Page 26 of Deep Blue Sea

Her sister had landed on her feet, she told herself with a trace of bitterness. The taxi driver had driven her from the ferry arrivals straight to the Giles-Miller Diving School office in Sairee village, and had refused to take a fare after Diana had told him that Rachel was her sister. ‘Rachel Miller, she good people,’ he had said in halting English. She had been even more surprised when she had met a tanned, sexy man in the office – apparently the Giles part of the partnership – whose eyes had opened like saucers when Diana had said her name and asked where she could find Rachel. The protective way he had spoken about her sister had made Diana wonder what the exact nature of their relationship was. If Giles was her personal as well as professional partner, then Rachel was even luckier than she’d thought.

‘Are you alone?’

Diana looked up, startled. She had been so lost in her thoughts, she hadn’t noticed Rachel approach.

‘Yes, I came on my own,’ she said.

‘Where’s Charlie?’

‘Mum and Adam took him back to school last night.’

‘Boarding school?’

‘Harrow.’

‘Figures,’ said Rachel, pulling up a chair, but only perching on the edge, as though she might jump up and run at any moment. ‘Do the rest of the family know where you are right now?’

Diana stopped a frown. She had left Hanley Park before the Denvers had arrived, leaving Sylvia and Adam to cover for her.

‘They know I’ve come to see you. They weren’t exactly thrilled about it.’

Rachel just nodded. Diana didn’t doubt that her sister felt awkward, but she could still be fearsome, formidable, even when she was cornered.

‘Is business good? I believe you have a diving school.’

Their words were brittle. That easy familiarity that had always existed between them had completely disappeared.

‘Business is great.’ Rachel nodded. ‘We train three hundred PADI-certified divers a year and we’re gearing up to expand, open up a whole resort.’ She tilted her head. ‘But you didn’t come here to run a credit check on me, did you?’

‘No, look, Rach . . .’ Diana began, but her sister had turned to speak to a waiter, rolling off long sentences in fluent Thai. Evidently she’d said something funny, because the waiter beamed as he scuttled back to the shack.

‘What’s so amusing?’

‘I told him you were a tourist, so to go easy on the chillies.’ A trace of a smile pulled at her lips. ‘I guessed you’d be hungry; haven’t been long-haul in a while, but I don’t remember aeroplane food being that exciting, even in first class. That okay?’

Diana felt her shoulders relax. Perhaps this wasn’t going to be as difficult as she’d thought.

‘Look, Diana, I’m so sorry about Julian.’

Diana blinked hard, unable to get any words out.

‘I thought it was better that I stayed away from the funeral,’ continued Rachel. ‘Even though I wasn’t there, it doesn’t mean I wasn’t thinking about you.’

‘I know.’

‘Did you get my letter?’

‘You wrote to me?’

‘You know me: I work better in print.’ Rachel grimaced. ‘Or perhaps not . . .’

Diana felt a sudden overwhelming desire to tell her sister everything, although not without some trepidation. Back in Britain she had been convinced that helping her out was the very least Rachel could do. But now she was here, was it right to ask her to give up her pocket of Paradise, to return home to investigate a crime that wasn’t even really a crime? To help her with her grief? To find answers Diana wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to hear?

She owes you, she reminded herself.

‘I need your help,’ she said finally. She almost felt a physical pain just saying it. She had spent years hating her sister. In those insomniac hours and days after Julian’s death, she had pinpointed the exact moment when her dream life with her husband had started to sour. And it was when her sister had chosen her career over her family by running a four-page exposé on Julian’s extramarital affair. ‘I want you to find out why Julian killed himself.’

Rachel jerked back. ‘Isn’t that what the inquest is for?’