“Please take a seat. What can I do for you?” The woman must have been around the same age as she was, long, dark hair tied back into a ponytail and exposing her high cheekbones to their best advantage. Margo instantly disliked her, and her French accent. She felt the frown before it showed on her face, eyes closing to present angry slits to the world.

“I’m Margo McDonald. Your paper has my boyfriend’s picture plastered all over the front page. How much will you pay me for my story?”

Josephine leant back in her chair, openly appraising Margo. “You’re direct, I like that.” Her cool brown eyes took in Margo at a glance, saw the bruising, the victim. “Let me be direct in return, we don’t pay for stories – unless you’ve something that will help sell newspapers.”

Margo was taken aback, she’d thought the paper would offer her a few hundred pounds for her take on Oscar, provide her the opportunity to play the grieving widow.

“I lived with him for years in that cottage, we were like husband and wife.” She said this defensively, not liking the way the reporter stared directly into her eyes, understanding too much.

“Then maybe you can tell me who killed him, and why?”

“How do I know? Oscar had a knack for pissing people off – take your pick of anyone in this town.”

Josephine reached for her notepad and pen, laying her phone on the table to record the conversation. “Tell you what, Margo. Why don’t you tell me about you and Oscar, and how you discovered his body? Then we’ll see if we can make an offer for your contribution to the paper.”

Margo stared back at her, feeling the bundle of £50 notes pressing through her jeans pocket. “Sod it. I’ll tell you what I know, then you better pay me something.”

Josephine smiled in encouragement and Margo began speaking.

“I knew Oscar all the way through school. He was always the coolest kid, not too bright but the other kids treated him with respect. I didn’t really pay much attention to him until high school, then I noticed how good looking he was. I knew he was trouble, even then, but you know how it is – there’s something about a rebel.” Margo had trouble describing what she did like about Oscar, what had drawn her to him like a primeval force when hormones first started blazing through her body. Oscar represented all those film stars she fantasised over, the rock stars that sneered out of the TV when her parents let her watch what they supposed was an innocent music show. She would tame him, make him her own – and all the other girls would be jealous the day they got married. Of course, it hadn’t worked out quite that way.

“We properly got together when I was fifteen, started walking out together.” Margo realised how old fashioned that phrase sounded, even as she spoke the words. What she should have said was, when heavy petting turned into something that spoke to the animal in both of them. She’d felt it then, felt as if she’d conquered him, even as he bragged openly about shagging her. She was made a woman, she knew things he didn’t. She knew he was still a boy and inside him was a need to be loved and held, warm and close to her skin.