Looking up, my eyes light on Bom, sitting serenely next to the night light. I know what I need to do. I tuck the sock into my pocket, pushing it deep down and then smoothing the pocket flat so there is no chance of it falling out, and snatch up the tiger. I check that I have the slip of paper bearing the postcode to Polly’s cottage and lug my suitcase out to my car. Returning to the house, I double lock the front door, and hurry back down the path to where my car is parked.

Turning on the ignition, I wait for the sat nav to fire up before I enter the Norfolk postcode, the screen telling me it is 180 miles away, and will take me approximately three hours and thirty-seven minutes to reach my destination. I check my watch. I should be in Norfolk by nine o’clock this evening. I put the car in drive and pull out on to the main road, taking a deep breath as I do so. I’m going to do it. I’m going to confront Fran.

CHAPTER 27

CHAPTER 27

It’s been years since I drove this far – I didn’t drive at all in Scotland, and I’ve only driven short distances or used public transport with Laurel since I started working for the Jessops, seeing as Fran didn’t like the idea of Laurel going out in my clapped-out old banger, and Dominic wasn’t likely to let me use his car. It’s dark before I’ve even hit the road, and by the time I am approaching the A140, the road that will lead me directly to Fran, I am battling a terrible headache, and my eyes are feeling the strain of concentrating for so long. Finally, the sat nav tells me to turn left, and that I am almost at my destination.

I dutifully follow the instructions, turning left on to an unlit track. The track is rutted and bumpy, full of potholes, and I flick on my full beam in order to be able to see more than a few metres in front of me. Doubt nags, and I wonder whether I punched in the wrong postcode, as now I have left the narrow country lanes behind there is nothing ahead of me, apart from more bushes, more trees, more shadows. Deciding that I must have made a mistake somewhere, taken a wrong turn perhaps, my mind full of Fran, Laurel, Dominic and the discovery of the yellow sock – something that makes my stomach flip every time I think about it – laid carefully next to me on the front seat, I decide to push on until I find a space to turn around when I see it.