‘You’ll be okay if you and your lawyer are prepared. Now. The next step. Money. Do you have any?’

‘Not a lot, just what I bring in from work. I haven’t been able to save a lot myself.’

Melanie merely lifted her drink, raised her eyebrows and said calmly, ‘So . . . show me the money. How are you going to pay the legal fees? And any bills that are in your name?’

‘I’ll go for fifty–fifty,’ said Grace. ‘It’s only fair. I’ll get my share.’

‘Will you? Have you seen the documents? How do you know what he might have put in your name? Or only in his name? Do you know exactly what you’re responsible for in the long term? I think you have to be very careful here,’ said Melanie.

‘He’s been paying the bills. Mortgage, insurance, whatever.’

‘Till now. But whose name is on all the documentation? Who’s responsible if he doesn’t pay? You said you signed a legal document but you had no idea what it was for. What else might you have signed, or agreed to? You trusted him.’ Melanie leaned forward. ‘I’m not trying to have a go at you, I’m just saying. But see what I mean?’

Grace went cold. She reached for a piece of sushi. ‘I don’t believe either of us expected to be dealing with . . . with what we’re facing now.’

‘The house fire or a separation?’

‘It all feels like the same thing.’ Grace ate her sushi, then asked, ‘Do you think we’d have broken up if we hadn’t had the fire?’

‘Hopefully you would have realised what he is like eventually, and sooner is better than later. But it’s not pretty. I’m just glad you’re not planning to hang in there for Daisy’s sake. Stable home and united parents, that sort of thing.’

‘I know that at least a quarter or more of Daisy’s classmates from her old school are from divorced families,’ said Grace.

‘And I bet not one of their parents has stories of their easy divorces. But I’m worried. Lawrence is such a cunning shit; will he take you, and your mum, to the cleaners?’

‘Mel, stop it! You’re overdramatising. You’re scaring me!’

‘Good. I want you to be alert. Don’t trust a thing he says or pretends to do or says he’s done.’ She lifted her drink. ‘You should go to Bali. Put in a pitch, at least.’

‘What’s the point if I can’t take the job? He’ll never let me take Daisy out of the country. Let alone for weeks or months, or however long it would be.’

‘Leave her with your mother while you go there for a few days, to see what it’s all about. Maybe get the lawyer to draw up some arrangement that Lawrence can visit, but not take Daisy away from the school or your mum’s place for the time you’re away.’

‘He’ll never agree to that.’

‘How often has Lawrence been to your mum’s house to see her since the fire?’