‘You brought this on yourself, Maggie, you really did. I can’t go home now – the police will have been there – and I can’t keep you two with me. If I’m to survive, I need to be on my own. I could let you go, but you know about my boat and you can’t be trusted. So I’m afraid I have no option.’

He looked at the knife, his eyes running up and down the blade.

‘I’ve thought it through and I have no choice.’

Maggie kept her eye on the knife. She knew now what was coming, but that was fine. Death was better than the life she’d had.

She nodded, and shrugged.

Wynne

Wynne turned to DS Chan. ‘How far can they be? Those boats are pretty slow, right?’

‘Four miles an hour,’ Chan replied. ‘Maybe five.’

‘And Best has two or three hours’ start? So they’re within ten or fifteen miles. We need to look inside every boat within twenty miles of here. Get a map of the canal and get officers on bikes pedalling every foot of them.’

Chan nodded. ‘He may have ditched the boat, too,’ he said. ‘He could be back on the road.’

‘We’ll keep that search ongoing,’ Wynne replied. ‘Either way, we’ll find the boat and we’ll track the bastard down from there.’

PC Oliver Reid

PC Oliver Reid had come off his shift at six a.m. and slept until one in the afternoon. Then he’d spent a few hours watching his son’s rugby match, and arranged to meet a friend for a pint after he walked his dog, Benjy.

The springer spaniel ran ahead of him, sniffing in the hedges and picking up this trail or that before moving on. Reid lived in a small village south of Warrington, and his dog walks took him deep into the Cheshire countryside. It always surprised him how remote it seemed. Liverpool was thirty miles to the west and Manchester thirty miles to the east, but out here felt like the middle of nowhere.

Up ahead, a humpback bridge crossed the Bridgewater canal. He normally picked up the canal towpath at the bridge and followed it back towards the village. As he approached, his phone rang. He glanced at the screen.

It was the station.

‘Olly,’ it was Pete Faro, the duty sergeant. ‘You still sober?’

‘I’m tempted to say no,’ Reid replied. ‘In about an hour I planned not to be. I’m assuming you need something?’

‘Yup. People in. Feet on the street, so to speak. Big search about to happen.’

‘For who?’

‘You remember that teenage girl who went missing, years ago? Maggie Cooper?’

‘Yeah. Something new turn up?’

‘It did. She’d been held captive. They found the place, but it was empty. Whoever took her fled with her. That’s who we’re looking for. Guy in his sixties.’