‘Ben just has to break cover once. Just once, long enough for the police to realise that he’s still very much alive and kicking. And then we can put our lives back together again.’

Her face crumpled as if she might cry.

‘I don’t know how I can have been so stupid, Joe. Can you forgive me?’

I still loved her. But forgiveness was more complicated.

‘Mel –’

She put her index finger to my lips.

‘Actually, you don’t have to tell me. Take your time. I don’t deserve to know either way, not until you want to tell me.’ She put her small hand over mine. ‘Tonight’s when I start to make up for it. For everything. Let’s go back to how we used to be.’

I looked at her then, my wife, my beautiful wife, my heart aching harder than ever.

After three whiskies she took me by the hand and led me up to our bedroom. I wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to do, if perhaps I should hold out, refuse her. Punish her for what she’d done – it was her affair with Ben that had led to all my troubles with the police.

But then she pulled her blouse over her head and dropped it to the floor, and all my thoughts of resistance vanished like smoke.

We made love slowly, as if we had all the time in the world, and there was no one in the world but us. As if nothing else mattered. Afterwards, Mel cried and asked me again to forgive her. She cried like a child, telling me she was sorry, over and over, while I wondered again about the toll all of this was taking on her. I wrapped her in my arms and eventually she drifted off to sleep. I dozed for an hour or so, dreaming about Ben chasing me through an underground car park, blood running down the side of his face, jumping out at me, running me down in his big white Porsche. Then I was awake again, staring into the darkness, looking at the cracks of street light filtering through the blinds and listening to Mel’s slow, rhythmic breathing beside me. Larssen had told me that if the police did end up charging me with murder, it was highly likely that I would be remanded in custody rather than being bailed.

So if I’m charged tomorrow, this might be my last night in my own bed for months. Or years. The last night beside my wife. As soon as that thought had taken root, sleep was out of the question. I lay there wondering what Ben would come up with next, what Naylor would throw at me.