It would have been hard at that moment to know which of them fancied that idea less. The main difference was that Jasmine had to disguise her misgivings at the prospect of letting Ingrams drive her off into the unknown behind a mask of gratitude for Rita’s helpful suggestion. Ingrams was not constrained by any such dichotomies and thus shot Rita a glare that would have had most people whimpering.

The fact that Rita seemed mildly amused by it told Jasmine that there must be a great deal of trust between them. Rita would not have presumed to impose upon him in the face of such obvious reluctance, and equally Ingrams would not have responded with a look like that if they didn’t both understand that she was immune to its threat.

Ingrams gave a sigh and muttered something about leaving in two minutes, before stomping back through the outside door again with unapologetically bad grace.

Jasmine had no reason to believe that she shared Rita’s immunity, but she couldn’t see how she could back out of this without making it obvious that she believed she had something to fear from him.

Rita seemed to read her apprehension. She patted Jasmine’s hand.

‘Make sure he buys you a cuppa at the garden centre, seeing as he’s hauling you away from this one. And don’t worry: his bark’s worse than his bite.’

Jasmine was reminded of dog-owners who said things like ‘he won’t touch you’ as their horribly befanged hound bounded towards her in the park, regardless of the fact that they would have precisely no control over the slavering beast if it decided to have her leg off. This woman, who ran a refuge, thought highly of Ingrams and thoroughly trusted the man, and that in itself was a kind of endorsement, but by her own admission there were plenty of things she didn’t know about him. Like whether he had murdered Jasmine’s uncle and was about to do the same to her. Either way, Jasmine really wished that Rita hadn’t used a phrase that included the word ‘killing’ when she made her helpful suggestion.

This Dark Place

‘What time will you be clear?’ Drew asked, as Catherine indicated to pull in at West Street underground station.

‘How long is a piece of string? You know what court’s like.’

‘You know what I mean. You sure you’ll be done in time for the boys?’

‘Of course. Don’t worry about it. You take all the time you need.’