‘Anyway. Nicole and Evelyn were in Julian’s classes that year. He liked them, and I guess they liked him. He met with them outside of class. They were all passionate about early twentieth-century cinema. It wasn’t inappropriate or anything. Our situation came up.’ Diana waves her hand as if Oli is about to protest. ‘I was fine with him talking about it, I wasn’t someone who wanted it to be a big secret. But about a week later, Nicole came to him with a proposition. She said she was willing to be our egg donor and surrogate. She had done some research—she wanted fifteen thousand dollars and all of the expenses paid.’ Diana hesitates. ‘I met her, and I liked her. It seemed too good to be true. Looking back, I can see how problematic it was, but she made it sound so easy, and she was so confident. Her positivity was contagious, and I was desperate.’

Oli thinks about what Cara said, about her sister being able to convince people to do anything. Then she thinks about Nicole throwing Billy against the fence. The more Oli knows about Nicole the more mysterious she seems. ‘She was your silver bullet.’

Diana looks grateful. ‘She was. I started to hope. She was so young and healthy.’ Her jaw wobbles. ‘I started to picture our child.’

‘But then?’

‘A few weeks later Nicole disappeared.’

‘Right,’ Oli says, trying to fit it all together. ‘And this was before you had proceeded with anything?’

‘Yes. We hadn’t gone through with the insemination at that stage. We’d agreed to it in principle and made a few inquiries, but that was it. We thought it best to wait for her exams to be over.’ Diana clears her throat elegantly. ‘So she wasn’t Julian’s student anymore.’

Oli’s heart is thumping in her chest. ‘Right, so …’

Diana transfers Hugo’s leash to her other hand, sighs and tucks stray hair behind her elfin ears. ‘So suddenly Nicole was gone, and it seemed my dreams were dead in the water again. It was a hideous time. We knew how it looked, Julian being at the house that night with a bunch of young students, but I knew the truth. I had been planning to go with him that night. They were our friends. In a way, it was like Nicole was going to be a part of our family. But we decided not to say anything about it to anyone.’ Diana looks pained. ‘We didn’t want the details of our lives splashed all over the papers, especially because we knew the facts would be twisted into something tacky. After the whole saga, Julian became very introverted. He would barely even talk to me. I knew he felt guilty, which I could understand, but … I don’t know. Maybe I just didn’t want to see what was right in front of me.’

‘Which was what?’