‘Yes, yes, of course. Please, please find her for me,’ he repeated plaintively.

As he walked them to the front door, Holly Little said very formally, ‘We’ll do everything we can. And be sure to call me if she comes home or if you hear from her.’

‘Of course.’

Suddenly, Alldridge bent down and said to him, almost conspiratorially, ‘Black Queen’s Knight to King’s Pawn three.’ He tapped the side of his nose. ‘Don’t let on I told you.’

As soon as he had closed the door on the officers, Niall hurried back into the lounge before he forgot what the tall copper had said.

Queen’s Knight to King’s Pawn three.

He feigned the move. Shit, it was one he had not spotted! The copper was right. Eden had totally missed it! If he made the move, she’d be in check. The only choices she’d be left with would be losing her King – game over – or her Queen – pretty much game over, too.

He looked forward to seeing her face when she came home and finally, for the first time in countless games, he would win.

Checkmate!

15

Monday 2 September

On their way out to the car, Alldridge stopped by the bin and raised the lid. Among the smelly detritus lying inside he clocked an empty bleach bottle, but said nothing until they were back in the car.

‘Nice man – not,’ Little said quietly, after making sure the car windows were closed. ‘Cat litter?’ She shook her head.

‘Bleach bottle in the bin,’ Alldridge murmured.

‘Who’s the house-proud one, then?’ she quizzed with a wry smile.

He nodded.

A rust-bucket of an old Vauxhall Viva with no apparent silencer shot up the road at high speed, two youths in it, baseball caps the wrong way round. Ordinarily they would have pulled out and stopped it, but not now.

‘It’s usually the small things people have the biggest arguments about, isn’t it?’ Holly said.

‘Tell me about it! Barbara whacked me over the head with a pillow the other night because I was snoring! And last week I was trying to sleep in on Saturday morning after being on nights and she decided to hoover the bedroom!’

‘Hannah and I had a row a couple of weeks ago because I’d put half a tin of baked beans in the fridge instead of pouring them into a bowl and covering them. Apparently, the tin reacts with them, so she said.’

He scratched the back of his head. ‘I was scene guard on a house, some years back, where a guy had bludgeoned his wife to death with a cricket bat because she’d rearranged his sock drawer without his permission.’

They sat in silence for some moments. ‘What do you think’s really going on here?’ she asked.

‘Clean skirtings, smell of bleach and empty bottle? Has his wife disappeared – done a runner – or did he kill her, is that what you’re thinking?’ Alldridge asked.

‘Aren’t you?’