‘I promise. The answer’s no. All the footage has been wiped.’

‘You wiped it?’

‘It’s gone.’

‘So filming me was a secondary motive to the primary motive of making sure you weren’t being spied on?’

‘Filming you wasn’t a motive at all.’

‘More like collateral damage.’

‘More like an unexpected benefit.’ I could see he regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth. ‘God, Holly. Fuck. I know how wrong that sounded.’

‘Why? It’s what you think. There’s no way anything about any of this can sound anything other than wrong. I found your magazines in the garage. And the things you kept in the bag with them.’

‘How did you get in the garage, Holly?’

‘Why does it matter?’

‘How?’

He had been so compliant, until that moment. So filled with sorrow.

Since it happened, his remorse had made him quell every flash of his usual anger. It made him quash his normal insistence on getting his way about everything. I’d known those things were still there, though. I had been waiting for them.

I felt myself tense with the usual fear. ‘Milly broke in when you were in Canada.’ He wouldn’t dream of talking to Milly about this, so I was in no danger of discovery that way. In any case, he would believe that almost anyone we knew was more capable of doing such a thing than I was.

The colour drained from his face. ‘Did Milly see?’

‘No. It was bad enough that I did. She left before I opened the bag. I’m glad she hasn’t had to have those images in her head, too.’

‘I’m ashamed of them.’ He was biting his lip. ‘I don’t look at material like that any more.’

‘It’s what you wanted to do to me all along.’

‘It wasn’t, Holly.’

‘It’s what you did do.’ I stood, trying not to wince, because I was secretly weaning myself off the painkillers that dulled me. The Far Away Tree journal fell to the floor. I did not pick it up. ‘I put your bag and its contents out with the rubbish where it belonged. I didn’t want it near me.’

At bedtime, I found the Far Away Tree journal on my bedside table, beside the pink memory box. I did not touch either of them.

The next morning, he sat with me at breakfast, but I did not eat the toast he had made me. ‘You took my baby,’ I said. ‘Tell me where she is.’

‘Holly, our baby died.’ He looked so sad I would have believed him if I didn’t know him better. He blinked so fast the two colours of his eye blended into one. ‘You saw her,’ he said. ‘You cried over her while you held her.’

‘You’re lying.’ The hair on my arms was standing on end. ‘I’d remember. That never happened.’