It could be her . . . and oh my god. Even as I’m thinking it, I’m wondering how I’ve missed it. It’s the biggest clue I could possibly have been given, yet it’s only now, as I’m piecing it all together, that it occurs to me what’s been staring me in the face all this time. Her New York accent; a characteristic so hard to disguise that she’d had to invent a whole backstory to pass it off without me realizing.

I remember the picture of New York that she’d given me, thinking it was Anna’s sweet attempt to make me feel more at home. But could it have been Jennifer’s warped endeavour to take me back there; to relive the horrors we endured?

No, I refuse to believe it. My own sister would never do this to me. Plus, I’m sure I would have recognized her in one of our many sessions together, that she would have slipped up.

‘I’m going to call the police,’ says Vanessa, edging herself away from me, looking terrified.

‘You know I’m not behind this,’ I say. ‘You know that’s not who I am.’

‘I don’t know who you are any more,’ she says tearfully. ‘I trusted you. I told you everything and you repay me by having an affair and . . . and doing this to him.’

‘Don’t listen to her, Naomi,’ bellows Michael, as he raises himself onto his feet. I immediately wish that I’d kept him restrained – at least until I know exactly what’s going on. ‘She’s a goddamn liar.’

‘You . . . you said that he’d hurt you . . . that he’d hurt the children,’ I say, looking to her in shock and confusion. ‘But how could he have when he’s been here?’

‘I thought he’d gone to ground because of the anniversary,’ she says. ‘I thought he just needed some time away – I was relieved because it’s what I needed too. But when he didn’t come home on Tuesday and again on Wednesday, I started to panic. I called the police because I was scared that he’d done something stupid, but they told me that it looked like he was having an affair.’

‘She’s lying,’ snarls Michael.

I shake my head, still unable to grasp what the hell’s going on.

‘I was so upset,’ she goes on. ‘And I desperately wanted to speak to you, needed to speak to you, but when you were there in front of me, I just didn’t know how to. I felt so foolish and ashamed; I never expected my husband to have an affair in an attempt to drown his grief.’

‘So you made up the assault?’ I ask incredulously.