Knowing the urgency of her situation, Amanda reached over to slam it shut but, before she could get there, it flew open, knocking Mrs Naseby against the wall and sending Amanda stumbling backwards. Mrs Naseby cried out, trying but failing to keep a grip on her stick. As the stick clattered to the floor, and her legs went from under her, she fell onto her side, just as the man came storming into the hallway, a renewed urgency about him.

Ignoring the old lady completely, he lunged at Amanda, knife first, his dark eyes burning beneath his balaclava.

Dodging him, she ran for the staircase, bounding up it as it whined and creaked beneath her feet, not sure where the hell she was going, but knowing she had to put as much distance between herself and her assailant as possible.

A door was open in front of her and she ran through it and into Mrs Naseby’s bedroom, noticing with huge relief as she slammed it behind her that there was a key in the lock. Pressing her whole body against the door, she locked it with shaking hands. She could hear him outside, his breathing calm and steady as he tried and failed to turn the handle.

A split second later, the door reverberated on its hinges as he slammed into it. It was only a flimsy lock and Amanda knew it wasn’t going to hold for long.

Shit. She was trapped. The door reverberated again and she heard the sound of wood splitting.

Looking round desperately, she spotted the half-open bedroom window. Running over, she forced it fully open, then clambered out through the gap just as the door flew open and he came striding in the room, making straight for her with the bloodied knife raised, like something out of one of her worst nightmares.

Gripping the window ledge with both hands, she turned herself round and slid down the wall. Then, just as she let go to jump the rest of the way, a gloved hand grabbed her wrist, and suddenly she was dangling helpless in mid-air.

As his sleeve rode up, she just had time to see the tattoo on his arm.

With his free hand, he brought the knife down towards her wrist. But as she pulled and wriggled with all her might, his grip loosened, and then she was falling through the air.

She hit the tarmac feet first and a stinging pain shot up her Achilles tendons as she rolled over and leapt to her feet, running again, making for the trees and freedom, tearing through the foliage. She felt a stinging pain in her right ankle but ignored it and kept running, running, running, making for the road, and anywhere where there might be people who could help her.

The hole appeared without warning and, as her foot ploughed straight into it, she tripped and went sprawling, landing painfully on the hard ground.

For a moment, she didn’t move, concentrating instead on quietening her breathing.

And then she heard it. The sound of a twig breaking, followed by undergrowth being pushed aside.

He was still following her.

Using her hands, she pushed herself into the lee of a holly bush, trying to get as far under it as possible. Finally, she lay still and held her breath.

Don’t move. Don’t speak. Don’t breathe. Don’t move.

In those moments, she thought about her own vulnerability, and the fact that a person’s world could change in the blink of an eye, or the deep, painful slash of a knife. One minute, she was a married woman living an easy life in idyllic surroundings, with few if any worries; the next she’d discovered a murder in her own home, and suddenly she was alone in the woods while the man who’d committed it hunted her with a knife.

She seemed to lie there for a long time. A minute? Two? Five? It was difficult to tell, and she didn’t dare look at her watch. But however long it was, she heard no further sound from her pursuer.

It seemed that he might have given up and gone.

And that was when she saw the glow of headlights coming from the road that ran through the woods, no more than fifty yards away. She had no idea who it could be. Very few cars used this route, especially at this time of night, because the road didn’t go anywhere, and there were only a handful of houses up here.

But in the end, none of that mattered. What mattered was that it couldn’t be the man chasing her because the car was coming from the wrong direction, which meant the headlights represented safety.

A twig cracked loudly a few feet away, and Amanda’s heart lurched. In the next instant, she was on her feet and sprinting through the woods, desperately trying to get to the car before it passed by. Screaming, too. Screaming at the top of her lungs, knowing that she must look a terrible sight to anyone driving through this lonely place at night, but no longer caring.

Her lungs felt as if they were bursting as she tore out of the trees and onto the road barely ten yards in front of the car, with its blinding headlights.

‘Help me!’ she yelled, waving her arms, hardly hearing the screech of brakes as the driver tried to stop, realizing at the last second that he wasn’t going to be able to manage it in time.

Amanda dived out of the way, crashing painfully into the tarmac, as the car passed by, inches away from her.

And then finally, mercifully, everything went black.

Two

Today 11.00

THE WOUND ON Amanda Rowan’s left forearm still throbbed. It was a good four inches long, running in a near dead straight line to just above the wrist and, even though the stitches had long since been removed, the cut was still deep and raw – a permanent reminder of the events of that bloody night. She examined it in the mirror as she did every morning and evening – a symbol of her vanity – but, once again, there was no discernible improvement.

She turned away from the mirror and went over to the window, looking over the sprinkling of houses that made up the village she’d made her temporary home, hundreds of miles from the house she’d shared with her husband, which was now tainted beyond repair.

The police had said that George and his lover – a woman fifteen years his junior – had been the victims of a serial killer known as The Disciple who’d been terrorizing the south of England for most of the previous year. Amanda had been the first person to have confronted him and lived, and as everyone, including friends, family and the police had been keen to tell her, she was extremely lucky to have escaped a killer who’d built a reputation for ruthless efficiency in his work.

The twenty-four hours after the attack had been frenetic. First at the hospital, where they’d treated her, not only for shock and the stab wound on her forearm, but also the extensive bruising she’d received during her ordeal. After that it had been the exhaustive police interviews, when she’d had to go over and over what had happened, even though her first instinct was to bury it deep in the recesses of her brain. And then, finally, the inevitable media storm. Amanda’s case had an extremely compelling storyline. Not only was there the infidelity angle, the wronged wife returning home unexpectedly, but the fact that The Disciple had been so determined to kill Amanda that he’d chased her right through her neighbour’s house (thankfully, Mrs Naseby had been unhurt), forcing her to jump from a first-floor window, and that she’d only just missed being hit by a car during her escape, and still survived, was the stuff of media dreams. Everyone wanted to interview her. The Sun had even offered her a hundred grand for her exclusive story.

But all Amanda wanted to do was get as far away as possible from what had happened. The police hadn’t been keen for her to go. Instead they’d offered her twenty-four-hour protection at a local safe house until they had The Disciple in custody, but Amanda was insistent. She was escaping the media – at least for the time being – and she didn’t want a police officer living with her either. She’d given the lead detective on the case – a big, good-looking DCS called Mike Bolt – her new address, and promised to keep it secret, even from her immediate family, until The Disciple was in custody. The consultant psychiatrist working with the police on the case had also suggested it might not be a bad idea for Amanda to get well away from the scene of her trauma, so Mike Bolt had reluctantly agreed (not that he had much choice), and had arranged for the local police to keep an eye on her. She also had a panic button, with a direct line to the nearest police station, installed at the property.