Gabby could almost feel the panic emanating from her mother, and she knew then that she would enjoy bringing her down, she would love every second of exposing her for the liar she was. ‘He’s in a morgue up in Leicester. He’s been dead for over a year, Mum. You do realise what that means, don’t you?’ She saw Cynthia trying to take onboard what she had said to her. ‘It means he couldn’t have been the one who set fire to my house, and it also means that you couldn’t have spoken to him a few days before like you said you did. Because he was dead then. Unless you saw him through a fucking medium, you lying, treacherous, fucking whore of a woman.’

Cynthia was taken aback by the vehemence of her daughter’s accusations. She knew only too well that her daughter was telling the truth. Now she had to find a way out of her lies and subterfuge. Trust that fucking James to be dead! That was so like her kids – they always let her down.

‘I know what I saw, and it was not long before the fire, but it might have been a few weeks before – I was confused, I was upset. For fuck’s sake, Gabriella, it was a terrible time. What are you trying to prove here?’

Gabby laughed harshly. Oh, she was really good. Her acting was of Oscar standard. Move over, Dame Judi Dench, you are an amateur in comparison with Cynthia Callahan. ‘What I am trying to prove? I am trying to prove who was responsible for the death of my little boy, Mum, that’s what I am trying to prove. And, by all accounts, it wasn’t my brother, your son, James, so who does that leave?’

Cynthia just shook her head in utter disbelief, stalling for time. She was thinking on her feet now, trying to work out how she was going to explain it all away. ‘I don’t know, darling – maybe he got someone else to do it, or it was someone after your Vincent. You know what villains are like – he probably fucked someone over in stir, and that door of yours was never safe, was it? One good push and it was open.’