His stepdaughter hesitated. ‘She said Michael shouldn’t have kissed me. But then she asked if I was flirting with him. Said I got silly when I drank too much. Said Michael was a senior figure in the law and I should be very careful what I said because my accusations could ruin his life.’

‘And you said?’

‘I said I wasn’t making any “ accusations ”. I said I hadn’t breathed a word and had no intention of doing so. I was just telling her what had happened because she asked. But James had got to her. She wasn’t listening.’

She laid her head on his shoulder. ‘We screamed at each other for hours, Finch, it was horrendous. I vowed after that I’d never mention it to another living soul.’ She took a shuddering breath. ‘Imagine telling Sam, and he reacts the same as Mum?’ He felt her tremble. ‘I’d die.’

Finch was struggling. He wasn’t au fait with the metamorphosis of teenage years, when your beautiful communicative gem becomes a sullen two-headed monster overnight. He hadn’t been there; he shouldn’t judge. But still. Nell’s response to Grace’s account seemed so unsympathetic … her own daughter.

‘We’re going to get you some help,’ he said, squeezing her shoulder. ‘You can’t deal with this on your own any more.’

This time, Grace did not put forward her usual objections. She just nodded and loudly blew her nose.

When the weekend was over, and Finch had time to think, it was to Romy – not Grace or Nell – he felt he owed an apology. Even Grace’s own mother had not believed her: Nell, his perfect, gold-standard wife. James had brushed it under the carpet. No one, back then, had taken Michael’s actions seriously. Just a foolish moment, oh, best forgotten. Move away, everyone, nothing to see here.

Now he grabbed his keys from the hook beside the door and his phone from the worktop. He needed to get some air – shake these people and their conflicting, bewildering behaviour from his tired brain.

50

After Romy had said a subdued goodbye to James on the pavement outside the restaurant, she had wanted to run, to go home to Sussex immediately and put as much distance as possible between herself and Michael. The thought of confronting him made her go cold. But she knew she had to do it. She didn’t want another long drawn-out discussion with him about nuance – who had said what, done what, how or why or in which way things had happened – or to hear his smoothly calibrated excuses again. She just wanted to state what she’d found out. Let him know that she knew. Then leave him to stew in his lies. What she dreaded was his tears.