“You think I took him? It wasn’t me, Tom. I was coming to tell you.”

“So tell me! Where is he?”

She shakes her head and sobs into her hands. “I don’t know.”

I want to believe her, and she looks frantic, but this isn’t helping.

“Who took him?” I shout.

Amy crouches on the ground and pushes her fingers against her temples.

“Your mum’s nice,” she whispers. “Mine isn’t.”

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“What’s she going to do?” I ask. “She won’t get away with it. I know everything.”

Amy shakes her head. “No, you don’t. You know some things. And I’m glad because it feels so fucking heavy. I wanted this to stop, because can you imagine? Christmas dinner when I’m forty, and we’re still pretending my brother isn’t dead.”

I gasp and step back, and Amy’s lips form the slightest sad-smile before she says, “Yep. He’s dead, and it’s my fault. And Logan took his place because my mother is very persuasive.”

“I…”

“You’re what? You’re sorry? No, you’re not. You thought I needed saving. You thought my dad was another abusive twat, but I’m the dangerous one. I let my brother die, and I took Logan. And, at some point, I stopped feeling completely, insanely upset because it hurt too much.

“I used to hate myself, and then I didn’t even feel that. I was numb because my life is a lie, and then you came along and…I felt something. I think you brought me back to life. So, when you started digging, I let you. I didn’t walk away because I wanted you to find out. Maybe, that way, this would be over, if we actually took responsibility and Logan went home and we went…wherever you go when you’ve fucked up this badly.

“I’ll help you find your brother. She won’t hurt him.”

“How do you know that?” I ask.

“This is what she does. It’s a warning. She wants you to know what she’s capable of if you ever reveal what you’ve found out.”

I check my phone, and too much time has already passed. “Where has your mum taken him? You said come alone, and I did what you asked.”

“What?”

“The message. You said he’d disappear if I didn’t come alone.”

Amy runs back into the house, moving from room to room and mumbling to herself. Then she goes upstairs and the mumbles turn to shouts.

When she comes down, she says, “I didn’t send that message. Mum must have got your number from my phone.”

“Why would she want me to come here?”

“She didn’t,” someone says behind us and, when I turn, Amy’s dad is there with two phones in his hands.

Handing one back to his daughter, he says, “I know where she’s taken him.”

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