The temperature was dropping fast. Large slate clouds hung over the moor.
A painted wooden sign had been knocked into the verge: ‘Private Road’. Beyond, a long driveway led towards a distant grand house tucked somewhere out of sight. The English landscape, as dreamed, thought Breen.
With Helen behind the wheel, they paused by the open iron gates, the old Morris rattling gently as it idled.
‘Go in, then?’ she said.
Large, black-barked cedars were dotted around on either side of the pale drive ahead of them.
‘We’re crossing a line now. This is different from letting Freddie show you a few files, one copper to another.’
‘I know,’ said Breen.
‘I mean, I don’t mind. But then I’m not a copper any more. No skin off mine.’
‘In for a penny,’ said Breen.
‘Right,’ she said, putting the car into gear and heading through the gateway.
They edged down the driveway.
‘Guernseys,’ she said, nodding at the cows grazing on either side of the drive. ‘Looks like they outwinter them. OK for some.’
Whatever that meant, thought Breen. In the distance, the large two-storey mansion loomed at the end of the driveway. For a stately home, it was an ugly one. A square building, the roof concealed behind a parapet that ran the length of it.
The house looked deserted. Helen pulled the car up on gravel close to the entrance. Breen got out and walked up lichen-covered steps towards a huge front door. To the right he found a handle on a chain and tugged at it, but if it sounded a bell, it would have been a long way off. He heard nothing.
He waited.
‘No one in?’ called Helen from the car.
Breen shook his head, banged on the door with the side of his hand. ‘I don’t think so.’
Helen got out of the car and, instead of coming to the front door, walked across a small strip of grass in front of the flower beds that spread under the house’s immense windows.
‘Bloody hell.’
Breen said, ‘What can you see?’
‘Get a load of this.’
Breen joined her on the grass, peering in through a large Georgian window. It was a living room, the sort you’d normally see in a stately home, with heavy velvet drapes hung around the windows and two large Chesterfields on either side of a vast marble fireplace. But instead of the usual oil paintings, the walls were covered by the mounted heads of animals.
A zebra, a warthog, gazelles, antelopes, some other deer-like creature with curly horns. Every available piece of wall was crammed full of staring animal heads. Some had mouths open, lips black and shiny, their eyes glossy and wide, in an eerie pretence of life. Breen shivered.
‘It’s like bloody Daktari,’ Helen said.
Above the fireplace, stupidly large, was a lion, faced fixed in a roar.
‘Hideous,’ she said.
‘They must be out,’ said Breen.
‘Imagine inheriting this lot. Jimmy Fletchet was born with a silver spoon up his arse.’
Breen looked at her. There was a darkness about her these last few days.
‘Only, strictly speaking, all this was supposed to be his brother’s. He was the younger one. But his brother was killed in a plane crash yonks ago.’
A huge blob of birds circled overhead, morphing into dark shapes, splitting into smaller ovals and rejoining.
‘A plane crash, you said?’
‘Can’t remember much about it. I must have been about sixteen or seventeen at the time. Sometime after that, Jimmy came home–got the farms, the house, everything, fluky bugger.’
Gravel crunched behind them. ‘Can I help you?’
They both turned. A tall, thick-hipped woman of about forty was standing about ten yards away with a pair of large pale brown dogs on leads. She wore a red coat and her long hair was held up in a bun.
‘We were looking for James Fletchet,’ said Breen.
‘You are standing in my roses,’ the woman said. She had a slight accent that Breen couldn’t place and was too stylish and colourful to be English.
‘I’m sorry. We were just trying to see if someone was here.’
‘The tradesman’s entrance is at the rear of the building,’ she said, then leaned down and unhitched the leads from the dogs. The dogs bounded towards them, stopping a few feet short, barking.
Breen took out his wallet, pulled out his warrant card and held it up. ‘I’m a policeman,’ he said.
The woman stepped forward. She was middle-aged, but beautiful, with striking olive-green eyes under broad black eyebrows. ‘Quiet,’ she shouted. The dogs were instantly silent. She took the card from Breen and leaned her head back a little to examine it. ‘You are from London?’
‘Yes.’
She turned her head towards the Tozers’ car. ‘And you came in that?’ She seemed amused. ‘Is that what British police drive now?’
‘Is your husband here?’ asked Breen.
The woman looked him up and down. ‘Why are you asking?’
