The searchers began walking again. In the darkness, no-one noticed me on the ground. As they marched away from me, I could see their torch beams dancing, lighting up a bush here, a patch of dirt there, a tree. Tiny shining specks in this gloomy paddock. A heavy cloak of darkness settled around me, and I curled into myself. This was where I’d stay till morning—if Bella was outside, then I should be too.

‘Lexie, where are you?’

Raising my head from my knees, I saw the torchlights had all turned and were pointing back in my direction. Not close enough to spot me.

Leave me. Go and find Bella.

‘LEXIE?’ Marty’s shout came out strangled with fear. Losing a child, losing an adult—it was all too easy.

‘Here.’ I patted the ground around me, feeling for my torch. ‘I’m here.’

I switched it on and Marty ran towards my light.

‘Are you hurt?’

I was hurting. But that wasn’t what he meant.

‘What did they find?’ I asked.

While I’d been kneeling on the ground, I’d seen a kaleidoscope of images: Bella lying in the grass, her eyes doll-like, staring blankly into space; Bella dehydrated but conscious, calling out, ‘Mumma, Mumma’; Bella’s clothes and shoes but no sign of her body; feral dogs skulking across the paddocks back to their lairs.

Marty hesitated before answering. ‘A green sloppy joe with a dinosaur on it. A boy’s one—too big for Bella.’

The cold had infiltrated my body. Cold like Bella would be. I wanted to succumb to it. Lie down on the damp earth and let it take me. Instead, I vomited, splattering my jeans, Marty’s shoes and the cold, hard ground.

In the car, Marty turned the heating up to its highest level. The sudden warmth made my fingers tingle. I angled the vent away from me; didn’t deserve to be warm. Outside the window, houses flashed by; houses where families slept soundly, their children tucked up in their beds, babies in their cots.

‘Lexie, you’ve been vomiting quite a lot.’

‘Mmm.’ I hadn’t kept track but my guts ached and my throat was raw.

‘Do you think …’

What was he getting at? My mind whirled slowly in the exhaustion. When I didn’t respond, he spelt it out.

‘Do you think you’re pregnant?’

I dropped my head into my hands. Back to this again. Really? Now? Was that what he wanted? A dozen children filling our huge new house so that when he upset one child or lost another, it didn’t matter—there were plenty more around.

‘I’m vomiting because I’m worried sick.’

‘Of course, of course.’ It was his doctor’s voice. Calm, reassuring, rational. ‘Perhaps it’s also because you’ve stopped drinking?’