‘What’s your name?’ the voice gasped. Leticia realised this person was reaching desperately for every breath. Each vowel a suck or a gasp.

‘Leticia Mountjoy.’

‘I’m Poppy, well, Penelope really. Vee mentioned you.’

‘Vee?’

‘Verity, my daughter.’

‘Why are you holding me prisoner here? You have no right to do this.’

A great wheezing noise rocked the woman, and she could feel the floorboards vibrate with her movement. A laugh. ‘The trouble with you, Leticia, is that you are too observant for your own good. Too inquisitive, too nosy. You’ve made this all very difficult, and it wasn’t easy to begin with.’

‘Neville Rollason was my client. I was responsible for him.’

‘And did you like him?’

‘It’s not a question of like or dislike, I had a job to do.’

‘How very professional of you.’

‘Verity is a professional, just like me. Our job is to guide—’

The throaty rasp interrupted. ‘Verity took some persuading, it’s true. Never happy with the plan.’

‘So you took it upon yourself to punish this man? Just like the vigilantes.’

‘He killed my firstborn, Robert. Verity’s and Gary’s older brother. He killed my son and he destroyed my family. He disappeared on Wednesday, 4 September 1986. It’s a date carved into my heart. His body was never found.’

Leticia had suspected something like this. ‘I didn’t think that was one of Rollason’s murders.’

‘Yes, it was.’

‘Not officially. Did he admit it?’

The wheezing laugh again. ‘Oh yes, he did. Eventually, almost with his dying breath.’

She felt Gary shifting uncomfortably beside her.

‘Excuse me, I need oxygen. I lose my voice without it,’ Poppy said. There was a pause, the hum of a machine. When her voice returned two minutes later it was higher and more melodious. ‘You see, Leticia, I’m a grieving mother and I have very little time left. I needed the truth, and I needed justice. Your lot let him out. Removed what little justice there was in my life. Disgusting. You gave him a new name, bought him a nice little house…’

‘Rented, actually.’ And not so little.

‘…Applied for his benefits, his council tax benefit, his Jobseeker’s Allowance. No one filled out a form for my Carer’s Allowance, my Personal Independence Payment. Your lot built him a new life, while I lay rotting in my old one.’

‘I take your point.’ Leticia could not deny this woman her grief, her grievance. ‘The justice system is so imperfect. But that doesn’t mean to say you’re entitled to get Gary to exact revenge on your behalf by killing him.’

The big man shifted uncomfortably beside her but said nothing.