‘I can explain that to Mr Fletchet. Is he here?’
‘He is at the hospital.’
‘Nothing serious I hope?’
‘A worker injured himself on the farm this morning falling through the roof of our barn. James has driven him to the hospital.’
The dogs started barking again. Helen squatted on her haunches and held out her hand. The dogs approached cautiously, sniffing.
‘Will he be back soon? We can wait.’
‘No. That won’t be convenient. I would prefer you to leave now.’
‘Beautiful dogs,’ said Helen, rubbing one of the dogs’ heads. ‘Otter hounds?’
The woman smiled. ‘My husband’s family keeps them.’
‘You know this girl has ticks?’ said Helen, ruffling the dog’s ears.
The woman raised her chin a little and said, ‘She does not.’
‘Reckon she does.’
‘Impossible.’
‘Suit yourself,’ said Helen. ‘Only if you don’t treat them there’ll be a bunch of them, come summer.’
‘Don’t be foolish. Dogs don’t get ticks at this time of year.’
‘Depends where they been. You keep pheasants, don’t you? I saw you had release pens down in the valley.’
‘Yes. For the shooting.’
‘If you don’t believe me, come and feel for yourself,’ said Helen.
After a second, the woman stepped forward. When Helen tried to take her hand, Mrs Fletchet snatched it back.
Helen said, ‘I’m not going to bite.’ Then reached out and placed her hand on the back of dog’s head. ‘See?’
The woman felt. ‘I’ll call the vet.’
Helen stood. ‘You could do, if you like. Or I could do them. Wouldn’t take a minute. I done billions of them. While we wait for your husband.’
The woman in the red coat paused, thought for a second, then said, ‘I suppose you could come round the back.’ Calling the dogs, she led them towards the servants’ entrance at the left of the building.
Breen followed her down a flagstoned pathway at the side of the house. Behind him, Helen muttered, ‘Never knew a toff that wasn’t stingy.’
Breen turned and said, ‘Don’t let her know that this is about your sister.’
‘In case I let slip that her husband was having sex with her?’
‘Shh,’ said Breen.
Mrs Fletchet stopped and looked back at them. ‘Did you say something?’
‘Just saying it looks like snow,’ said Helen.
She frowned. ‘Does it?’
The kitchen was huge. Heavy pans hung on hooks from the ceiling. A pot bubbled on a giant stove. Mrs Fletchet hung her coat on a rack while the two dogs left muddy footprints on the tiled floor.
‘Got any tweezers?’ said Helen. ‘And alcohol.’
‘I have gin. Will that do?’
Breen sat at a long kitchen table and watched as the two women held first one dog, then the other, Helen steadily picking off ticks and placing them in a glass.
‘I don’t understand what you two are doing here,’ said the woman as Helen checked the second dog. ‘You’re not on official business.’ She pronounced it ‘oh-feesh-al’. ‘You wouldn’t be in that car if you were.’
‘It’s an old inquiry. I was in the area so I thought I would come and talk to your husband.’
‘I’m his wife. Why not tell me?’
‘It’s confidential.’
Mrs Fletchet snorted, looked up from the dog. ‘So it’s something to do with one of his women?’
Helen looked up. ‘What do mean, “his women”?’
Mrs Fletchet tugged the dog away. ‘You have finished. That is enough.’
Breen said, ‘Is your husband a hunter? I noticed the animal heads on your walls.’
‘You were snooping,’ she said.
‘I was just trying to see if anyone was in,’ he said.
‘James still chases after foxes and badgers and otters,’ she said. ‘I am less interested in that kind of sport. I always preferred bigger game.’
‘You shot those animals?’
‘Some. The elephant is mine,’ she said. ‘And the leopard. One of the buffalo, too, I think. We used Zimmermann’s of Nairobi. The best taxidermist’s in the world,’ she said. ‘Have you heard of it?’
‘No,’ said Breen. She seemed disappointed. ‘I suppose it’s hard, to shoot an elephant.’
‘Harder for the elephant,’ said Helen.
Mrs Fletchet shrugged. ‘If you know what you are doing… and have the right gun. I got him with a Magnum .460. A shoulder shot. It severs the main artery above the heart.’
‘You lived in Africa?’
‘Kenya. For many years. Until James inherited this estate. Do you know Kenya?’
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘It was an exciting country. I loved it. England is so very dull in comparison. And so wet.’
