Harry had felt sick to the stomach. He knew his father hadn’t believed him and that by punishing Owen he was punishing Harry in a way that was worse than a beating. Harry would recover from the physical pain of a slap or a thrashing with the belt, but he’d find it hard to recover from the hurt inflicted on his brother.

In the end, Harry opted to tell Steph about the mouth-washing incident as the lesser of the evils.

‘I’m sorry,’ said Steph, not for the first time.

‘I don’t want any pity,’ said Harry. ‘I’m long past that stage. In fact, I ought to be grateful to him for being such a bastard.’

She raised an eyebrow questioningly. ‘How’s that?’

‘I now know exactly how not to behave if I ever have any children. Basically, all the tactics my dad employed I shall totally ignore and do the complete opposite. That way my child won’t fear me, won’t hate me, won’t try to avoid me and won’t secretly wish they had been born to another family.’

‘Wow. That’s quite a confession.’

He hadn’t meant to say so much, but somehow she was drawing it out of him with the casualness of her conversation, as if the questions were perfectly normal between two friends who were comfortable with each other, but then, of course, she was a reporter, so maybe it wasn’t surprising.

They walked on in silence for the next ten minutes and as they rounded the track they got their first glimpse of Conmere Lake.

They walked down to the edge of the lake and sat on a wooden bench. Harry looked across the water; the breeze was causing small, wave-like ripples across the surface. It was a grey-blue colour today, with the clouds overhead shielding it from the sparkle of the sun. The Con Point Hills on the north side of the lake looked down on them like an oppressive bodyguard, hunched and ready to swoop at the first sign of danger. Years ago he had nicknamed them Pru, Dominic and Owen. Defenders of the Sinclair name.

Harry ran a hand down his face. ‘Elizabeth was rescued from the water,’ he said, his thoughts taking him back to that day. ‘It was my mother who first saw her and raised the alarm. Elizabeth was flown to hospital and fought for another forty-eight hours. But she died, surrounded by family, by nursing staff; everything was done to save her, and when we were told there was no way back everything was done to make her comfortable.’

‘That must have been so difficult for you.’ Steph rested a hand on his arm.