‘You fucking beetch,’ he shouts, and I lunge forwards, lifting a shoulder hard at the same time, and I feel a huge weight lift off me as Carrie loses her grip and crashes to the floor. I barrel into him like a charging bull, and I hit him just in the right place.

His arms windmill as he falls back, realising that there is nothing behind him, and he bends in half and topples over the balcony. After a moment, there is a wet, crunching sound as gravity deals with this rotten apple of a man. Not a man … an animal.

A wolf.

I’m relieved that the hotel is practically deserted.

I peer over the edge, and see the lump of flesh and bone on the concrete below. There’s no way he can have survived that fall. I take a step back and let out a long, slow breath.

‘It’s OK,’ I say, quietly. ‘He’s gone, Carrie. He can’t hurt you anymore.’

No answer.

I turn, expecting to see her crying on the floor, but that’s not what I see.

She is on the floor, but she is not crying. She’s not moving. Her face is turned away from me, a small pool of blood forming on the floor where she has hit her head on the edge of the bedside cabinet.

Oh God … oh God … oh God.

Carrie is dead.

A creak brings me back to the present, movement on the bench as someone sits down at the other end, a little distance away from me. I open my eyes and wipe away my tears. I never meant for that to happen. Of all the things, I never meant for that. I can see the new arrival out of the corner of my eye – a young woman in a long floral dress, floppy sunhat and huge shades. She seems to be alone.

Can I risk another friendship? Perhaps, but I have to sort out some admin first.

I open the email app on the laptop and scroll back up to the top of the list – to the most recent email from Laura to Carrie. It must’ve come in while I was in the hair salon.

HER REAL NAME IS VERONICA DELAUNEY, AND SHE IS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS!!!

I laugh out loud. I can’t help it. The stupid cow still thinks she’s talking to Carrie.

I type a reply to the message:

What’s with the dramatic caps, Loz? It’s fine. I am safe.

Then I delete it, and type instead:

My name is VIOLET, my dear Laura … and they will never find me.

I delete this too, then snap the lid of the laptop shut. I’ll deal with it later.

‘Too nice an evening to be working, right?’

I turn towards the voice. The girl in the sundress. She’s taken off her sunglasses and placed them on the table.