Someone has stuck a Post-it note to my computer screen. A scribbled name and number. I don’t know who it is. It’s either a) a complaint b) a story so dull it will never see the light of day, or c) an elderly reader who just wants to chat. The best tip-offs from the public usually come through the news desk, handed out, like sweets, to favoured reporters. I remove my notepad from my bag and place it on the desk.

Lawrie puts down the receiver and tugs at his fringe. ‘That’s five minutes of my life I’m never going to get back.’

‘Waste of time?’

He doesn’t answer, distracted by the ping of an incoming email. ‘Is everything OK?’ I pose the question, not because I don’t know the answer, but because I can see it isn’t, I like Lawrie and Colin has told me to help.

‘The editor wants to splash on the Hilltop House murders tomorrow’ – my breath catches in my throat at the mention of this spectre from my childhood – ‘and I need a top line.’

A top line. Stupid phrase, isn’t it? But it’s exactly what it says on the tin. The killer angle. The exclusive. The opening sentence of the story that will persuade readers to buy our newspaper above all others, especially our tabloid rivals.

I imagine the shock on Lawrie’s face when I tell him that I lived next door to the Carter family; that arterial blood is bright red and venous blood is darkly rich, like wine; that Shannon Carter – the tearful star of this headline-making documentary – wasn’t wearing any shoes when the police led her away and she left bloody footprints on the pavement. That a killer isn’t always who you think she is.

But instead I grimace and express my solidarity. ‘Nightmare.’

Lawrie runs his hand through his hair again. It sticks up and makes him seem younger than he is. I wonder if this is what he looks like when he wakes up in the morning and then I push the thought away with both hands. As if that’s going to happen.

Embarrassing as it is to admit – I’m thirty-three years old, for God’s sake – I’ve never spent the night with a man. Quick and perfunctory sex, yes. Actual long-term relationship, no. It’s not that I don’t want to meet someone. But I don’t like showing my scars, inside and out. I prefer the dark corners of alleyways or a stranger’s car, where I can keep my shirt on and the pain of my past to myself. Anyway, Lawrie has a girlfriend and she’s beautiful, and that is the end of that.

‘Have you asked the ITV press office for some exclusive footage?’ It’s an obvious avenue, but perhaps, amid the hectic pace of the news day, it hasn’t occurred to him.