The Problem with Perfect Read online

  She pushed back tears and surveyed the rest of the contents. She wasn’t expecting any case files. Those were going to storage. Legally they needed to be stored for a certain amount of time to meet professional standards, and Aaron, as questionably competent as he was, had arranged for that to happen.

  There were the standard ‘supplies’ people often kept in desks at work: mints, a packet of aspirin, a packet of throat lozenges (he often got sore throats and couldn’t afford to be croaky in court), and some eye drops. He needed to be on form when he was in court, so it wasn’t surprising he kept a few things on hand in case he felt a little under the weather.

  There was one package of pills with no name on them. What were these for? She’d been so shocked when she found out his cause of death. She’d had no indication that anything had been wrong with him, but could these pills be medication he’d been taking? She put them aside.

  Julian had always been particular in his appearance, so unsurprisingly there were a couple of spare ties and a white shirt still in its packaging. A pair of unfamiliar cufflinks were in a box. Spares? She inspected the design. Silver retro-looking aeroplane blades. Most unlike Julian. He rarely bought cufflinks that were considered humorous or quirky. Silver or gold, round or square – that was about the sum of what he owned. Maybe mother of pearl, or onyx, but definitely no cartoon characters or anything sports-related. Perhaps a gift, and he decided to keep them as an emergency pair? She shut the box. He always wore French cuff shirts and hated being without cufflinks. He always said a shirt without cufflinks felt casual.

  There was a bundle of cards – mainly consisting of thank-you cards from clients – nothing particularly of interest. But she would put those aside for Finn to have a look at. None of the names meant anything to her.

  She reached the bottom of the box. Nothing about the apartment. No keys. No paperwork. Nothing. It was as though the apartment didn’t exist. If she hadn’t been inside it, she’d almost believe she’d imagined it. She shoved the items back in the box and replaced the lid.

  Julian had loved his job. Was this all that was left? A box of stationery? She thought of her own desk at work. Most likely the office in complete darkness, Kendall sitting somewhat lonely at her desk, perhaps wearing her runners, knowing Marigold wouldn’t be in.

  This was ridiculous. She should be at work now, not going through a box of Julian’s things. She picked up her phone and called Kendall.

  “What’s going on there?”

  “Nothing.” Kendall sounded bored. Probably was without her there, poor thing.

  “Nothing? Kendall, don’t be silly. There’s always something happening. What’s going on with the Adelaide deal?”

  “I don’t know, Marigold, I really don’t. Your dad has given me some extra paid leave while you’re away, so I’m working part-time at the moment. I’m going to Byron Bay on Tuesday.”

  Extra paid leave? Her father was being rather generous. Or…? A cold hand of doubt crept through her. Was he trying to cut off one of Marigold’s key sources of information, to isolate her further from D-Line? She was beginning to doubt the sincerity of their plan for her to take over the company later in the year.

  “Well,” she cleared her throat. “Byron Bay is lovely and I hope you have fun. Before you go, please find out what you can about the Adelaide deal and text me?”

  Her father could ban her from the building, they could revoke her access, they could send her assistant to the beach, but she’d still find a way to be part of this merger she’d worked so hard on. But how?

  Chapter Seventeen

  Finn

  “She’s fine,” Finn said to Peter. He was sitting in his car outside Marigold’s house. He’d been putting off briefing Peter, but he knew he couldn’t wait any longer.

  “She’s going out?” Peter asked him. “She’s not spending all day at home?”

  “No, she’s going out. She goes shopping, running, to Pilates…” Investigating what her husband was up to. Hiring private investigators.

  Peter might be furious to know what his son-in-law had been up to. Actually, he knew Peter would be furious.

  Would it be easier for Finn to tell Peter about Julian? It would be easier for him, but he couldn’t betray Marigold’s trust like that.

  Why was never anything straightforward with this family? He’d never worked for the person he was meant to be watching for someone else. He felt like a double agent, working for two bosses at slightly cross-purposes.

