As she sat despondently in the car, willing herself to start the ignition and begin her journey to the crown courthouse in Carlisle, her mobile rang, as if on cue. It was Kate Umshaw. Detective Sergeant Umshaw was her right arm, and her second in command. The woman she couldn’t live without. Their friendship had grown from the necessity of being colleagues, when she’d turned up in Cumbria, fresh from the Met in London, six years ago, tail between her legs and eyes wide shut, to the close bond they had now. They’d been through much together, and Kate was about the only person on the planet who understood what she was facing today.

‘Hey,’ Kate said.

‘Hey,’ Kelly replied. ‘It’s so good to hear your voice.’

‘How you feeling?’ Kate asked.

‘Shit.’

‘Obviously. Are you sure you don’t want me there?’

Kelly had told her that she’d rather face today on her own. It wasn’t because she didn’t want or need Kate by her side, it was just that she had to concentrate on shutting out the noise. It was a paradox that to get through one of the hardest days of her life, she’d have to purposefully focus on being quite alone. Of course she wanted Kate there. Kate had been there, in Highton prison, when it all kicked off. Kate had seen what Ian Burton was capable of. But most of all, Kate knew Johnny. It wasn’t that Kate couldn’t face him – quite the opposite, in fact; she’d been arguing that life was too short to hold grudges. It was testimony to her emotional maturity that her 2i/c liked the man, but disapproved of his behaviour.

In court today, the defence team was wrapping up. Yesterday had been the turn of the prosecution, and Kelly knew the case inside out. It was her case. She’d lived the details for months, from the moment they’d found Jack Bell’s body to the moment they’d finally given the Crown Prosecution Service enough to charge the twisted bastard who did it.

What she hadn’t seen coming was that the divisions between the defence and prosecution inside the courthouse would tear her love life apart. Johnny had moved out, but it wasn’t that they’d fallen out of love straight away, or had a massive messy fight and thrown things, or said stuff that they couldn’t take back. No, it wasn’t like that. It was simply impossible to live with someone who was a witness for the defence. He’d been Kelly’s rock pretty much the whole time she’d been back in Cumbria. He’d helped her pick herself up when her mother died. He’d caressed her in the middle of the night when she woke up sweating, not sure if she could go on pursuing people so sick in their heads that it made her physically ill.