It was of course risky to be picked up at the house, what with both Nora and Nick potentially spying on me. I told Dr Holt, as I had once told you, to meet me up the lane a bit, where a passing place widened out the road and a car could pull up. If he found this strange, he didn’t comment, and a few hours later we were driving in his jeep towards Sussex, where Nora was from.

He kept glancing over at me in the passenger seat. ‘You’re sure you’re alright?’

‘Fine.’ I scrabbled to find clear floor space for my feet – the car was like a bin on wheels. Remnants of non-NHS-approved fast food littered the footwells, and the back seat was heaped with trainers, jumpers, fleeces, boxes of tissues, a bike helmet. As if he lived in here most of the time. I found it endearing somehow, after the sterile tidiness of my own home. ‘The place is hard to find, I think – nothing’s coming up on Google Maps.’ From the old news reports, I had worked out the approximate postcode of where the house was, and we were heading there. To find what, I had no idea.

I almost enjoyed the trip. It was warm inside the car, with a slight undertone of old burger, and we listened to Radio 2 and shared a bag of wine gums, which he’d brought along with him. He asked was I alright at least four times. Was I warm or cold. Did I need water. Did I want to stop for the loo. I wondered why Nick’s version of looking after me didn’t feel like this.

After a while, he said, ‘So what are you hoping to find out?’

‘I don’t know. What happened to her family – if she’s dangerous.’ If she might hurt me, or my baby. If I really had no choice but to run, burn my life to the ground. When I wondered what we might learn when we got there, my stomach dipped. I cradled my bump, and the gesture wasn’t lost on him.

‘Suzi, you don’t need to go home after this. If you feel you’re in danger from . . . anyone.’ Meaning Nora, meaning Nick. Both, or either. He was right to think I wasn’t safe at home. But I couldn’t think that far ahead.

‘I know. Thank you.’ We drove the rest of the way in peaceful silence, me turning over my options in my head, not liking any of them.