Bill switched the phone on and passed it over. Katie could see at once what the photographs depicted. There were thirteen of them, and they had been taken from her own back garden, into her brightly lit bedroom window, when the curtains were still wide open. They showed Kyna entering the room, wearing nothing but a towel, and then kneeling down naked beside Katie and pecking her on the lips. Two more of them showed Kyna giving her a deep French kiss and fondling her breast.

Katie laid the phone back down on Bill Phinner’s desk. ‘How many people have seen these?’ she asked him. Her heart was beating so hard she wouldn’t have been surprised if Bill could hear it.

‘Conall, and me, that’s all. Here in the lab, anyway.’

‘You mean that somebody outside the lab might have seen them?’

‘They were all sent to an email address – immediately after they were taken, I imagine. It’s [email protected].’

Katie felt as if iced water had been poured down the back of her blouse, and she shivered.

‘Your man sent these pictures to Chief Superintendent O’Kane?’

‘It looks like it, ma’am, I’m sorry to say.’

‘You’re sure about that?’

Bill Phinner nodded.

‘Mother of God, Bill. I can’t believe it.’

‘C’mere, look – take the phone away with you for your own safekeeping, and I can swear to you that neither Conall nor me will mention to anyone at all what we’ve seen. Not unless for some reason we’re called to give evidence in a court about it.’

‘I appreciate that. I truly do.’

‘I’ve tested the casing myself for fingerprints and DNA. There’s both. Clearly your man wasn’t expecting to lose it. I sent them off about an hour ago so I should have the AFIS result in about another hour and the rapid DNA result half an hour after, or maybe even sooner.’

‘Bill—’

‘I’ve seen what I’ve seen, ma’am, and so I can’t unsee it. But you’re the best detective superintendent I’ve worked with, bar none, and you’ve stood up and defended me more than once when my findings have been questioned. On top of that, I’ve always believed that what anybody does when they’re off-duty, that’s their own business, like, unless it’s criminal, and nobody else has the right to judge them. It’s up to the Lord God to decide if they’ve done wrong.’

‘Okay, Bill. Thank you. I’ll wait to hear from you.’