Recognising his ringtone, Alicia grabbed her phone.

‘Hi,’ Justin said, as soon as she picked up. ‘I just wanted to check you were okay.’

‘Yes,’ Alicia assured him, amazed he cared enough to even ask after the news she’d given him. ‘Why?

‘No reason. I just thought I’d check.’ There was a pause on the line, then, ‘Radley,’ he said, almost spitting the word out. ‘If he gets in touch, will you let me know? Regarding Sophie, I mean.’

‘Obviously I will,’ Alicia said, wondering why he’d think she wouldn’t. Then she thought of the paternity test, her heart aching for him as she imagined what his line of thinking might be: that she might decide her future was with Sophie’s father.

‘And you’ll let me know if he bothers you? Assuming you don’t want him to contact you unnecessarily, that is,’ Justin went on, sounding awkward now, uncertain.

‘Justin…’ Alicia paused. It would be so easy to just say it, to blurt it out. But then what? The endless questions, the disbelief. Him thinking she was incapable of doing anything but lying. Things were so clouded and confused in her mind now, she couldn’t even be sure she wasn’t lying to herself. She couldn’t bear that Justin might think she had ever wanted to be with anyone but him. That she would entertain the thought of talking to Paul Radley now, unless through a solicitor. God forbid he should ever go down that route, but he well might now that he’d had the paternity test, meaning she would receive some cold, official letter in the post. ‘I don’t want any contact with him. Not ever,’ she said.

She wished she could be with Justin now. Hold him. She wished there was something she could do to prove how very much she’d always loved and cared for him, even when she’d done the most careless thing in the world.

‘Okay,’ he said, drawing in a tight breath. ‘I needed to check, for my own peace of mind.’

His peace of mind? Alicia looked upwards, blinking hard… Would he ever have that again?

‘I’d better go,’ he said, after another awkward pause. ‘I have some places to check out.

‘Wait,’ she said urgently, wanting to at least check how he was. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked him, stupidly. She knew how he was: a jaded, broken man. He missed Sophie and Lucas as much as she did: every minute of every waking day, in her dreams and her waking nightmares, she thought of them. Yet they couldn’t reach out to each other, comfort each other. The void between them, where their children should be, was too vast.

‘Tired,’ he admitted. ‘I’ve moved rooms. Renting nearer the area I’m going to check out later tonight.’

‘Is it clean?’ she asked him, grieving for what they’d lost, for the ability to talk naturally that they’d once had. There was nothing between them now but stilted conversation.

‘Reasonable,’ he said, then, ‘What about you? You’re going to be staying with Jess for a while, I take it?’

‘Yes, for now,’ she said, not sure what else she could say. She couldn’t contemplate the thought of going back to a house where the ghosts of her family would haunt her. She hadn’t even broached the subject of the house with Justin, whether he would want her going back there, whether he would ever want to go back.

‘Jess is here now.’ She glanced towards her sister as she poked her head curiously around the kitchen door.

‘Justin?’ Jessica mouthed.

Alicia nodded.

Jessica nodded in turn, and then waggled her phone in Alicia’s direction, indicating she was going to make a call.

‘We’re just back from distributing leaflets at district train stations,’ Alicia went on. ‘We have lots of shops and supermarkets putting up posters, too,’ she said, as if her efforts amounted to anything compared to what he was doing.

‘Good. That’s good.’ Justin sounded relieved. ‘Tell Jess thanks.’

‘I will,’ Alicia said, and then wondered what else to say. There was no subject that was safe. There was no future they could discuss, as Justin had pointed out. No present. No past. Every memory they’d made together had been tarnished.

‘Right, I’ll get off,’ he said, when it was clear they’d exhausted all topics. ‘Talk tomorrow.’

‘Okay.’ Alicia’s heart fractured a little further. ‘Be careful, Justin.’

‘I will. You too,’ Justin said, and ended the call.

Alicia listened to the empty silence. There had been no coldness in his voice – he’d sounded like Justin – but it was as if he’d been talking to a sister or a friend, not his wife, not his lover. But then, she wasn’t either of those any more.

Going to the fridge to pour herself a large wine, Alicia swallowed hard on the thought that one day he would stop calling. That would be the day she would stop breathing.