  Peter’s voice interrupted his ethical deliberations. “Yes, Rose mentioned the Pilates. That’s good she’s trying something new. Thanks, Finn. I want to make sure that there are people around her. Even if she doesn’t know it.”

  “What about friends?” He figured he knew the answer.

  “Marigold has never been much of a friend person.” Peter’s voice was hesitant and careful. As Finn suspected – he’d never seen any great indication of Marigold having close and personal friends. But aside from Simon, he’d never really had a lot of friends either. He was rather fond of his own company too.

  “I understand.”

  “Thank you, Finn.” Peter hung up.

  Finn slipped his phone into his pocket and opened the car door. He walked towards Marigold’s front door and knocked sharply.

  She appeared at the door. “The box arrived from Julian’s assistant,” she informed him and immediately moved down the hallway.

  “Good morning, Ms Doyle,” he said, closing the door behind him.

  He watched as she paused and turned her head towards him. “I didn’t say good morning, did I?” she asked, a frown on her face, causing little worry lines to appear in her usually smooth forehead.

  “No.”

  “Sorry. I’m not good with greetings,” she said, almost ruefully, and continued towards the dining room. “Julian used to tell me that.” She let out a sigh.

  “You’re a busy person.”

  “I used to be, before I was banned from work.” She pointed towards the box sitting on the dining table. “Now I go through boxes looking for clues to find out if my late husband was a drug dealer or an adulterer or maybe a secret agent.”

  “I doubt he was a secret agent.” Julian wouldn’t have lasted two minutes in any sort of training situation. He’d always looked lean, but sort of floppy, almost as though he was being held up by the starch in his shirt collars. He’d have been made mincemeat of at the academy.

  “But you are thinking perhaps a drug dealer or adulterer?” Marigold crossed her arms in front of her.

  “I’ve not formed an opinion yet on what he was doing.” Finn looked over to her polished mahogany dining table with some sort of elaborate candelabra in the middle that looked as if it would house hundreds of candles. A cardboard box, similar to what someone might use in an office to store files, was perched on a fluffy white towel. He looked back at her. “Why’s there a towel under it? Was it wet?”

  “No, but it had been outside.” She gave him an incredulous look. “I eat off that table.”

  He wasn’t surprised that she might be a potential germaphobe. Unsurprising, given the pristine nature of her home. She probably scrubbed it with disinfectant every day, or more likely had someone do it for her.

  Finn walked over to the box, removing his notepad and pen from his pocket. “May I?”

  She waved a hand to indicate approval and he started pulling things from the box. “Do you recognise the names on the cards?” he asked as he flicked through them. They had jumped out immediately. One had a somewhat feminine edge to the handwriting, and only used an initial: S.

  She clasped her hands on her opposite elbows and shook her head. “No, they sound like they’re from clients.”

  “This one’s interesting.” He held up the card from ‘S’.

  “S?”

  “A client, perhaps? It’s thanking him for helping them through a tough situation.”

  Finn read the card again. Something didn’t feel right about it. �
�But to sign it with an initial? How many clients would Julian have in a month, a year?”

  “A lot.”

  “So how would he know who it was, if he had that many cases?”

  Marigold raised a hand to her forehead. “I’m missing so many things, Finn. Of course, you make a good point. That does sound more personal.” She cast her eyes down. “I’m not thinking straight.” She was almost chastising herself as though she’d missed a good hand in a poker game.

  Was she actually in competition with him to solve this thing? He’d had that before, especially when he was a cop. Neighbours or friends who’d watched too many television shows where everyday people solved crimes in their spare time, and they thought they could do the same thing. He once had a well-meaning neighbour who took it upon himself to go through the bins of a homicide victim, and present Finn with the alleged ‘evidence’ of the killer’s identity in neat plastic sandwich bags. A threat to arrest him for tampering with evidence, and a stern warning from Finn, led to that amateur sleuth hanging up his magnifying glass and deerstalker hat.

