Angel looked at him. Tom’s head wound was dressed with small staples now, the bandages gone. He seemed to be on the mend. She squeezed his arm. She loved Tom. She looked over at the aunts, still cheerfully squabbling over the flowers, and had to smile.

‘I’d like that,’ she told him, and they walked over to join Lil and June.

If I’m still free to do it, she thought.

167

The knock came at last, just as Angel knew it would. Monday afternoon, her and Tom were back in his flat, and it was all tidy again, as if Baxter Graves had never ploughed his lumbering, destructive way through their lives on Frank Pargeter’s orders. They were just off out to the club when it came.

Tom went and answered it, while Angel sat frozen, terrified.

Then she heard his voice. It was Farmer.

‘It’s for you,’ said Tom, coming back into the flat.

Angel stood up. Her legs felt as if they’d barely hold her. And there he was, framed in the open doorway. Cory Farmer. Her stomach jolted when she saw him standing there.

‘We need to talk,’ said Farmer. ‘Don’t we.’

Angel nodded slowly. ‘I was just off to work.’

‘No, I’ll go on alone,’ said Tom. ‘You two take your time. This your copper, yes?’

‘This . . . Tom, this is DI Cory Farmer.’ Her eyes met Farmer’s. ‘This is my cousin, Tom.’

Farmer nodded. ‘How’s the head now?’ he asked.

‘Fine, fine.’

Farmer turned to Angel. ‘Let’s go back to mine, shall we?’

This time there were no crazy, lust-driven kisses in the back of a taxi. Farmer drove them in his car, and they were both silent all the way there.

When they got to his ground-floor flat, Farmer unlocked the door, ushered Angel inside. He didn’t shove her up against the wall this time and kiss her until she nearly passed out. Instead he led the way into the lounge, a neat little taupe and brown room, very much a bachelor pad, with French doors leading out into a small, tidy garden.

‘Have a seat,’ he said, and Angel sat down on a leather couch. Farmer took a thick yellow file off an armchair and sat down there, placing the file on his lap. Silence fell again between them.

‘You know,’ said Farmer eventually, ‘I’ve had some very hard thinking to do about all this.’

Angel nodded. She knew. Farmer was all about doing his duty. Now his duty was at loggerheads with his personal life.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

‘In here,’ he said, indicating the folder, ‘is everything I’ve gathered over a lot of years, about Donny Maguire.’

Angel said nothing.

‘The man was a bastard. He was on the take. He was into things most people wouldn’t even want to think about. I was warned off this time after time. It goes deeper even than I suspected. And now I know you’ve killed him.’

She stared at his face.