‘Yeah but you lied, didn’t you?’ I shout, shrinking against the wall as he comes closer still. ‘You lied and lied and lied. They know. They’ve even got a photo.’ I screw my eyes shut, trying to blot out the picture, in neon technicolour this time. ‘The police are so far on to you that they’re leaking actual mugshots to the press – the victims who were failed. The commissioner said it herself! And, guess what? Now I know too. I know what you did to her … and to me. You let it happen. And you can’t play me for a fool anymore.’

I stop as I open my eyes to see him sagging in front of me.

‘A photo? Of whom?’

I laugh even though I think I might throw up. ‘What, now you 173get to play dumb? Why else would I be here if I hadn’t figured it out? Even you couldn’t pick that little girl out of a line-up in the playground. They’ve got a photo only I would recognise…’

‘Sit,’ he spits, turning and stalking back to his desk to pick up a phone.

‘No,’ I say, tottering as I force myself to stand straight. ‘You put me on to Shacklin. Then I’ll sit.’ I cower into the wall as he slams the phone back down.

‘So tell me, Marie,’ he growls, moving like a panther back across the room towards me. ‘That’s what we’re calling you these days, isn’t it? Tell me, do you know how easy it is to go from victim to accomplice? From child to adult, just with the flick of a switch? Miss Baines – Rach, that’s what you called her, wasn’t it? She was seventeen, you were fifteen. Which of you ended up in jail, and why? Don’t you remember? Tell me, do you know how easy it is to blow up a person’s new identity, especially when you created it in the first place, especially when so many members of an organised crime ring managed to escape without charge? And tell me, do you know how easy it is to move wards of the state, dependent on state protection, to brand-new surroundings and circumstances? To make them disappear without trace, if you want them to?’ He clicks his fingers, so close now I can see every line in his face.

‘You don’t scare me,’ I say, forcing myself to look into his eyes; black, like he could be blind. ‘I don’t even know you.’