‘Look, I’m going to ask you to sleep on it. If you’re worried, I’ll get a car to drive by your place. It’s not uncommon for victims of crime to be paranoid.’

‘It’s not paranoia. I was right about Joe.’

‘You were, but the fact remains, both fires appear to have been set by one person. This other person may be guilty of something, but they’re not guilty of lighting those fires.’

‘He could have set one of them, or driven the car. He could be an accomplice.’

‘The whole thing sounds like a strange situation. I can see why it would be distressing to realise a former client was in a relationship with your daughter. It’s— ’ he pauses ‘— just gone eleven, so unless you’ve got a new crime to report, I’m going to ask you to sleep on it. I’ll have a car drive by to check in.’

‘Alright,’ I say. ‘Sorry for bothering you.’ I hang up the phone but don’t let go, squeezing it tightly in my hand.

Prosecutor: ‘Now for the court, please read from this sheet.’

Simms: ‘Sure. Documentary evidence – Exhibit D Personal diary extract’

‘It happened last night. She came over. It wasn’t scheduled, it wasn’t my idea. She wanted to see me. We kissed again and this time we did more. I left the woman I once thought was the love of my life for her. I’ve moved on now. Margot is my future, I can see that. She can keep me calm, keep the demons at bay.’

Chapter Twenty-Six

TWENTY-SIX

IT’S LATE. GABE’S asleep in bed where I left him and I’m sitting on the toilet in our ensuite, the only light coming from my daughter’s phone screen as I punch in another passcode. Wrong again. Nothing has worked. I couldn’t sleep and I wasn’t just going to lie there all night, curling my thoughts in on each other in a cycle of anxiety, a snake consuming its tail. How could I possibly sleep knowing what he is capable of? He was inside our home.

Locked out from trying any more passcodes in July’s phone for a quarter of an hour, I reach for my own phone instead and continue my search for N. Schultz. I try variations with the last name in Google.

N. Schultz Melbourne

N. Schultz Cormac

Birth N. Schultz 1994

Birth N. Schultz 1995

1996

1997

He has an apartment in the city, he’s clever, educated and he has money. I begin with the private schools in Melbourne. I search within five kilometres of the city. There are dozens. One by one, year by year, I search N. Schultz and each school name.

N. Schultz Melbourne Grammar 1996, 1997, 1998 … and so on.

It’s been an hour in this darkened room, maybe more, and still no results, still no access to her phone.