‘Gotcha,’ I say. I’m glad Aislinn is the vic and Lucy is the witness here, not the other way round. By this point I would’ve brained Aislinn with something gingham.

‘So you must’ve been well pleased when she hit it off with Rory,’ Steve says. ‘Nice single guy, nothing to cause tension between the two of you, nothing to cause Aislinn hassle. Yeah?’

‘Yeah.’ But there’s a fraction of a second before it. Another brush past something Lucy isn’t telling us.

I say, ‘Did you get the sense she’d finished it with the other fella before she started seeing Rory? Or would you guess she had them both on the go?’

‘How would I know? Like I said—’

‘Was she still being vague about her social plans? Still cancelling on you at the last minute?’

‘I guess. Yeah, she was.’

I say, ‘So that’s why you were worried about Aislinn?’

Lucy’s still messing around with paint smears, elbows on her thighs and her head right down. ‘Anyone would be. I mean, juggling two guys, one of them’s married . . . that’s not going to end well. And Ash . . . she’s really naïve, in a lot of ways. It wouldn’t occur to her that this was a pretty volatile situation. I just wanted her to be aware of that.’

This is making more sense, but not enough. ‘You said Rory didn’t set off your alarm bells,’ I say. ‘What about this other guy?’

‘I don’t know anything about him to set off alarm bells. Like I said. I just didn’t like the whole setup.’

She’s tensing, digging her elbows into her thighs. Whatever we’re circling, she’s not happy being this close to it. I’m not happy myself. Lucy is no idiot; she should know this isn’t the time to fuck about. I say, ‘That still doesn’t explain why your mind went straight to Aislinn when we showed up at your door. You want to try again?’

The edge on my voice makes her elbows dig in harder. ‘That’s why. Because what else was it going to be? Maybe I lead a really boring life, but most people I know don’t do anything that could land actual detectives on my doorstep.’

I’m less and less in the mood for bullshit. ‘Right,’ I say. I lean over and give the ashtray a shove so it slides towards Lucy, a little puff of rancid ash rising into the light. ‘Like I said: try again.’

Lucy’s head comes up and she gives me a whole new kind of wary look.

Steve shifts his weight beside me. I know that shift: Leave it.

I consider punching my elbow through his ribs, but the fact is, he’s right. I’ve been getting on well with Lucy, and I’m about to throw that away for good. I say, more gently, ‘We’re not planning on doing anything about that. We’re only interested in Aislinn.’

The wary look fades, but not all the way. Steve – right back in the Good Cop seat, where he’s happiest – says, ‘Tell us a bit about her. How did yous meet?’