‘I’ve told the police everything,’ Kath said. ‘There isn’t anything else. I know she was your best friend but she was my friend, too. Imagine how I feel, knowing people think my—’

‘Kath – stop.’ Robin’s voice was louder than she’d intended, taking them both by surprise. ‘I haven’t come to pressure you.’

A small snort.

‘I don’t think it was Josh.’

She gave a bitter shrug. ‘You mean, you think he had a breakdown.’

‘No. I don’t think he did it.’

Kath looked at her, assessing, then her eyes filled with tears. Robin havered. Should she go over there, put an arm round her? Would that be good – was Kath a hugger? Probably not, with people she wasn’t close to. She felt a guilty wash of relief.

Kath gulped and reached for the kitchen roll on the worktop, hands trembling. ‘I’m sorry.’ Another painful-sounding swallow. ‘That … You took me by surprise.’ She pressed the paper against her eyes. ‘I thought you’d come to have a go at me.’

‘What? No.’ Robin was taken aback. What kind of person did Kath think she was?

‘It’s just … Someone besides me and Dad who doesn’t think he’s a monster. Or – best-case scenario! – he lost his mind.’

Robin took a breath. ‘I’m not saying I think he was totally innocent.’

Her eyes: Please don’t hurt me.

‘I don’t know what happened – at all – but I think it’s possible he was mixed up with something that got out of control. Or someone.’

‘Why?’

Your instincts tell you? The memory of Freshwater’s scorn launched a spasm of self-doubt: what if she was misleading Josh’s sister? ‘At this stage it’s only a theory, I don’t want to give you false hope.’ She looked Kath in the eye. ‘Did you hear what happened to me?’

One nod. ‘Josh told me.’ A tiny pause. ‘And I saw it in the paper. They get the Mail in the staffroom.’

‘I’m completely out of the police for now, maybe for good. I could be wrong about that case, Jamie Hinton, I still don’t know, and I could be wrong about Josh. I want to be totally upfront about that.’

Another nod.

‘But the fact that there’s no sign of him yet, three days in. That he hasn’t given himself up or been found. If it had been a moment of madness, I think one way or another, he would have been found by now.’

Kath’s eyes were fixed on her.

‘Then last night I heard the factory was going under.’

She frowned. ‘You didn’t know that before? Didn’t Corinna tell you?’

‘No. Did she talk to you about it?’

‘Yes. But I’m family, I knew anyway, so … She really didn’t tell you?’

Something – pride – stopped Robin answering again. ‘Can you tell me?’