  But with Marigold, this was highly personal. Of course she was invested. “It’s probably nothing,” he said gently. “It might be someone he has worked with for years, or a repeat client. I’m simply being as cautious as possible in terms of trying to find out anything we can.”

  “But—”

  “But nothing. That’s why I’m here. Fresh eyes, that’s all.” He didn’t want to be patronising or condescending to her. She was too smart – she’d figure that out – but he did want to tell her it was ok not to have all the answers.

  She gave him a weak smile. “Coffee?”

  “Thank you.” He didn’t want a coffee, but it would get her out of the room for a moment so he could look through the box without her eyes over his shoulder. “Black coffee?”

  “That’s how I drink it. Frederick tells me only psychopaths drink black coffee.”

  “And have cold showers.” Finn continued to look through the box as he heard her disappear into the kitchen. “And have an inflated sense of their own abilities.”

  The contents were unsurprising in many ways. Pretty typical of what you would find in most desks in most offices. Some basic over-the-counter remedies for headaches and sore throats. A few spare items of clothing, perhaps in case of long hours or urgent dashes to court; not unexpected in his line of work, where presentation would count.

  “Who bought the ties and the cufflinks?” he asked when Marigold returned with two cups of coffee.

  “I’m not sure. The ties were his favourite brand, so I think he did, but the cufflinks? Hideous, yes?”

  Finn glanced at them. They seemed ok to him, but they clearly weren’t overly expensive or from a high-profile designer that Marigold would likely gravitate towards. “They’re neither here nor there, but do you think he bought them or were they a gift?”

  “They look like a gift.”

  “Did he often receive gifts from clients or colleagues?” he asked, taking one of the cups from her.

  “Sometimes,” she said. “A bottle of wine, or perhaps movie vouchers – that sort of thing. He mostly gave the gifts to his assistant, Aaron, or donated them to a charity.”

  “I’m meeting Aaron later today. I’ll ask him about the cufflinks.” Finn made a note in his notepad. He looked again at the medicines, picked up a bottle of pills that had no identifying label on them, and held them up to Marigold. “What are these? Was Julian taking any medication?”

  She gave a worried look. “I didn’t think so, but I don’t know what these are. Could they be a prescription? But usually something like that would have a label on it with dosage and such information.”

  “I’ll have them tested and find out what they are.” He made another note in his notepad. “I went by the apartment.”

  “And? What did you think?”

  Finn took a sip of his coffee. It was good – perhaps he should get over his fear of those fancy places and buy himself a decent coffee machine. “No-one’s been there for a bit. No signs of anyone other than Julian being there. There was a toothbrush and comb. I can run these for a DNA match to be certain, if you have a comb of his here.”

  Marigold nodded. “I do.”

  “I don’t think that anyone else was there on a regular basis. There were no clothes or belongings to indicate as such.”

  Marigold nodded again. It appeared to be verging on nervous reflex. She was beginning to resemble one of those bobble-head dolls.

  “I spoke to the neighbours. It was mentioned that he often had a wheeled suitcase with him. I couldn’t see it at the apartment. Did he have something like that he used for travel or work?”

  “He had a case he’d use if he had a lot of files or paperwork to transport. It’s upstairs.”

  “Have you looked inside it?”

  “No, I didn’t think to. He didn’t use it all the time.” She sounded defensive. Why was she competitive about this? Maybe she was simply a competitive person. Successful people often were. She’d probably been a nightmare at that private, hoity-toity girls’ school she’d been sent to as a teenager, competing over maths scores or rowing results.

  “We should have a look.” He set down the coffee and looked at Marigold.

  She led him upstairs to a study that was off her bedroom. He glanced over at her room. It was hotel-suite elegant. Stark-white bed linens, a giant padded bedhead and a vase of flowers on the dresser. Everything about her was impeccable. He considered himself neat, but this was a whole new level of OCD neat. Even the quilt cover appeared to have had been smoothed with some sort of roller so as not to leave the impression of a crease.

