‘Don’t worry, I made sure the floor was dry,’ Callanach said. ‘You have much more important things to do. Mr Jenson wasn’t disturbed at all. As you said, he really wasn’t aware that I’d visited. It’s a tragedy.’

‘I know. His son Andrew finds it difficult to visit him, too. Will you need to come back, do you think?’ she asked.

Luc swallowed his guilt. He was flirting for his own purposes, well aware of the effect he had on women when he switched on the charm. His looks had got him modelling contracts and a stream of rich, good-looking girlfriends until he’d grown up and decided to do something with his life. Now living in Scotland, he supposed he was almost exotic with his deep-toned skin and still getting to grips with a second language. He might have been bilingual since childhood, but that didn’t account for fighting with the Scottish accent and colloquialisms.

‘I’m not sure. I may be back in a few days,’ he said, showing perfect white teeth. ‘Hopefully you’ll be on duty again?’

‘I might just be,’ she giggled.

He’d pretended to be on official police business, thereby avoiding signing the visitor’s book. No one had thought to take a note of his details. It was shocking how easily people let the rules slide when you flashed a badge. Giving the nurse a final wave, he took the corridor towards the car park.

If Jenson proved to be his father, it was more complex than just knowing he had the genetics of a monster. There was the issue of hereditary Alzheimer’s to contemplate. Worse than that, he would either have to reveal to his mother that her rapist had indeed impregnated her, or spend the rest of his life lying to her about it. Neither prospect was a happy one. Then there was the complication of potentially having a half-sibling. Would he want to know more about Andrew Jenson, or was that a step too far?

If Jenson wasn’t his biological father, that would mean tracking Gilroy Western down in Spain. Obtaining a reliable DNA sample from a man who would quite possibly remember Callanach’s French mother, would prove much more difficult.

Callanach pushed through the double doors into the car park, sighing. He didn’t want any of this. He longed for a simpler time, when he thought he’d known who his father was, even if losing him so young had pained him his whole life. If it was the living, breathing, golf-playing Gilroy Western, how was he going to make sure justice was done?