Tasker nodded. “I often wonder why other authors’ biogs are so dull,” he said. “Interesting things happen to everybody, so why not mention them if you’re writing something about yourself that’s going to be read all over the world? The least interesting thing about me is that I’m forty-seven and live in King’s Lynn with my wife, so I don’t bother mentioning it.”

“You could spice up the biog for your next book by adding that you killed Damon Blundy,” Gibbs suggested. Unprofessional. Fuck it.

“Except it wouldn’t be true. Blundy was murdered on Monday morning, wasn’t he? I was here, at home, with Jane.”

“Doesn’t Jane have a job?”

“She works for me.”

“Doing what?” Gibbs asked.

“Admin. Fending people off, mainly. Answering endless emails that if I answered them myself, I’d never get a word written. Not from readers,” Tasker clarified. “If someone’s read one of my novels, I always write back myself—even if they’ve written to say it’s the worst book they’ve ever read, which some do. Jane deals with my agent, the festivals, the media, the accountants, my travel and hotel arrangements if I’ve got an event coming up—all the practical stuff.”

All the boring stuff. His wife was his slave, working to promote his product. Instead of developing any interests of her own, personal or professional, she had chosen to devote her life to making Tasker’s life easier. How likely was she to say, “No, Reuben, I’m not going to lie to the police for you and pretend I was with you on Monday morning”? Not very, Gibbs concluded.

“Here.” Tasker handed him a copy of Craving and Aversion. “This is my novel that won the prize. Damon Blundy thought it was a pile of pretentious shit. You might agree, or you might not. Either way, I’d be interested to hear what you think.”

Gibbs muttered an awkward thank you. Liv had read it, after it won the Books Enhance Lives Award. In her opinion, it was “spectacular,” and Gibbs should ignore Damon Blundy, who was a philistine. Gibbs had told her it wasn’t Blundy’s scorn that would put him off so much as the possibility that Tasker was a sadistic murderer. Liv had rolled her eyes. “He’s just a suspect, Chris,” she’d said. “One of many. And anyway, you’ve got to separate the art from the artist. But you know, thinking about it . . . it strikes me as highly unlikely that the author of Craving and Aversion is a killer of any kind. Really, you should give it a try. Don’t look like that! I’m not asking you to marry the man.”

Marriage. Why did it matter so much? To Gibbs, Liv, his wife, her husband? It was no more than a word accompanied by a certificate.