A second later, she saw Kyle pull out of the top of the drive in what looked like a Ferrari, the color a lustrous obsidian. Sending her a brilliant smile, he raised his hand in a wave as he headed down while she headed up. Anahera raised hers back, keeping things friendly. If he was a psychopath as Will ­suspected—­and the cop had good ­instincts—­it’d do well not to let Kyle see that she wasn’t taken in by his act.

Parking, she got out and had just begun to walk up the two shallow front steps when the door opened from the inside. Jemima stood smiling on the doorstep. “Oh, you’re here.” A delighted brightness to her, a hint of surprise.

Because Anahera had kept her word?

“Thanks for having me,” Anahera said with a smile of her own, “but I’m starting to feel a little underdressed.” Jemima was wearing a white dress with little red flowers on the fabric, the bodice nipped in at the waist and the ­calf-­length skirt flaring out below. Her hair was ­blow-­dried to perfection, shone under the sunlight.

Vincent’s wife laughed. “Oh, don’t mind me,” said the woman no one seemed to truly know. “I used to dress up even as a little girl. I don’t get much of a chance to do it when in the Cove. I hope you don’t mind.”

“As long as you don’t mind that I’m wearing jeans and a shirt.” She hadn’t bothered to put on her anorak after leaving the church; the sun took some of the bite out of the air.

“You look beautiful.” Jemima’s face glowed. “Come in.”

When Anahera walked into the living room, it was to see two cherubic children playing on the rug in front of the crackling fireplace. “I always get cold,” Jemima said. “The whole house is heated, of course, but nothing beats a fire, don’t you agree?”

“Mama!” The boy held out his arms.

Not hesitating, Jemima went over and picked him up for a cuddle. Not to be outdone, his younger sister asked for the same.

“They’re so competitive at this age,” Jemima said afterward, “but they do play well together. We should be able to talk without too many interruptions.” She showed Anahera to a comfortable seating area in front of wide windows that looked out over the dramatic untamed landscape beyond.

Anahera didn’t immediately sit. “Damn, that’s magnificent.” It came out as a long exhale.

There were no pathways in this part of the bush, no trails for hikers to follow. If you went into the dense growth so thick it turned the world quiet and dark, you did so on your own steam, knowing the wild could swallow you whole.

Jemima came to stand beside her, her perfume a delicate floral note in the air. “It is beautiful, isn’t it?” she said softly.

Anahera turned to look at the other woman’s unsmiling profile. “It must get lonely, though,” she said. “I used to feel that way in London, a country girl lost in the big city.”

“It’s not so much the ­country—­I grew up in a large game reserve. It’s ­that…” She wrapped her arms around herself, her hands cupping her elbows. “Everyone knows each other already and they don’t seem to want to know me.” A glance at Anahera out of the corner of her eye.

“Small towns,” Anahera said. “They have their good points and bad points.”

Releasing her arms to her sides, Jemima nodded. “We’ve witnessed the good over the past few days, don’t you think? People coming together to search for Miriama.”

“The bad, unfortunately, is the insular nature and the gossip.”

They both moved naturally back to the seating area, with Jemima taking the armchair that would allow her to keep an eye on her children while they spoke. On the small table in between them was a fine china tea set and a plate of small, beautifully iced cakes. “It’s not actually tea,” Jemima whispered with a grin that seemed far more real than any other expression Anahera had seen on her face. “It’s coffee. I hope you don’t mind.”

That was the second time the other woman had used those words: I hope you don’t mind. A nervous habit? Or had someone trained her to be uncertain by being constantly irritated or annoyed at her actions?

It was equally possible Anahera was letting her own past color her reading of Jemima Baker.

“Are you kidding?” she said, determined to get to the truth. “I live on coffee.”

Jemima laughed and poured the rich, dark liquid into both cups. “Cream? Sugar?”

“I’ll do it.” Anahera reached for the sugar bowl as she spoke. “We’re ­friends—­or at least I hope we’ll become friends. Friends don’t stand on ceremony.”

Sea green eyes filled with light. “I’m so glad you’re back, Anahera.” Her hand flew to her mouth almost before the last word was out. “I’m so sorry. That was incredibly thoughtless of me.”

Anahera shook her head. “It’s all right. I’ve had time to accept my husband’s death.” Accept his perfidy and his generosity and his betrayal and the love he’d once had for her. Maybe one of these days, she’d even stop being so angry at ­him—­not for the affair, but for dying and leaving her with no target for her grief, her rage.

“Vincent and I saw one of the shows he wrote when it did a run on Broadway,” Jemima said softly. “The one about Jane Austen’s life, with those amazing costumes and that strange, fascinating timeline.”

“That was always Edward’s favorite.” He’d been so happy when it won award after award, such a kid about showing off the statuettes to anyone who came around.

Old affection stirred in her chest, waking from a long sleep. “We flew over to see its Broadway debut, and the whole time, he sat there grinning while holding my hand.” It seemed a memory of two distant strangers. “We traveled constantly in the first year of our marriage. You and Vincent do a lot of travel, too, don’t you?”

“We used to do a lot more.” Jemima held her teacup of coffee on her knee. “But since the children, I prefer to stay in one place for longer periods and Vincent doesn’t seem to mind traveling alone when needed.”

The Anahera who’d sat next to her grinning husband in that darkened theater wouldn’t have caught the bitterness hidden beneath the unexceptional words. But to the Anahera who’d helped her husband’s distraught mistress from his graveside, the acrid taste was as familiar as the knot of anger and resentment and grief in her own chest.

Jemima knew.

43

The question was if she knew only that Vincent had been unfaithful, or if she had the name of the woman who’d become a silent third party in their marriage.

Anahera liked Jemima, but Miriama also had a call on her loyalty.

And the time for lies and rumors was over.

“You can tell me to shove off and mind my own business if I’m crossing a line,” she said, “but I get the feeling you aren’t happy in your marriage.”

Jemima’s face closed over. “That’s a very personal thing to say.”

“Comes from experience.”

Jemima froze in the act of stirring more cream into her coffee. Looking up after several long seconds, she searched Anahera’s face. “Do you usually tell strangers?”