What You Don't Know

What You Don’t Know

…will hurt you

On remote Wyeebo Island, Tess and Joe appear to have it all. She’s a children’s mystery author, soaking in the solitude of island life. He’s a high-flying professional, home on weekends and devoted to his wife. But safety is an illusion—and secrets run deep.

When a prowler appears near their home, Tess’s long-buried trauma resurfaces. The shadow of her best friend’s unsolved death looms larger, and the cracks in her memory widen. Joe seems distant, secretive. Then a local woman goes missing—and their lives begin to unravel.

What follows is a tense, twisting descent into suspicion and fear. Tess is no longer sure who she can trust—not even herself. As threats close in and long-buried truths emerge, she must confront the terrifying possibility that everything she thought she knew was a lie.

From award-winning author Sandi Wallace comes What You Don’t Know, a suspenseful psychological thriller where the past refuses to stay buried, and the most dangerous secrets are the ones closest to home.

Start reading today and uncover the chilling truth behind paradise.

Excerpt from the book

Almost home, Tess faltered, thrown by a grating sound. Randomly, her mind jumped to the metallic screech of a train. Bad things coming out of the blue. Sandpaper scratched at her nerves.

‘Idiot. Nothing bad is happening today,’ she murmured, recovering her stride. Whatever the noise was, it’d turn out to be laughable. Had to. This was Guyeem Beach, Wyeebo Island. On just another Tuesday. A nice morning for mid-August before this change rolled in.

She lifted her chin and inhaled the sweet, earthy smell of rain. Usually, comforting. Shame the rasping spoiled it.

What is that?

Suddenly, it stopped. After a pause, came a crack and a thump, silencing the birds, sending a tabby cat across Potoroo Street with its ears flattened and belly low to the blue metal gravel.

For a few strides, all was quiet, then Tess heard puffing, seeming to come from number four’s yard. She leaned in and almost bumped noses with Madeleine Hatford.

Tess took in the dark-purple rings under her eyes. ‘Mads—’

‘I’ve got to keep going. So sorry, Tess.’

‘What are you doing?’

‘The bushes have grown too high.’

Maddie gestured with her pruning saw at the camellia hedge along her frontage. To her left, it topped three metres, thick, glossy-leaved and flower-covered. Tess’s stomach pitted. The rest were ragged trunks, and deep-red ruffled flowers made trails to piles of branches, their petals bruised by Maddie’s boots. All done in the few hours Tess had been out.

‘Aren’t you going a bit hard, Mads?’

Maddie mumbled, ‘I thought I saw somebody watching. And then I saw how tall—’

‘Watching what?’

‘Your place, my place? But no. Anyway.’ She swung around. ‘Must get on with it.’

Thoroughly baffled, Tess said, ‘Let’s have a cuppa and talk?’

‘Later, okay?’

‘Mads, it’s going to rain soon—’

‘Doesn’t matter.’ Maddie hacked at a branch. ‘Stay safe.’

‘But—’

‘Leave me to it. Please, Tess.’

Nothing Tess tried got a response. She hated abandoning Maddie but had no choice and eventually crossed the street with the rasping following her until she slipped through her front door. She went straight to the kitchen. Dumped the groceries and mail onto the island counter, and looked down at her chocolate labrador as he stretched.

‘Did you miss me, old buddy?’ She knelt beside him. ‘We’ll do our Wilson Walk after the rain, okay?’

His tail thumped on the blackbutt flooring. Tess smiled and kissed his nose, then remembered Maddie.

‘You wouldn’t believe it – Mads is butchering her trees.’

Wilson focused on her lips with his head cocked, clearly as puzzled as she felt.

‘She was okay on Friday. Maybe a bit quiet…’

His head tilted the other way. Too cute. Tess glided his silky ears between her fingers. She forgot everything, enjoying his bliss.

After a while, she scrambled off the floor, talking as she stashed away the groceries. Wilson paid no notice. But when she fixed a cuppa, he turned on a hopeful expression.

‘You know me too well.’ She pointed above. ‘Ready?’