‘Sweetheart, you sound almost bitter,’ Astrid purred. ‘Do you know, I actually believe that nothing’s going on between you.’

‘Ms Borde, did you smother Bruce Jenson with a cushion?’ Ava asked.

‘That’s an oversimplification. I did many things. I helped Luc when he couldn’t help himself; although I recognised from his email to his mother that he was asking for assistance. I also ensured that justice was done. Bruce Jenson and Gilroy Western raped Luc’s mother. Did you know that?’

Astrid’s cheeks were fevered, her eyes too bright. The obsession she’d had with Callanach was not at all diminished by the passage of time. Ava almost pitied her. Callanach, on the other hand, looked exhausted. Not scared, not even interested. Just done with it all.

‘I did know, actually,’ Ava said. ‘Luc told me when Jenson was discovered dead. And Gilroy Western, that was your work, too?’

‘Not just me. You keep saying that as if Luc and I weren’t involved in it together.’

‘We weren’t,’ Callanach responded dully. ‘Because there is no we. I wasn’t communicating with you, Astrid. The emails I sent my mother were private. You hacked into them, the same way you hacked into mine.’

‘Hacking’s a hysterical term. Your mother emailed me before when I was in contact with her. I just had to guess her password. You kept the same private email address from when you worked at Interpol and I had access to your personnel records, remember? Sloppy of you not to have changed it. I paid an online company based in Colombia to access your email account. It’s not even a hidden Web service. Took them less than a day. But you knew I could do that, too. What I found in there was a clear call to arms and I responded exactly the way you wanted me to.’

‘And the email to Western purporting to be from Jenson’s solicitor?’ Ava asked.

‘The easiest part of it all. When people want to believe what they’re reading, they get careless.’

Callanach looked Ava in the eyes briefly then looked away. She saw that he’d given up. Astrid had the sort of fixation that couldn’t be reasoned with or persuaded. The sort of fixation, in fact, that made it possible for her to suffocate a terminally ill man and cut the brakes of another who had plenty of life left in him yet.

‘You can’t arrest me,’ Astrid declared. ‘I’ll tell them Luc was in on the whole thing. He’s suspended at the moment, isn’t he?’

‘No, he’s not,’ Ava replied, taking a step closer to the bed. ‘Do you mind if I sit down?’