It was the sort of cottage that popped up on the front of storybooks and shortbread tins. It looked like the sort of place where good things happened, where families came together, where love, and laughter, and moments together were shared.

There was a light on downstairs. The flicker of a TV painted pictures behind the grey tartan curtains. Smoke rose like puffs of fluffy white cloud from a squat brick chimney, before swirling away on the wind.

The creaking of the gate was a cheerful two-tone note when Hamza pushed through it. The doorbell’s bing-bong was a happy one, announcing his arrival to the people inside.

He heard music. Laughter. A shout of, “Coming!”

And then, a woman was there, all warmth and welcome, and smiles for the stranger on her step.

“Mrs McAllister?” Hamza said.

“That’s me!” she trilled. “Are you…? Do we have you booked in with us?”

“No, Ma’am. I’m Detective Sergeant Hamza Khaled.” He felt the heat of the house escaping past him. “Do you mind if I come inside? There’s something we need to discuss.”

“Um, yes. Yes, of course,” the woman in the hallway said, clearing the way for him to enter.

Hamza nodded his thanks and stepped inside.

And the cold and the rain followed with him.

* * *

“I… I can’t tell you.” Billy Neeps was sitting forward in his chair now, elbows propped on the table, hands supporting the weight of his head. “It’ll break her heart. It’ll kill her.”

“What will, Billy?” Logan asked.

“I didn’t hurt anyone. I’d never… Not something like that. I couldn’t. When you told me what happened, I just… I don’t know.” He raised his head just enough to meet Logan’s eye. “I cried. Once you’d left. I just lay down on the floor, and I cried. I mean… Archie’s one thing. It’s bad, obviously. It’s horrible… But Donna and the girls? What sort of monster…?”

The two DCIs on the other side of the table said nothing. Billy was finding some sort of flow now, and it was best not to interrupt. Let him talk, see what came out, then pick it all apart. That was how you got the bastards.

“I did know where he was,” he admitted. “But not because I was… He phoned me. Out of the blue. I’d been trying to get hold of him, to talk to him about the show being cancelled, but he was dodging my calls. And then, Sunday…” He frowned. “No, Monday. He phones. He’s all apologies, says he feels bad, but he says… ‘I can make it up to you,’ he says.”

“Make it up to you how?” DCI Filson prompted.

Tears misted Billy’s eyes. He clamped his hands over his mouth, like he was trying to force back the words that were determined to come.