Marjorie hooted with laughter. ‘Nothing to worry about; there’s been a wee accident, that’s all.’

Nicky and I exchanged amused looks.

‘Never a dull moment,’ she said, glancing at the large clock on the wall. ‘And it’s not even tea-break time yet.’

‘So I see.’ I leaned forward, about to rest my forearms on the desk and remembered just in time.

Nicky giggled. ‘Believe me, it’s had worse things on it than Mr Bradbury’s green wee.’

Green? I winced and stood up straight. ‘How was your first night in your new home?’

Her face went all gooey. ‘Perfect. Just perfect. With that and Adam proposing to me last week, my head’s in the clouds. I’m so in love I can’t tell you.’

I felt a tiny pang of envy. ‘I’m so pleased for you and I hope you’ll be very happy.’

‘We will,’ said Nicky, blinking happy tears away. She picked up her pen. ‘So did you want an appointment?’

‘No. Well, possibly, I’m back for a while so I thought I should re-register.’

Nicky nodded and pushed a card under the gap in the counter.

‘Put your new address on here—’ She interrupted herself with a gasp. ‘Oh blimey, I almost forgot! What am I like!’

She grinned goofily at herself and I looked quizzically at her.

‘We had a visitor this morning looking for you. Tall, muscly, black hair. He turned up at the house just as I was leaving for work.’

My blood turned to ice: Harvey.

I swallowed. ‘What did you tell him?’

She shrugged. ‘I said you weren’t here and as far as I knew you were living with your sister.’

‘Oh God.’ I pressed a hand to my chest, racking my brains to think whether Harvey had ever been to Evie’s house. He had. I remembered one night last autumn having a Chinese takeaway for Darren’s birthday. I could feel my heart thudding against my ribs as urgently as if I’d just sprinted a hundred metres.

‘I’m really sorry. Did I say the wrong thing?’ Nicky bit her lip. ‘You’ve gone a funny colour. Do you want a glass of water?’

My head was spinning and I felt faint. Even if he had gone round to Evie’s she wasn’t in any danger; Harvey wasn’t violent. What about last week, when he wrapped your ponytail round his hand and tugged it? said a little voice.

‘I’ve got to go,’ I murmured and abandoning the GP’s registration card, I stumbled back out of the automatic doors.

Outside the bright sunlight was such a contrast to the cool of the surgery that I had to stop, shade my eyes and take a few breaths.

I pulled out my phone and saw a text message from Evie. My hands trembled as I opened it, worried that Harvey was already there.