Chandler had half-expected Mitch to insist that he stayed at the station, keeping him from the kids to help further his and Teri’s case for custody, but Mitch was preoccupied with completing the prosecution notices, so Chandler went home.

With Sarah glued to her phone, Jasper dragged him to the garage and insisted on him retrieving the go-kart from it. Laying it on the driveway, Chandler could see that the back axle had worked loose over the winter and was in need of some work, but Jasper was in no mood to fix what was immediately serviceable. Plumping himself down on the plastic seat they had cannibalized from an old buggy he demanded that his dad push him around the yard. This carefree attitude to safety reminded Chandler of his own youth darting around on motorbikes. It was also the reason Jasper tended to get into scrapes, his grandparents too slow to keep up with him, usually arriving on the scene in the aftermath of an incident. Indeed the knobbly knees which protruded from Jasper’s khaki shorts were presently crisscrossed with a series of cuts and scabs as if he had been dragged back and forth through a nest of brambles. The type of injuries that would cause whoever was ruling on custody to think twice. But Chandler was sure they would have to accept that kids could not be watched over one hundred per cent of the time. Tears were part of growing up and with Jasper they never lasted long anyway, his life a constant stream of adventure: fortresses and stunts, cops and robbers. And now, murderers.

After a pleasant family dinner, Chandler put Jasper to bed with a bedtime story, a fantastical tale of robots and spaceships on a distant planet where the water was sparkling soda and the scenery was edible, a rip-off of a nursery rhyme from his childhood he couldn’t quite recall. Before he had turned the second page, Jasper was asleep, the evening’s exertions taking their toll.

Next stop was Sarah. She was curled up in bed, the phone inches from her face. Chandler felt tentative as he entered, expecting questions that he didn’t want to answer. He played it safe at first.

‘How was your day, honey?’

All he got in reply was a mumble. A good or bad sign, he couldn’t tell.

‘Nothing exciting?’

‘No First Confession yet.’

‘Yeah, sorry about that. But there’s—’

‘Sophie says there’s been a murder and that you have the murderer. Two of them.’

So much for caution. He cleared his throat. ‘There’s an investigation in progress.’

‘Dad, I’m not a kid. You can tell me.’

‘Even if that were true I couldn’t tell you.’

‘Is it true?’

‘There’s nothing to worry about. We have it under control.’

‘Then why did you – they – stop the First Confession going ahead?’