was a beach umbrella, a black minidress, a loaf of bread, an arrow, two parallel lines, and the word ‘Traralgon’ crossed out beside a pair of handcuffs.
