Again, she had the powerful sense that she didn’t want him to leave. As if he had heard her thoughts, he bent his head towards her, an uncertain expression on his face mixed with something else. Without thinking too closely about what she was doing, Heather took hold of the front of his shirt and, pulling him towards her, kissed him.

There was a second where he didn’t move – Heather could almost hear him questioning his own judgement – and then his arms were around her, his mouth pressed firmly to hers. He tasted of wine and something else she couldn’t place, and his hands as they slid up the back of her shirt were pleasantly callused. Together they bumped against the kitchen table, and as she kicked off her trousers, her hands busy at his belt, she briefly wondered what her mum would think.

All things considered, I think me fucking a policeman on your kitchen table is fairly small beans, Mum.

‘Are you … Is this okay?’

Heather looked up into Ben’s flushed face and realized she’d laughed out loud.

‘God, yes. Don’t bloody stop.’

Afterwards, they stumbled upstairs, laughing quietly, and had a slower second round in the guest room. When they were lying together in the dark, finally exhausted, Heather found herself listening to his breathing, slow and steady and somehow comforting. It would be easy to lie here, listen to him go to sleep, let tonight become a pleasant memory, eased and turned fuzzy around the edges by too much wine and sleep – but the images of the bodies he had described, the words he had used to describe the killer, were floating in her head like buzzing neon signs.

‘Hey.’ She nudged him with her foot, and he gave a delicate sort of grunt. ‘Ben?’

‘Mhm?’

‘I hate to say this, especially after … But you can’t sleep here. I have to go to my mum’s funeral in the morning.’

He grew very still in the bed, and then turned over. In the half-light from the hallway, she could see the firm muscles of his stomach and the soft thatch of hair on his chest, slightly darker than that on his head. It was tempting suddenly to see if she could get him to stay for longer after all, but it was clear from the way he sat up that the word ‘funeral’ had scattered all chances of that.

‘Ah. Shit. You didn’t say anything.’

‘What is there to say?’ She sat up too, her arms around the tops of her knees as she watched him climb out of bed, looking for his pants. ‘They’re by the door. Sorry, it’s just … I doubt I’m going to be good company in the morning. You know?’