“Dave, thanks for calling, mate.”

“Yeah, you said it was urgent so I’m guessing you want to meet for a pint later?” He lets out a laddish snort of laughter. I feel unspeakably sad suddenly. I’ve duped this lonely man into confusing work with friendship.

“No, well, yeah, maybe. Look, I need some help. I’ll pay—a hundred quid?” I stop myself from calling him mate.

“I’m listening.”

“I need you to ID someone for me. Someone local, white male, anywhere up to midthirties I’d say, tall, slender build, with a tattoo on the left side of his neck. Someone who’s been in trouble before.”

The pause stretches, awkward, even across the phone line.

“I don’t know, Jon, that’s not really—”

“Just run a few searches, ask around a bit. He’s local and most likely well known to you lot.”

Dave pauses again. It makes me uneasy so I say, “OK, two hundred. I’ll give you two hundred quid just to ask a couple of questions.”

“Two hundred and a few pints when I finish at five?”

“OK. Done. I’ll meet you at half past.”

I spend most of the afternoon at the kitchen table, rereading old articles I find online about Danny’s death and scouring a few photos Ben sent through from the Chronicle’s archive. The articles are old, sparse on detail. They mention the family from Plymouth staying for the weekend in Port Raynor Caravan Park, but mostly they’re interested in what the council is going to do to stop any more accidents in the future. The photos are more helpful. There are a few of a much younger, healthier-looking Simon, his arm protectively around Meg’s shoulders. It must have been a hot day. Meg’s wearing a flowing caftan; her body is well hidden in most of the photos, but in one her right arm is curled around the dome of her lower belly, as though she’s giving herself a hug. Grace was born that September so she would have been around six months pregnant when the photo was taken. I try to remember how big Ruth was at six months, but I can’t, not really. I stare at her belly until my eyes start to blur, and at some point I must drop my head onto the table because I wake two hours later with a crick in my neck and my glasses squashed across my face. I stand and move slowly into the sitting room but Cara’s already left, the sleeping bag carefully rolled up at the end of the sofa. I understand why she’s terrified, but if I’m right and Meg was giving Grace drugs, then that changes everything. If she wasn’t kidnapped but ran away from Meg herself, she doesn’t need to be rescued, she needs to be found for questioning, to find out what happened that night. Her own father’s future is on the line—and so is mine. There’s no way I can stop now.

The Red Dragon is quiet at half past five; the few lone drinkers stare dull-eyed into their fast-emptying pints like fortune-tellers searching for answers in tea leaves. The bank only let me take out a hundred quid. I’ll just have to convince Dave I’m good for the rest. He’s already sitting at a round table, his legs curled under the small stool like a fat jockey. I wish I could ask him straightaway about the envelope sitting on the table in front of him, but Dave needs a chat first and I need to keep him on my side.