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Back Before You Were Gone Save as PDF
Chapters (58)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. One
  4. Two
  5. Three
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Eight
  11. Nine
  12. Ten
  13. Eleven
  14. Twelve
  15. Thirteen
  16. Fourteen
  17. Fifteen
  18. Sixteen
  19. Seventeen
  20. Eighteen
  21. Nineteen
  22. Twenty
  23. Twenty-one
  24. Twenty-two
  25. Twenty-three
  26. Twenty-four
  27. Twenty-five
  28. Twenty-six
  29. Twenty-seven
  30. Twenty-eight
  31. Twenty-nine
  32. Thirty
  33. Thirty-one
  34. Thirty-two
  35. Thirty-three
  36. Thirty-four
  37. Thirty-five
  38. Thirty-six
  39. Thirty-seven
  40. Thirty-eight
  41. Thirty-nine
  42. Forty
  43. Forty-one
  44. Forty-two
  45. Forty-three
  46. Forty-four
  47. Forty-five
  48. Forty-six
  49. Forty-seven
  50. Forty-eight
  51. Forty-nine
  52. Fifty
  53. Fifty-one
  54. Acknowledgements
  55. An Eastbourne Murder Mystery
  56. Canelo Crime
  57. About the Author
  58. Also by Sheila Bugler

A photo of Michael Holden accompanied most of the stories. On her phone screen, the photo was too small to see his face clearly. Now, Emer enlarged the photo, examining his face in more detail. He was wearing a shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He had sandy, blond hair that hung down almost to his shoulders. He was grinning at the person taking the photo, a big happy smile that made you want to smile back at him.

He’d changed a lot, and certainly hadn’t been smiling like that the last time she’d seen him. But Emer was in no doubt. The man in the photo was the same man she’d met at the flat in Stockwell earlier that morning.

Thirty-three

The dark shadows were creeping closer. Each time they threatened to pounce, Dee refilled her glass and drank some more wine. She was too weary to try to fight it. She felt wrung out, done in, finished. All she sought now was oblivion, and past experience had taught her that this was the fastest route. It had also taught her that drinking tonight would make it harder to manage the darkness the following day. But that, she reflected, draining her glass and savouring the taste of the cool wine on the back of her throat, was a problem for tomorrow, not now.

Further along the beach, she could just make out the glow of light through the sitting room curtains inside the mobile home. She should have been over there earlier this evening, having dinner and spending precious time she would never get back with the little boy who’d become the centre of her world over the last few years. But by the time she’d got back home from London, it was too late for dinner and Jake was already in bed.

The hours when she should have been driving home and getting ready for dinner had been spent inside Brixton Police Station. When she’d finally got out, it was already dark and she knew her dinner would have to be cancelled.

‘We’ll find some time over the next few days,’ Ella had said, when Dee called to tell her she wasn’t going to make it.

Dee had said yes, of course they would. But she knew, even as she said it, that it wouldn’t happen. How could it, when there were only five days remaining until they left?