Yet Cleverly had sired the man who’d sat opposite McNab and, despite the apparent fact that he’d had nothing to do with him from birth until now, had attempted to cover up his crime.

Had Cleverly just been worried that any DNA left at the scene might find a familial link with himself?

‘If Cleverly hadn’t come up here that time,’ Janice broke in on his thoughts, ‘we may never have discovered the connection.’

In the end, McNab decided his money was on the two men being aware of one another. Which one had made the first move, they were unlikely ever to find out. Especially now that Cleverly was dead.

‘Did you ever try to find your father?’ Janice suddenly said.

‘Never,’ McNab said. ‘My mother insinuated he was dead. Maybe she did that to make me feel better about never meeting him.’

‘Would you have liked to meet him?’

‘Sadly,’ McNab said, honestly, ‘I fear he would be too much like me.’

86

‘So tonight’s the big night?’ Chrissy said.

‘I wouldn’t call it big. More like – interesting,’ Rhona said.

‘God, I’d love to be a fly on the wall at this one. Could you record the proceedings for me?’ Chrissy asked with an innocent air.

‘No photos, no videos. You’ll just have to rely on what I tell you, or what Janice does. What about your plans for the weekend?’

‘Well, Mum and her man are staying in, so I can go out.’ Chrissy smiled. ‘Go on, ask me who with?’

Normally Rhona couldn’t really keep up with Chrissy’s string of boyfriends, but recently things had been slower, with the absence of a babysitter. She decided to take a wild guess. ‘What about the helicopter guy. Is it him?’

Chrissy’s face fell. ‘How did you know?’ she said, mystified.

‘He spent a lot of time up in the air talking about you, which kept my mind off the fact that I was actually up in the air.’

‘His name’s Angus Neil and I don’t know where we’re going or what we’re doing.’ She looked quite happy about that.

‘I have a feeling your evening will be more relaxing than mine,’ Rhona said.

Drinks after work with colleagues was fine, when you could always find a reason to head for home. Couples-themed dinner parties could be harder work, depending on how the couples were actually getting along.

Paula and Janice were okay, she thought. She and Sean could be all right, depending on the topic of conversation. McNab and Ellie . . . well, she had no idea how that would go.

At this point in her thoughts, Chrissy came back in.

‘The three of you will end up talking about work and piss off Paula, Ellie and Sean.’

Sean hadn’t looked too keen when she’d told him about the invite. ‘Won’t it be all shop talk?’ had been his exact words.