Exiles (Aaron Falk #3)(73)

“Listen.” He spoke before he could stop himself again. “It’s hard to see detail in daylight.” He tapped his own phone and held it out. “That’s my number. Send me the video and I’ll take a proper look later.”

“Yeah? Great.” Joel swiped at his own screen, and Zara gave Falk a small smile.

Thank you, she mouthed over the boy’s bent head.

Falk nodded, still uneasy, and picked up his cloth. Zara joined him, and together they gave the barrier in front of them a last going-over. They were nearly done, and Falk heard Joel’s phone buzz in his hand.

“Oh. Sorry, it’s just Gemma. I’ll show her what we’ve—” Joel held out his phone and snapped a photo of a stretch of sparkling barrier. He tapped a few words, then lowered the phone, message sent. A minute passed, then two. Then the buzz of a reply. Joel ran his cloth over the last of the markings with one hand and checked the message with the other.

“So, Gemma’s not working tonight and asks if you two want to come to the house for dinner?”

“Sure,” Zara said easily. “What are we having?”

“Lasagna, I think.” Joel looked at Falk. “You?”

He hesitated. “She definitely means both of us?”

“Yeah.” Joel sounded surprised at the question. He held out the message. “She said.”

Ask Zara and Aaron if they want to come back here for dinner. So she had.

“Great, I’m pretty hungry.” Zara was already tidying up the cleaning supplies. “Come along,” she said as she reached out for Falk’s cloth. “Why not?”

Well. There were probably a couple of reasons, he thought. Maybe even good ones. But standing there in the early-evening sun with the invitation right there on-screen, he was struggling to think of them.

“I’m letting my dad know.” Zara got her own phone out and glanced up, fingers poised. “So, you’re in?”

As if there had ever been any real doubt.

“Yeah.” Falk nodded. “I’m in.”





24


Falk couldn’t be certain, but Gemma answered the door fast enough that it was distinctly possible she’d been waiting in the hallway.

“Oh.” Joel blinked as it swung open before he’d had the chance to turn his key in the lock. “Hey. We’re back.” He dumped his backpack beneath a gleaming side table. “This looks nice and tidy.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Gemma said quickly.

The house was a low-slung white weatherboard cottage on a leafy block of land. Falk had followed Joel and Zara from the reservoir up through the bushland on an unmarked but well-worn trail. They’d emerged at the top onto a quiet paved road, much like the one outside the vineyard, and followed it for a few minutes past driveways that each wound their way to a house set back among the trees. Falk had looked at them with curiosity, the windows glowing as the sun dipped lower, turning the sky a deep pink. As the road rounded a bend, Luna barked and ran ahead, up a neat gravel drive lined on either side by tall eucalyptus trees that rustled in the breeze. Home.

“Hello. Come through,” Gemma said now as she stepped back to let them into the hall. She was wearing a casual linen dress with a pattern that reminded Falk a little of the first time they’d met, in the Southbank bar. The high-ceilinged hallway had been painted cream, and a colorful rug covered dark wooden floorboards. A lamp on the side table—which did indeed have a faint telltale aroma of fresh furniture polish—threw out a warm light. Gemma’s eyes met Falk’s in a mirror on the wall.

“I’m glad you could come. I hope you all like lasagna.”

Falk loved lasagna.

The kitchen was bright and airy, with soft music playing from a speaker on a shelf lined with cookbooks. Gemma set them to work putting out plates and glasses and jugs of iced water and a bowl of salad, and then the four of them sat around a large table made from reclaimed wood and served themselves second helpings from the deep dish on a heat mat in the center.

Zara quizzed Falk about the best case he’d ever solved, so he told them his most fun story, about the actor and the casino parking lot and the flat tire and the bricks of money where the spare was supposed to be, and they’d all laughed. They talked about the festival and Gemma said it was going well, on track so far to meet their projections for this year. The kids were thinking ahead to uni. Zara was pretty set on Adelaide the following year, Joel was hoping to be studying in Sydney after the summer. Both he and Gemma seemed confident he’d get into the course he wanted.

Afterward, they loaded the dishwasher and Joel and Zara slunk away to watch something on his laptop in the living room. Falk helped Gemma wipe down the table, then she opened the fridge and put two cold beers on the counter. She peered around the door to where the teenagers were still occupied and nodded to the veranda.

“Do you want to sit outside for a while?”

“Sounds good.”

The night was still warm, and Falk could hear the cicadas chirping in the dark and the music playing softly from the kitchen. The veranda looked over a garden lush with native plants. Beyond lay the bushland, a little darker and deeper, and above, the sky was heavy with stars.

“Well. Cheers.” Gemma pulled up a couple of well-loved outdoor chairs, and Falk sat down next to her. They looked out at the evening, Luna flopped at their feet. “And thank you for helping Joel today. Once again.”