‘There’s chocolate mousse,’ she said tightly, and dumped it on the table with a slap that would, if she’d been waitressing at the Ritz, have got her the sack before she could have blinked. Which was just what she wanted. She wanted to be dismissed. She felt young and country-bumpkin frumpish and she even wanted Ryan to go home. Just get them both out of here.
She ate one spoonful of chocolate mousse-funny that Jack liked it because as far as Abbey could tell it tasted like mud-and then the phone rang.
Thank heaven for phones. Only this time the thought was inappropriate.
Abbey lifted the receiver and it was Marg Miller.
‘Abbey… Abbey…’
Chocolate mousse, Felicity-even Ryan-forgotten, Marg Miller suddenly had Abbey’s full attention. There was no mistaking the terror flooding down the line.
‘Marg, what is it? No! Marg, you need to stop crying. Take your time. Three deep breaths and then say what’s wrong.’
Abbey waited while the ragged breathing steadied. When Marg spoke again, at least Abbey could understand her.
‘Abbey, it’s Ian. He came home last night. From Sydney. Abbey, he looks just awful…’
‘He’s ill?’
‘Yes, but… Not ill… I mean… Abbey, he’s gone…’
‘Is he dead?’
The shock tactic worked. Marg gave a terrified gasp and then steadied. When she spoke again her voice was almost calm.
‘Abbey, I just don’t know.’
‘Is he there with you?’ Abbey had visions of a heart attack now. Ian dead on Marg’s kitchen floor. She cast an urgent glance at Ryan, who was rising to his feet. She had Ryan’s total attention, as Marg Miller had hers.
‘No. He’s not. Abbey, that’s just it. I don’t know…’
‘Marg, what is it that you’re afraid of?’ Abbey demanded harshly, making her voice as authoritative as she could. ‘Quickly. Just say. I can’t help unless you do.’
Silence.
And then Marg’s voice, breaking with sobs again.
‘Abbey, he came home just miserable. He’d hardly speak to me. Just went to bed and stayed there. Today he went out for a walk. He walked for ages and when he came home he seemed… well, odd. But he wouldn’t say what was wrong. Then tonight… I had to go out to a CWA dinner and Ian said just go. He said I mustn’t stay home because of him.
‘So I went but when I got there I started thinking-you know when you think there’s something really, awfully wrong but you don’t know what? And I came home. But he’s not here. Abbey, there’s a note on my bed, saying goodbye. And he’s sorry. And… and his car’s gone and… Abbey, I know this is stupid but so is the hose I keep by the kitchen door. Abbey, he wouldn’t… You don’t think…? He wouldn’t-’
‘What’s he driving?’ Abbey snapped.
‘A red Corolla.’
‘Licence number?’
‘Abbey, I don’t know.’ Marg’s voice broke into a wail and Abbey clipped it off fast.
‘OK, Marg. Ring your sister. Tell her to come over and be with you.’ Marg’s sister lived on the adjoining property, Abbey thought thankfully, and Annette was a sensible woman who could be relied on in an emergency. ‘I’ll contact the police to get things mobilised, and I’ll be right there.’
‘You don’t think… Abbey, if I’m being stupid…’
‘Marg, do you believe Ian intends suicide?’
There was a sharp, horrible pause.
‘Yes, I do,’ Marg said bleakly. ‘I don’t know why but, God help us, Abbey, yes, I do: Please, Abbey, hurry.’
‘I’m coming.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
RYAN came with her.
It took three minutes before they were in Abbey’s car, heading for the Miller property, and by then Abbey felt like all the wind had been pushed right out of her. If there was one thing Ryan Henry could do, it was mobilise help in an emergency.
He organised Jack while Abbey contacted the police. By the time Abbey was off the phone she knew there was no way Felicity would look after Jack. Abbey would never have thought of asking it of her but Ryan knew no qualms. He asked but he got nowhere. Felicity took herself off in Ryan’s car, clearly appalled that Ryan felt the need to get involved. Abbey heard her talking angrily while she was waiting for the police sergeant to answer his mobile phone.
‘For heaven’s sake, Ryan, this is none of your business. These people have nothing to do with you.’
Ryan didn’t respond to Felicity’s anger at all. ‘I’ll see you later, Felicity,’ Ryan said flatly. ‘I’ll go over the road and find the girl who looks after Jack…’
Their voices faded out of range and Abbey blocked Felicity’s anger out of her mind. She simply didn’t have time to think about it.
She rang the ambulance as well as the police, asking the officers to take the vehicle out to the Millers’.
‘I hope I’m overreacting here,’ she said to herself. ‘I hope Marg’s overreacting.’
But Marg Miller was a sensible, unemotional woman who’d buried a husband and raised a family of six on her own, and Abbey had never known her to panic before.
With a sinking heart, Abbey slipped off her dress, hauled on jeans and a sweatshirt and emerged to find Marcia had already arrived from over the road. Ryan was a mover and shaker if anyone was. The next thing Abbey knew they were turning out of the driveway, with Ryan at the wheel of her car.
‘Tell me where to go, Abbey,’ Ryan said curtly.
‘Just straight north.’ She paused. ‘You know the Miller farm?’
‘I think so. Off Palm Road.’
‘That’s the one.’ Abbey frowned. ‘It’s not much use us going there, though. Ryan, where would you go if you took off in your car from the Millers’ with a piece of rubber hose, and suicide in mind? You’d need a spot where no one would find you until morning.’
‘Mmm.’
There was silence while the little car cut through the night. Outside was still and warm and starlit. It was a lovely night. Hardly a night for ending your life.
‘Ryan… when I asked for your help with Mrs Miller and told you I thought there was something wrong with Ian… did you contact him?’ Abbey said diffidently into the darkness. She tried as hard as she could to make her voice non-judgemental but it still came out badly. And Ryan heard it
‘No.’
‘Oh.’
Silence.
‘Hell,’ Ryan said at last. ‘I didn’t see the need. It was none of my business. I rang his mother like you asked.’
‘And?’
‘And she said she was worried about Ian’s health. So I told her to have him make an appointment with you or Steve or me next time he was home. Or see his own doctor in Sydney.’
‘Just like he would if he had a sore throat,’ Abbey said softly.
‘How the hell was I to know he was suicidal?’
‘You weren’t to know that,’ Abbey agreed. ‘I should have rung myself.’
‘Abbey, Ian’s health is none of our business.’
‘No. Like Felicity said…’
‘Abbey…’
‘Just shut up, Ryan,’ Abbey said, in a voice that dragged. ‘You’ve changed from the Ryan I knew and loved. I don’t think I know you any more, but I guess it doesn’t matter. It’s not us that’s important here. Just… just think about where Ian would go.’
‘Thomlinsons’.’
Ryan’s voice three minutes later, cutting across the silence, made Abbey jump. Her mind had been racing in a million directions, and she didn’t like where she ended up each time. How long had Ian been away? Marg hadn’t known. How long had he had to carry out what he intended?
‘Pardon?’
‘Thomlinsons’,’ Ryan said heavily. ‘You must know the place, Abbey. The cove where we swam out to rescue old man Thomlimson’s crayfish?’
Abbey frowned. And considered.
The Thomlinsons ran a derelict property just north of the Millers’. The ground on the Thomlinsons’ place was rough and hilly, giving way to mountains behind. From the foot of the mountains the land turned into uncultivated wilderness.