Miller gave her a smile in the rear-view, below groggy eyes. ‘True, dear, but we’re on-call this week and we sleep when we can. Like cats. The team got to go home and kip in the afternoon.’

Anna got out. She noticed a small van parked outside her back fence that said, K9 WONDERS, with a picture of a dog in mid-run. A guy in blue coveralls with the same name on the back was leaning against his ride and smoking a thin cigar. Any other day, it would have appeared to be a company that groomed dogs for their posh owners. Not today. Someone had told her that South Yorkshire Police had only a handful of Victim Recovery Dogs and if none were available they used private companies. But in the hospital, the foul detective, Nabi, had used another term.

‘Cadaver dogs,’ she said as Miller exited the vehicle.

Noting Anna’s interest in the van, she quickly suggested they moved to avoid the neighbours. At her back gate, Anna stopped. Her eyes were on the garden, portions of which had been taped off using sticks driven into the soil, like little plots for planting bulbs. She hadn’t noticed while it was dark, but the police had cordoned off places where they’d found footprints, and that was good. It meant they were trying to identify unknown abductors.

‘Forensics think they’ve isolated more than one set of footprints made since the rain started. Three, at least. That goes some way to confirming your man’s story,’ Miller said.

That wasn’t any sort of good news, because she’d never doubted Nick’s innocence. But the evidence plots weren’t what had caught her attention. It was the K9 guy. She looked at him again. Why was he just standing there, waiting, instead of out with his dog, searching old barns or whatever?

Miller said, ‘Please, dear, let’s get inside.’

Anna didn’t move. Miller clearly didn’t want Anna to dwell on the K9 guy, who was watching them. Then she made a connection. ‘He’s not here to search old barns or whatever, is he?’

‘Please, Anna, we should go in.’

‘He’s been searching my house, hasn’t he? For blood or whatever. For signs that Josie was hurt there. You still think we had something to do with hurting her. That her kidnap is a lie.’

Miller objected, but Anna tried to tune her out. A police car turned on to the street and they watched it approach. Anna was surprised to see Nick exit it. He did so slowly, still not out of his ketamine funk.

‘I called the station to do the release,’ Bennet said as he got out and told the driver to depart. ‘No need to take Mr Carter all the way there for a signature. There were no belongings to collect.’