“What’s the job for then?” he spits at her. “Why d’you need a job all of a sudden? Do you want me to buy you something? Is that it? Or what are you hiding?”

“It’s not about the money, or not only, I haven’t even got my first paycheck, Tel,” Simone soothes, daring to touch Terry’s grasping hand. It is a mistake. She had hoped to coax his hand away from her throat, but it makes him grip harder. “Tel, Tel, please let go,” she gasps.

There are footsteps on the other side of the arch and, still gripping, Terry manoeuvres his body in front of hers so that to anybody passing they look like an ordinary couple locked in close conversation. Even in public he can control her; he wants her to know this. Breath evades her. She could kick him, but he’d punch her for sure. She could flail her arms and legs and try to at least grab somebody’s attention, but what stranger would stop to save her?

“Plead again,” Terry whispers.

Obediently Simone mouths the words, but no sound comes out.

Finally, when the pedestrian has passed, Terry loosens his grasp. Simone splutters and he stands there watching her struggle. Watching. Watching. His face is full of disgust, and maybe pleasure.

“Don’t whimper,” he spits. “It’s ugly.”

Simone attempts to struggle more quietly. When at last she catches her breath, she says softly: “I wouldn’t leave you. I just want to do something for myself, Tel. I just wanna try the job.”

For a moment, relief washes over Terry’s face. She sees it coming, growing. For a moment he believes her. But only for a moment. The next second his jaw is clenched again, his eyes locked. He speaks slowly. Smoothly through his fury. “I know you wouldn’t leave me, cos I’d kill you if you did. I’d kill you and your fucking son. And Jasmine. I’d kill all of you.”

If somebody threatens you enough times, you believe it.

Simone nods.

“I’d kill you,” he repeats.

Simone nods again.

He lets go of her and she reaches tentatively for her neck, stroking the angry skin.

Then, “I love you,” he says suddenly, as fiercely as his threat of death. “You know that.”

Simone nods once more. “I know, Tel. I love you too.”

It’s true, but the sour taste comes again.

Terry doesn’t seem to notice. Gently, he touches her on her shoulder, and for a moment she thinks he is going to hug her, but he is only reaching for the strap of her handbag and then lifting it away. Opening the zip, he pulls out her wallet and removes her bankcard and the thirty pounds of cash, then grinning with bizarrely abrupt merriment, he thrusts the emptied wallet back at her. “Go on then, scurry off to your job.”

A switch has been flicked.

His anger gone.

On. Off. On. Off.

Simone knows that she shouldn’t say anything, but a snaking thought creeps through her mind and she cannot help herself. “What do you need the cash for, Tel?”