The incessant whirring of the door buzzer was what caught her attention first. Kate forced her eyes open, glimpsing the morning light stealing around the edge of the curtains. Barely five hours had passed since she’d arrived home and crawled into bed. She’d left the crime scene and started preparing the incident room to brief the teams who had been speaking to people with key cards for the car-park entrance barrier, when Underhill had arrived, bleary-eyed, demanding to take over. Kate didn’t argue, she had seen what she needed to see.

She wasn’t ready to share the possibility that Amy’s killer was back; without a shred of evidence she knew everyone would think she was crazy. Laura would keep her in the loop and Underhill could clean up the mess while she carried on with her own investigation.

The buzzer sounded again.

‘All right, all right,’ she grumbled to nobody in particular. ‘I’m coming!’

Pushing the duvet back, she was relieved to see the skin around her ankle had turned a sickly green-yellow with hints of plum, and the swelling was almost gone. She reached the front door without her crutch and pressed the intercom button. ‘Yes?’

‘Finally!’ Rob groaned. ‘Are you going to let me in or what? It’s sheeting down out here.’

Confused, Kate buzzed him in, and opened the front door, waiting for her ex-husband to reach the top of the stairs. ‘Did I miss something? It’s not my day to see Chloe until next weekend. Right?’

He brushed droplets of rain from the front of his zipped hoodie. ‘No, sorry, I’m alone. I was hoping we could talk about this.’ He raised a brown envelope into the air, and Kate knew immediately why he’d travelled an hour to visit her without warning.

‘What needs discussing? I’ve applied for joint custody of our daughter.’

He didn’t seem angry. ‘The letter from your solicitor came a bit out of the blue. Can I come in so we can talk about it like grown-ups?’ He looked down at her foot. ‘Looks painful.’

‘It’s only sprained. I’ll live.’

‘You should have told me…’

Kate waved away his concern. ‘It’s nothing. Really.’ She hopped backwards to allow him in. ‘Why don’t you wait in the kitchen while I throw on some clothes?’

She didn’t wait for a response, using the wall to balance as she hobbled quickly back towards her bedroom, closing the lounge door as she went. Yesterday’s clothes were in a pile at the foot of the bed. She plonked herself down on the end of the mattress and wriggled into them. Stopping only to run her fingers through her thick brown hair, she stared at her reflection in the mirror. ‘Looking good,’ she whispered sarcastically.

Out in the hallway, she saw that the living room door was now open and Rob was pacing beyond the door. Why couldn’t he just wait in the kitchen like she’d told him?

Pushing the door open wider, she moved inside, closing it behind her.

‘Before you say anything…’ Kate began.

He was staring at the pages tacked to the wall. ‘Jesus, Kate, talk about bringing your work home with you. What the hell is all this?’

She tried to keep her voice low and controlled. ‘What I do in my home is none of your business.’

‘On the contrary, when our daughter is here, it is my business. What if Chloe had wandered in here instead of me? Do you think it’s appropriate to have photos of dead bodies hung on the wall where our daughter can see them? It’s enough to give me nightmares, let alone her.’

‘But she isn’t here. And I did tell you to wait in the kitchen.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘It’s… nothing.’ She didn’t want to tell him what she’d been looking at. ‘It’s just a project; an old case I was asked to review.’

The penny dropped. ‘This is about her, isn’t it? Amy Spencer?’

She raised her hands to pacify him. ‘Listen, Rob, it’s not what you—’

He spun on his heel. ‘Listen to me. You need to let it go. There’s an entire team in London investigating her death. You know that, they don’t need you.’

She kept her voice quiet, controlled. ‘Nobody knows this case better than me. If anyone is going to find who killed Amy, it’s me.’

‘Have you heard yourself? It isn’t your case anymore, Kate. I’d have thought after the way they blamed you for her death, you’d want nothing more to do with it! We might be divorced, but you still carry my surname and I still care. This needs to stop. Now.’

He pulled the closest image to him from the wall; Willow Daniels, post-mortem, floated to the floor.

