When I return, Becker and Hicks stop mid-conversation as the door opens. They look at me and then each other. Are they apprehensive? Perhaps worried I had overheard? Someone has turned the heating up as the room is warm now or perhaps it’s because I’ve moved. I put the blanket over the back of the chair and sit, ensuring my body language is open. No crossing of legs or arms, no barriers of any kind. The interview has been routine so far. No questions have been asked that I haven’t anticipated.

‘Can you describe the next time you saw Ian?’ Hicks asks, once he’s pressed the recorder to start again and continue from where we left off.

‘I saw him a few more times at the gym.’ I know this isn’t what they want, but I can’t resist being obtrusive. I don’t want to make things too easy for them.

‘Sorry, I meant outside of the gym. Just the two of you,’ Hicks clarifies, without a hint of irritation.

I nod like I’ve just understood. ‘Oh yes, of course. It was in the New Year. I didn’t see him over Christmas. When we saw each other at the gym, he asked if I wanted to go for a drink.’

‘Where did you go?’ Becker asks.

‘Mangos, the wine bar on the corner of the high street. We had a few drinks in there. I didn’t want a late night as I was getting up early the next day and when we left at about half ten there were no cabs.’ It was freezing outside, but the lack of transport turned out to be a stroke of luck. ‘He said he only lived around the corner and we could wait in the warm whilst he called an Uber,’ I continue.

‘So, you went to his house. Do you remember the date?’ Hicks asks.

‘Not exactly. It was two weeks ago, the second Friday in January.’

Hicks taps his smartphone, appearing to struggle with the buttons. Sighing, he hands the phone to Becker, who finds the calendar and scrolls through.

‘Twelfth of January?’ she asks, directing the screen towards me.

‘Yes.’

‘You felt safe with him, at that point?’ Hicks’s tone is laced with something. Not sarcasm, perhaps judgement? I’m not sure.

‘Yes, I had no reason to fear him. It wasn’t like we’d just met.’

Becker coughs and shoots a furtive glance at Hicks. It may be a reprimand. These two are difficult to read. Not like Ian. He was easy, he was transparent.

Tuesday 2 October 2017

‘Scream and I’ll cut you,’ he hissed, pulling my jeans to my hips and shoving me to the ground.

I sat up on my elbows, scrabbling backwards in the dirt, but he pulled me back by the ankles. My shirt rode up, and gravel scraped into the flesh on my back.