‘You having to bring me up when you were still a kid yourself. Mom being the way she was. Turning our childhood into one big hippy love-in.’

‘A love-in?’ Dee laughs. ‘Where was the love? No, I never resented you at all. You were just a kid. I liked looking after you. You know how I am. A nurturer. And I don’t resent Mom either. She had us too young and didn’t want to miss the party. That’s the thing with having kids, isn’t it? It’s not a mistake you can take back.’

‘I would never change my time with Liberty,’ I say. ‘I’m so scared, Dee. That he’ll take her away from me.’ I start to cry. ‘Dee – how am I going to get her back?’

‘Okay.’ Dee cuts up little pieces of food in her neat, tidy way. She always takes so long to eat. It’s like a religious experience for her. ‘Well, you can’t go back to his house. That’s a definite no. You can’t get arrested.’

‘I need the police to believe me,’ I say. ‘If only they’d search his property. We just need proof—’

Dee gives me sad eyes. ‘There was no evidence. Nothing to make them search his grounds. In fact, it made them think you had something to hide. Remember?’ She raises an eyebrow.

‘I’ve got it.’ I click my fingers. ‘I’ll talk to Cat. She knows the truth about Michael and she’s clean now. Maybe I can ask her to go to the police again and they’ll believe her—’

‘Cat Cannon?’ Dee pauses, mid-forkful. ‘Annalise’s mother?’

‘Yes.’

‘When you say she knows the truth …’

‘She was the only one who believed me back then.’

‘If the police didn’t listen to Cat before, why will they believe her now?’ asks Dee.

‘Because she’s stone-cold sober these days,’ I say. ‘I saw an interview with her in the Guardian. Clean as clean. She’s even been ordained.’

‘She’s been what?’

‘Ordained. You know. Like a Buddhist monk type thing. She was in this article. Celebrities who found God. Except Cat didn’t find God. She found chanting.’

‘Cat Cannon? A Buddhist monk? Wow. You can just never guess how life is going to turn out, can you?’

‘You can say that again. I mean, look at me. I make monsters for a living.’

‘Well, I hope Cat’s finding peace. Isn’t it better just to leave her be? I mean, her daughter is gone. Life must be hard enough.’

‘She believed me about Michael,’ I say. ‘She knows her daughter stayed at the house.’

‘Does she know though? For certain? Can it be proved?’

‘She … not exactly. But she was on my side. She went to the papers with me. And the police.’

‘So if it can’t be proved …’