Apparently last night, after Skinner had left, Butch had come inside to watch the 24-hour coverage, and yeah, he’d still been high on the angel dust, but he’d just become so enraged that he’d kicked in the TV screen. The latest development had surrounded Murphy – ‘we don’t sell weed to minors’ – and how he seemed to hold power over Madison Mason, enough to make her adamantly declare he had nothing to do with the disappearances.

Madison Mason . . . Murphy would usually never hurt a girl, but he wanted to throttle the little bitch.

His heart lifted. Sara had appeared in his dream. Did that mean she’d heard his prayer? Maybe.

Still, Madison was to blame. She had constructed this plan and now his Jasmine was missing. Or maybe she wasn’t missing, just didn’t want to be found.

Hope and fear mingled within him, making him even edgier. Where would she go? Her backpack presumably had the same gear as the ones at the Hut. So where would she set up camp, where would she think no one else would know to look?

It hit him. Of course. The crop.

She wasn’t supposed to know where it was, but Murphy had always suspected Jasmine had followed them there, at least once.

He got off the couch and found his brother. ‘Let’s go check on the crop.’

‘Bad idea, lad,’ said Butch. ‘The cops are watching.’

‘Good. Let them. You know we’ll lose them in the gully. And we have a right to walk through the bush if we want to.’ He couldn’t hide the excitement in his voice, but he didn’t want to tell Butch the real reason.

‘It’s just adding fuel to the fire. If they catch you in the bush, they’ll think you’re off to bury the bodies or something,’ said Butch. ‘What’s gotten into you, lad? Usually it’s me wanting to do the risky shit.’

Murphy hadn’t told Butch that Jasmine had intended to disappear. It was stupid, but there was always that sibling rivalry when it came to raising Jasmine. He wanted Butch to think he was a good dad, even though his daughter had captured the entire world’s attention by . . . It’d come out sooner or later, but if he could find Jasmine today, then maybe it wouldn’t be as bad . . .

And well, maybe, he wanted to protect Jasmine’s reputation in Butch’s eyes. He thought the sun shone out of his niece.

‘Let’s just go check the crop. I know it sounds stupid but . . . maybe Jasmine is there.’

‘It’s too risky. We’ve never been watched this closely.’

‘Bro. Jasmine could be there.’

Butch threw his hands up and went to get changed.