Jasmine was right about it being the end of the line, for the train could go no farther than the station at the far end of the Promenade—and access from the motorway was as arduous in parts as it was spectacular in others, as it passed through ever-changing countryside. They’d chosen to come here quite randomly, for their Internet search had thrown up many remote towns and hidden villages that could have provided equally good cover, if not better. However, when Marcy had mentioned that she’d come here on holiday a few times as a child, Claudia had allowed that to be the decider. It was the only link they had to the place, which was no link at all really, but Claudia had seen right away how pleased her mother was to agree.

Since their first visit just over six weeks ago, when the three of them had come to check it out, they’d found that it really did have everything they were looking for. They’d wasted no time in contacting an estate agent and by the following day they’d not only managed to secure this flat, they’d also registered with the local authority, and even enrolled Jasmine in the local school to sit her GCSE exams. No references from her previous school had been asked for yet, but Claudia already had a plan for how to handle that when it came up. (Honesty was usually the best policy—and the story she’d concocted was a fair version of it.)

It was as they’d driven back to her mother’s house in the Chew Valley, south of Bristol, that they’d received a call informing them that a completion date for the sale of Claudia’s childhood home had now been set. As requested, it would happen during the week of their planned departure.

Claudia felt more guilt over the loss of that house than she did over anything else, for it was the first and only home her parents had lived in until her father died.

“If he were here,” her mother had argued when Claudia had protested at the suggestion the house should be sold, “he’d be doing the exact same thing as I am. You were what mattered to him, and your daughter, and if he knew that selling this place would make you safe he’d have it on the market quicker than you could choose an estate agent.”