‘Thank you both so much for agreeing to come on the show to speak with me, I’m sure it’s been a rocky couple of weeks for you.’ There was no warning that the interview had started but when she pauses and raises those neatly manicured eyebrows, I realise this is the first question.

My racing mind searches for a way to describe what we have been through but defers to the cliché. ‘It’s been a rollercoaster.’ Did I mumble? Annunciate, Lina. The lights are a little too bright, too hot. My heart is already thrashing in my chest.

‘Yeah, we’ve been through a lot,’ Cain adds, ‘but we’re just glad to make it out the other side relatively unscathed.’ He is much more eloquent. High pressure makes a diamond of him and coal of me.

‘You say relatively but of course it’s impossible not to look at you and see that scar healing above your left eye.’ She turns her head slightly to encourage Cain to show where a knock had split open his brow. He does exactly what she wants, showing it, touching it with his forefinger.

‘I’m a big boy,’ he says with a smile. ‘It’ll heal just fine. But it was a very scary night for us.’

‘What was it like, Lina, that night? Knowing Cain was incapacitated? Tell us what went through your head.’

I swallow, count to four before I answer. ‘It was terrifying. I was certain at times I was going to die and I thought Cain was already dead.’ I can feel tears starting, but I sniff them back. ‘Cain has always been there, he’s my rock and I knew I needed to do everything in my power to help him, to help us.’

‘You must have felt pure relief when you discovered Cain was okay?’

I find myself nodding. ‘Relief, yes. And just an overwhelming sense of love. But it didn’t last very long.’

‘Oh?’

Don’t mention the fear of a second man, I tell myself. ‘I knew for certain that there was only one intruder in the house that night, but until the police arrived I still felt like he had one last trick to torment us with. I wanted to get away from him as quickly as possible and away from the cameras,’ I say. ‘Then when the police arrived and the paramedics said Cain was going to be okay, that was when I let myself feel relieved.’

She turns back to Cain. ‘And you’ve been through…’ she pauses, skews her head searching for the right word, ‘… trauma before, haven’t you?’

Cain nods before answering. The nest of snakes in my stomach quivers, threatening to wake.

‘Yeah, I mean Afghanistan was scary for different reasons, but nothing prepared me for the helplessness and the…’ he’s thinking now for the word.