‘I mean, I just wish you’d try and be a bit less … brutal.’ She took a knife from the block and decapitated a packet of chocolate digestives. ‘I expect it’s a good thing to be hard in your line of work but it isn’t very attractive. Your attitude towards your brother …’

‘My attitude? Do you ever think about what it’s like for me, your favouritism? Always taking his side in a fight, always taking his word before mine …’ Justifying his crapness while she found the negative in everything Robin did that was good.

Christine paused then seemed to come to a conclusion. ‘Luke came over last night,’ she said, ‘because he and Natalie are having a tough time.’

Something in her tone stopped the glib response on Robin’s tongue. ‘Why?’ she said. ‘What do you mean, tough?’

‘They thought they were expecting but it was a false alarm. They’re both very disappointed, obviously, and things got a bit … heated. Your brother needed a bit of support.’

And now she felt like a cow. Great. ‘Just for the record,’ she said, ‘I came in here to apologize.’

‘And there you go. Why do you always assume I’m criticizing you?’

‘Weren’t you?’

‘I’m trying to help you.’

‘By what? Telling me I’m hard?’

‘By telling you that storming around bickering and pushing people away all the time isn’t going to make you happy. It’s no wonder you can’t hold down a relationship. This idea you seem to have that relying on anyone else is a sign of weakness or in some way against your feminist principles …’ The usual disdain at the phrase, as if she wished she had her rubber gloves on.

Somewhere in her jacket, Robin’s phone rang. ‘It’ll be the seventeenth century, I expect,’ she said, ‘wanting their worldview back.’

‘Mum, Gran,’ came a plaintive voice from the other room, ‘could you please stop fighting?’

They stared at each other, the phone ringing. Christine turned away and took a side plate from the cupboard. ‘Are you going to get that?’ she said, cold.

Robin dug it out of the jacket pocket and looked at it: Number withheld. She hesitated then went out into the tiny hall. ‘Hello?’

‘Robin? It’s Samir.’

Oh, for fuck’s sake. ‘Hold on.’ She reached back into the kitchen for her jacket then let herself out of the front door, an instant temperature-drop of about thirty degrees. ‘Right,’ she said, jacket on, ‘let me guess. You’re calling because Webster saw me in Bishop Street?’

‘Correct.’

‘I was in my car, didn’t even get out. I wasn’t doing anything.’

‘Apart from putting yourself in the frame. Do you want him to think you’re involved? Is that the idea?’