Next came David, and as I looked at photograph after photograph I felt my breath come louder in my chest. He had been shot, messily, in the stomach. He had taken a while to die, dragging himself across the floor of the hallway, which was smeared and streaked with his blood. His eyes were open and his face looked angry, an unnatural stiff white shade. His fingers reaching out, clawing on the floor, as if trying to move himself. He had turned over half on his side, so at least most of the mess of his body was hidden.

Then came Madison. I had not seen her body before, since I hadn’t gone upstairs, and I let out a whimper as the photographs were held in front of me by an impassive court official. Madison’s face was blue. Her eyes were bloodshot, another tell-tale sign of suffocation. Her bed with the pink frilly sheets was so familiar. Her hair was spread out around her. She almost looked like a doll.

‘Please,’ I said. I was choked with tears. ‘I can’t – I don’t want to see it.’

The prosecutor turned to the jury with a smirk. ‘Hard to look at the fruits of your work, isn’t it?’

‘I didn’t do it,’ I wept quietly. ‘I didn’t kill them.’

‘Ms Adams, I have to ask you to stop crying so we can continue.’ The judge was a stern old man, close to retirement. What could he know about being a girl of nineteen, trapped in a world that no longer made sense? ‘Ms Adams! You’re disturbing the court.’

I gulped in deep breaths, but my chest was tight, and I couldn’t get any air. They were dead. Madison would never dance or chatter or tantrum again. Abby with all her dreams of rediscovering fame. And David. David . . .

I completely lost it then and didn’t care what the cameras or reporters thought of me, or that the judge had ordered me to stop crying, as if I could just turn it off like a switch. Over the desperate gasps of my tears, I heard him order a recess. The guards moved towards me, cuffing me to them, yanking me up. I’d be taken to a small, airless room where – if I was lucky – I might be given a sip of stale water, while listening to the sounds of the courthouse outside, the free people watching my life go up in flames, as they laughed and chatted and made phone calls.

As they passed me on their way out, I saw the prosecution lawyers give each other a discreet high-five. Things were going well for them. Whatever I did, whether I managed to stay composed or broke down weeping, it made me look guilty. There was no way out.