He stares directly at me, his lips pursed. I shiver under his gaze then look away.

‘You particularly like inventing characters, don’t you?’ he says, his voice hardening. ‘So much so it would seem like you missed your vocation. You could have been another Geoffrey Rivers. A bestselling novelist.’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ I say as Bains riffles through a bundle of papers. ‘I swear to you that the person on the CCTV is not me. I’m not Iris Lawson. I have no idea what any of this is about.’

‘I could believe that, Vanessa,’ says Bains, straightening out a piece of paper on the desk in front of him, ‘if only I hadn’t had statements from at least a dozen estate agents up and down the country with CCTV footage of you doing this same thing over the last six months. Now, do any of these people ring a bell?’

My body goes cold as he recites the list of names.

‘Tabitha Richardson; Elsie Summers-Allan; Eleanor Hawkins; Monica Holmes; Imogen Hartley.’

The names make me cringe. How does he know?

‘I can see by your reaction that you’re familiar with them,’ says Bains.

He stops reading and places the piece of paper to one side.

‘We’ve all done it, Vanessa,’ he says, leaning forward, his voice softer now. ‘Looked at something we have no intention or means of buying. I mean, I spend my Lotto win in my head every Saturday night before the draw. A place in the Bahamas, new car, that kind of thing. My missus used to like viewing those new-build show houses, back when they were a “thing”. We used to go and have a look at them, imagine ourselves living there with all the snazzy furnishings.’

I don’t know where he’s going with this but I try to keep my face still.

‘What I’m saying is that we all do it,’ he says, shrugging his shoulders. ‘We all dream, imagine other lives for ourselves. Only, you went one step further, Vanessa. You actually created different personas for yourself – posh Tabitha Richardson, tree-hugging Eleanor Hawkins. You admit that, don’t you?’

I glance at Frank Solomon.

‘You don’t have to answer,’ he says, shaking his head.

I turn back to Bains. He has another set of notes in front of him now.

‘Estate agents are used to this,’ he says, flicking through the notes with his index finger. ‘I mean, they’re wise to the time wasters, aren’t they? The people who just want to have a nose around a posh house with no intention of buying it. That must be really annoying for those estate agents. Most of them are on commission, aren’t they, poor sods?’

I don’t respond but as he speaks I feel a creeping dread rise up my spine.