My eyes flitted back to the book, nubby embossed leather and pages aged yellow at the edges. I wanted to touch it, feel it, like the sweet burn of alcohol in a drinker’s throat first thing in the morning.

It repulsed me how much I wanted it.

I looked up at her again, my eyes drinking in the blood red of her hat, her scarf, her glistening lips.

“If I keep this here, you know what will happen. Take it to someone else, anyone else. Just get it out of here.”

” I can’t. You’re the only one left. You’re the last choice on my list, God knows, but you’re the only choice left.”

She looked surpised at my shock.

“You didn’t know? That they’d disappeared?”

“No. I haven’t had any contact in over a year.”

“Well, I suppose a reluctant saviour is better than no savoiur at all.” She pulled me up out of the chair, shoving my coat into my hands.

“Come on then, you know as well as I do that we have to go now.”