But Angel couldn’t relax. She had a bad case of the jitters. Farmer had been on her trail and that was a frightening feeling. He knew she was lying, not telling him things. She kept expecting him to show up with the cuffs and drag her down to the police station and charge her with Donny Maguire’s murder. But . . . oh, and this was so messed up . . . she’d got used to being the focus of his attention. She perversely liked it. Every time she saw him, she was fearful – but she was also attracted. Fiercely attracted. She’d never felt that with any man before.

With Donny, it had all been about his abusive power over her.

With Lenny, it had been about having a place of safety.

With Farmer, she found herself reacting in a new, purely female and weirdly pleasurable way. She felt almost unbearably sensitized whenever he was near her; and when he was absent, she wondered when he was going to show up again. She ached for it, in fact. And that was stupid; self-destructive.

Stop it, she told herself. That man is going to finish you. Are you crazy?

To have feelings, romantic feelings, for Farmer? This couldn’t happen. She couldn’t let it.

To feel so drawn to a man was an entirely new experience to her, and it was scary. It was doubly scary, and fucking ironic too, because of all the men in the world, Farmer was the only one who could put her away.

And he would.

She knew he was straight. This was no cruel devious Donny, no extravagant, excessive Lenny. This was an honest hardworking man with a passion for catching criminals, and she was a criminal. She was a killer, and he was going to do his job. He was going to hunt her down and when he did, she was going to take the biggest knock of her life. She was going to finally pay for her crime. She was going to prison.

‘Angel?’

Lil was talking to her. Angel snapped back to the here and now and looked at her aunt.

‘Yes, what?’

‘I’m going over to the hospital to collect Tom at four. D’you want to come?’

‘OK,’ said Angel.

‘I’ll come too,’ said June with a shudder, slapping her teacup back into the saucer. ‘I’ll clean up that mess upstairs later. Looks like a pig’s been slaughtered up there. One of the cops told me you got him with a razor blade, Angel, that right?’

‘June,’ said Lil.

‘It’s OK,’ said Angel. She was getting to know Aunt June now. She had no tact, no diplomacy. Everything was black and white to her. Actually, now she was getting used to it, Angel was beginning to find Aunt June’s acid comments almost funny rather than offensive. ‘That’s right. I did.’

‘Well fucking good on you,’ said June. ‘Yeah, I’ll come with you. Fuck staying here on my own. I still got the shakes something awful.’