I avoid Fran for the rest of the day, instead calling my mother and telling her I’ll be home on Christmas Eve. She sounds pleased to hear from me, and I feel the burden of returning home lessen slightly. Perhaps it won’t be as bad as I first thought it would, although the idea of Christmas without Laurel is difficult to imagine. I decide to only pack the bare essentials, at least giving me an excuse to come back to the house under the guise of collecting the rest of my things before Fran sells and I have to leave completely. I don’t know why I feel so reluctant to let go, especially when not so long ago I was thinking about leaving. Now, when I think about never coming back, I think about how my memories of Laurel will fade and there’ll be nothing left of her, merely the same old photos recycled on the front pages of the newspapers every year on the anniversary of her disappearance.

Shoving jeans and sweaters into a backpack, my phone buzzes and I grab it as a reason to stop packing for a moment. It’s a text from Pamela. I pause with my finger over the delete button, wondering whether to simply trash it without even reading it. She’s been interviewed by one of the red tops, giving her side of the story regarding Dominic, and I was witness to Fran cutting the paper into tiny shreds on reading it. Curiosity gets the better of me, and I stab at the phone screen, opening up the message.

‘It’s Pamela. I need to speak to you – please call me, or even text if you’d rather, so we can arrange to meet. I wouldn’t ask, only it’s important.’

Sighing, I hesitate only for a second, before I punch out my reply.

‘When?’

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 25

It is several weeks later before I manage to meet up with Pamela. Christmas was spent with my family, my mother over the moon to have me back at home again. Although things were a little awkward and stilted when I first arrived back, I kept a low profile from the neighbours, and by the time Christmas Day was over it was as if I’d never left for Scotland in the first place.

On Christmas morning I go to church, walking slowly through the rain to arrive towards the end of the service. I slide unnoticed into a pew at the back and wait for all the other parishioners to leave before I approach the altar, lighting a candle and saying a whispered prayer for Laurel. I wonder if Fran is doing the same thing, Polly beside her, or if she is curled up in bed, not wanting to face Christmas Day at all. I wonder if Dominic is thinking of Laurel today, too, alone in his cell.