‘She wasn’t alone, at the end …’ he said. ‘The police told us you were holding her hand. Had put your jacket over her. That means a lot.’

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak.

‘Did she say anything? Did she speak at all?’ he asked.

I was aware of Patricia close by. She’d asked me not to reveal what Clare had said to me. That it was sensitive to the case. I didn’t want to lie – that felt wrong – but I had to do what Patricia had asked, so I shook my head. I watched Ronan deflate in front of my eyes. Watched as Patricia took in every detail of our exchange.

‘She wasn’t really conscious, slipping in and out, you know …’ I told him. ‘I doubt she’d have been too aware of anything around her at that stage.’

‘But you held her hand?’ he asked.

‘I put my coat over her and called the emergency services, then I held her hand. Pleaded with her to hang on. She was just too ill.’

I felt a tear roll down my cheek. Saw images of her poor, mutilated body flash before my eyes. I shuddered. Patricia placed a cup of tea in front of me.

‘It’s a great comfort to my parents to know someone was with her,’ Ronan said.

‘Mr and Mrs Taylor are sleeping at the moment; it was a bad night for them,’ Patricia explained.

‘I can imagine,’ I said softly.

Although that wasn’t quite true. I didn’t need to imagine. I knew exactly how it felt to lose a child in the most horrific of circumstances.

Chapter Ten

Rachel

I was exhausted, physically and emotionally, by the time I got home. I’d picked Molly up from crèche and had done my best to pretend everything was normal, but I could feel my facade slipping.

Spending time with Ronan, and then his parents, had been harrowing. It had made it too real. Mrs Taylor was the kind of woman who was always impeccably dressed and made up. She used to give us girls make-up lessons when we were teens – warning us against the dangers of going overboard on the rouge or choosing the wrong shade of lipstick. I’d never seen her without her make-up before – not even when I’d had a sleepover at Clare’s. Yet, there she’d been, her face pale, devoid of its usual glam look, her hair pulled into a loose bun, wearing a pair of black trousers and a jumper that seemed to swamp her. She’d looked so small, so vulnerable that it had shaken me, but at least she’d been able to talk to us. Mr Taylor – this big teddy bear of a man with a booming voice and an even louder laugh – just sat silently, staring into a mug of tea that he didn’t once lift to his lips.