There was the sound of tyres on gravel.
‘I expect that will be him now,’ Mrs Fletchet said. ‘If you must talk to him, you had better come.’
They followed her out of the kitchen into a huge hallway, the dogs padding behind. A twelve-bore shotgun sat propped against the wall by the door, next to an ugly carved-wood umbrella stand.
Mrs Fletchet opened the door, letting in icy air. Outside, a tall man in a brown cap was getting out of a short-wheelbase Land Rover.
‘Is he all right?’ Mrs Fletchet called.
‘He’ll live.’ James Fletchet approached his front door. ‘Who’s this?’ He looked Breen up and down.
‘This is a policeman,’ said Mrs Fletchet. ‘He wants to ask you some questions but he won’t tell me what it’s about.’
Breen stepped forward. ‘I wonder if we could speak in private, sir?’
Fletchet hesitated. He looked at his wife.
‘Well?’ said Mrs Fletchet. ‘Che cosa, James? Have you been gambling again?’
‘Haven’t the foggiest, darling. They don’t even look like police officers to me.’
Breen held out his warrant card and said, ‘Do you know a police officer called William Milkwood, sir?’
‘Milky?’ said Fletchet. ‘What about him?’
‘I’m looking over the details of an investigation that he was part of four years ago.’
‘Ha detto Bill Milkwood?’ said Mrs Fletchet.
‘Bill’s in London,’ Fletchet told his wife. ‘I have no idea what they’re going on about.’
‘Would you like us to explain a little more about the investigation?’ said Breen.
Fletchet coloured. ‘Get your superior officer to write to me. Right now I’m busy. I have a farm to run and thanks to some idiot injuring themselves I’m short-handed.’
‘I just want to get a few facts straight. It will only take a few minutes.’
Fletchet raised his voice, ‘If you don’t get out of my house I’ll have you thrown out. Please leave.’
Breen hesitated. He was about to give up and step onto the gravel when, behind him, came a voice.
‘My name is Helen Tozer.’
Fletchet looked at her, startled.
‘Cosa?’ said his wife. ‘Who is she?’
‘I’ll walk you to the car,’ Fletchet said.
Mrs Fletchet stood at the door looking angrily at her husband as he followed them across to the car. Helen got into the driver’s seat. Breen sat next to her.
‘I’ll talk to you,’ Fletchet said quietly, leaning into Breen’s window so he could speak out of earshot of his wife. ‘But not now.’
‘When, then?’
Fletchet hesitated. ‘How did you get my name? I cooperated with the police fully. I told them everything I know.’
‘I could ask your wife about Alexandra Tozer, if you’d prefer.’
‘There’s no point. She doesn’t know anything about what happened.’
‘Exactly,’ said Breen. ‘All I want is thirty minutes.’
Fletchet stiffened. ‘That’s a little grubby, isn’t it?’
‘Unlike sleeping with sixteen-year-olds,’ said Helen.
Fletchet looked startled. ‘OK. Tonight,’ he said. He gave the name of a pub.
‘Do you know it?’ Breen asked Helen.
She nodded, started the car engine, then leaned across Breen. ‘You might think about moving those cows down the bottom to higher ground. It’s going to snow tonight.’
‘Tonight, then?’ Breen said. ‘Seven?’
The clouds were blacker than before. The starlings wheeled in the sky above them. Breen leaned forward to watch them rolling above the car as they drove under them.
It was a long, grey building, low-doored. Cold in spite of a log fire burning slowly in the grate.
Above the fireplace was a fox, stuffed and mounted, grimacing its teeth.
‘Why does everyone stuff animals round here?’
‘They’d go off otherwise,’ said Helen.
‘No. I meant…’
‘Look,’ said Helen. ‘Snow. The temperature’s dropping. It’ll turn to ice. It’ll be a tough drive getting back.’
Beyond the window, flecks of white were starting to fall. Breen watched them settling on the road. ‘I’ve got to get out of here. It’s sending me doolally,’ he said.
‘See what I got away from?’
‘Are you going to be OK? Meeting him. After all…’
Helen looked at Breen. ‘You don’t know what it’s like, do you?’
‘I was just thinking it would be upsetting. Even if he has an alibi, he’s still a suspect. You’ll be thinking that he could be the one.’
‘What if I am? You think I’d sleep better not having tried?’
Breen looked at his watch. ‘He should be here by now.’
