Not all the adults who answered the phones were sober.

After hanging up, he swung by the two homes where a missing child might not immediately be noticed or reported. Catching sight of a teenager’s lanky form through the open window of one, and spotting the other sitting safely on the back stoop of her home sneaking a cigarette, Will continued on his way. He felt no surprise when a ­low-­slung car with its headlights off fell in behind him as he turned into his own street.

Kyle Baker didn’t like being told no.

Halting the police vehicle in the middle of the otherwise empty road without warning, Will got out and pointed a flashlight directly at the driver’s seat of the car sitting on his bumper. Kyle jerked up a hand to block the glare before backing up and screeching into a U-­turn to head back the way he’d come.

The rest of Will’s drive home was unremarkable.

Once inside, he made himself a cup of coffee, then opened Miriama’s journal. This time, he read sequentially, his focus no longer on discovering the identity of her lover.

Many entries were simple descriptions of her day, or of something she’d seen that had caused her to pull out her camera, but she’d also filled the pages with dreams. Of travel, of passionate love, of creating a better life for her children than she’d had herself.

I love Auntie, but I’ve always missed having a mother. A proper one. One who’d take me shopping for my school shoes, and teach me how to cook and put on makeup.

Auntie did a lot of that, and I’d never disrespect her by saying how much I wanted my ­mother—­except without the drugs and the ­men—­but it’s a hole inside me, that need. I can’t ever have a real mother, but I can be one. I’m going to have babies and I’m going to do all those things with them. Not just yet, not before I’m ready and strong enough to take care of a child, but one day.

It was months later that she mentioned the topic ­again—­after her breakup with Vincent, and soon after she’d begun to see Dominic.

I asked Dominic if he wants children. It’s a scary question so early into a relationship, but it’s important to me. I can’t be with a man who doesn’t want to build a family.

He said yes. His face glowed because I was talking about our future. I asked him if he’d be okay with it if we had four ­kids—­he looked a little petrified by the number, but he said that if that was what I wanted, then he’d figure out how to look after four little ankle biters.

I can see it, see how much I’ll love him one day. Not the way I love the man I shouldn’t, but in the way of a dear friend. Dominic will never hurt me, never treat my dreams as anything other than important.

We’ll create a family, and we’ll be happy.

Dominic turned up again several ­pages—­and a couple of ­weeks—­later.

Dominic made me a picnic today. I asked him how he had the ­time—­I know he’s busy at the clinic. He admitted that he’d asked Auntie to help him, and it was so cute, the way he blushed.

The other day, I wrote that I’d never love Dominic the way I do someone who’ll never be mine, but when he does things like this, when he treats me so ­wonderfully… I think my feelings for him will grow and grow. I’m so glad to know that. I never want to hurt Dominic. I’m going to be the best wife. I’m going to make him so happy.

And I’m going to leave this town. Leave the man for whom I broke God’s commandments. Leave the memories of his smile and his kisses and his promises. I’m going to fly free and I’m not going to look back.

42

Anahera spent hours thinking while Nikau snored in his drunken sleep.

Sometime in the midst of it, she took out the card that Jemima had given her and sent the other woman a quick email asking if Jemima was free for coffee midmorning the next day.

The answer was waiting for her when she woke:

Ten o’clock will be perfect. Vincent has to fly to Auckland on company business and our nanny has the week off, so the children and I will be alone all day. Vincent won’t get back till after nine tonight.

Anahera found it worrying that the other woman had so deliberately pointed out that her husband wouldn’t be around, but that might just be her suspicious mind at play.

After kicking out a badly hungover ­Nikau—­though she did have mercy enough to give him coffee ­first—­she looked at the work emails she’d been ignoring for weeks. All about her music, music that she’d played for hours and hours and hours the day she saw Edward’s body, so pale and motionless. Like a wax mannequin of the man she’d loved.

She hadn’t played since.

Anahera glanced down at her hands, flexed them. And decided to take Pastor Mark up on his offer.

The church door was open as always, the pews empty and the interior cold. Exposed timbers arched above her head, while the floor beneath her feet was worn down by the passage of thousands of feet over tens of years. No fancy stained glass for this church on the edge of nowhere, but the quiet within was as profound as in the greatest cathedrals in Europe.

Sitting down at the old piano, she lifted the ­lid… and put her fingers to the keys.

It was the sound of tears that brought her back to earth. Letting the notes fade, she looked at the pews to see that she had an audience of three. The pastor, Evelyn Triskell, and a man with a ­sea-­battered face she thought might be the uncle of Tania Meikle’s husband. “Thank you for getting the piano tuned.” She knew it must’ve been done for her.

“Ana, dear, what a gift you’ve given us in return.” Pastor Mark patted Evelyn’s shoulder.

Sniffing, the older woman looked at Anahera with ­red-­rimmed blue eyes. “You play with such sadness. It breaks my heart.”

What could Anahera say? In this house of God where anger seemed a sin and forgiveness was cherished. “I played my ­first-­ever nocturne on these same keys.” She ran her fingers across them, the touch featherlight.

The man who might’ve been related to the Meikles said, “Will you play more?”

So she did.

Her hands ached by the time she left for the Baker estate, and the sun had banished any lingering clouds, the sky a crisp blue. Jemima had messaged her to say she’d leave the gate open. As a result, Anahera didn’t have to stop at the foot of the drive. The landscape looked far different in bright sunlight than it did in the moody gray that so often swathed the area.

Sunshine glimmered and glinted on the dewdrops that had survived the morning sun, and speared through the green of the leaves to turn them translucent, and she could hear the distinctive song of the tuis with their white ruffle at the throat and iridescent black feathers.

Sometimes, Anahera could imagine no more beautiful place in the world.

Other times, she wondered why she’d come back to a place she’d always wanted to escape. Maybe it had never been about the place at all.

She’d seen him in town as she drove through, the man who called himself her father. He’d seen her, too, had paused on the sidewalk, as if expecting her to stop.

Anahera hadn’t stopped, would never stop for that man.

It was only as she was about to reach the top of the Baker drive that she realized while Vincent was gone, Kyle might well be home. If that turned out to be true, hopefully Jemima would either usher him out or he’d stick to a distant end of the house.