  It was like the rooms in those home magazines that Zara used to pore over. She’d point to bedrooms and kitchens and whatnot and talk about their plans to do up the home in Canberra they owned together. The home which was later sold, in all its unrenovated 1970s glory.

  “It’s in there,” she said, pointing towards a cupboard.

  He opened it and removed the case, wheeling it out into the light of the room.

  “Did you speak to his neighbour across the hall? The pretty one?”

  Finn noticed the way her voice choked slightly on the word ‘pretty’. Marigold was jealous. Was this her competitive nature rearing its head, or just fear that her husband had been having a relationship with Leonie?

  Either way, he wasn’t going to fall into the trap of saying anything about her appearance. “I spoke to a woman in apartment 208. Leonie.” He unzipped the case.

  “Leonie. Yes, wears activewear when watching television, for some unknown reason.”

  Finn paused. Leonie had been wearing exercise clothes when he saw her too. “Perhaps it’s comfortable.”

  “No, it’s weird. Activewear is for going to the gym, not lounging around your house. What did she say?”

  Marigold was a control freak. Who cared what the woman wore, and for what purpose? He thought Leonie had looked pretty good in the Lycra ensemble. “She’d noticed him come and go, noticed he wore a wedding ring. Never saw anyone with him. Noticed this bag.”

  Marigold made a pfft sound. “You got more out of her than I did.” But her voice changed as she said, “Do you think she and Julian were…?”

  He looked up at her and shook his head firmly. “No. She didn’t know anything about him.” He continued to search through the bag. “There’s nothing in here.”

  “I told you. He only used it when he had a lot of files. Mostly, he kept everything in his briefcase. I’ve already been through that, but you’re welcome to look at it as well.”

  He unzipped another pocket of the bag and removed a couple of slips of paper. “Boarding passes.” He glanced at them. “Sydney.”

  “Sydney?”

  “One is from six weeks ago, the other one month before that.” Finn handed them to her. “Do you remember him going to Sydney?”

  “No.” Marigold took the boarding passes, staring at them before looking back a
t him. “Why had he been in Sydney? And why didn’t he tell me?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Marigold

  Marigold checked the dates for the Sydney trips from the boarding passes Finn had found. She had nothing marked in her diary, and they certainly didn’t ring any bells. Why had he gone up to Sydney without telling her? Given that there were no other nights they were apart, these must have been day trips.

  She tapped her nails against the side of her desk. She should have looked in that bag. She’d have another look through his possessions later. Finn probably thought she was an idiot not to have checked it.

  At least he was making progress. She’d made the right decision to hire him. Unsurprisingly, Active Wear Girl had been a lot nicer to him.

  Must have been the eyes. Finn did have piercing blue eyes, and could probably give a devastatingly charming smoulder when it suited him. She wondered if he had a girlfriend. He didn’t wear a wedding ring, but she’d noticed that some men didn’t. Aside from the fact he’d been a member of the Federal Police, she really knew next to nothing about him personally.

  She knew she wasn’t good at ‘chit-chat’ with people. Julian had been much better at that sort of thing. He’d been more of a people person. She used to call him a bit of a gossip as he seemed to know what the neighbours were up to, but he liked talking to people. He liked to know people’s ‘stories’ as he put it – their experiences, their backgrounds and their interests. Perhaps that was one of the reasons he liked being a barrister.

  Blinking back tears, she moved towards the front door. There hadn’t been a knock or a ring but she’d heard Rose talking, likely on her phone to someone. That wasn’t uncommon – that Rose was on the phone, or that she was heard before she was seen. She was a socialiser.

  Marigold opened the door and waited expectantly for Rose to finish her call, which she did and flung her arms around Marigold. “How are you?” she cooed as she came inside.