“Micky.” As I said his name, he moved a couple of steps nearer to me, his long arms dangling at his sides like a caricature of a Western gunslinger. “I want to ask you about events in this room immediately after Moira died.”

“I’ve already told you all I know,” he said mutinously.

“All I want is some more detail,” I said persuasively.

“Tell her what she wants to know,” Jett growled.

Micky looked as if he wanted to argue, but he quickly remembered which side his bread was buttered. “OK, fire away,” he complained.

“Can you tell me where you were sitting and who you were talking to?”

“I sat down on that chair over there,” he said, pointing to the one where Tamar was currently leaving salt stains on the silk upholstery. “Kevin was stood next to me, by the bar. He poured me a drink, and we talked about Moira being killed. You know, what a shock it was, that kind of thing. He was worried about the effect it would have on Jett. Whether he’d be able to finish the album, whether the bad publicity would affect sales, the usual kind of Kevin shit.”

“Did he say anything at all about how she’d been killed?”

“Only that nobody seemed to be telling exactly what had happened. He said it must have been a burglar, or somebody she’d brought back with her from the village.”

I hoped to hell Jackson was keeping an eye on everyone. I was concentrating too hard on what I was doing to check the reactions around me. “Did Kevin talk to anyone else apart from you?”

Micky’s forehead concertinaed as he thought for a moment. “Yeah,” he eventually sighed. “Neil came over and asked what he wanted doing about the press. Kevin told him to deal with it, and to put out a story on it, just giving the bare bones of what had happened. He said he wanted it all handled in-house, and that Neil should make it clear that any other journalist who tried to get an interview would be wasting their time and his.”

I felt that warm feeling in my gut that tells me I’ve cracked it. “And that’s all he said?”

Micky nodded. “Yeah. Neil fixed himself a drink and kind of drifted off to the corner. He was sitting scribbling in a notebook. I suppose he was getting a story together.”

“When did you and Kevin separate?” The crucial question.

Micky looked exasperated. “I don’t know what this has got to do

I turned my head towards Neil. His eyes were calm and clear as they met mine, as if he were offering me some kind of challenge.

Chapter   31