This will worry them. They will fear that the kidnapper will be angry if they say they can’t pay. And eventually, if they keep saying it, the kidnapper will realize it’s true and disappear, along with their children.

They are probably working out what they can offer. Sell the house, ask relatives. Maybe they can come up with half a million.

Tops.

But they don’t need to worry. I won’t be asking for money. I want something much more valuable.

And the time has come to let them know what that is.

I will tell them what I want, and they will give it to me. It will be a shock to him. A blow, a loss almost beyond imagining.

Not to her, though. Neither a shock, nor a blow. It will be welcome.

Time now, then, to introduce them to their new futures.

Same method: take out a new phone. Type a new message.

Press send.

And wait.

Annabelle

The message was from another new number. Annabelle held it so that both she and Matt could read it.

If you want to see your children again you will do exactly as I say. Understood?

She squeezed his upper arm. ‘Jesus,’ she whispered. ‘This is actually happening.’

He glanced at her. ‘I think they want a reply. For us to say we got the message.’

‘OK,’ she said. She typed a reply.

Understood.

The reply was immediate.

Good. And I see you have not informed the police. So we can move forward.

‘They know,’ Annabelle said. ‘They know we haven’t told the police.’

‘It could be a bluff,’ Matt said. ‘Or a guess.’

‘Maybe.’ She pressed her head to his chest. This was unbelievable. They were having a text conversation with the kidnapper of their children. Her stomach heaved. She dropped the phone and staggered out of the living room. The door of the downstairs bathroom banged as she slammed it open and threw up in the toilet bowl. She stayed kneeling before it, her hands on the tiled floor.

Matt appeared in the doorway.

‘I’m so sorry,’ he said. ‘If I hadn’t left them—’

‘Don’t,’ Annabelle said. She didn’t want to go down this route, not now. She didn’t know where it would end, because he was right, if he hadn’t left them …

But that wasn’t going to bring them back, and at the back of her mind she couldn’t stop the idea that this was coming someday, whatever they did. This person was so determined, so twisted, that they were going to get to their kids one way or another, come what may.

‘Ask for proof they’re alive,’ she said. ‘I need to know my babies are OK.’

He typed a message and showed it to her.

Please send proof the children are well.

The reply was immediate.

Later. First, I tell you what I want.