Under Christine’s tasselled yellow lampshade, Patel looked as if the past thirty-six hours were beginning to catch up with him. Thomas, on the other hand, could have come straight from hair and make-up. Via wardrobe, actually: under the sharp coat, she had on a caramel round-necked sweater and another pair of immaculate trousers. It was nine o’clock at night, day two of a murder investigation – how the hell was she doing it?

Dennis hovered in the kitchen doorway then came forward to shake hands. ‘Good to meet you. Well, not the circumstances. You know what I mean.’

Nervous. As far as Robin knew, his own dealings with the police were limited to filing a report twenty-five years ago when someone nicked his car radio during a children’s birthday party at Solihull ice rink. Having a cop for a daughter, what he knew from her years in the job, meant nothing when it came to having detectives in his home, notwithstanding the fact that one of them looked like a sixteen-year-old tech nerd.

‘Come through,’ she said, taking control, but DS Thomas stayed put.

‘Mr Lyons, it was just you who saw Corinna with the injury, is that right?’

‘Yes.’

‘Then it’s you we need to talk to, okay?’

‘Yes, of course.’ A look of bemusement – well, duh, as Lennie would say – but then he got what she was driving at. ‘Oh. Right.’

In they went and Patel closed the sitting-room door after them, looking Robin in the eye as if it was the sodding Godfather. The dramatic effect was undercut by the door being glass and because, in the kitchen, they could hear every word. Silently, without acknowledging what they were doing, she and Lennie took stools at the breakfast bar along the wall. Christine hesitated for a moment then sat, too.

‘So, Mr Lyons.’ DS Thomas’s voice was totally clear; the wall might as well be cardboard. She and Patel were on the sofa again, inches away.

‘Please, call me Dennis.’

‘Dennis, Robin told us the rough outline, obviously, but we’d like to hear it from you. Tell us what you remember. Take your time.’

‘Well, there isn’t much more than what she said on the phone. I saw Corinna at the garage a couple of weeks ago. The Shell on Stratford Road, by Showell Green. I was on my way home – it must have been just after six, maybe quarter past. I was filling the car up. I might also have bought a Crunchie. Well, it was two, actually. I stop in there quite often in the evenings, to be honest – I’ve got a bit of a sweet tooth.’

Christine huffed: on the way home to his dinner. Robin glared: ssssh.

‘A couple of weeks ago – could you be more specific?’

Ask his wife when he didn’t do a good enough job on his lamb chops.