Bowman sounds confused. ‘No, as far as I know she was still passionate about being a detective. But I do know she was finding other aspects of her life challenging.’

Oli swallows. ‘Do you think Bouris acted alone?’

‘I have never had a prouder moment than when we put that piece of shit away,’ Bowman says with frightening intensity.

‘Did he follow her from the house that morning?’

‘We think he was following her for days.’

‘But—’

‘He is a monster. Pure evil.’

‘Do you think it’s possible he was tipped off? I’ve been wondering—’

‘Get some sleep, Ms Groves.’ Bowman hangs up.

Oli throws the phone in the console and starts the car. Nicole’s manipulation is starting to become clear. She fooled everyone. She connects to Bluetooth and calls Dawn.

‘I need to change the piece I sent you,’ she says in greeting. ‘Apparently it’s not the Carter girl. But I’ve found out more about Nicole that I think is worth digging into. I think she might be involved in some kind of fraud—’

‘We’re not running them, Oli.’ Dawn interrupts. She is in the office; phones bleat in the background, and a familiar voice is reading a news report. ‘We’re not running either of them.’

‘What?’ Oli asks, accelerating into the morning traffic.

‘Oli, I appreciate that you’ve been working around the clock, but this isn’t right. You need to slow down.’

‘My piece needs to be re-worked, I get that, but why can’t we run the podcast? I deliberately avoided hard claims. I know it needs editing, but I don’t know how to do that.’ Her voice cracks. ‘I’m sure someone in Kylie’s team does.’

‘We can’t risk it with the cops. And as far as I can tell, it’s just your opinion. I think you’re too close to it.’

‘You mean you don’t want to risk it.’

‘Oli.’

‘What? When did we lose the last of our spine?’ She drops her voice. ‘Come on, Dawn, this is important. This might prompt someone to come forward. People were sending Cooper emails after the first Housemate episode.’

Dawn sighs. ‘Oli. I know you’re upset about Cooper, but this isn’t good. You’re acting erratically. Update your piece if you can, and I’ll review it, but the podcast episode you recorded is not going to happen. I’m not about to start an all-out war with the cops over a hunch.’

‘But I’m on their side! Surely, everyone will want Isabelle’s death re-examined if it turns out there’s more to it.’

‘Just focus on the piece.’ Dawn’s tone teeters on the edges of being patronising. ‘We need to have a broader conversation about the podcast anyway and how we manage it going forward. I don’t think it works with one person. I’ll set up a meeting next week.’