Jackie gave a harsh bark of laughter. “Damn right. If I’d killed Alison, I’d have made bloody sure I didn’t get caught. She wasn’t worth serving a life sentence for. But I don’t have to tell you that. You know better than anyone what she was like, don’t you?”

“I have very vivid memories of what Alison was like, yes.”

“I know, I know. She told me she’d had you on her hook. Told me that’s why you had to do a runner to London. Told me you were scared of what she could do to you. I thought to myself then that if she could put the frighteners on someone as tough as you, I didn’t have a cat’s chance.” Lindsay listened, appalled, to Jackie’s words.

“But that’s not true,” she protested. “I went to London because of Cordelia, not Alison. I’d finished with her long before I even met Cordelia. She was just trying to scare you, Jackie. I called her bluff, you see. I was the one that got away, and she didn’t like that.”

Jackie’s face crumpled and Lindsay thought she was on the point of tears. Instead, she crushed out her cigarette and lit another immediately. Lindsay noticed her nails were bitten to the quick. “The bitch,” Jackie said bitterly, sucking the smoke deep into her lungs. “My God, she deserved to die.”

“Want to tell me about it?”

“I still don’t understand how it happened. I hadn’t even thought about being unfaithful to Claire until I did so. I suppose we were in a bit of a rut, but it was a rut I liked. It was comfortable, it was home. Then Alison started planting her poison. It was all very subtle, just the odd sentence here and there, all calculated to make me start wondering if we were as solid as I thought.” Jackie rubbed her eyes. “God, I was gullible.”

Lindsay nodded. “She was good at that. I’ve seen her do it to other people.”

“But I fell for it. And then I fell for Alison. We’d gone out for a meal one night after I’d been working at the Clarion. We got royally pissed, or at least I thought we did. Looking back on it, I think I got royally pissed and Alison stayed sober. We went back to her place, lights down low, Mary Coughlan on the stereo, another little drink. Next thing I know, we’re undressing each other and it’s hands everywhere. And that was that. I was hooked.” Jackie stared bleakly at the wall, trapped by the memory.

“She was like a drug,” Lindsay said, caught in the memory of her own affair. “I couldn’t get enough of her. It was as if the act fueled the appetite.”