‘You could see he was scared when he realised who I was. What if he doesn’t come?’ He watched her biting a fingernail. ‘Are we having a drink?’
So they sat and had a drink as the snow started to fall. And just as he was at the bar buying Helen’s third rum-and-blackcurrant and she was starting to look relieved that he wasn’t coming after all, the pub door opened and Fletchet came in, snow on his cap.
Fletchet was one of those people who made the chairs he sat on seem small. He was over six foot, tall and hearty in a way that city people never were. He looked at Helen across the table.
‘I thought about what you said. You were right. I decided to move the cows. That’s why I’m late.’
‘Don’t sound surprised. I’ve been working with cows since I was a girl.’
‘You’re Alex’s sister, aren’t you?’
Helen nodded, lips pressed together.
‘I thought I recognised you.’
She didn’t answer.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Fletchet, voice quiet. ‘A terrible thing. I’d just like to say, I thought your sister was… amazing.’
Helen didn’t speak for a while. Finally she said, ‘My sister was sixteen.’
Fletchet hung his head. ‘I didn’t know. Not until later.’
‘Of course you knew. How could you not know?’
‘In other ways, she was very… mature.’ He was blushing now. ‘Besides, she told me she was nineteen. She told me all sorts of things. That her father was a film star. That she was born on an ocean liner. She liked to do that. It was always a show, you know? I broke it off as soon as she told me her real age. I don’t suppose you believe me. But she really didn’t look sixteen. She didn’t act it.’
‘Bet you were scared shitless when you found out. Any younger and you’d have been done for statutory rape.’
Helen was tipsy already, and angry, and Fletchet was the sort of man she would have hated even if he hadn’t slept with her sister. Breen resisted interrupting her, telling her to keep her voice down. He wanted the opportunity to observe Fletchet. Fletchet was rubbing his palms against the top of his thighs as he tried to answer Helen. Were his nerves a sign he was lying, or was it just embarrassment that was making him squirm?
‘If you give me a chance, I’ll explain,’ Fletchet was saying.
‘I know the explanation already,’ said Helen.
Fletchet dropped his voice. ‘For God’s sake. I am throwing myself on your mercy here. This was a deeply shameful and tragic episode of my life. I know that, OK?’
Helen looked at him. ‘OK,’ she said, finally.
Fletchet sat with a pint of stout in front of him. ‘I met Alex that spring,’ he said. ‘At a point-to-point. I had a couple of horses. One was a grey filly that had just come third in a race that day. Alex came right up to me and told me how beautiful the horse was. She said she’d like to ride it. She was so confident I never imagined she was only sixteen.’
‘She liked horses,’ said Helen.
‘And she was good with them, wasn’t she?’
‘Yes. She was.’
‘I told her she should come up to the house. Try her out. And she did.’
‘And one thing led to another,’ said Helen.
‘Please. You’re making it sound like something it wasn’t,’ said Fletchet. ‘My wife and I had taken over the house here the previous summer. Eloisa had never wanted to leave Kenya. We had a big estate there in the White Highlands. She’s Italian. Doesn’t much like it here in England. She liked all the servants and parties out there. The whole shebang. It was high society, really. But my brother died. I inherited the estate here. It was my duty to come home and look after the estate.’
‘Poor lamb,’ muttered Helen.
‘What I’m trying to say, if you’ll let me, is that Eloisa didn’t like the change. We had rows. In 1964 it came to a head. She went back to her mother in Milan. For a while I thought that was it. And I was pretty down. I was finding it really hard to fit in back here. My brother had been popular and practical and had made a success of the farm. I was the unfortunate child they’d sent out to Africa. When I came back I was trying too hard, I suppose, trying to be the new lord of the manor. Out in Africa you had to be larger than life. The big bwana, you know? I suppose I carried that on a bit too much back here. I threw parties like we had in Africa. Went to all the races. Splashed out. Looking back, I realise everyone was just laughing at me. And then I met your sister. She was gorgeous. She was confident. There was something very pure and English about her. And she liked me. And looked up to me. And believe me, it wasn’t me who took the first step.’
‘She was a kid. Of course she was going to be impressed by you.’
‘Are you going to make this public?’
‘Why shouldn’t I? It’s true, isn’t it?’ said Helen.
‘Oh, God,’ said Fletchet, putting his head in his hands, fingers in his thick hair.
