‘Beth’s right,’ Paul said. ‘You’ve spent the afternoon telling me the police are putting extra measures in place because there might be a crazy person on the loose and you want to go out running on your own?’ He raised an eyebrow.

‘I’ll take the car and drive to the riverside. There’ll still be loads of people around. I’ll stick to the walk along the quay. It’ll be jammed with the weather being so nice. Safety in numbers,’ I said, although even as I spoke I felt my own nerves resurface.

The thought of a crowd of people may well provide a safety of sorts, but I didn’t know who this was. I didn’t know who was trying to scare me. I could brush past them in a sea of people and not know. At the same time, I didn’t want whoever this was to make me a prisoner. I needed room to breathe, and in that house – the air thick with heat, and tension, I couldn’t relax.

‘I suppose,’ Paul conceded. ‘And if it stops you sitting there like a cat on a hot tin roof all night, it might be a good thing.’

‘I don’t like it, Mum,’ Beth said.

‘Your mum’ll be fine,’ Paul said. ‘And sure, she’ll have her phone with her at all times, won’t you, Rachel?’

‘I will,’ I said.

‘Besides, when she’s out, we can watch some more of the TV series Stranger Things, since she refuses to watch it with us.’

Beth smiled nervously but seemed reassured by Paul’s words and his promise of some quality time together.

I went to get changed back into my running gear, no longer convinced it was a good idea but too stubborn to back down. As I tied the laces on my trainers, my phone beeped. Picking it up, I saw a message from Michael. I immediately felt a swirling in the pit of my stomach:

Rachel, we need to talk. I’m so sorry about this morning. This just all felt out of control. Is there any chance at all you can get away, even for half an hour?

I didn’t think twice before responding. I simply asked him when and where.

Michael and I had met when he’d registered for a three-month creative writing class I taught at the local technical college. It was something I’d fallen into, but I found that actually I quite enjoyed it. My students were older than the truculent teenagers I stood in front of every day in my day job and they had a genuine enthusiasm for what they were doing.