In the playroom was a little bubblegum pink safe that Josie had wanted for her secret items. As Nick was bending to tap in the code, he stopped and picked up one of the Batman comics laid atop. He had a terrible vision of putting these comics in the bin; of taking all of Josie’s clothes and toys to the charity shop. Of redecorating the room, because there would be no Josie to ever occupy it again.

Kids often thought of their dads as superheroes and Josie was always asking if Nick could beat up Batman. The answer was always yes, but it was a lie. Batman would kill him. Batman would have saved Josie from the kidnappers. Nick was far from a superhero.

It was a silly thought, so he tossed it. He put the comic back and opened the safe for what he’d come for.

He took the item into the living room. Despite their worry that he’d run out of the house again on a vigilante mission, nobody had watched him leave the room and only Miller saw him return. They were in the dining area and beyond the room divider he saw her head turn his way. The others, including Anna’s father, were too captivated by the six cameras displaying Anna’s journey on laptops, each split screen. Cameras #1 and #2 covered the view behind and ahead of the Corsa, #3 and #4 displayed the back seats, and the remaining two showed the empty passenger seat and Anna behind the wheel. At any time, if something worthy happened, a specific camera could be cast to full screen on all three computers. He stepped up to the room divider, staring past a goldfish bowl full of coins and at the image of his wife. Anna was driving as she had ever since the day of that horrible event that had propelled her to leave London: both hands tight on the wheel, leaning forward slightly, wide-eyed and deep in concentration, as if she was a learner on a lesson. And alone. Since that day so many years ago, she had always driven alone, except for when taking Josie to school. If ever he and she had gone out, he had always had to drive. And never at night, because night was when that horrible thing had happened.

‘It’s her birthday, by the way. Happy birthday, eh?’ he announced to the detectives. He waved a wrapped present. Nobody said anything, but Miller turned to smile at him.

He tore off the wrapping as he crossed to the TV stand. The gift was a CD. On the cover was Josie, standing in her room with a plastic microphone. It said: JOSIE CARTER LIVE AT THE APOLLO. He put the disk in the Xbox under the TV and fired up both devices.

‘Thank you, thank you. It’s good to be here.’