Breen decided it was time to speak. ‘We don’t need to tell anyone about this, Mr Fletchet. We’re more interested in knowing the truth of what actually happened between the two of you. We need to know what you told the police.’
He looked up. ‘How did you find out I spoke to the police?’
Helen said, ‘That’s what you’re worried about really, isn’t it? Because if we found out, maybe anyone could.’
‘Enough now,’ Breen said to Helen.
Helen folded her arms and looked away.
‘And who are you?’ Fletchet asked. ‘Why are you so interested?’
‘I’m a friend of the family.’
‘So this is unofficial?’
‘Yes.’
Fletchet looked relieved about that. ‘OK.’
Breen said, ‘If you tell us exactly what happened and don’t hold back anything, we won’t need to tell anyone else about this. We will agree to keep it to ourselves, won’t we, Helen?’
Helen grunted, folded her arms.
‘Won’t we?’ Breen said again.
‘Yes. OK.’
‘Right. When did you last see her, Mr Fletchet?’
Fletchet looked from one to the other, as if weighing them up, then said, ‘The day before she died. I took her out for a drive. We broke up.’
‘Why did you break up?’
‘Because I found out she was only sixteen, believe it or not. We were having an argument. I had a car radio. State of the art. It was the bloody Beatles all the time. All that yeah yeah yeah. She always tuned the radio to Caroline and then called me names when I tried to tune it back to the Home Service.’
‘The bloody Beatles,’ said Helen. ‘That was Alex.’
‘And then I told her to grow up and act her age and she got into a real bate with me and told me what her age was.’
Helen closed her eyes, as if trying to picture her sister.
‘How did she take it?’ Breen asked. ‘When you told her it was over.’
‘Very well, I think. Better than I’d imagined.’
‘You being God’s gift, of course.’
‘Say what you want,’ Fletchet said to Helen. ‘I did adore her. You have to believe me. She was beautiful. I think about her all the time. She told me I was too old for her anyway.’
‘I bet she dumped you, only you don’t like to admit you were dumped by a sixteen-year-old girl,’ said Helen.
‘You don’t have to believe anything I say.’
‘I don’t.’
‘Were you angry with her?’ said Breen.
‘I suppose I was,’ said Fletchet. ‘But I know what you’re trying to say. And no. Not like that. I wasn’t angry like that.’
‘But you were worried that she would go round telling everyone she had slept with you,’ said Breen. ‘And that your wife would find out.’
‘My wife was in Italy. She had left me, remember? You must think I’m a bloody monster. I did not kill her. I was nowhere around her when she was killed.’
‘You made sure of that, did you?’ said Helen.
‘For God’s sake. The police suggested that too at the time. Don’t think they didn’t.’
Breen sat and thought about this for a while. A car drove past outside. Breen could hear the tyres throwing up slush.
‘I think about her all the time too,’ said Helen.
From the bar, the elderly woman who ran the pub called, ‘I’ll close down if that’s all you’re drinking.’ She wore glasses so dirty they seemed pointless. The single log in the fire cracked and shot a spark out onto the hearth.
‘I’ll have another drink,’ said Helen.
‘You’ve had enough,’ said Breen. ‘I can’t drive.’
‘I’ve barely begun,’ said Helen.
Breen watched the old woman grope her way to the beer taps to pour Fletchet another pint.
‘How did you say you heard she was dead?’
Breen stood and walked to the window. Snow had settled over the Morris, covering the windscreen.
‘It was on the news. I was watching it at home. I knew it was her.’
‘They kept showing that school photo,’ said Helen.
‘So I went out and phoned a friend I knew in the police.’
‘Milkwood,’ said Helen.
‘I made a statement, there and then.’
‘You made a statement to your mate Milky. Who happened also to be your alibi. I’m sure he gave you a hard time.’
Fletchet lit a cigarette. ‘I came forward. I gave a statement.’ He chewed on his lip. ‘I was nowhere near poor Alex when she… died. Like it or not–and I do not particularly like it–because of my family, I was a well-known figure locally when this happened. Sometime in the autumn my wife, Eloisa, came back home. We both agreed to try and make a go of it again. It would not have been good for your family or for mine if our affair had been made public. Believe me, if I could find the man who did this, I would make him bloody suffer. I would dearly, dearly, dearly love to do that.’
‘Man?’ said Breen. ‘How do you know that?’
