‘You know nothing about me. Nothing about the real me. Michael O’Neill isn’t even my real name. I know him, of course. We were good friends, you know. Before Laura died.’

My head hurt. My body ached. I could feel pain shift and move from my arms to my legs to my head. I was just so tired now. What little energy I’d had was seeping from me, as was any hope of being saved.

‘So who are you?’ I asked.

‘I’m not sure I should tell you,’ he said, pacing back and forth again.

I was sure I heard the sound of a helicopter in the sky. Most likely the police. Dare I hope they were looking for me?

Michael, or whatever his damn real name was, heard it, too.

‘You’ve got to give them extra points for trying,’ he said coldly. He pulled his chair closer to me and sat down again. ‘Maybe you could guess who I am. So I’ve told you I’m not Michael O’Neill – and I have to say I’m surprised you never made the connection between that surname and Laura. Didn’t you think it an odd coincidence?’

I didn’t want to tell him that until the last few days I hadn’t thought about Laura O’Loughlin in years, let alone wonder if she’d married and changed her name. I stayed quiet.

He shook his head. ‘Silly, naive, self-obsessed Rachel. Never looks beyond the end of her own nose. Is it any wonder your husband found another woman?’

I wanted to cover my ears. I bowed my head, tried to make myself as small as possible.

‘Look at me, Rachel,’ he said.

I stayed staring at the floor until I felt the tip of his knife at my chin, urging my head upwards.

‘I said look at me!’

I raised my head, blinked and looked at him. This mystery man hell bent on revenge.

‘It doesn’t matter who I am, don’t you realise that? I might as well have stopped existing the day she died anyway. Everything changed. I realised that I didn’t matter. All everyone could think about was poor Laura. Even our own mother. It didn’t matter to her that she still had one living child. I became invisible to her. Do you know what that felt like, Rachel? To lose my sister, to lose my mother, too? And all of it because of you and your stupid friends. For a long time I wasn’t strong enough to do this, but I am now, Rachel.