Diane shakes her head. ‘I don’t know about that. But I’ll tell you something. Lorna knows something she’s not letting on about that girl. You know what they say about mud slingers. They’re the dirty ones. And it’s odd that your mother gave you that middle name, to say the least. Like she has a guilty conscience.’

‘My mother says Annalise stayed here,’ I say. ‘With you and Michael.’

‘That was just Lorna pot-stirring, love,’ says Diane. ‘Divide and conquer. Cause trouble between Michael and Cat. Hell hath no fury.’ She meets my eye. ‘For what it’s worth, I never believed what Lorna said about Michael. Not for one second. Do you think I’d still be with someone who was capable of something like that? I’ve had Cat here in floods of tears. If Michael knew anything, he’d have told her. Lorna makes me out to be some shy little fawn, hanging on to my husband’s coat-tails. But I make my own money. I have my own clothing line business. I might not be Coco Chanel, but my jumpsuits are big sellers on the home shopping channels. If Michael was as awful as Lorna said, I’d have left long ago.’

‘So why does my mother believe Michael had something to do with Annalise’s disappearance?’

‘Honestly, I think Lorna lost her mind a little bit and has never put all the pieces back together.’ Diane lets out a long sigh. ‘Lorna … she was like some fatal attraction thing. The poor girl had this fantasy in her head. She made up a fictitious relationship. And then when it all went wrong, she convinced herself Michael was this evil abuser. Which I’m telling you now, he isn’t. Your mother hadn’t long recovered from cancer. She thought Michael was her fairy-tale ending. When it didn’t work out like that, well … as I said, hell hath no fury.’

‘Do you hate my mother?’

Diane twists her wedding ring. ‘Sometimes.’

I put my head in my hands. It feels weird that my hair isn’t long anymore. Usually it would tumble through my fingers.

‘Mum and I used to be best friends,’ I say. ‘I believed everything she said. But lately … I mean, it’s just a joke how overprotective she is. And now Nick has moved in, it’s chronic. Just so bad. Mum says something crazy and Nick is this nodding puppet going along with her. My head is all over the place. I don’t believe most of what Mum says anymore. And I sometimes hate Nick for being too stupid.’

‘It must be hard,’ Diane ventures. ‘When your mother … I mean, she’s not the most stable of characters. Sorry.’ She catches herself. ‘Well, at least you’ve got a port in a storm here now. If things get too terrible you can come and stay with us.’