Franciszka puffed up, towing a suitcase and beaming. She picked her seat in the minibus, which proved the cue for the teenagers to all clamber in too. From his crate, Doggo woofed as if to tell the luggage handlers to hurry up. Lily stuck her head inside the minibus. ‘Everyone got their passports?’

‘Mum’s already checked like twenty-five times,’ Charlotte grumbled.

‘Check twenty-six then,’ said Lily good-humouredly and grinned as passports were dragged out of pockets and waved.

Another few minutes and the suitcases were stacked on and around Doggo’s crate and Isaac fastened the straps that would prevent the luggage mountain shifting.

As Lily was in charge of itinerary and paperwork she got in the front seat beside Isaac with Carola on her other side. Isaac set the sat nav for Folkestone, called, ‘OK, everyone?’ Receiving loud agreement he shoved the minibus into first gear and drove out of Carola’s drive.

Lily breathed a long sigh of relief. ‘Phew! More or less on schedule too. Aaaand … relax!’

Carola gave a small smile.

‘I said “relax”,’ Lily pointed out. ‘That means you can smile properly too.’

With a nod and a barely perceptible widening of her smile, Carola turned to gaze out of the window at the frosty village.

With her left hand in the sling, Lily couldn’t reach to pat Carola’s arm sympathetically but she knew Owen’s puzzling silence was eating her friend. In contrast to Carola’s reticence, the babble from the back of the bus provided a wall of sound under cover of which Lily could dip her head closer to Carola’s and say, ‘Not heard from him?’

Carola shook her head. When she turned back to Carola her pale blue eyes were sad but she’d arranged the corners of her mouth in an approximation of a smile. ‘Don’t worry. The Middletones are on their way!’ But she turned again to gaze out of the window as they drove up the lanes, through Bettsbrough, through the centre so they could pass beneath the Christmas lights: white and ice blue snowflakes this year.

Lily was very conscious of Isaac a few inches away in the driver’s seat, his gaze moving between the road ahead and his mirrors as he guided the big vehicle through the traffic. Evidently feeling her gaze he turned and sent her a smile that shot through her like a flame.

‘How’s the hand?’ he asked.

‘I’m trying not to think about it too much.’ Gingerly, she tried to flex her purple-banana fingers. ‘It’s not appreciating the jostling but I can put up with it.’

Whatever Isaac had intended to reply was interrupted when his phone rang. He’d paired it with the Bluetooth system before they set out in case of calls from Tina or Tubb with pub-related queries. After a quick glance down at the screen he pressed the phone answer button. ‘Hi, Mum.’