Cooper waited, recognizing that she needed to sort her feelings out before she put them into words. Whatever it was that she wanted to tell him, it might be the first time she’d talked about it to anyone. He’d learned when to listen and not interrupt.

‘You know that under the effects of intense heat, your brain expands?’ Petty said at last.

‘Yes, I think so.’ Cooper put down his glass. He had a feeling it was going to be worse than he’d imagined. Chocolate truffle cake was suddenly less appealing.

‘Well, a child’s skull is a lot weaker than an adult’s. The bones are very soft at first, you know. They showed us some photographs from this scene, where the young boy had died. The fire was so rapid and the temperature so high that when the child’s brain expanded, it burst the skull. The captions said skull failure and brain protrusion in a two-year-old fire victim. And I was thinking, if you came on a scene like that, your assumption would probably be that the child had died from a serious head injury before the fire.’

‘And that a fire had been started to conceal the evidence,’ said Cooper. ‘It happens.’

‘Right. But it would be a wrong assumption. Chances are, it might just have been the fire.’ Her voice dropped lower. ‘It might only have been skull failure and brain protrusion. Only that.’

Cooper heard the break in her voice, and let the silence settle. It was as if a bubble had formed around their table, insulating them from the rest of the wine bar. He felt he could almost reach out and touch that rare thing, the ability of two people to think the same thoughts and share the same emotions without having to speak them out loud.

Then Liz reached out for his hand. ‘You didn’t want dessert, did you, Ben?’

‘No, not really.’

‘Let’s pay the bill, then.’

Stella Searle looked away from the TV set in her bedroom towards the shower, where she could hear water running. Darren had bought her the TV himself. He’d do almost anything to keep her happy, except the one thing she really wanted.

‘Daz!’ she called. But she only heard him humming some tune to himself, like a cocky child, and she had to call him again. ‘Darren!’

‘What’s up?’

‘Come out here.’

‘I’m having a shower, darling.’

‘Come out here. There’s something on the telly you’ve got to see.’

‘It’ll wait. I won’t be a minute.’

‘No – now,’ she said, using the tone of voice she knew he’d recognize.

‘Oh, bloody hell.’

The water stopped, and after a moment he padded out into the bedroom with a towel wrapped round his middle, his hair wet and feet making damp marks on the floor.

‘What is it, Stell?’