Why? What did he know?

‘Why were you and Becky meeting on the Saturday?’

‘What were you talking to Roger about?’

They’d spoken simultaneously and there was a nervous pause in the conversation.

‘Becky said that you were helping her with a story,’ said Kate quietly, watching his face.

He affected puzzlement. ‘Really?’

‘About herbicides.’

‘What about them?’

‘She was researching the health effects on families who lived near regularly sprayed fields.’

‘We didn’t ever speak about it,’ he said casually, but she could hear the strain in his voice.

She nodded. Took a sip of her coffee. ‘But is that what you were supposed to be meeting about? The day after she died?’

He didn’t know what to do with his hands, was fiddling with his teaspoon, and she placed her hand over his to still it.

‘Please tell me, Adam. It would help me to understand the loss.’

He looked up sharply. ‘Why?’

Damn, she hadn’t meant to say that, to alert his suspicion.

Adam seemed to be wrestling with something. ‘Kate, how did Becky die?’

She spoke slowly, carefully, watching him. ‘She was knocked off her bike. Just a few streets from her office. A lorry turned into her path.’

His eyes widened as he took this in. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he repeated, but behind his eyes unease was looming, she could sense it. Her own heart beat quicker as her sickening suspicions were brought to the surface again.

‘What happened to the driver?’ asked Adam.

‘Nothing. It was recorded as an accidental death.’ She paused. ‘Something that I still don’t understand on many levels. Not least because she was such a careful cyclist.’

Adam had sat back in his seat, his arms looped over the back of his chair, but he looked anything but relaxed.

‘Is there something wrong?’ asked Kate. She saw him glance back towards his company’s stand. ‘Is everything OK? You look nervous about something. Or someone.’

‘Not at all.’

‘Why did you google her? When she didn’t turn up?’

‘What?’

‘You just said – you googled her name.’

Tiny beads of sweat were forming at his hairline and Kate felt goosebumps rise up on her skin.

‘I should get back, actually,’ said Adam. ‘It was nice to meet you.’ He quickly stood and held out his hand but didn’t wait for her to shake it, instead he grabbed his jacket. ‘Great. Right, well enjoy the rest of the conference.’

And then he was gone, swallowed up in the crowd.

FORTY-TWO

Kate had gone to the library to print out the photo of Becky in the snow then taken it home and placed it carefully on the fridge. It had been taken twelve days before she’d died. She would stare at it, looking deep into Becky’s eyes, wondering how much her daughter had known of whatever it was that Adam was keeping from them.

He and Becky had planned to meet up on the day after she’d died. Had she already had a sense of what the meeting was about? Kate would stare so hard she began to imagine she could read something in Becky’s expression, a crease in her forehead, a sharpness to her eyes or maybe something in the way she was carrying herself. She stared until her eyes blurred and then she would bang her head against the fridge in frustration and despair; no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t read her dead daughter’s mind.