But it was too late. She was dead.

Baby Reign started crying and I pulled myself together.

‘You’ll be my reason to live, then,’ I told her, my own tears falling on hers. ‘Okay?’

The space around the metal front door was burning, blackened and warped and white-hot with thick, black smoke billowing in around the frame.

More hot tiles smashed to the floor.

I put a screaming Reign down on the damp mattress and looked around the burning building. Hope dwindled, but hope had dwindled before and I’d pulled through. And I decided, just as I had on the hospital bed, that I was going to survive. Not to see some make-believe pop idol this time around, but to protect this baby from her father.

As I prayed, the rain started – soft at first, then hard and heavy, pummelling the roof, falling through holes and steaming on the cement floor.

There were still flames everywhere, but the wooden frame around the metal door had turned black and charcoal-like. I hurled my body into the heat. The pain did not scare me. Nor did the choking, chemical smoke. My body had been washed with chemicals before.

I didn’t think the door would give way, but it did, exploding in sparks and wood splinters. Air rushed into the cottage, and with it fire, eating away at the walls. The doorway was an angry, burning ring, raging and tearing.

I took one last look at Annalise’s stiff, dead body. Then I picked up the baby and walked right through that burning doorway into cool, dark woods.

For a stupid moment I just stood, staring at the burning cottage. The roof was ablaze and tiles were falling. Then the roof collapsed and I ran through the woods. Reign bobbed in my arms.

Finally, I made it to the gate and hit the release mechanism. The gates opened slowly, whirring like screams in the silent night, but eventually they were wide enough and I slid through the growing gap and onto the lane outside.

It was a long way to the main road. About a mile down a straight, tree-lined path. Street lights twinkled up ahead like stars. There were big, swaying fir trees either side.

I began to half walk, half run down the path, the baby bundle held close to my chest, eyes fixed on those twinkling lights.

Then I heard it. The roar of a quad bike.

I began to jog, taking hasty glances over my shoulder.

Warm, distant headlights flickered in the woods, then appeared on the path behind me, a long way behind but gaining ground all the time, lighting up the bumpy road.

I knew I couldn’t outrun the bike. Any moment, Michael would screech up behind me, shoot me and take the baby. Or maybe shoot both of us.

I carried on running.

‘Lorna!’ called a voice. ‘Lorna!’