‘Well, it’s obviously a man, isn’t it? I mean…’
‘You were worried that if news of your affair with a teenage girl got out, your wife would divorce you,’ said Breen.
‘I didn’t want to hurt her,’ said Fletchet.
Helen rolled her eyes.
‘As time went on, and no one was found, they announced that some people from another county were about to come in and review the case. I became worried that somebody would go back to the files and turn up at my house unannounced. I mentioned my concerns to Milky. He said he could sort something out. As a favour. And he did. I swear on my heart that I would throw away my entire inheritance if it would help find the bastard who did that to her.’
‘What was in it for Milkwood? Did you offer him money?’
‘God. No. It wasn’t like that at all. We were friends. We’d known each other for years. He didn’t do anything wrong. I was absolutely cleared. One hundred per cent.’
‘He removed the files. That’s wrong,’ said Breen.
‘Well. Maybe technically, yes.’
‘When did you last talk to Sergeant Milkwood?’
‘He was transferred not long afterwards. To London. I hear he’s in the Drug Squad now. He will tell you that everything I’ve told you is true, I promise,’ said Fletchet.
‘The Drug Squad? You sure?’
‘He’s a good copper. I expect he’s very useful to them.’
‘Do you keep in touch?’
‘Christmas cards. His wife sends them. She’s a bit of a social climber. She seems to like writing my full title on the address.’
‘Your full title?’
‘Lord Goodstone.’ He grinned. Brushed his blond hair away from his forehead. ‘Nobody calls me that. Ridiculous. This is 1969, for God’s sake.’
Helen said, ‘You two used to be big mates, I recall. You’re not any more?’
‘Time goes on. He moved away. I’m busy with the farm. I’m sure he’s busy too. As policemen are. If you’re planning on heading back home, you’d better think about it,’ said Fletchet. ‘The snow’s getting thicker. I’d offer you a bed at my house, but… it would be hard to explain to my wife.’
‘What about other boyfriends?’ Helen asked. ‘Did she tell you about any others?’
‘No. But then I wouldn’t have expected her to. From the way she behaved, I expect there were others.’
‘What do you mean, “the way she behaved”?’
‘I was not her first.’
‘How did you know?’
He blushed. ‘I’m afraid you’ll have to use your imagination.’
‘Did that disappoint you?’ said Helen. ‘That you weren’t her first?’
Fletchet looked at Breen and said, ‘I’ve come here to try to be helpful. There’s not a single day when I haven’t regretted what happened between myself and Alexandra. It was a mistake.’
‘You must have had some idea of other boyfriends she’d had?’
Fletchet shook his head. ‘You didn’t know about me, did you? Alex was good at keeping things quiet. A girl who talks about these things gets a reputation. Alex was far too clever for that.’
‘How very convenient for you,’ said Helen.
Fletchet pulled at his cuffs. ‘I should go. I need to check on the cows before it gets too late.’ The window was obscured by spatters of snow now. ‘I shouldn’t try driving if I were you. I’m sure Dot here will put you up overnight if the snow’s too thick.’
He held out his hand for Breen to shake, then said to Helen. ‘I know you hate me, but please believe me. Your sister was a remarkable young woman.’
‘I know,’ she said.
‘I miss her still.’
‘Right,’ she said quietly.
When he was gone, Helen said, ‘Not staying in this dump,’ and fumbled in her handbag for the keys to the old Morris.
His bare hands ached from the cold, brushing the snow off the windscreen in the darkness.
‘You sure about this?’ he said when they were both inside. ‘You’re drunk.’
The engine was cold. It whined before the engine finally started, stalled and started again.
‘It wasn’t him,’ said Helen.
‘How can you be so sure?’
‘His alibi, for one.’
‘He could have got someone else to do it,’ said Breen.
‘But why torture her? Why do all that stuff?’
‘To make it look like the work of a madman?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I just don’t think it was. Funny thing, but I think he meant it when he said he missed her. I mean, that’s really weird. It made me so angry hearing him say that. How does he have any fucking right to say that? But I think he meant it. He was in love with her.’
She put the car in reverse and the wheels spun on ice.
‘Crap,’ she said. ‘Maybe there was another boyfriend then?’
‘Maybe.’
She revved the engine again. The car didn’t move.
Breen saw the light go off in the bar where they’d been sitting. He jumped out and started banging on the door of the pub until the light came back on again.