I scuffed my toe and thought about what to say before I replied. ‘The problem with counselling was that she didn’t just want to go over what happened the night I was attacked, but everything that led up to Lexi dying, and before that. There’s too much in my past that I don’t want to be raking over again. So, I didn’t go back after the second session.’

Singh moved as if about to put a hand on my shoulder, but then let his arm drop back to his side, and I realised how close we were standing to each other. ‘Do you mean about the deaths of your parents?’

I had told him about that back in February. My parents and my younger sister, Anna, were all profoundly deaf, and I grew up as part of the Deaf community. Our dad died suddenly when I was in my first year of a textiles design degree at university, and I dropped out in order to support Mum and to try to get Anna through her exams. Then Mum developed cancer, and all the responsibility fell on me. I became an interpreter to help pay the bills, using the British Sign Language that had been my first language, and somehow never found my way into a different career. But that wasn’t what the counsellor had been trying to delve into. I could have coped with that; I felt like I’d come to terms with the loss of my parents, still being so close to my sister.

‘No. Other stuff,’ I said, running my hand over the trunk of the tree I was standing next to, a dusting of frost clinging to my glove. I could sense that he wanted to ask more, but I wasn’t prepared to talk about it, so we stood in an awkward silence for a moment.

‘How’s work at the moment?’ he eventually asked. ‘Getting plenty of jobs?’

I winced slightly. He’d managed to touch another nerve, but I didn’t feel I could ignore this question.

‘Not really. The agencies have a lot of influence, and it’s difficult working as a freelance interpreter and building up a decent reputation.’ I looked up at him, finally, and gave him a quick smile. ‘Max has been really supportive, though.’

Singh nodded. ‘Max?’ His tone of voice was hard to decipher. ‘Max Barron?’

‘Yeah.’

‘You’re still in touch, then?’ he asked, glancing at me then looking away again, towards the dense line of trees along the side of the path. Singh had met Max at the same time I did, during the investigation into Lexi’s death, because Max was connected to her family.

‘Yeah, we’re …’ I cleared my throat, suddenly feeling embarrassed. ‘We’re seeing each other.’

‘Oh. Well, that’s good,’ Singh said, though his face didn’t match his words.

‘What?’

‘Nothing. I mean … nothing.’

‘Seriously, Rav. What’s wrong?’