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were taken very seriously indeed. I spent five months behind bars for assault and was kicked off the force.”
    “That’s awful.” She studied him for a few moments. “Are you bitter about it?”
    He could say what he always said, that it was water under the bridge. “You bet your life I’m bitter, Ruby.”
    She nodded, as if she’d expected nothing else. “So how do you fill your time these days?”
    “I’m a private investigator.”
    Again, her face lit up. “Now that is exciting. I bet you have all sorts of clever gadgets. Pens that are really recording devices. A gun disguised as a cigarette lighter. A car with number plates that change at the press of a button.”
    Laughing, Dylan helped himself to peanuts. “You’re confusing me with James Bond.”
    “But you must have some gadgets surely?”
    “Nothing very exciting. I’ve only just got the hang of my computer.”
    “Ah. I expect you’re more like Sherlock Holmes then.”
    “Not even close, I’m afraid.”
    Ruby’s chatter made him forget that he’d had no sleep and that everyone else on this ship was crazy. It didn’t stop him wondering if there was a killer in the crowded bar though.

Chapter Six
    Back in the bar, chatting to Dylan Scott, Ruby had thought she’d be asleep as soon as her head touched her pillow. Now that her head was finally resting on the pillow, she was wide-awake. Awake and feeling completely out of sorts with life in general and her children in particular.
    It didn’t seem so long ago that she’d stood outside her children’s junior school and shared jokes with the other young mothers about the first eighteen years being the worst. How wrong they’d been. The first eighteen years were easy. Children believed, deep down, that Mother always knew best. It was when they became adults that they decided Mother knew nothing and must be bossed around. All for her own good, of course.
    The only problem she’d had with Tom and Laura when they were children was the constant quarrelling. Despite there only being a two-year age gap, they’d fought like tigers over the most trivial matters. They’d certainly never been close.
    She sat up in bed, switched on the lamp and picked up her Joanna Trollope paperback. Perhaps reading about fictional families’ problems would take her mind off her own.
    Her children believed they knew what was right for her, and they made her feel old. Old, out of touch and barely capable of making a decision for herself.
    She’d promised herself she’d phone Laura this evening, but she hadn’t. She’d put it off until she was able to convince herself it was too late to disturb her. The truth was that she hadn’t been able to face it. Now, of course, she felt awful.
    Perhaps she was turning into a cantankerous old woman. She loved Norway, adored cruising along its wonderful coastline and seeing the towering mountains and waterfalls that tumbled down for hundreds of metres. Laura had gone to the trouble of booking this cruise as a treat. Ruby should be thrilled to have such a thoughtful, considerate daughter instead of seeing it as bossiness.
    It was good of Tom to give up time he could ill afford too. She knew he didn’t want to be here, knew he felt duty bound to accompany her on the annual trip, and so she felt bad about that.
    Realising she’d read the same paragraph three times and not a single word had registered, she closed her book and slumped back against her pillow.
    Tom was the real reason she felt out of sorts.
    She hadn’t been too surprised when he’d asked her for money because hints had been flying her way for months. Perhaps he hadn’t been surprised when she’d refused.
    Of course, she felt terrible about that too.
    It wasn’t as if she couldn’t afford to help him. She simply didn’t believe it was the right thing to do for the long term. As she’d told Dylan Scott, Tom struggled to settle to anything and, to get the success he craved, he needed to be willing to put in the