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I try to quell my anger. ‘And did she?’ So far, everything Taylor told me about how they met seems to be true.
‘No,’ Max says, hanging his head. ‘She said she didn’t care. That she loved me and that was all that mattered. She said we can’t help who we fall in love with.’ He sniffs. ‘It scared me. Nothing I did seemed to make any difference. I told her I’d never leave you and Poppy. Never.’
I stare at him, shock and disbelief clogging my brain as I struggle to make sense of Max’s words. ‘So Alice wasn’t leaving you?’
‘No. I was leavingher. She told me she’d booked a hotel room at the River Walk and begged me to meet her there at five. But I had no intention of going. I…I was a coward. I let her think that I would meet her, because it felt easier. And by the time she realised I wasn’t turning up, I would have told you everything. That’s what I was coming home to do. So Alice would have no more power over me if she threatened to tell you.’
‘So you never went there? You’ve never set foot in that hotel?’
‘Never. I was telling the truth when you asked me that. By the time I got home, ready to tell you – she’d been found dead.’
‘But I found the key card in your pocket. If you didn’t go to the hotel, why did you have it?’
‘I don’t know how it got there.’ He lifts his head and stares at the ceiling. ‘How do we know it was even Alice’s card? It could have been a different one? Someone must have put it in my pocket. I don’t know, Hannah! If I’d gone there and killed Alice, why would I have kept the card in my pocket? I would have got rid of it, wouldn’t I?’
Max has a point.
Silence floats around us, uncomfortable but somehow peaceful along with it. A release. I look at him. ‘When you came here that night, when you had the knife – I thought you were trying to frame me. I thought that’s why you said I’d killed her.’
‘I’m sorry. There’s so much I’m sorry for, Hannah.’
‘Do you think Shane is capable of murder?’
Max shrugs. ‘I don’t know. But it’s too much of a coincidence that I met Alice randomly in a pub and she just happens to be a good friend of his. The colleague whose life he claims I’ve ruined.’
I let this sink in. It’s true. It might be a small world, full of uncanny coincidences, but I can’t believe for one second it was random that Alice met Max that night. ‘He engineered it,’ I say. ‘He must have. He got Alice to approach you.’
Max frowns. ‘Maybe. But he wouldn’t have been able to force her to become obsessed with me. And that was real. I know it was. I felt the intensity of her. If he was just trying to ruin my life, all he’d need was one picture of us. For me to sleep with her once. But it went on for months.’
There are still so many unanswered questions. This is far from over.
‘I don’t understand why he’d want her dead,’ Max says.
‘Maybe she was going to tell you the truth about how she came into your life? I don’t know, Max. He’s the only one who can answer that.’
Max stands up and walks to the window, peering through the blind. ‘She didn’t deserve to die,’ he says. ‘For all her faults, Alice was a good person. She knew who she was and she wasn’t afraid to be that person, even if it wasn’t who everyone wanted her to be.’
Somehow it hurts more to hear Max saying kind words about her than it does to know that he slept with her.
‘What now?’ he says. ‘What are we supposed to do?’
‘We go to the police,’ I tell him. ‘After that, I don’t know.’
He turns to face me. ‘I love you,’ he says. ‘That never stopped. I just lost sight of myself. Of us. I’ll never forgive myself for that.’
‘Are you askingmeto forgive you?’
He stares at his trainers. ‘I don’t know what I’m asking. All I know is that I love you and Poppy. I want to be in your lives. I know it will take time, but I’ll wait as long as it takes.’
I ignore him. I’m not ready to deal with any of that now. Perhaps I never will be. ‘Where did you go after work that night she died?’ I ask. ‘You were late home that day. I remember Poppy and I were waiting for you. I’d made risotto. If you didn’t meet her at the hotel, then where did you go?’
Max hesitates for a moment. Barely enough time for me to register a flicker of doubt on his face. ‘I went to the Spotted Horse for a bit. Alice hated it in there so I knew she’d never turn up there. I wanted to prepare how I’d tell you. Plus, Shane had been threatening me and he was ramping it up. Telling me I didn’t deserve to be alive. I wasn’t ready to come home.’
‘Someone there must have seen you? You’ll need an alibi for the police, won’t you? When we go and tell them everything?’
Max is silent for a moment. ‘I’m ready to go. This has gone on long enough.’
Then I remember something that’s been niggling me. ‘What was that flat I followed you to?’
