Steve’s eyebrows go up. ‘“I thought he was kind of boring, but Ash was obviously seeing something I missed . . .” ’

‘Yeah, we’ve only got Lucy’s word for that, too. For all we know, she was just as into Rory as Aislinn was. For all we know, she was actually seeing him behind Aislinn’s back.’

‘We just said: she cared about Aislinn. A lot.’

‘And for some reason, she’s not happy admitting that. Could be guilt.’ I get more coffee into me. ‘Like she said herself, that love-triangle shite can go way wrong.’

‘She’s got an alibi,’ Steve points out.

‘Yeah, plus the shock was genuine. Lucy’s not our woman. But her alibi means she can’t give Rory an alibi. So if she wants him off the hook, for whatever reason, the only thing she can do is come up with some mysterious other guy for us to chase.’

Steve chews and thinks. ‘We’ll cross-check Lucy’s and Rory’s numbers, Facebook accounts, e-mails, see if they’ve been in touch. Not that it proves anything if they haven’t; Lucy could still be into him.’

‘Yeah.’ The dinosaur kid is hovering, balancing on his scooter and eyeing our rolls. I give him a hairy look till he backs off. ‘And we need to go through Aislinn’s stuff ASAP, see if we find any evidence that this other fella existed. If he did, there’s gonna be something. Texts, calls, e-mails.’

Steve examines his breakfast roll, picking an angle. ‘Well,’ he says. ‘Maybe.’

‘What’re you on about, “maybe”? There’s no such thing as invisible, not any more. If he didn’t leave tracks, it’s because he wasn’t there.’

‘Tell you what I was thinking,’ Steve says. ‘Just an idea, now. But I was wondering: what if Aislinn’s other fella was a crim? A gangster, like?’

Fried egg nearly goes down my nose. ‘Jesus, Moran. How desperate are you to make this one interesting? Shame they got Whitey Bulger, or you could’ve told yourself it was him.’

‘Yeah yeah yeah. Think about it. It explains why Lucy doesn’t want us going after Rory: she’s positive it’s the other guy, doesn’t want us heading the wrong way. It explains why she figured straightaway we were there about Aislinn. It explains why she texted her to be careful, last night: if Aislinn was two-timing a crim, she’d want to be bloody careful about inviting some new fella around for dinner—’

I still have my mouth open to slag strips off him when it sinks in: Little Mr Optimist is right. It would fit.

‘Jesus,’ I say. That pulse is hammering right through me, practically lifting me off the bench. Forget coffee; this job, when it’s right, this job is the hit that speed freaks throw their lives away hunting. ‘And it’d explain why Lucy’s keeping stuff back. She wants us to get him, but the last thing she wants is to be up on the stand with some gangster watching her explain how she’s the one who dobbed him in. So she throws the idea out there for us to chase down, but she makes a big deal about how she doesn’t know the other guy’s name, doesn’t know anything about him, can’t even swear he exists, her and Aislinn weren’t actually that close. Fair play to you, Steo. It works.’