She watches as his face takes on a new pallor. ‘Fine, sure.’ He hangs up. Slowly, he turns to her. ‘They want me to do a polygraph test.’

Patrick stands completely still, his cell phone still in his hand. He can feel the sweat at his hairline. He reaches up automatically as if to loosen the collar at his neck, but he’s only wearing a T-shirt – he doesn’t have to dress for work any more – and he lets his hand fall.

His wife looks at him. ‘That’s all right, isn’t it?’ she says tentatively. ‘They’re not arresting you. They’ll do the polygraph, and when you pass, maybe they’ll drop the whole thing and leave us alone. They’ll know you didn’t do it!’

He turns on her, his voice tense. ‘It’s not that simple, Stephanie.’

She falters, her face pale and drawn, ‘What do you mean?’ There’s a long, fraught pause.

‘Those tests aren’t reliable. They aren’t even admissible in court.’

‘Then why do them at all?’

He looks back at her, rage building inside him. Those bastards. He tries to remain calm. ‘I’ll tell you why. The police can manipulate them. They’ll make me come off badly.’

‘Surely they can’t make you fail – not if you’re telling the truth.’

He turns away; he doesn’t want to look at her. He turns to his cell. He needs to talk to his attorney.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

THE FOLLOWING DAY, Thursday, Stephanie wakes early. She looks over at her husband, still sleeping. The babies aren’t even awake yet. She stares at his sleeping form, the familiar shoulder, his dark hair, his classically handsome profile. She thinks about how much she once loved him. It wasn’t even that long ago. It makes her wonder if love is just an illusion, one that disappears when reality gets too dark. No, she decides. Love is real. The love she feels for her baby daughters is real. But romantic love – maybe that’s all an illusion.

She must pack up the twins early and take them back to Hanna. She and Patrick have a flight to Denver today. They will meet at Lange’s office in Denver, and then together they will go to the Sheriff’s Office in Creemore. She doesn’t know what’s going to happen. She finds the tension almost unbearable. There was an awful moment, booking the tickets online, when Patrick didn’t know whether to book two same-day return tickets or just one. Lange had warned him that he might not be coming back. In the end, a return ticket wasn’t much more expensive than a one-way fare, so he booked himself a return ticket too.

She knows that she, at least, is coming home on the evening flight. She’s assured Hanna of that. She’ll be home late that night to take the twins off her hands.

Patrick had argued with her about whether she should go at all. He’d been quite insistent – even adamant – that she not go. There was nothing she could do to help; she should stay home and take care of the twins. It wasn’t like the inquest, where appearances mattered. They were going to go to the Sheriff’s Office, as requested, and whatever was going to happen would take place outside of the public eye. There was no need for her to be there, he’d assured her.

But she’d stood her ground. What he didn’t seem to understand was that she wanted to be there. She wanted to hear for herself what the attorney had to say.

Most of all, she wanted to be there when Patrick took the polygraph at the Sheriff’s Office.

She slips out of bed quietly and goes downstairs to put on the coffee.

The time goes by in a blur – she feeds the babies, dresses them, has toast while Patrick showers, and takes the twins across the street just before they leave. They’re in the car by 6 a.m. for their 8.35 a.m. flight. They don’t speak during the entire long drive to the airport.

Stephanie spends her time leaning against the window, her mind blank. She’d told Hanna that they were going to see the attorney in Denver, and that the police wanted to question her husband. Hanna hadn’t known what to say. She’d just given her a big hug.

The flight lands on time and soon they are in a cab on their way to the attorney’s office. Stephanie stares stoically in front of her. She has no interest in Denver.

The law firm is sleek and modern and hums with a discreet energy. Lange meets them at reception. ‘How was your flight?’ he asks. It’s small talk and none of them are in the mood to engage. ‘Follow me,’ he says and directs them to his office. They were here before, to prepare for the inquest.

