I barge in past her and she nearly falls over. She follows me, leaving the door open and hurries over to some guy standing in the corner.

‘Where is he?’ I hear my shrill, hysterical voice say. ‘Where’s Jack?’

She looks closely at me.

‘Caroline? Is that you?’

The guy has his arm protectively around her shoulder. It’s the bloke from the photographs who I thought was her brother or something. They didn’t look romantically involved. I can’t have got it this wrong. I can’t have.

‘Where is he?’ I run through to the kitchen and back out again. Louise has her mobile phone in her hand and I snatch it off her. ‘No. You’re not doing that.’

They suddenly both look quite scared. They step backwards and I realise that I’m brandishing the phone like a weapon. I lower it.

‘Sorry. Sorry. It’s just that … Look, I know what you did. You slept with my husband. While he was married to me.’

It’s all coming out wrong. She stares at me. She tries to step forward but he restrains her. She shakes him off. She’s right in my face.

‘It’s OK, Nick. I can handle this. You think you’re the only one who’s been hurt here, don’t you? Poor fucking Caroline. I know all about you. All about how you harassed Jack’s conquests. How you lost your kids because he walked all over you. How the police think it’s all got to you and you’re back to your old ways.’ I can feel the spittle hit my face as she shouts. She’s red in the face and then I see that she’s pregnant. She’s pointing a false talon with sparkly crystals dangling from it at me, right in my face. ‘What about me, eh? What about the other ones?’

‘You knew he was married to me. I’ve seen pictures of you inside my house.’

I didn’t want to go down this road. But as I’m here it slips out. She steps back.

‘Oh! Really? Well, you know, Caroline, shit happens. I met Jack. We had a relationship. It was fun.’ I look at the guy. He shrugs. She continues. ‘Nick knows everything. But you don’t. You don’t know the half of it.’

She sits down and I look at Nick. He nods and I sit down heavily on the sofa. How did I get this so fucking wrong?

‘So I’m going to tell you, whether you like it or not, Caroline. I’ve seen all this stuff on Facebook and I expect you think it’s all a bit of fun. But it’s not fun for me because he had me arrested.’

I feel a shiver down my spine. It’s a wake-up call.

‘What? Who did?’