She’d counted six payments from Nick’s account to Simon over the last three years. And knew there were at least three further payments he’d made in the years before that.

‘It is a lot,’ Simon said. ‘But he had so much. I didn’t understand why he was making such a big deal about it. Ten grand was nothing to him. I’d have thought he’d want to help me out, get me onto the property ladder with a place of my own. But he didn’t give a damn about that. After all the work I’d done to build bridges between us, have a good relationship with him, and he just threw it all back in my face over a bit of money.’

‘Quite a lot of money, actually,’ Rachel said.

‘For me and you, yeah. Not for him.’

He sounded like a petulant child, Rachel thought. She had an older sister, Debs, who she loved dearly. But Debs would never have considered handing over large sums of money to Rachel on a regular basis without ever expecting the money to be paid back. Rachel wouldn’t have wanted it, either. That sort of financial dependency could only damage their relationship over time. Which is exactly what seemed to have happened between Nick and Simon.

‘It wasn’t fair,’ Simon said. ‘He had so much and I’ve always had to work hard, scrimping and saving for every penny. But he wouldn’t stop going on about that bloody loan. Pestering me about it every opportunity he got.’

‘Is that what happened on Saturday night?’ Rachel asked.

‘Saturday?’ Simon frowned. ‘No. I already told you. I kept well out of his way on Saturday. I saw the mood he was in and I knew if I went anywhere near him he’d start on at me. I was worried Bella would hear him. She didn’t know about the loan and I wanted to keep it that way. Of course, thanks to you she now knows something’s up.’

‘She asked you about it then?’ Ade said.

‘She was really upset,’ Simon said. ‘Wanted to know why I hadn’t told her about it.’

‘What did you say?’ Rachel said.

‘What could I say? I told her there never had been a loan and there was obviously some sort of misunderstanding.’

‘So you lied to her again,’ Rachel said.

‘I can’t see that my client’s relationship with his wife is relevant to this conversation,’ the solicitor said.

‘It proves he’s a liar,’ Rachel said, ‘and that is certainly relevant to this conversation.’

She was starting to strongly dislike Simon Gilbert and was wondering just how far he might be willing to go to make sure his wife didn’t ever learn that he’d been taking handouts from his brother.