Since he’d come home, she had been making a massive effort to put the spark back into their marriage. Evan hated that she let the dog lick her face, so she’d put a stop to that; and she had taken to cleaning the house while he was at work, so it was nice for him to come home to. She’d even started wearing the sexy underwear he liked, despite the fact it made her feel fat and ugly. In return, Evan had been coming home straight from work instead of sloping off to the pub; and he’d started paying her little compliments instead of constantly criticizing her. And last week, the night before he’d disappeared, he had bought her flowers for the first time in years. They had been half-dead, and some of them hadn’t even survived their first night in the vase, but it was a romantic gesture, and she had really thought they were turning a corner. So why had he abandoned her again?

It had to have something to do with what that woman had said before Frank had shut her up. She’d said that Evan was a liar, and that Marie deserved to know what he was really like, and the only conclusion Marie could draw from that was that Evan was cheating on her, and Frank and his bitch knew exactly where he was – and who he was with.

Convinced that she was right, Marie marched inside when she got home and, ignoring her beloved dog when it bounded out into the hall to greet her, dragged a suitcase out of the cupboard under the stairs and carried it up to the bedroom. Throwing it onto the bed, she unzipped it and tipped the contents of Evan’s drawers into it, before chucking the contents of the laundry basket on top. If this new woman of his wanted him so badly, she was welcome to him and his stinking underpants and sweaty socks!

Drawers and laundry basket empty, Marie opened the wardrobe and pulled out his shirts and trousers. Pausing when she came to the suit he had bought for their wedding six years earlier, she clutched the jacket to her breast and sank down on the bed when she picked up the faint scent of his aftershave.

Something hard was pressing against her breastbone, and she reached into the inside pocket and pulled it out. It was the passport Evan thought he’d lost after his last trip abroad, and she flipped it open and looked at the photo he had always complained made him look older than his dad. A wave of sadness washed over her as she stared into the familiar eyes, but it was quickly replaced by anger when she remembered that he was probably lying in another woman’s bed right now; having sex, and telling the bitch he loved her.