Page 106 of We Chase Shadows

‘Umm, still, please,’ says Steve. He wanted sparkling really, but was that too racy? Did it send out the wrong signals?

‘Sparkling for me,’ says Georgie. ‘To match this gentleman’s eyes.’

Through the window of the restaurant Steve could swear he sees Rosie. He thought she’d got a dentist appointment suspiciously easily.

‘What shall we talk about, Steve?’ Georgie asks.

‘Let’s talk about murder,’ says Steve, and sees a waiter with a basket of bread overhear him and make a last-minute diversion away from their table.

‘That’s more like it,’ says Georgie. ‘That beats trains, doesn’t it?’

Again, not the time, but Steve is interested in both. If this isn’t a date, and it isn’t, then it should be an interview. Talking to a suspect. Now, Georgie mustn’t think it’s some sort of criminal interrogation, but, equally, she mustn’t think it’s a date. What a tightrope. It is still entirely possible he is sitting opposite the woman who had Esteban and Korbin killed, and pinned it on Eriksson.

‘I think you recognized the name Jakob Eriksson,’ says Steve. ‘When we came to see you?’

‘First I’m resplendent, and now I’m a liar,’ says Georgie. ‘What mixed messages.’

‘Did you recognize the name?’ says Steve.

‘No,’ says Georgie.

‘Okay,’ says Steve. He knows she’s lying.

‘But I did recognize the man in the picture,’ says Georgie.

There we go. ‘You recognized the man calling himself Jakob Eriksson?’

‘They never do this on the dates on Love Island, Steve,’ says Georgie. ‘So he’s not called Jakob Eriksson?’

Steve shakes his head. ‘He’s not even Swedish.’

Georgie shrugs. ‘I mean, not all that many people are Swedish. What is he?’

‘English,’ says Steve.

‘I see,’ says Georgie. ‘And do you know his name?’

A new bread basket is finally making its way over to the table. Steve had been too nervous to eat this morning.

‘Have you heard of a man called Connor Brooks?’ Steve asks.

Georgie looks up to the left. ‘Possibly. Jog my memory.’

‘He committed suicide,’ says Steve, and sees the waiter with the bread basket swerve around them again. ‘In Málaga in 2001.’

‘So he’s not the man in the photograph?’

‘He is,’ says Steve. ‘We think Vern helped him to fake his own death.’

Steve catches the waiter’s eye now. ‘Could you just bring us some bread, whatever we’re talking about?’

‘Certainly, sir, right away,’ says the waiter. He is super-polite, but Steve notes that he does back away from him very slowly.

‘So Connor Brooks becomes Jakob Eriksson?’ says Georgie. ‘That’s the working hypothesis?’

‘It’s the confirmed hypothesis,’ says Steve. ‘You disagree?’

Georgie looks around her.