Dylan poked her again.

‘Stop that.’ The rebuke was brusquer than she’d intended and his face fell.

‘Perhaps you should listen to your son, Mrs Hepworth,’ said the taller officer.

Now it was her turn to be abashed. Cheeks growing hot, Julia looked down at her son.

‘I’m sorry, darling,’ she said as brightly as she could manage. ‘What is it?’

‘Poppy’s not upstairs. I’ve looked everywhere. She’s not here.’

Julia could tell he was frightened and a ripple of fear shook her body. She looked at the officers.

‘You mean . . .’ She couldn’t get the rest of the words out.

The tall one nodded. ‘There’s been no mistake. Your daughter’s in trouble.’

5

There was no template for the way a parent reacted to the news that their child was dead. The bewilderment that followed them being told almost instantly gave way to a scale of responses that, in Maggie’s experience, stretched from eerily calm or catatonic with shock at one end, to hysterical and in need of sedation at the other. Right now Imogen Tyler was pinballing from one extreme to the other – in-consolable for the most part, but calming down long enough to mechanically answer Maggie’s preliminary questions.

No, there was no reason for Benji to be in school so early. I thought he was in his bedroom getting ready.

He settled in well at Rushbrooke, made friends and had been invited to a couple of birthday parties.

We left Somerset because I wanted to come home to Mansell. I grew up here and need to be closer to my mum.

Now she was crying again, doubled over as though in pain, unloading her anguish into her lap. Only the crown of her head, the tiniest hint of dark roots striping her blonde hair, was visible to Maggie sitting opposite. As she cried, her small, delicate hands rhythmically clenched and unclenched on her knees, bared by the bright orange sundress she wore. Her nails were coated with blood-red varnish.

Maggie’s gaze was drawn to the rings on the fourth finger of Imogen’s right hand – a wedding band and an exquisite diamond solitaire. Relics of a former marriage moved to the opposite hand at its demise, or heirlooms passed on? Her left hand was bare.

Maggie waited for a lull in the crying, then leaned forward.

‘Would you like me to contact Benji’s father?’ she asked gently.

The blonde hair slowly lifted. Imogen was short, much shorter than Maggie’s five foot eight inches, and she had to look up to make eye contact. Her gaze was bloodshot and swollen.

‘His father?’ She spoke the word as though it was alien to her. ‘He . . . I mean –’ She sat up straight, the effort it took reflected in her weary expression. ‘My husband died when Benji was a baby.’