Kate rushed to it, pinning it back on the wall and lifting her arms to create a barrier between him and the remaining pages. She knew how this must look, but this wall, this puzzle, was her only release from the guilt and the anguish she’d been dragging around for the last year; a year spent trapped in a maze of her own making. Punishing as it was, finding a way out was the only possible therapy. ‘Don’t come into my home and start pulling things down.’

‘Fine! You want this shit all over your walls, so be it, but you can think again if you think I’m going to let Chloe come anywhere near this mausoleum.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ she whispered, cold dread prickling her skin. Not again, she couldn’t lose Chloe again.

‘What do you think it means?’ He raised the envelope again. ‘You’ve petitioned for joint custody, but you’re not ready. Until you’re able to make her your priority, you’ve no right to request additional access.’

‘No, please, Rob. I’m better now, you know that. You’ve seen it; I’ve changed. I live for the time I get to spend with her, and twice a month just isn’t enough. For either of us. That’s why I instructed my solicitor to raise the request. I thought you’d be pleased that I want to play a more active role in Chloe’s life.’

He raised his hand to cut her off. ‘I accept that she needs both her parents, but not when you’re like this.’

His words stung, but she did all she could to control her emotions. ‘Like what?’

‘This! Whenever you have a big case on you become obsessive. It’s not good for you and it’s certainly not good for Chloe. She needs a mother who will put everything else to one side, and give her the love and attention she deserves.’

‘I will. You know I will. I’d never let anything happen to her. I know I haven’t always been there for her, but you’ve no idea about the horrors I’ve seen. I used to be so terrified that she’d look at me, or touch me, and see it too. I wanted to protect her more than anything, and I thought that meant staying away. But I realised last year that I’m the best person – the only person – who can keep her truly safe. She’s the reason I go the extra mile to solve the investigations I lead. It’s to make a safer world for Chloe. For our daughter.’ Kate trembled at her own admission. ‘Please don’t challenge the petition, Chloe doesn’t deserve that. She needs me, and I – I need her.’

Rob slumped into the armchair. ‘I know. She misses you, too.’

Kate saw a tiny chink of hope and grasped at it, suddenly oppressed by the wall of horrors behind her. ‘She grows so quickly, and I’ve already missed so much of her life – and I accept that that’s my own fault – but I don’t want to miss any more. I don’t want to disrupt her life, and I know that you and Serena do a great job of taking care of her, but I’d like the opportunity to spend more time with her. If you’ll let me? Maybe our one day every other weekend could become two days every other weekend? Or maybe I could come and see her in Oxford at the weekend when she’s not due to come here? You have to admit the drive to Southampton every fortnight isn’t great for you either.’

He shrugged.

‘I don’t want to cause trouble, but I think she would benefit from having us both in her life. I’m ready to do whatever it takes.’

‘What about… you know… your depression?’

‘I won’t pretend it’s easy for me to trust myself as far as Chloe is concerned, but that’s only because my love for her is so strong. I would lay my life on the line for her, and you must understand what that means. I’m sure you’d do the same. Please, Rob?’

‘What about that boyfriend of yours? Ben?’

‘What about him?’

‘Well, Chloe seems to like him. She says he tells funny jokes. Is it serious between the two of you?’

Kate didn’t know how to answer the question after what had happened on Friday night, but she realised that she hoped it was salvageable. ‘He’s a good guy.’

Rob squinted. ‘That wasn’t really an answer. Do you love him?’

‘Uh, we’re getting off the subject.’

But Rob wasn’t prepared to let it go. ‘I disagree. If you’re to have more contact with Chloe, I have a right to know who else will be present during the access. Who is he? You’ve never introduced us.’

‘He’s a pathologist. He’s kind, and he’s funny and smart. Chloe adores him and I—’

Rob fixed her with a look. ‘—love him?’

Kate was about to tell him it was none of his business, but was relieved to be interrupted by the sound of her mobile ringing. Seeing Laura’s name on the display, she excused herself. ‘I need to take this.’