Foley shifted a little in his seat. "Different perspective, that sort of thing."
"Yes, if you like." She shuffled a few papers on her desk. "Susie, she was how old?"
Foley blinked. "She was four."
"And you've two other children? From a previous relationship?"
"Yes."
"How old are they?"
"Fifteen and eleven. Jamie, he's fifteen, Ben's eleven."
"Both boys."
"Yes."
"It must have been different, having a girl?"
"Yes, I suppose." He looked away, as if there were something logged in his brain. "I suppose it was."
"You still see them, the boys?"
"Not really."
"You not want to or-"
Foley shook his head. "They're living in Suffolk, for one thing. Colchester, just outside. Not as if you can nip across of an evening, anything like that. For another, she's married to a real self-righteous prick, excuse my language, who's gone out of his way to make it clear from day one that any contact with me was definitely a bad idea. So, no, I don't see too much of them anymore."
"They're your children."
"I know, but"-Foley leaned forward, one arm on the table between them-"you've got to understand, this last five, five and half years, since I met Chris, Christine, my life… well, let's say my life changed. Tanya and I, when we got together, got married, and Tanya had Jamie, I was what? Twenty-four? Twenty-five? Still wet behind the ears. I was out there working all the hours God sends. Different jobs, lots of different jobs in those days. Tanya, too. Bits and pieces, you know how it goes. And the boys-it was never easy. Jamie, he was always getting into trouble at school, and Ben, Ben was… well, Ben was, I suppose you'd say, slow. Kind of slow. Special needs. So it wasn't easy. None of it was easy. And we'd row, Tanya and me. Fight. Argue. It was all a kind of nightmare. I don't know why we stuck with it, either of us, as long as we did.
"But then, then I met Chris and everything else, everything that had happened, it didn't seem to matter, this was it now, this was my life, and when Susie was born, I suppose-I suppose, if I'm honest, that was when I seemed to start caring less about not seeing the boys, just birthdays and Christmas and not always that." He looked at Lynn. "That's wrong, I know."
"Not necessarily."
"But that's how it was, Chris and Susie and me, the three of us, you know? Perfect."
He brought his hand to his mouth as if to stifle a sob and turned his head aside, and Lynn asked herself if he were putting it on.
"Till something went wrong," she said.
"What?"
"Something went wrong, with the relationship. Between you and Chris."
Foley tilted his head back and, for a long moment, closed his eyes.
"I had this stupid, this bloody stupid-I won't even call it an affair, it wasn't an affair, not anything like that, it was a fling. I suppose if you want to call it anything, that's what it was. A fling with this girl, worked in the showroom. I needed my bloody brains tested, I know. It was all stupid, like I say. She was just some kid flashing her legs, bending forward whenever I walked past the desk so I could see right down her front. I mean, she knew, she knew I was married, I think that was half the fun of it for her, to see if she could. Jesus!" He hit the edge of the table with his fist. "We were at this sales conference, Milton Keynes, a whole bunch of us drinking in the bar after dinner, you know how it is? Having a laugh." He shook his head. "I'm not making excuses, it's just how it happened. One minute we're down in the lobby, and the next we're getting into the lift, and then we're there, in my room and, to be honest, I was too pissed to remember much about what happened, but it did, just the once, and Chris she finds out. Next day. Only texts me, doesn't she, this stupid little tart, and Chris has got my mobile because the battery on hers is flat and the cat's out of the fucking bag and I'm out the door. No explanations, no excuses, no fucking second chance."
He pushed his hands up through his hair.
"I still don't understand it, you know, how you can throw everything away, everything we had, all because of one little… transgression. One half-drunken step in the wrong direction that didn't mean a thing. Not a bloody thing. You understand that? Can you?"
Lynn wasn't sure. Although, looked at coldly, it did seem a bit extreme, she thought perhaps she could. If what they'd had together had really been as full, as complete as Foley had said, then maybe all it needed was one little crack to feel the whole thing was in danger of falling apart.
"I mean, would you?" Foley persisted. "In her situation. React like that?"
Would she, she wondered? If she found Charlie going over the side? She didn't know. She'd never really given it a thought.
"You tried to get her to change her mind?"
"Of course I bloody did. Only she'd met up with what's-his-face, bloody Schofield, by then, hadn't she?"
"How did you feel about that? Christine meeting somebody else?"
"How d'you think I felt? Like shit got wiped off some fucker's bloody shoe."
"You got angry, then?"
"Of course I got bloody angry!"
"With her?"
Foley shook his head. "First off, I thought it was, you know, tit for tat. Sauce for the goose, something like that. But then it was more. More, and I was out on my ear for bloody good."
"You didn't like that."
He looked at her as if it were a question not worth answering.
"You kept trying to get Christine to change her mind. Rowed in public. Shouted. Argued."
"She wouldn't let me into the house."
"So you shouted at her in the street."
"It was the only way to get her to see sense."
"Not just in the street, the shops, the supermarket."
"Her fault for locking the door in my face."
"She was within her rights."
"What about my rights?"
"You threatened her."
"Never. Shouted, maybe. Lost my temper, all right. But I never raised a hand to her. And I never threatened to, never."
"'If I can't fucking have you, no other bastard will.'"
"What?"
"It's what you said."
"When? Where?"
"One evening, outside the house. Little more than a week before she was killed."
"No."
"'If I can't fucking have you, no other bastard will.'"
"No way. No fucking way. I'd never've said that, not to her. Not in a million years."
"You were heard."
"Yes? Who by?"
Lynn lifted out a copy of the statement. "A neighbour. Evelyn Byers. Lives across the street."
"Nosy cow."
"Thursday evening. The week preceding the murder. Says she knows it was Thursday because that's the evening her daughter always comes round. Heard the shouting and went to the window to see what was going on."
"I'll bet she did."
"And that's when she heard you."
"And when was this again? Thursday? Thursday before?"
"Yes."
"Then, no. Can't have been. She might have heard somebody, but it wasn't me. I was in Portsmouth. Gone down about a job. New job, change of scene. Living so close, driving me round the twist. I went down that morning, the Thursday morning. Drove. Interview in the afternoon, dinner that night with the sales manager and a couple of the staff. Here"-he took a personal organiser from the inside pocket of his suit-"names and numbers-you can check."
"And it checked out?" Resnick asked.
"In detail," Lynn said.
It was not so long after eight thirty in the evening, neither of them with time nor inclination to cook, and they were sharing a takeaway from one of the Indian restaurants on the Mansfield Road. Lamb passanda and chicken korma, saag aloo and brinjal bhajee, fried rice and naan bread, plus an assortment of pickles from the cupboard and the fridge. In the absence of any more Worthington White Shield, they split a large bottle of Hoegaarden between them.