‘At the stud?’

Hearing the self-interest loaded in the question, Pax waited for its sting to soften. ‘Not for long. I’ll rent somewhere. I’m looking at new schools this week, seeing one today in fact.’ She sounded a lot calmer than she felt, the panic that bubbled up around Mack’s threats never far from the surface. ‘The village primary school here.’

‘Good God, Pax!’ Alice sounded shocked at last. ‘I had no idea it had come to that. You’re off the juice, I take it?’

Again, Pax let indignation subside. Outside, her mother had mounted Dickon and was clattering around impatiently while Luca tried to find a girth long enough to fit the stallion.

‘High and dry,’ she told her sister through gritted teeth. Without Kes at home, the only way she’d maintained it was going to bed at teatime to read gripping thrillers, sweating through the need for Scotch, battling to focus on whodunnit and why she cared.

‘Well, I hope your solicitor’s good.’

‘She is.’ Straight-talking, refreshingly upbeat and also a mother – her daughter went to the village school – Helen Beadle worked from her attic office with such tenacity that Mack, predictably, had sneeringly dubbed her Hell On Call. ‘She’s more softly-softly than his grand inquisitor, and her track record’s good in disputes over children.’ It was on Helen’s advice that Pax hadn’t kicked up a fuss about Kes’s day trips and sleepovers with his grandparents. ‘She says Mack’s doing himself no favours, freezing the joint bank cards and changing locks. My clothes were dumped in bin bags at the end of the drive here yesterday – Mummy’s horse spooked at them and almost went under the postman’s van. Then, apparently last night, Mack put a rant up on Facebook accusing me of everything from bankrupting the company to shagging his best plasterer.’ Social media was the deep, dark woods to Pax – ironically, Mack was the one who’d talked her out of it, claiming it was full of predatory paedophiles and lifestyle envy – but friends had told her, and it stung like a wasp swarm. That he’d later deleted it was no comfort. ‘It could be worse, apparently. Revenge porn or suchlike.’

‘Good God, is that a thing? Please tell me you haven’t…’

‘I don’t think pictures of me sunbathing in a bikini in Cornwall count.’ For once, Pax was grateful for their unadventurous, uncatalogued sex life.

‘If you ask me, it all boils down to money. Supposing Mack has divorce in his sights, he’ll be after maximum return on his eight years; bad PR devalues your stakehold. There’s the stud to think about now, Pax. He’s an acquisitive sod, let’s face it.’

‘He’s in bits, Lisp.’ Pax was shocked. ‘I’m the one calling time on our marriage.’

‘Don’t you dare feel guilty,’ Alice snapped. ‘You’re telling me he wants to take your son away from you.’

‘Well, he won’t get him!’ She’d barely slept more than three hours strung together all week, more weight dropping off, anger chasing blame around in circles as she paced the cottage’s small rooms. She’d never imagined it would all happen as quickly as this, but Mack had always been knee-jerk. Often without the knee.