‘Who called you out?’

‘The neighbours. Said it was a dreadful racket. And even when we got there, I could hear smashing from inside.’

Freya swallows. She can barely bring herself to ask. ‘And what was he doing?’

Watts takes another biscuit from the pack. He shakes his head. ‘Not him, her.’

Freya’s surprised, and pauses, chocolate melting on her fingers. ‘What do you mean?’

‘That’s why I remember it. We knocked, expecting the usual shitbag beating the crap out of his wife, but when the door opened it was him. Had a gash across his forehead. House was a mess, broken crockery and glass on the floor. And she was something else.’

He takes a bite and chews, thoughtfully. Freya waits. ‘She was quite a wildcat. Still hurling plates as we walked into the room.’

‘But you didn’t arrest her?’

‘No. He was apologetic, didn’t want to press charges. We made sure he was okay, the cut had stopped bleeding, then left him to it.’ He stops eating biscuits. ‘Why do you want to know? Has she killed him?’

Freya stutters for a moment. ‘Why d’you say that?’

‘Because that’s what normally happens, doesn’t it, love?’ he says, matter-of-fact. ‘The abuser kills the victim. Men or women, doesn’t matter,’ he adds cynically. ‘Did she push him out of a window?’

‘No, we…’ Freya stops. ‘We don’t know what happened yet.’

‘But he’s dead, yeah?’ Watts says. And Freya nods. ‘Always comes to that in the end,’ he finishes.

Freya walks back to the incident room, her mind reeling. She met Jonathan a year after this happened, but she remembers the many times she saw marks on his body. Accident while playing squash, tripped over, he would say, and she didn’t think anything of it. But had that been Amy?

The anger overtakes her, then the tears. She stops for a moment in the empty corridor, leaning against the wall, her hands over her face, trying to stop herself from crying. What must he have gone through, her kind, honest Jon? She feels her legs wobble and crumples, sliding down the wall.

‘Hey, you okay?’ A female PC she doesn’t know stops and crouches next to her.

Freya takes a deep breath in. ‘Yes, sorry.’ She forces a smile. ‘Just having one of those days.’ She wipes her eyes with her fingers, sniffing back the tears.

The woman’s eyes are sympathetic. ‘Don’t I know it,’ she replies. ‘Have a little sob, makes you feel better. That and a large G and T at the end of the day.’

Freya stands up again, feeling foolish for her public display of emotion. ‘I’m fine. Thank you,’ she says, and the woman smiles then continues on her way. ‘Shit,’ Freya mutters. She can’t do that again. What if that had been Baker? She needs to hold it together. For Jon.