‘Would you have told me?’ I asked him, pulling back slightly. ‘If it hadn’t been for what happened to Clare? If the police hadn’t called you in? Would you have told me or would we just have gone on as we were?’

‘If I’m being honest with you, Rachel, I don’t know. I can’t answer that because what happened, happened. And it changed everything. It made me realise I don’t want to lose you. And now there’s someone doing their very best to hurt you or scare you, and I’m scared. I’m trying not to be, but I am. But no matter how scared I am, I promise you this. I’ll do everything in my power to try to make sure they don’t hurt you, or the kids. If you’ll let me.’

He held me tightly again and for the first time in a long while I felt a genuine connection between us. It was a fine one, thin, fragile, but it was there. If only I could escape from the fact that I was guilty, too, and I’d also slept with someone else. Someone I still had feelings for. Someone I couldn’t stop thinking about. Someone with whom I wondered if I’d ever have allowed myself to get close to if things between Paul and I hadn’t slid so far off course.

I just held him, allowed him to hug me, then I closed my eyes and rested my head on his shoulder, trying hard to cut out all the outside noise.

I had no idea at all where we went from here except that in that moment, in that room, keeping the people here with me safe was the only thing that mattered.

Molly ended up sleeping in between us that night. Beth slept in the other bedroom on her own but insisted on keeping the light on and the door open so she could see us. I’m not sure I really slept at all. I jumped at every voice walking along the corridor, at the sound of every car driving into the car park. I’d pushed a chair against the door, making sure the back of it jammed the handle so no one could get in or out, but still my nerves jangled. I wondered if we should have stayed at home, where the police could’ve kept a closer eye on us, after all.

When it was quiet, instead of drifting off, my mind wandered to what Paul had told me. What the police had shown me. I wondered how Julie was. How Ronan was. Had the police told him they’d been speaking to Paul? Did he think Paul was guilty now?