Louisa’s breathing shallowed as she scanned the fence – there were no gaps; it was too high to push Oliver over. She tried to relax. It was just scare tactics, that was all. Melissa couldn’t really carry out her threat. Oliver knew that too, and that’s why he was relishing the fact, and now taunting his wife. Louisa hoped Melissa wouldn’t snap; she didn’t want to witness, or get involved in, any kind of scuffle – she was already regretting being talked into doing this.

‘Say it, Oliver. Tell us the truth. Let Louisa off the hook.’

‘And what? You’ve got your phones recording and will go to the police with your “evidence”?’ Oliver shook his head. ‘I’m not fucking stupid.’

‘I haven’t used my mobile, obviously. I’ve been missing – remember?’

Oliver turned to Louisa – the light from her mobile’s flashlight app still illuminating the quarry fencing. ‘And yours?’

She held it out towards him. No apps were running. No voice recording activated.

‘Hmmm.’ Oliver crossed one arm and put his other to his chin, stroking it, mockingly. ‘You want me to believe you’d be that naive?’

‘I don’t care if you think we’re naive, Oliver – it’s about hearing the truth, not about catching you out, or grassing you up.’

Even Louisa didn’t believe what Melissa was saying now. The uncomfortable feeling she’d had was growing – the purpose for which Melissa had got her and Oliver there was becoming more ominous by the second. Yes, she wanted the truth too, and if she was honest, she also wanted Oliver to suffer for everything he’d done. She’d have preferred to have gone through the proper channels, though – police. Justice in the way it was meant to be carried out. While she understood Melissa’s reasoning and knew she was right, that there was no evidence to convict Oliver of any wrongdoing – here and now, she wanted to back out. Retreat. Go home to her family. Forget everything about the last few weeks.

But Melissa wasn’t done. She couldn’t forget – Louisa got that. Oliver had murdered her sister and disposed of the body. Then he’d actively sought Melissa out, manipulated a meeting, and shoehorned himself into her life, the same as he’d recently done with Louisa’s. Had he pretended to love Melissa for all that time? Is that what she was thinking now, that for the entire time she’d been seeing Oliver it had all been fake, his feelings for her fabricated? Or, Louisa wondered, had he been so torn about his actions that being with Melissa and marrying her was his only way of redeeming himself.