All the way north in the car she’d ranted at poor Joe Ashworth. ‘Do I have to think of everything? I asked for a staff list. For cross-checks between all suspects and the health club. Charlie was supposed to be doing it. What’s the idle bastard been up to?’ Driving too fast through the fog, enjoying seeing him grow pale, wincing when they almost hit an oncoming vehicle, his mouth clamped shut.

Finally she’d provoked the reaction she’d hoped for. He’d cracked, lost it too. ‘Just because you don’t have a life worth saving, you don’t have to take me down with you. I have a wife, kids. People who actually care about me. And if you spent your time supervising your team, like an SIO should, instead of doing their work for them, you’d know what Charlie had been up to.’

She’d dropped him off at the end of his street, with a curt arrangement to collect him the next morning: ‘Make sure you’re ready. I don’t want to hang around while you’re changing a nappy or kissing your brood goodbye.’ No invitation to come back to her house for a drink first, although she’d been looking forward to that all afternoon: the chance to put things into perspective, to relax with the one man she’d ever really been close to. She’d had it in mind since suggesting that he leave his car in the Tyne valley.

How sad is that! It was her father sneaking inside her head again. He’s young enough to be your son. Do you really think he gives a tinker’s curse for you?

She got to her feet and went to the window. The fog hid all the lights in the valley. It was as if she was marooned, alone in the world. Unsteadily she carried the bottle and her glass into the kitchen. If she had another drink now, she knew she’d be up all night, and she had to show the ghost of her father that she was good at her job. That she knew what she was doing.

Kimmerston police station and the morning briefing. Ashworth had been ready when she’d arrived at his neat little house in the tidy estate of wannabe executive homes; he’d appeared through the front door before she’d even left the car. And she’d been gracious. Had apologized, which was almost unheard of for her. So now there was an uneasy truce between them.

She looked around the room at her team. ‘We’ve cocked up big-style.’ Vera thought that was noble of her, the ‘we’. ‘How did we miss the Morgan/Willows connection?’