I clean the rattle, running my fingers over the intricate pattern, until the crushing sadness and following rage that descends every time I touch it becomes too much and I wrap it in a tea towel and hide it in the pantry. Then I go to the laptop and click on the icon for Rav’s screen. A lock screen comes up with a password box and I falter for a moment. Would he have changed it? It was always AllieVero2 – my first and middle names, Vero for Véronique – and 2 for the fact that there was just the two of us when he set it up. I type in the words and wait anxiously, suddenly convinced that he will have changed it to try and keep me out. After a few seconds, the screen changes and I am in. The screen fills with a picture of the two of us, taken on the beach at Colva on our last day there together. Before we were married, before the children. His arm is slung over my shoulder and I am looking up at him, laughing. Rav is laughing too, his eyes crinkled, his hair swept back by the sea breeze. I think of the way we were before we moved here, before all of this. Before he was caught up in cases he is desperate to win, too busy to spend time with his family, before I felt constantly watched, before Agnes. I resist the urge to lay my head in my arms and cry. Instead, I look to where the baby lies in the Moses basket, his breaths deep and regular as he sleeps. Passports are sorted. Rav’s message to Naomi is illuminated in my mind. They are planning to take my children, I think, certainty making my senses feel sharp and alert. They are going to take them away from me. I pull up Safari and open up Rav’s search history. I hit the jackpot straight away, he hasn’t even tried to hide his tracks. Why would he? I think. He doesn’t know that I have any idea what he is planning. The website for the airline is the first one that comes up, and thanks to cookies on the laptop, I can see exactly what he has been searching for. Flights to Goa, to Dabolim Airport, for two adults and two children, leaving on 18th June. He hasn’t entered a return date, only one-way details. The breath is knocked out of me, and I feel winded. How could he – the only man I have ever loved – do this to me? Take our children from me. I wonder whose idea this was – Rav’s or Naomi’s? Maybe this is what Naomi wanted all long. Rav is a good man. Maybe this is why she has planted the idea in his head that I am going crazy. I picture the way she is with the children, the way she always goes to Mina when she falls, jumping up before I can even realize something is wrong. I imagine Naomi being the one taking the baby to his first day at school, talking to Mina about boys, sitting beside Rav in a fancy hat as Mina walks down the aisle. My fingers are cold, so cold they feel numb and I rub them together to get some life back into them as I stand and start to pace the sitting-room floor. Does Avó know about this? Was she trying to warn me the other day, when she said that I looked as if something was wrong, that I looked unhappy? A scratch comes from the chimney, making me jump. Dialling with shaky fingers, I call my mother’s number, even though I know she won’t pick up.