‘Carry on with what you were saying. The Tribbecks adopted you …?’

‘Yes, and did their best, which was probably more than adequate, and better than I could do myself in a similar situation, but I didn’t have a fantastic time growing up in that house. To put it mildly. I had the chance to trace my biological mother when I was eighteen – should have left well alone, but I’m not the sort of person who can ever do that – so I leapt at it. Found out very quickly that she’d died the year before. Choked to death after getting a piece of chicken lodged in her throat. Her best friend was with her at the time but couldn’t help her. Horrendous. Last time I saw Cheryl, she still wasn’t over it.

‘They were close, her and my mum. Cheryl was able to tell me stuff I might have been better off not knowing: Elaine desperately wanted to keep me—’

‘Elaine? Your mother’s name was Elaine?’

‘Yes. Why’s that important?’

‘Was it ever shortened to Lane?’

‘Not as far as I know. Why? Cheryl calls her El – I think most of her friends did, and Marion and Trevor insisted on the full Elaine and didn’t care what she wanted to be known as.’

‘Never mind. Go on.’

‘My mother hadn’t planned to get pregnant so young, but once she found out she was, she desperately wanted to have the baby: me. She’d already figured out that her parents were twats, and she had no siblings, so having a baby seemed to her to be the only way of securing a halfway decent relative for herself.’

‘This is coming from Cheryl, all this information?’ Waterhouse asks.

I nod. ‘And she’s convincing. I don’t think she’s just saying it to make me feel I was wanted. Some of the details I’ve heard are too specific, and Cheryl’s not imaginative enough to invent them. Elaine wanted to keep me. She talked about me every single time Cheryl saw her – being forced to give me up haunted her. It became an obsession. She never forgave Marion and Trevor. And there was an added twist that made it all so much worse for her.’