“I didn’t.” More fork stabbing. “He came round to mine.”

“Oh. Right.” Logan allowed himself a moment to let this sink in. “Palmer? Came round? To yours?”

“Yes,” Shona said, then some overly-enthusiastic stabbing sprayed hot noodle water up over her hand. She set the pot down on the countertop and sighed. “No. Of course, he didn’t. You think I want Geoff Palmer knowing where I live? I mean, he’s a nice enough guy—”

“He isn’t,” Logan countered.

“I phoned you. Facetimed you, actually.”

“Did you? When?”

“Night before last,” Shona told him. “Some woman answered.”

“What woman?”

Shona shrugged. “Don’t know. Tall. Short hair. Pretty.”

“Heather?”

Shona picked up the fork and the pot, and went back to stabbing. “I don’t know. I didn’t catch her name.”

“Sorry. She didn’t tell me you’d called.”

There was a shrug from the pathologist. “It’s fine. I’m sure you were both busy. No harm done.” She smiled, but it was fooling nobody. “Honestly, it’s fine. It’s not like I waited up until, like, one o’clock in the morning, or anything, in case you called back.” She laughed. And stabbed. “I’m not that sad!”

“Heather is the DCI who replaced me down the road,” Logan said. “And, aye, cards on the table? We had a thing a few years back. Several years back. But that was then. I have no interest in her whatsoever.” He shrugged. “I mean, she’s well into me, obviously, but you can’t blame the lassie for that. She’s no’ blind.”

Shona’s stabbing motion switched to a less violent stirring one. “Someone thinks very highly of themselves.”

“Well, you did say you’d stayed up until one o’clock waiting for me to call,” Logan teased.

“No. I think you’ll find I said I didn’t do that,” Shona countered. She tore open the sachet of sauce and poured it over the noodles. “Technically, it was closer to two. But only because The Bourne Ultimatum was on ITV3. I wouldn’t have bothered, otherwise.”

She stirred in the sauce, and voiced no objections to him moving in closer until he was standing right in front of her.

“I’m sorry she didn’t tell me you’d called,” Logan said. “If I’d known, I’d have phoned you back.”

“It was Facetime,” Shona said. “I had this, like, face paint on. It’s probably just as well you didn’t see me, to be honest. I looked like Brandon Lee in The Crow.”

“Never seen it,” Logan confessed.

Shona dropped her fork into the pot. “OK, not returning my call is one thing, but that? Not having seen The Crow? That’s unforgivable.”

“I will do my best to remedy the situation as soon as possible,” the DCI promised.