Mostly I’m furious with myself for thinking I could trust anyone, let alone love anyone again. Andrew was a one-off. Most men aren’t puzzles, they’re booby traps.

Chapter 40: Dan

Heavy feet stumble towards my pitch. ‘Oi, mate, you OK in there? We’re hanging out in the ruins – it’s drier.’

I poke my head through the tent flap. ‘Might come out in a bit.’

He shrugs and trudges away. The faces of the rough sleepers are different from twelve years ago, but their desperation hasn’t changed, and neither has the smell of weed and sour bodies.

Most are already wasted, even though it’s not quite midday. The handful with more get-up-and-go will have been working their pitches around the city, but they’ll be heading back, now the heavens have opened. You don’t get much for begging or drawing pavement pictures when it’s pissing it down.

I’m half-tempted to join them. Last night, after I left the penthouse, I knew I couldn’t go back to my place and boot out my Airbnb guests. So I grabbed the tent from my jeep and came here, buying a six-pack of gut-rot cider on the way. I held off drinking any, but I couldn’t face work today, and a few cans now might knock me out and stop the bad thoughts.

Except that’s too much of a cop-out. The look on my daughter’s face when I tried to explain my lies was the most shameful moment of my life. And God knows, there’s been some stiff competition. Pretending the penthouse was mine isn’t the worst thing I’ve done, and I did try to explain that it started as a misunderstanding. But then Angelica, calmer than I’ve seen her all month, pointed out how pathetic my excuse was, how I always go for the easy option, never face my mistakes until there’s no choice. And she was right, of course.

Oh, Casey, I am so sorry.

They didn’t try to stop me leaving the apartment. And now it hits me: that might have been the last time I’ll ever see my daughter.

I crack open a can of cider. The cheaper the booze, the more intense the memories. As the alcohol hits my brain, happy snippets come to the surface. They’re the bloody worst.

Eating chips at the seaside, the vinegar bleeding through the paper, stinging my fingers. ‘Always tastes better when it’s been paid for by punters,’ he’d say, after a day ripping off holidaymakers with his favourite find the lady scam.

Shopping for child-sized Doc Martens lookalikes to match his own. ‘We’re the terrible twins. Always buy the best shoes you can afford, Daz. Shoes show what you’re made of.’ He could be bloody generous and liked me to look sharp, because it reflected on him.

Would he be proud of me, despite everything? I’ve got more than he had. The jeep, a flat – OK, no penthouse, but somewhere with an actual mortgage and bills that I pay by direct debit, instead of waiting for the cut-off notices and doing a runner.