I tried everything I could to keep Liam away from the castle, to stop him from confronting the stranger, but of course he wouldn’t listen.

When he discovered the boathouse, I had no time to warn Mia, and so the only thing I could do was to throw myself out of the boat. I knew if we left the island then that was it – all our plans would have been for nothing. So, even though Liam has left me terrified of water, as soon as he took his eyes off me to look over his shoulder, I launched myself over the edge of the boat and into the freezing waters of the loch. If I drowned, I told myself at least I would die on my own terms and it would be my choice.

I was the one, too, who left the glass angel on the ground by Liam as he slept. Mia wanted him to see it; she believed it would be the final puzzle piece that would jolt his memory and make him realise who was stalking him and why. But when I woke up, I remembered the story Mia told me of how she’d fled through the snow with her feet bleeding, glass splinters embedded in them, and so I placed it where I knew Liam would step on it.

I wanted to make him suffer; to let him have one more taste of his own medicine.

While he went hungry, I was eating trail mix that I’d hidden in my pockets. When he asked me to grab the shotgun shells at the castle, I did, but I also picked up the empty ones from the pile of rubbish and while he slept, I was the one who replaced the shells he’d loaded in the gun with blanks.

And all the while, I remembered my mother and I remembered the beatings he’d given me and I thought about what he’d done to my cat and to Will and to Mia, and who knows, maybe even to other women before her.

He thought I was weak and that I would never fight back. He got that wrong.

‘I need help,’ Liam begs weakly, flopping backwards in a river of mud.

The rain has almost completely eased; the thunder and lightning are rolling off and out to sea.

‘There’s no help coming,’ I say to him. Then I crouch down beside him again, no longer afraid that he has the strength to hurt me.

Mia joins me. Liam looks between us in disbelief, clearly still shocked that he’s fallen victim to our plot, struggling to understand how Mia is alive and how we managed to fool him.

His face crumples and he lets out an almighty bellow of rage. It’s the cry of a lone wolf caught in a trap. He knows his time is running out, and that no one is coming to help.