When the water began to turn cold, I pulled out the plug and heaved my body out of the bath. I wrapped myself in a towel and padded back into my bedroom. I massaged oil into the skin of my legs to soften the vividness of my old scars. Through the window, I could see the moon beginning its nightly ascent, and its reflection in the water of the bay. I sat on the bed and rested back against the pillow – and jumped up again at once.

Something was beneath the sheet. Oh God!

I leapt off the bed, took hold of the end of the sheet between my thumb and forefinger and peeled it back slowly, my heart thudding.

Please don’t let it be a dead animal, please don’t let it be a dead animal, oh God, please, please, please.

It was a dead animal!

I screamed and dropped the sheet, backed into the corner of the room, crying, gasping for breath.

It wasn’t an animal, it was the puppet Matilde had given us. It lay spread-eagled at the top of my bed, its head at a terrible angle, the painted eyes and lips gouged from its face. The marionette’s limbs were arranged in a gruesome dance pose, hair torn from its head and stuffed, disgustingly, between its legs. In the middle of the doll’s chest, between its two small, wooden breasts, was the blade of a knife, our knife, the kitchen knife, the one we used for cutting vegetables.

Joe burst into the room.

‘Jesus!’ he said when he saw the puppet. ‘Jesus fucking Christ!’

‘Get rid of it!’ I cried. ‘Get it out of here, Joe!’

Joe reached for it, but he didn’t want to touch the disgusting thing any more than I did.

I pushed my damp towel towards him and he picked it up with that, swaddled it, took it out of the room and onto the landing. Two or three small, curly hairs still lay on the white sheet. I would never sleep on that sheet again.

Joe came back into the room. I was huddled in the corner.

‘They came into the villa! They came up here! They could have hurt the kittens,’ I whimpered.

‘We’d locked the door to Anna’s room…’

‘But what if we hadn’t? What if we’d left them downstairs? What if…’

Joe came to me. He put his arms around me and kissed the top of my head. ‘Shhh,’ he said. ‘Stop it. All that’s happened is some sick fuck came into the house, found the puppet and put it in the bed. Nothing more than that. They want you to jump to the worst-case scenario. They want you to start asking yourself: “What if?” That’s exactly what they want. If you start doing that, then they’re winning.’

I nodded miserably. Joe held me tight.