Until she’d said it, Liza had been barely aware of thinking it. But somehow, just as she’d been letting herself relax, an idea that must have been nagging at the back of her brain without her noticing had come straight through her neurons and out of her mouth without her permission.

Opening her eyes, Hanna looked around. “Beats me, but I can’t imagine it closes before dinner.”

“No, it’s not that.” Liza wriggled Hanna out of her lap. She knew she was killing the peaceful atmosphere, but killing was the issue. And much as she wanted to step back and forget about it, she couldn’t. “I just mean, dinner was late last night, but not that late.”

Sitting up, Hanna did her best to be indulgent. “Why does it matter? If you’re hungry we can order something in the lounge.”

Bounding out of bed, Liza rummaged through the pile of welcome materials that had come with the room. Eventually she found a delicately embossed menu that, on the reverse, included the details of the hotel’s dining policy. “No, here it is. The kitchen definitely closes at half past ten. You can get food later, but only by special arrangement.”

“I’m confused.” Hanna’s air of indulgence was drifting slowly out the window. “Why the sudden obsession with whether you can get artisanal biscuits and homemade chutney?”

There was no explaining it. This was just … whatever the murder investigation equivalent of an earworm was. And ideally, Liza would have been able to let go and focus on just being in the moment and enjoying her wife’s company, but the suspicion was only getting stronger, and if she didn’t do something about it she’d be running what-ifs all night. “This isn’t about artisanal biscuits.”

“Oh, good. Because that would have been weird.”

“If the kitchen closes at half ten,” Liza said, “why was Emmeline only leaving at one?”

Realisation dawned belatedly but inevitably in Hanna’s eyes. “Fuck. No. Do not go down this road.” She flopped back onto her back despairingly. “I’m not—this isn’t a ghoulish thing, but it does make me feel like you’d rather run down somebody’s alibi than spend time with me.”

Even Liza had to admit it sounded pretty bad. “I’m sorry. I just—aren’t you even a tiny bit interested?”

“Honestly?” Hanna seemed to be seriously thinking about it. “No.”

There were many, many times when Liza had wished her mind worked differently. She’d always been easily distracted, prone to whims and fleeting obsessions. It hadn’t normally put her relationships in peril. “Okay. But I—it’s not—you’re still my number one—but we—we saw a dead man yesterday.”