‘She’ll surface soon,’ says Michael. ‘She always does, doesn’t she? Like you always say, she’s fifteen going on forty. A real little grown-up.’

‘But it’s been so long now. Months and months.’ Cat looked Michael right in the eye then. ‘Tell me the truth, Michael. Do you know anything, anything you’re not telling me?’

Michael’s jaw set hard. ‘Now pull yourself together. And stop throwing accusations around.’

Cat started crying, tears pouring down her face, red mouth opening and closing.

I couldn’t bear it, and for once my decency overcame Michael’s control.

‘Cat, why don’t you try the hospitals?’ I said.

‘Hospital?’ Red nails shot to Cat’s mouth. ‘You think something happened to my baby?’

‘She said she was pregnant.’ I glanced at Michael. ‘So maybe she visited a hospital. For a check-up or something.’

‘She was pregnant?’ Cat glares at Michael.

Michael gave me an angry smile, and I knew I was in trouble. ‘Annalise wasn’t pregnant, love,’ he said. ‘She just made all that up. A big story to get attention. They were jumpers stuffed around her middle. Didn’t you notice?’ Michael scratched his nose. ‘Cat, she came here and left. That’s the whole story. At the end of the day, Cat, I’m not her parent. You’ve let your daughter live away from home for all these months.’

‘She said she was staying with a guy from the tour. I was in rehab. I thought she was okay …’

‘Cat, you’re wasting your time here,’ said Michael. ‘I’ve got work to do. Show yourself out.’

Michael headed past me, up the stairs.

Cat loitered in the hallway for a few desperate minutes. Then she said in her gravelly opiate voice, ‘Is he telling the truth, Lorna?’

I shuffled on the stairs. ‘Annalise did leave, Cat. A long time ago. She … she told me she was pregnant. But I guess she wasn’t.’

Cat shook her head in disgust. ‘One thing I can’t stand. A woman who lets a man think for her.’

‘I don’t do that,’ I said.

‘Yeah, you do.’ Cat left then. I watched her American 1968 Ford Mustang drive over gravel onto the winding woodland path and away.

Later I was in the gym room, red-faced, trying to run away from the morning.

Michael came striding in and I tensed, mid-run.

I expected him to punch me, then drag me up to the turret room and leave me without food for the next few days.

If I was lucky.

I braced myself. Self-defence was useless. It only made him angrier.

‘Turn that thing off for a minute,’ said Michael, pressing the treadmill emergency stop. ‘I’ve got something for you.’ He gave me a stubbly kiss on the cheek and held out a sheaf of magazines.

I flinched at the kiss, still wary. ‘What are these?’ I asked, head rushing, seeing glossy models in white dresses.