After the aircraft parks, and all the passengers have disembarked, I quickly check my phone and find a voicemail from Andrew. It’s clipped and to the point, no emotion in his voice. ‘I thought you’d want to know Stephanie didn’t make it.’ As the return passengers board, I’m in shock; on automatic. All I can think is what a waste of a life. The flight back to Gatwick is surreal, life suddenly even more tenuous than usual, no less because I’m at thirty-five thousand feet, where a few millimetres of metal is all there is between life and certain death.

*

I try to call James before driving home, but it goes to voicemail. When Andrew gets home that evening he has little to add to his earlier message, other than citing organ failure as the most probable cause of Stephanie’s death.

Whenever I run past the Hamptons’ house in the days that follow, the windows are closed and curtains drawn. Even at night, it’s in darkness and I wonder how long before the bank forecloses, before what’s left of James’s life is gone.

Oddly, I find my husband is suddenly home earlier, and around more often, as Stephanie’s comment from the last time I saw her comes to mind. ‘Do you know how many people would give anything to be in your shoes …’ It makes me think about James’s hatred, about the jealousy in Stephanie’s eyes, and all of a sudden, everything falls into place as I see what’s been right under my nose.

I remember the call I picked up ages ago, before Hollie disappeared. No-one had spoken or left a message. After, I’d written the number down, but never called it. Searching in the kitchen drawer where I would have put the piece of paper I’d written it on, I find it, against the odds. Then I dial the number.

After, as I try to take in what I now know to be fact, I take advantage of the fact that Andrew’s out. Going to one of the cupboards, I start gathering bottles, pouring away every last drop of his beloved Scotch, then taking the expensive red wine he buys outside and hurling each bottle into the dustbin, listening to the glass shatter. Then back inside, I’m forced to wait, on edge, mentally preparing what I want to say to him. When he comes in from work and goes to the cupboard where the whisky’s kept and finds it empty, he glares at me.

‘Elise. My Scotch isn’t here.’ He speaks impatiently, accusingly.