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‘See?’ she said, holding up an A4 sheet of paper with the relevant subject line before slapping it back down on her desk.

‘I just wanted to ask you if you’re okay – if there’s anything we can do to support you, going forward, with your workload, or anything.

If you need some time off, or some counselling? ’

I pushed myself up a little on the chair, digging my nails into some of the flaking rubber in the handle.

‘I heard through the grapevine that all the way up the Met food chain, they were putting the pressure on you to make an arrest. You know, a bureaucratic fraud syndicate right under their noses would be a horrendous bit of PR for the police, considering our default public opinion is usually negative.’

I saw Vivian brace herself, like I was an insolent child playing up.

But I also caught the slightest, almost unnoticeable, bit of nervousness as she needlessly arranged some of the paperweights on her desk.

No one fidgeted quite like Vivian. She twisted a glass apple to one side before pushing it back to its original position.

‘Gareth, I do understand that you’re upset?—’

I groaned, scrunching my nose and flicking a little bit more of the innards of the chair handle onto the carpet, watching Vivian’s eyes as she tracked its descent.

I could see she was getting agitated. Part of me was enjoying it, forgetting that my wife was a murderer awaiting trial with potential life imprisonment on the table.

Only last week we had still been happily married, trying for a baby to complete our vision of domestic bliss…

Shit, what if Fran was already pregnant? I hadn’t thought about that.

‘Gareth, I think you may need a few more days off. I feel like you can’t be expected to…’ Vivian began, breaking my quick brain spiral of wondering how I would raise a baby on my own.

‘Okay,’ I said, nonchalantly rising from the seat as if I didn’t have a care in the world. ‘But I guess everything about this whole fraud syndicate is all going to have its day in the sun.’

Vivian winced as if I had just struck an uppercut to her face.

I’d hit a nerve. Oh, maybe this was the reason the superintendent was getting involved with the case?

Another corruption scandal would be the last thing they needed, even if it was from decades ago.

I had handed the evidence over to Cis and Steve, initially thinking Fran might have killed the two men for the money or something.

Bunch of rich guys who liked to flaunt their cash made for high-value murder targets.

But maybe not. Maybe this went a lot deeper than I’d ever realised.

‘You know how we work, Gareth,’ Vivian said after a pause. ‘And you know that we wouldn’t have arrested Fran if we didn’t have enough evidence against her. Do you think that maybe your feelings right now are coming from a place of…guilt?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Gareth, come on. I know you were the one that gave Cis the photograph of the two men outside the children’s home, connecting Fran to the murders, and I know you two worked together on this case.

Do you think I’m stupid? That gave us evidence beyond reasonable doubt.

I mean, Fran is suspected of killing two men, and both men happen to be linked as benefactors to the children’s home she grew up in.

Both men are murdered and somehow Fran is a likely suspect in both. That’s no coincidence.’

Vivian’s reaction to the way my face must have shifted told me that she instantly regretted her remarks to a husband who was going through a lot right now.

Was she saying I was to blame for his? Her mouth dropped a little before she caught herself, straightening her back against her office chair.

I could see that, out of the corner of her eye, she was trying to skim-read the piece of paper, refreshing herself on the best thing to say next.

‘Are you aware of our Employee Assistance Programme?’

I saw myself out.

I glanced again at the copy of the photo Maeve had let me take away, comparing it to the Wikipedia image on my phone. For what was probably the eighteenth time today, I scanned between the two images. It was definitely him – Abe Clark, MP, wildcard Leader of the Opposition some forty-odd years ago.

I could see Vivian standing sentinel, watching me from the office to make sure I was leaving the building.

I gave her a wave, gesturing to all the necessary work equipment I was leaving behind on the desk.

Her face wore an expression of both suspicion and relief.

I didn’t much care what she thought any more.

I walked across the office, still feeling the stares, their gazes following me into the bathroom.

