“I believe,” he continued carefully, “I hope, that if you can gain an insight into the person who did this to you and why he did it . . . OK, I know he was paid, and that he needn’t have done it, but if you read his story, told in his own words, it might help you to understand him . . .”

“I’ve already told you . . .”

“. . . and that could be extremely beneficial for you, and for your mother. I think Jasmine needs it too, but Marcy is the one who is finding it the hardest to overcome what happened. It’s not just her injuries, although obviously they’re a big part of why she hardly goes out in public, it’s the suppression of her spirit, her inability or unwillingness to communicate or to feel that is the biggest concern. We both know what a lively and confident woman she really is, and I accept that the kind of trauma she suffered can change a person, but I am not ready to accept that it’s changed her. She’s still there, I’m sure of it, and I know you are too. We have to support her, Claudia, and the fact that she’s prepared to read the letters suggests to me that she’s ready to do even this if it’s going to help her.”

Claudia lowered her eyes, not wanting to look at him anymore, not even sure she could go on listening in spite of the glimmers of hope he was offering. She wanted to resist him, to carry on ranting, accusing him of betraying her trust, insisting that he didn’t know what was best for her mother, or for her. The words, the anger, were all there knotted up inside her along with the hatred of Archie Colbrook and all the evil things she wished on him. And yet, making its way into all that pent-up rage and venom was the inescapable realization that Dan could be right.

Minutes ticked by. There was so much she wanted to say, to ask, to feel even, but everything was so jumbled and uncertain that she couldn’t try. She simply stood where she was, stiff and cold and finally yielding to him as his arms went around her and he held her the way he had the day he’d found her on the moor, soothing her loneliness and despair with his quiet, undemanding strength.

“It’s starting to rain,” he said after a while. “We should go back inside or sit in the car.”

She chose the car and it was only when she found herself on the passenger side that she realized they were in his BMW, not hers. It hardly mattered, they weren’t going anywhere, although perhaps she wished they were, somewhere a long way from here where she might be able to think more clearly, or even pretend that life didn’t require so many impossible decisions.