‘Stella, I killed her.’ He lowers his voice even further and leans across the table towards me. ‘And I should be punished for it.’

‘But if you didn’t bury—’

‘I know what I did,’ he interrupts me. ‘I know I must have killed her and I need you to make sure they know it too.’

‘Danny, what do you mean, you must have?’ I say.

‘Will you just do that for me?’ Danny cries. He curls his hand into a fist and thumps it against the table. ‘I want to go back to my cell now,’ he calls out, looking about, making me think we are being watched. There are no cameras, no flashing lights, yet it is only a matter of seconds before the door opens and Harwood appears.

‘Danny—’ I start as my brother buries his face in his hands.

‘Please. I just want to go now,’ he mumbles and refuses to look at me as I’m led out of the room.

Chapter Twenty

‘He says he thinks he must have done it,’ I say on the phone to Bonnie after Harwood drops me back at the interview suite. I leap out of the way as a car swerves close to the kerb, sending a puddle splashing towards me.

‘I can’t believe you went to see him. You said you wouldn’t.’

‘No,’ I say, ‘I don’t think I ever did. But that’s not the point. The point is he doesn’t know, Bon. He says he thinks he must have. Not that he did. And not only that, he says he didn’t bury her.’ I don’t bother admitting he didn’t tell me this outright.

‘So why the hell would he confess? Of course he did it, he’s going to say anything to get out of it now. He’s scared.’

‘He’s not trying to get out of it, he wants me to get the police to believe him.’

‘So, what’s the problem?’ she cries out. ‘Tell them that and we can all move on with our lives.’

I sigh as I open my car door and climb in. ‘Bonnie, isn’t there any part of you that wants to believe he might be innocent?’

She laughs. ‘Do you really think I want to live with the fact my brother killed my best friend? Only the odds aren’t exactly stacked in his favour right now, are they? Think back,’ she goes on. ‘Remember all the times he’s done something that wasn’t right—’ Her voice suddenly cuts out and when I look down at my phone I see my battery is dead.

I drive straight to Bonnie’s. She leads me down the hall, but on the way I pass Luke lying on a sofa in the living room. ‘Are you feeling better?’ I ask as I pause in the doorway.