Ruthless bastard. Felix already knew the company was in trouble at that point: it’s why he pulled out of the house sale just a couple of days later. Which means he was also well aware Harper would almost certainly lose any money she invested with him. He probably figured she deserved it for trying to screw him over in the first place.

I sigh. ‘How much did you give him?’

‘Me and Kyle had a hundred and fifty thousand in our joint savings account. It was only getting one percent interest where it was. It seemed like a smart thing to do!’

‘Does Kyle know?’

She shakes her head.

‘You may get lucky,’ I say. ‘They’ll probably recover some of the funds. Maybe not all of it, but—’

‘We got the money through from selling our house two weeks ago,’ she says, her voice a whisper. ‘I gave Felix that, too. All of it. I gave him everything.’

‘Jesus, Harper! What were you thinking?’

She raises her white face to me. ‘That’s why I have to find him. It could take years for creditors to get paid and even then they won’t get all of their money back. But if I can find him, if I can talk to him – he can’t have spent it yet!’

I glance in my rearview mirror at the knot of reporters outside the Glass House.

The crowd is growing as news of the company’s collapse spreads; it’s not just photographers and journalists now, but a far sadder and more desperate demographic: ordinary people like Harper who’ve woken up to the realisation that every penny they’ve saved for their retirement, to buy their first house, to put their kids through college – it’s all gone.

Harper abruptly drops her feet to the floor of the car. ‘He knew, didn’t he?’ she says. ‘He knew the company was going bankrupt when he took our money!’

Even though this is a mess entirely of her own making, I can’t help but feel sorry for her. When the Porters broke our housing chain, I didn’t tell Harper about the issues with Copper Beech at Stacey’s specific request, because she was worried about the legal implications of sharing insider information with me. There was no reason for me to tell Harper why the Porters had pulled out anyway – I couldn’t have known she’d try to blackmail Felix and get caught up in the Copper Beech collapse. But she’s just a kid. I should have looked out for her.

‘What about Stacey?’ Harper says. ‘Did she know too?’

‘No,’ I say firmly.

Stacey knew the company was in trouble, of course, but I’m sure she had no idea about the ransacked pension fund. She wouldn’t have stood by and allowed Felix to defraud ordinary hardworking people.