I pushed open one of the stalls and flicked out my phone to have a look through Clark’s file in private.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t print out Clark’s record or email it to myself: that would send alarm bells across our very secure network.

The man’s file was pretty standard for a pensioner: no police record of convictions, cautions, warnings, or reprimands.

Before I even had time to process the discovery, I heard a loud noise coming from the cubicle next to me – a long sniff that evolved into a hearty cough. I knew that sound. It was the sound of a very particular type of substance being insufflated as it lined the nasal passages.

I flushed the loo, left the stall and waited as I washed my hands, looking at the shadow of the person still inside in the cubicle.

He coughed heartily again.

‘You all right in there?’ I asked.

No answer.

I finished washing my hands and waited for a few moments longer.

‘You sure you’re all right, buddy?’

Still no answer.

I stepped away from the sink and towards the door, opening it and letting it go as I kept my feet planted to the same spot within the small alcove by the door.

I heard that long, loud sniffing again as I watched the lock on the cubicle door flick open and Steve timidly strolled out, his nostrils flared and red. His eyes expanded in panic as he saw me waiting by the door.

‘Come on, man,’ was all I could say, a little crestfallen.

Steve was too shocked to see me to even think of some kind of excuse. Instead, we both stood there, looking at each other. I wasn’t so far gone in my police career that I could be apathetic to a man sniffing up the very stuff we were policing.

‘Don’t tell Vivian,’ he muttered softly, his lips barely moving as his limbs stayed frozen to that position. ‘It’s just been really hard with everything going on.’

I didn’t have any words to say to him, so I just shook my head and yanked open the bathroom door, leaving him standing there. I wondered how long he would remain stuck in that position.

The radio continued to crackle and screech, offering little more than static as I drove down the never-ending, winding country lanes towards the town.

My only option in the old CD player was one of Adele’s early albums, which – while lovely – wasn’t exactly the vibe I needed to pull me out of my mental health crisis.

When I arrived, it didn’t take me long to find the shop.

It sat not too far up the high street. I pushed open the door, which was suitably festooned with leaflets and adverts for events that went as far back as the early 2010s.

The small, cramped interior was piled high to the ceiling with useless nonsense, the kind of place you could spend a fortune without actually purchasing anything worthwhile.

Chad Dangerfield was the identity I was about to inhabit; a private eye who investigated cases out of his own moral obligations.

But not only did it sound a little porny, it had also turned out to be very close to the name of a fictional Lego character when I’d googled it.

So, I had decided to keep my name secret if anyone asked.

After all, it was something of a legally grey area I was currently operating in.

A young lad poked his head up at the far end of the shop, smiling at me courteously as I raised a hand and began to stroll around. There was no sign of ‘Abe’ at the moment, so I continued walking around, looking at the copious amounts of sealant.

Spotting a pink fluffy pen, my lips involuntarily curved into a smile.

It was exactly the kind of thing Fran would adore – uber-garish and ridiculous.

She’d claim to hate it, yet I knew if she owned it, she would never part with it.

As much as I tried to suppress the thoughts, memories of Fran seemed to keep flooding in.

I missed her, and the gnawing uncertainty of whether our marriage had reached its end kept swirling around my mind.

Every time the thought crossed my mind that the last time I might have ever looked into her eyes was when she had pinned me against the wall with her elbow, a sharp, icy pang of pain came to my chest.

I thought about the potential minimum sentence she might face, wondering if a skilled lawyer could argue ‘belief in imminent attack’ in her favour.

Yet, even with a strong defence, she could still face a lifetime behind bars.

The law rarely showed leniency for taking a life, even when it might be considered self-defence.

‘Oh, hello there,’ I heard a voice say. Lo and behold, there he was: Abraham Clark, now aged about forty-odd years since that photo. ‘Cool shades,’ he said. I had forgotten they were still on. I wasn’t a hundred per cent sure if he was being sarcastic or not.

