Linda averted her eyes, staring down at a robin hopping over the lawn by the fence. “It gets very hazy, but when Caxton finished, he rolled off me. I made to stand up. It was hard. I was winded, and he’d made me sore . . . you know. I felt sick from the champagne. But Caxton said I couldn’t leave yet, and he pushed me down again, then he told the other man it was his turn, to hurry up.”

“And what happened then?”

“The younger man raped me, too. There was something . . .” She stopped, as if trying to find the right words. “Something reluctant about him. Like he didn’t really want to do it, but he wanted to please Caxton. Maybe he’d been pushed into it, you know, maybe Caxton was challenging him to be a man or something. But what happened had excited him, and he’d passed a point of no return. I don’t know. Maybe I’m being fanciful, using hindsight, but I don’t think he felt comfortable.”

“But he did it anyway? Did he rape you as well?”

She turned her head away. “Yes.”

“So this man was both a witness and an assailant. You didn’t mention this to DI MacDonald?”

“No. I just told her someone else was there. I never told my mother, either.”

“Or the Leeds police?”

“No. I was too ashamed. Somehow, it seemed . . . being raped twice . . . I just couldn’t.”

“Did you tell your friend Melanie?”

“I’ve never told anyone.”

“Where’s Melanie now?”

“She died a few years ago.”

“I’m sorry to hear it,” said Banks.

“We’d lost touch, more or less, over the years.”

“Did they talk to each other, this man and Caxton, use names or anything?”

“Not that I remember, no.”

“I know this is a bit delicate,” said Banks, “but did either of them use a condom?”

“No. I thought later it was a miracle I didn’t get pregnant, but I didn’t.”

“What happened next?”

“I was crying and I just wanted to go home. It was like I didn’t exist for them anymore. I just walked out of the room in a daze.”

“Nobody tried to stop you?”

“No.”

“How did you leave the hotel?” Banks asked.

“Through reception, out the front.”

“Caxton didn’t make you go by the back entrance, where you’d come in, have his driver take you?”

“He didn’t even give me bus fare.”

“Did anyone see you leaving?”