‘I’d heard,’ I told him. ‘It’s very sad.’

‘Do you know how she killed herself? Where she did it? Why?’

I shook my head. ‘No.’

He pulled his chair closer, sat down.

‘She did it here. At this site. Down by the river, at the railings. She came down here and she cut her wrists then she tied a noose around her neck and hung herself.’

I shuddered. The image in my mind was horrific. Poor Laura. What could have been so bad to end her life, and to end it in such a brutal manner?

‘She had two children as well, you know. Just like you. Just like Julie. So when you plead with me to let you go, that your children need you, that’s not going to cut it with me. No one cared that Laura’s children needed her … they still do. But they can’t have her. She’s been gone from their lives for two years. Seven and nine, they were. Babies, really.’

‘So why inflict that pain on other children? On my children?’ I was crying again, thinking of my girls. ‘Molly’s only three. She needs me.’

‘She’ll adapt,’ he said, his tone cold. ‘Children are very adaptable, especially when they’re younger. Maybe Paul will start a new family with that woman of his. Molly’ll get a new mummy.’

‘But why us? Why me? I didn’t do anything to Laura. I didn’t hurt her. Her death has nothing to do with me.’

‘You’re colder than I ever gave you credit for, Rachel,’ he said. ‘That you don’t even realise. Out of all three of you, you were the one I thought might have been truly good at heart. If you’d agreed to run away … maybe …’ His eyes seemed to glaze over for a moment before he blinked and looked me directly in the eye. ‘Each time you excluded her, you made her feel worthless. Every time you rolled your eyes when she talked about her favourite book, or stopped talking when she walked into a room. Every time you all picked her last for games, or left her sitting on her own on school trips, you made her feel she wasn’t good enough. That she would never be good enough.

‘Do you not remember the time she had her hair cut? Permed. She was delighted with it. Clare, though … Clare laughed at her. I always remembered that name. Always remembered how this Clare told her she should sue the hairdresser. You didn’t step in. Did you? You let her say it. You must have known it was cruel.

‘She started to cut herself, you know, back then. She was broken even then and you three, you just chipped away at whatever was left of her.’