‘Sorry, you may get this a lot, but has anyone ever told you, you look like Abe Clark, the politician?’

The man gave what I think he thought was a humble smile as he swished back a loose lock of his hair.

‘From a long time ago, yes,’ he replied, with a kind of fake modesty that felt sort of sickening, honestly. You could tell the man was obviously enjoying being recognised. Like he was realising he wouldn’t need to touch his Viagra tonight.

‘So, tell me,’ I said, summoning Chad Dangerfield, ‘the hotshot bad boy of politics is now running a DIY shop? Shouldn’t you be coasting off that sweet, sweet parliament pension fund?’

‘Well, everyone needs a hobby,’ he replied. ‘And this was my father’s shop, so I was keen to make sure it stayed in the family.’

I was done with the artificial affability. He seemed at ease, which made it the perfect time to strike.

‘Mr Clark, I’m an investigator for a case that’s currently unfolding, and wanted to ask you some questions, if that’s all right.’

He tilted his head back, an ever-so-small tremble on his lips. I could see from the way his face shifted that he was still a little bit proud that someone had come to find him. ‘Do you have five minutes?’ I asked.

‘Of course, but only if you buy some bin liners,’ he said with a simper and an old wrinkly finger pointed towards me.

‘Gordon O’Neill. You knew him?’ I asked, ignoring his Sunday matinee stand-up routine.

That name struck a chord. The smile on his face vanished, and I could see him become guarded. He asked the boy in the shop to go and check some of the stock in the back, while I examined his wrinkly hands clutching the edges of the counter.

‘A long time ago, we were friends. Part of the same charity.’

‘Are you aware that he’s dead?’

I watched carefully as I saw Mr Clark look visibly jolted by the revelation, his thick, wiry eyebrows shooting up his face, jaw dropping open.

‘I was not, no. That’s a shame. I haven’t spoken to him for quite some time.’

‘You used to be quite close, correct?’

‘We did, but again, a long time ago.’

‘And am I correct in thinking you were close with a Mr Macleod too? Thomas Macleod?’

‘Yeah, he was part of the charity, too. But that was decades ago. We all went our own separate ways, after a while. I mean, I briefly saw Gordon at Thomas’s funeral, but haven’t seen him since then.’

‘And I take it you’re aware that Mr O’Neill was murdered?’

I watched carefully as I saw Mr Clark’s face sort of collapse with disbelief, like someone had instantly sucked the smugness out of it, his expression morphing into shock then quickly into fear.

His hand started to tremble. He pushed it into his pocket, attempting to hide the tremor, but I had already spotted the bronze ring on his finger.

‘That’s horrible,’ he murmured. ‘Do I need protection? Police protection? Should I call the police?’

‘Why would you need to call the police?’

‘Well, I was friends with both of these men, and both of these men were murdered; that seems awfully coincidental. What if I’m next?’ His voice was rasping now, frantic, his hand scratching the inside of his leg from his pocket.

‘Why would you be next?’ I asked stoically.

‘What was your name again? Why are you here? Telling me this?’ Mr Clark said, raising his voice now. In the internal reflection of my sunglasses, I could see who I presumed to be his grandson emerge from the back. He quickly scuttled away when he noticed his grandfather’s fury.

‘Please, don’t get upset,’ I said. Though in my experience, that always made people more upset.

‘Get out of my shop, please. I don’t want to talk to you,’ Clark said, pulling his hands out of his pockets and belligerently waving me away.

I knew I wasn’t going to get anything more out of him, so I pivoted around and wandered out, taking one glance behind me to see the man with his head in his hands, slapping away at his grandson as he tried to get closer to his grandfather.

I may have been on the verge of a nervous breakdown, but my detective senses were still intact and were tingling away.

One thing I knew for sure was that this Clark guy was central to all of this.

The way he’d reacted, like an infant having a tantrum, confirmed to me that Fran was somehow involved.

Only she could make someone go quite that crazy.