No, I actually didn’t have time for … Fuck … We’d agreed that trading information via iMessage was too risky given Zac’s previously unfettered access to our Apple accounts.

I stood from my desk, stretched, smiled at Agnë, pointed at my phone, went through to the kitchen.

‘Hey, how did it go?’ Sarah said.

‘Pretty much useless.’ I’d called Child Protection to plead our case; they’d said they couldn’t do anything to help us.

‘Shit. Right … So, I went to the court this morning with Zac’s paperwork. The guy at the Magistrates’ looked at it and said I should try the County Court, even though it was addressed from the Magistrates’. So I went to the County Court and the guy there told me to go back to the Magistrates’.’

‘Sorry for the runaround.’

Tea. I should make one. I opened the fridge. Other people’s lunches and snacks, not mine. I’d smashed the pastrami sandwich Biddy had bought me, was still ravenous.

‘The woman I spoke to the second time was a bit friendlier – big eyes, a nice smile. I don’t know, just something about her presence, maybe her aura. Anyway, she studied the letter and typed something into her computer, and –’

‘What did she type?’

‘I don’t know, but she had this really funny expression, a bit surprised or something. She said she couldn’t give me any details but the letter was a fake.’

‘What does that mean? Did she tell you how she knew that?’

‘She just apologised and said she couldn’t tell me anything else. I started crying and told her I was worried about our children, in case we had a cuckoo-lala in the nest. She gave me a tissue and –’

‘Did you get any more information?’

Silence, then, ‘She told me she could lose her job but that, yeah, someone of that name, or that alias or something, had been convicted. But not for the charges listed on the letter. They were similar, the forgery stuff at least, but –’

‘He went to prison for something else?’

‘He didn’t go to prison, Chris.’

‘What?’

‘She said Zac didn’t go to prison, hun.’

‘So where the fuck did he –?’

Footsteps. Agnë came into the kitchen, smiling, cup in hand. I smiled, nodded, pointed at the phone, paced through to the bathroom, locked the door, sat on the sink. ‘You still there?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Where the fuck was he, then?’

‘I don’t know, Chris. I’m finding this all a bit overwhelming. He’s been texting me all morning.’

‘Yeah, me too. Just hold him off, we’re nearly there.’

* * *

By Wednesday afternoon, my eyes were getting heavy, my mind weary.

‘Oh, that’s such a wonderful sport.’ Agnë had snuck up behind me, was pointing at my monitor.