My trail through the woods is only two days old, but hard to find in the dark. Up close, the trees are seething with life, insects devouring everything that isn’t made of stone, and plants slowly smothering everything that is. My footprints are half buried in a layer of patchy undergrowth. Ten steps in and I can’t see my car through the wall of dark green, speckled with white flowers. I flick on my flashlight app, but keep the beam at a low angle.

Soon I think I’ve reached the spot where Biggs’s body was. My footprints become indistinct here, and then reappear somewhere else, less deep without Biggs’s weight. The blood is gone, consumed by the forest.

I turn slowly, thinking back to the moment when I realised someone was moving through the woods towards me. They came from … this way. I now know it wasn’t the police, who still don’t know Biggs was here. I trudge in that direction, looking for someone else’s tracks.

It doesn’t take much searching before I realise this is hopeless. I could find my own path only because I knew where it was. The tracker’s footprints are impossible to find.

But soon I stumble across a trail. Dirt, just wide enough for a single pair of tyre tracks, rutted deep over the years.

Not a trail. A driveway.

I imagine Biggs, naked in the passenger seat. The car stopping, maybe to let a deer pass. Biggs making his move, opening the door and leaping out. He sprints into the forest, and … dies of a heart attack after twenty yards.

Possible. Maybe. Either way, I want to find out who lives out here.

I walk up the drive. A slight upward slope, enough to leave my thighs burning after a while. I occasionally stop and listen. Too far from the main road for traffic noise now. The silence is crushing.

Eventually I spot a cabin. Bigger than a standard hunting lodge—my guess is three bedrooms. The pine logs are recently oiled, and the windows cleaned of cobwebs. No lights on. I hide the flashlight and slow down as I approach. When I reach the edge of the trees I stay still for a moment, listening. Can’t hear any voices or movement from inside, but it’s almost midnight now. The occupants could be sleeping, unaware that a monster is lurking in the dark right outside.

I weave through the trees in a slow circle, wanting to examine the back of the cabin from a safe distance.

The other side has big windows, clean gutters and a rainwater tank. I can’t see anything through the windows other than lacy cream curtains. The place seems too backwater to be a holiday rental. No mailbox. Maybe it’s one of those doomsday prepper places, a hideaway for the apocalypse. The inside might be stuffed with canned food and batteries.