‘Leave it, Freddy,’ the barman says, without looking up from my notebook. ‘I don’t want to know.’ He signs his name with a trim tap of the pen at the end, passes the notebook back to me and picks up his glass-cloth. ‘Anything else, no?’

Outside, Steve slides the photo of Aislinn back into his jacket pocket. He’s thinking I told you so loud enough that he doesn’t need to bother coming out with it. ‘So,’ he says instead.

‘So,’ I say. The thought of the incident room left to its own devices, or Breslin’s, is making me antsy. ‘That’s all the locals. Can we get back to the squad now, yeah?’

‘Yeah. No problem.’

We head back down the potholed laneway, towards the road. That rain is kicking in, nasty spitty flecks edging towards sleet – I hope Meehan was brisk enough to get done in time. A bubble of low-grade trouble is building up on the corner – kids who can’t go home because they’re mitching off school – but apart from them the street’s empty. A marker-graffiti creature, all bared teeth and bug-eyes, stares us out of it from the shutter on an abandoned shop, between a missing-cat poster and some leftover summer-fair thing, dancing kites and ice creams grinning manically from their faded paper.

Steve’s self-control runs out. ‘The secret boyfriend’s looking good.’

He is. I say, ‘Or else that was some guy from Aislinn’s work—’

‘She worked way out in Clondalkin. Why would they go for pints in Stoneybatter, unless they were buzzing off each other and didn’t want to get spotted?’

‘—or a pal from her wine-tasting class, or whatever she was at in August.’ The car is parked half a dozen pubs back. I pick up the pace. ‘Those fancy clubs she liked, those are full of good-looking, rich young guys; Aislinn could’ve had any of them. Why would she be buzzing off some middle-aged fella who was nothing special?’

Steve shrugs. ‘There’s women who prefer older guys.’

‘Rory’s her same age, give or take.’

‘She could’ve had a daddy complex before him. Remember what Lucy said: Aislinn’s da leaving, that messed up her life. Maybe she went looking for a father figure. When that didn’t turn out the way she was hoping, she switched to guys her own—’

‘Jesus.’ I nearly walk into a lamppost, slam a hand against it at the last second. ‘That’s where I knew her from. That’s where I fucking saw her.’

‘What? Where?’

‘Jesus Christ.’ My palm is throbbing; the glossy paint of the lamppost feels slimy against it. I can hear the street-corner kids laughing at me, somewhere behind us. ‘Her.’