Free Marriage & the Mermaid (Hapless Heroes) by Louise Cusack

anything,” he said, “I’ll get her to phone you.”
    Moore nodded and pulled a card from his pocket. “Use the mobile number,” he said, then turned to Venus. “Thank you, Miss Dalrymple. I appreciate you seeing me.”
    Venus nodded, then laid back on the bed and closed her eyes as though she truly was exhausted, and perhaps it wasn’t a stretch to pretend that. Baz left her to sleep and walked Moore out, closing the bedroom door behind them. Once outside the guest suite, he fumbled for the key, then realised Moore was watching him, perhaps wondering, now that he’d seen how gorgeous Venus was, why she was locked in.
    Baz dropped the key back into his pocket and left the door unlocked, hoping he wasn’t going to regret that.
    They found Waikeri in the kitchen where Ted was wreaking havoc.
    Saucepans of water boiled over on the big gas stove and it looked like half the contents of the walk–in pantry were lined up on the long oak servery. The big Maori had settled in at the kitchen table with the remnants of a bowl of potato crisps, a packet of chocolate biscuits and three empty bottles of cola lined up in front of him.
    “Damn, Elsie…” Ted muttered from inside the pantry.
    Moore propped himself against a servery while Baz turned the hotplates off and walked over to the open pantry door. “Dad, what are you doing?”
    “Looking for coffee,” Ted snapped over his shoulder, then went back to moving bottles of preserved fruit around. “Thank God Elsie left. She hid things, I’m sure. This new housekeeper will be much better.”
    “When she’s up and about,” Baz said. “She almost drowned this morning, remember, so we’ll give her a day to recover, at least.” During which time Baz planned to find out a whole lot more about her. “In the mean time…” He took Ted’s arm and drew him out of the pantry. “… I think you should try to remember where things are, dad. The coffee is over here.” He led his father to the corner of the servery where the kettle and the coffee, tea and sugar fixings were kept. “You put water in the kettle if it’s low, then pop it back on its cradle to boil.”
    “Lovely,” Ted said, smiling. “You get the cups and the tray. We’ll have tea in the library.”
    “Actually, we have to go, Mr Wilson,” Moore said from the corner. “Vigo Skeyne is arriving tomorrow and we need to get ready for the media circus that comes with him.”
    Waikeri shot his partner a scathing glance. “But Ted has ice–cream —”
    Ted slapped his hands together in delight, “The shark hunter!” Tea apparently forgotten. He turned to Baz. “I’ve seen Skeyne on the television. He catches Great Whites. The big ones.”
    “This is a big one,” the blond constable said quietly, clearly not sharing Ted’s enthusiasm. “That’s why we have to go.” Baz noticed the younger policeman shooting his superior a hurry–up glance. Which was odd. Why would a lowly constable be bossing a sergeant around?
    But the big Maori did as he was urged, lumbering out of his seat and spilling potato crisps across the floor in the process. “Thanks for the snack, Ted,” he called, then nodded to Baz, “Wilson. We’ll see ourselves out.”
    Moore walked over and held open the swinging kitchen door, letting Waikeri through first.
    Ted glanced up from the sink where he was fiddling with the lid of the kettle and said, “I’ll walk them to the door.”
    Baz saw his father wink, as if signaling to one of the men, then he toddled off behind them in his tartan slippers. The polished timber door swung shut behind them and Baz frowned at it. He would have sworn they were all strangers when his father had met them at the door. Now everyone seemed so… familiar. Had his father forgotten who they were, and now he remembered? Or was something else going on?
    Baz turned off the tap his father had left running and followed them into the hallway. He passed the guest suite silently, making a note to himself to