Without a word, I passed him the letter, my hands quivering.

His brow furrowed. ‘What’s this?’

‘You need to read it. I’ve just been speaking to the vicar in Dorset. I didn’t want to believe what he told me, but reading between the lines, it’s here in black and white.’

Jack handed Elodie to me and sat beside me on the bed. Silently, he began to read the words that I was still struggling to digest.

27th December 1980

My darling Ginny,

I’m sure you know how I’ve been feeling – and that this has been building for many years now. I’ve thought long and hard about it, but I can’t live with myself any longer. We opened Pandora’s box when we declared our love for each other. We knew what it would mean for us, how people would react, and we were prepared for it. And at first, moving to Rose Cottage felt like a clean slate, the chance of happiness in a place no one knew us. But what has happened in the years since has been far worse than anything I could ever have imagined. Our fresh start was only the beginning of the nightmare. The pain is too much to bear. Everything keeps going round and round in my head endlessly – I feel sick when I think about it all.

We may have had different beliefs, but we have always been two halves of the same person. We both know it. But you are the strong one. You have always been able to hold your head up, ready to spit the world in the eye and defy anyone who dares to speak ill of us, or look at us as if we’re the Devil’s spawn. I can’t even cope with that these days, much less the knowledge of what he did. The product of our union, our love, and he is Satan himself. There’s no other word for it. But he’s a monster of our making. Rotten to his very core. I know now that he should never have been born. The girls being taken from us was an act of God. We should have known that we weren’t meant to have our own children. It was never to be.

Even though he is no longer living with us, the memory of his suffocating presence and his shocking deed haunts me still, every waking hour. We have been punished for our unnatural love. God has passed judgement on us and we will pay the price for as long as we live. I blame myself. I should have had more self-restraint and walked away from you. It may have been hard at first, but we could have moved on eventually. Maybe then we’d both have had the chance of happiness with someone else and none of this would have ever happened.