Once they’re inside his office, settled in their chairs, he gets right down to business. ‘I’m sorry about this, but I’m not surprised. As I told you after the inquest, after a verdict of undetermined, they have to be seen to be doing something. Questioning you is the next step. They have to do it. And, in Colorado, it’s pretty common to ask a suspect to come in and take a polygraph.’

‘What if I don’t do it?’ Patrick asks.

Stephanie looks at him in dismay.

‘Then they might arrest you,’ the attorney says.

‘I don’t understand any of this,’ Stephanie says. ‘Why do the polygraph if they can’t use it?’

Lange looks at her. ‘Let me explain about polygraphs. The way they work is by measuring various physiological changes – in heart rate, blood pressure, perspiration, breathing and so on – when the examiner asks each question. Based on the results, the examiner may conclude whether the person is lying or not. They are often unreliable. And yes, for that reason, they’re generally not admissible in court.’

‘Then what purpose do they serve?’ Stephanie asks.

The lawyer says carefully, ‘Although they may not be admissible in court, the police think they provide valuable information.’

‘So the police believe them, they just can’t use them in court,’ she says, reading between the lines.

Without answering, he turns to her husband. ‘If you pass, that will probably be the end of it. It usually is. And it would be next to impossible to prove murder at trial.’

Stephanie glances at her husband, who has his attention fixed on the attorney.

The lawyer leans forward at his desk. ‘Let me tell you something else about polygraphs. They are very risky. We never let our clients take a police polygraph without doing one with our own examiner first.’ He lets that sink in, regarding them both with a serious expression. ‘In any event, agreeing to come in and take a police polygraph test amounts to the same thing as giving an interview to the police. You may be manipulated or tricked into giving incriminating information – because although the results of the polygraph aren’t admissible in court, the questions and the answers you give are. Sometimes it’s better not to talk to them at all. It’s an important decision, not to be taken lightly.’ He adds, ‘In most cases, a police polygraph is not helpful, but sometimes it can be.’

There’s an uneasy silence, into which Patrick says, ‘So what are we going to do?’

‘Like I told you on the phone, we’re going to get you hooked up to the machine and do a polygraph right here,’ the attorney says. ‘Sit tight, I’ll be right back.’

Patrick hadn’t told her that they would do a polygraph at the law firm first. Stephanie sits in her chair, reeling. The attorney doesn’t seem to think Patrick will pass the polygraph. Fair enough – most of his clients are probably guilty; they probably routinely fail. But surely Patrick didn’t murder his wife. This is going to help them. It has to.

She looks at Patrick, sitting nervously in his chair; he refuses to meet her eyes. A chill creeps over her, like cold fingers running over her body.

When the attorney returns, he’s accompanied by a man carrying equipment. They quickly get everything set up on a table in the corner of the large office. Soon Patrick is sitting across from the examiner. He has two rubber straps across his chest and a clip on his index finger.

Stephanie and the attorney watch from the side. ‘Just relax,’ Lange tells Patrick. ‘Roddy here is one of the best in the business, a retired police officer. He knows what he’s doing.’ Her husband flicks a nervous glance at the examiner. ‘Roddy is going to ask you a series of questions that we have prepared. Just answer yes or no,’ the attorney says.

The examiner nods at Lange, and the attorney says, ‘Okay, let’s begin.’

The examiner, when he speaks, has a calm, measured voice.

‘Is it the month of October?’

‘Yes.’

‘Are you going to answer all my questions truthfully?’

‘Yes.’

‘Have you ever lied to get out of trouble?’

A slight hesitation. ‘Yes.’

‘Were you living in Creemore, Colorado, in January 2009?’

‘Yes.’

‘Before your wife, Lindsey Kilgour, died on January 10, 2009, did you know that it is dangerous for a person to be inside a running car if the exhaust pipe is blocked with snow?’

‘No.’

‘On the day that your wife died, did you tell her to wait in the car while you shovelled it out?’

‘No.’

‘Before your wife died on January 10, 2009, did you know that the exhaust pipe of your car was blocked with snow?’

‘No.’

‘Do you currently live at Seventeen Danbury Drive, Aylesford, New York?’

‘Yes.’