‘She’s probably annoyed with her husband or her mother for taking the baby out of the house without asking her permission, or at least informing her,’ Ian suggested, when Geraldine arrived home that evening and told him about the interview.

‘To be fair, there’s no way anyone should have removed the baby from the house like that without letting her mother know,’ she agreed. ‘It’s a cruel thing to do. But what I don’t understand is why she didn’t at least try to contact her family before coming to report the baby missing.’

Ian frowned. ‘If you ask me, the mother’s deliberately creating a fuss to make them feel guilty.’

‘That’s harsh,’ Geraldine replied. ‘But in any case, let’s hope you’re right and she’s panicking unnecessarily, and her baby will be found with the father or grandmother.’

‘And now, let’s forget about work and focus on what you’re going to make for my dinner tonight,’ Ian said, grinning.

‘I hadn’t thought about it.’

‘Well, why don’t you leave it to me?’

‘If you’re sure?’

‘I just need to pop out for a few things and then I’ll make you an unforgettable curry.’

‘Is it a threat or a promise?’

Geraldine sat on the sofa in her living room, and not long afterwards the front door closed and she heard Ian humming to himself in the kitchen. He brought her in a large glass of red wine.

‘All these years I’ve known you, and I had no idea you could make a curry,’ she said.

He smiled at her. ‘Bev was never happy to spend time in the kitchen unless we had guests,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why really, because when she did cook, when we had her friends or family over, she did a good job of it. But she never wanted to bother when it was just the two of us. So it was a case of necessity, really. If I wasn’t going to starve, and we weren’t going to cripple ourselves financially by eating out every night, which is what she would have preferred, one of us had to learn to cook, and she made it clear it wasn’t going to be her.’

‘Poor you.’

He shrugged. ‘On the contrary, I discovered I enjoy cooking.’

‘It’s a good way to relax and take your mind off things,’ she agreed.

‘Yes. And if it works, you get a decent meal out of it, which doesn’t happen with meditation. So she did me a favour, really.’

‘She certainly did me a favour,’ Geraldine grinned. ‘I don’t know exactly what you’re concocting in there, but it smells wonderful.’

Ian went back to the kitchen where she could hear him chopping and frying and, she suspected, experimenting. She loved Ian and he was happy and, for one evening at least, nothing else seemed to matter.

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