I shook my head. I didn’t want a sedative. I didn’t want to be taken away from all this only to have it swoop back in again when I woke, like a fresh cut. I thought of that woman. Clare Taylor. How she’d looked at me. Resigned to the fact that she was dying. I saw the light go out in her eyes. Could someone I’d treated as if he were one of my own really have left a human being in that state – butchered, carved up and left to die?

I shook my head, sniffed. Tried to compose myself.

‘No. I need to know what’s happening,’ I said, even though I was weak and tired and really wishing that right now the light would go out in my own eyes. I’d had enough.

I’d lost too many people to tragedy. Seen too much hurt. In the theatres when I was nursing. On the farm. Losing my husband. Losing my children. Now, I could lose Michael and my grandchildren. If this was karma paying me back, she was a cruel mistress.

If only I’d known in the past, when things had seemed so bright, how it would all turn out …

I closed my eyes. Remembered the two little people playing in the yard, laughing together. Teasing each other mercilessly but with great affection. I remembered watching them through the window, the smell of my home baking making my tummy rumble. The feeling of my husband behind me, his arms slinking around my waist, him kissing the back of my neck and then joining me in watching our children play.

‘This is the life,’ he’d said.

I’d never felt as content in my life as I did in that moment. I felt untouchable – how wrong had I been?

DI Bradley came back into the room. I was scared of what he’d say to me.

‘We’ve gone to your son-in-law’s house and he’s not there. Nor is he at work. Can you think of anywhere else he might be?’

‘What time is it?’ I asked.

‘Just before three,’ Cliona said.

‘The school,’ I told him, my stomach sinking. ‘He’ll be picking the children up from school. St Patrick’s.’

‘And his car? Can you describe it? Do you know the vehicle registration? Don’t worry if you can’t, we can check with the DVLA. This might just be quicker.’

My thoughts were all so jumbled. My brain hadn’t knitted all my memories back into place yet. But I knew his car was silver. A Toyota. I couldn’t give any more details than that.

‘Thank you,’ DI Bradley said, putting his phone back to his ear and passing the information on to his colleagues.

He hung up and stood awkwardly at the end of my bed.

‘I’m so very sorry, Elizabeth,’ he said.

All I could do was nod.

‘The children?’ I asked.