Pete’s call at eleven was a pleasant surprise. She needed something, or someone, to distract her from the maelstrom of emotions that Eddie’s worrying silence was evoking in her. She’d tried his mobile several times, sent texts that she’d edited as much as she could to make sure there was no ounce of neediness contained anywhere between the lines. It was simple; she just needed to hear Eddie’s voice. To know that things were okay between them. She needed him to tell her that he loved her, even though part of her wondered if he ever would. But still, just knowing that they were together, even if he couldn’t say the words, was as much as it would take for her to quell this terrible feeling of emptiness within her.

‘Hey, what are you up to?’ Pete sounded good and if she thought there was an undercurrent of worry in his voice, she simply put it down to her own black mood.

‘Not a lot, just hanging about here, quite content and happy with a new book.’ First lie of the day: she felt anything but content or happy.

‘How are those lambs? I thought I might go and see them – if you had time to spare, you might even treat me to a cup of tea?’

‘Sure, not that I’d expect you to know one end of a lamb from the other.’ Pete had grown up in the village – his father was a barber and his mother worked in the local supermarket – but as soon as he moved to the city when he went to college, Pete became a townie.

He arrived within minutes, loaded down with a six-pack of fancy craft beer for her dad and chocolates for her mother, smiling and full of his usual friendly banter, but Liv knew immediately that something was wrong. She dragged him from the warmth of the kitchen out to the little shed where there were now sixteen lambs bleating loudly.

‘What is it? What’s happened?’ Her gut felt heavy with anticipation; she just knew it was bad news.

‘It’s nothing. It’s…’

‘It’s not nothing. I can read you like a book, remember?’ They’d been through too much together watching Rachel die for there to be room left for secrets or half-truths between them.

‘Fine, I just… I don’t know how to say it, but…’ He walked towards the far end of the shed, picking out his steps – she had a feeling he was even more carefully picking out his next words. He seemed to be purposely keeping his silent stare on the ground, as if he couldn’t quite meet her eyes. She knew then it must be really bad, because they’d shared the worst news and never had there ever been a time when they couldn’t just blurt out what they were thinking.