“No, if you were home, you’d be where you’re supposed to be,” Sophie said, sounding more exasperated than angry. “How do you get into these things?”

“Natural talent?”

“Natural stupidity, more like.”

“I couldn’t just leave Meredith to it, could I?” Lindsay said plaintively.

“I don’t see why not,” Sophie grumbled.

Even with a continent and an ocean separating them, Lindsay could tell her heart wasn’t in it. “The woman you fell in love with wouldn’t turn her back on Meredith.”

“That was then. Things that are endearing in the first flush of passion can lose their charm, you know,” Sophie pointed out, a warning creeping into her voice. “This isn’t just about Meredith, is it?”

“Yeah, all right. Partly it’s for me. I cared about Penny. We both did. I’ve tried to keep my nose out when people I care about have died before, and I never managed it. I thought this time I might as well be honest right from the start and admit that I know I can find out things the police won’t get to hear in a million years.”

“I thought it might be something like that. Is that why you didn’t wait until I got home? Did you really think I’d try to talk you out of it?”

Lindsay thought she detected a trace of hurt under the warmth in Sophie’s voice. “I wanted to wait till you came home, but the plane tickets were already bought and booked. I didn’t feel I had the right to go wasting Meredith’s money. I did try to call you at Crazy John’s, but they said you guys weren’t in and didn’t have a table booked. I didn’t know where else to try. I’m sorry if you feel I didn’t take you into account. That wasn’t what I had in mind.”

Sophie sighed. The silence stretched and Lindsay couldn’t avoid filling it. “Anyway, you’ll be here next week. Things’ll be sorted by then. We’ll have our holiday just like we planned.”

Another sigh. This time Sophie followed it up with words. “If you’re still in one piece,” she said gloomily.

“No reason why I shouldn’t be,” Lindsay said. “Come on, I know how to take care of myself.”

More silence.

“I’ve done this before, you know. I did it before I had you fussing around like a nursemaid. I’m not a child, Sophie. I’m not helpless.”

“I didn’t say you were, my love. I just worry about you, okay? I know it’s totally unreasonable of me, but I do worry.”

“You don’t have to. I’m too much of a coward to get damaged.”

In her office with its view of the Oakland Bridge, Sophie Hartley grabbed her graying curls with her free hand. Lindsay might have chosen to forget, but she could never lose the knowledge of how dangerous her lover’s favorite game could be. “I hope you’re right,” she said softly. “I really hope you’re right.”

Chapter 8

Lindsay stirred the warm gray liquid that passed for coffee in the supermarket café and stared across the car park at the row of converted mews cottages that housed Monarch Press. Nothing was moving so far. But that was hardly surprising of a publishing house at five to nine in the morning. In an ideal world, she’d still be tucked up in bed letting her body recover. But Helen had never mastered the art of rising quietly and unobtrusively. If she was awake at seven, the rest of the house was guaranteed to be awake by five past, their ears possessed by Radio Four at full volume. Helen liked to hear the morning news wherever she was in the house, including the shower.