But why, Fleet wondered? Time for what? Even more than before, he had the sense events were building up to something. That the game that was mentioned in the anonymous email was still going on.

Fleet held out his hand for Randy to shake. ‘Thanks, Randy. I know you didn’t have to go out on a limb for me the way you have.’

‘You know me, Detective Inspector,’ Randy said with a glint. ‘I’ve always been a sucker for an underdog.’

Fleet smiled wryly.

‘There is, however, just one final thing I wanted to mention before you head off to solve this thing,’ said Randy.

‘Oh?’ said Fleet.

‘Whether or not you feel it’s important, I’ll leave up to you. But our friend, Mr Wheeler. I’ve never seen a liver so damaged in someone so young.’

‘You mean he drank?’

‘To excess. Quite regularly, I would say. And although it will be a while before we get the toxicology report on his blood, I’m expecting it to prove a heady cocktail. Amphetamines, marijuana, barbiturates: my guess is that Lance Wheeler was a regular consumer of everything and anything he could get his hands on.’

Given Lance’s apparent trajectory after leaving Beaconsfield, Fleet wasn’t exactly surprised. But there was clearly something significant about the extent of the man’s substance abuse that Fleet was missing.

‘All I’m trying to say,’ Randy concluded, ‘is that just because Wheeler’s death wasn’t suicide, doesn’t mean he wasn’t trying to kill himself.’

Friday 25 October, 2.47 p.m.

Melissa Haynes was a ghost. She was the key to this case, just as Rob had said, but Nicky was running out of ideas about how to find her. How did you track someone who left no footprints? Who had no digital presence, no assets, no friends or family? And more to the point, perhaps, how did someone end up that way in the first place? Why?

It was desperation that led Nicky to call the manager of Shining Light. She’d left him a stack of business cards, and he had assured her he would ask around among the other residents and get back to her if any of them had any clue as to where Melissa might be. That he hadn’t been in touch suggested he’d had about as much luck as Nicky had – but when Nicky spoke to him over the phone, it turned out the call was worth making after all.

‘I suppose there is one person you could try,’ Zack Lawrence told her. ‘I mean, I doubt very much she’ll talk to you, or I would have suggested you speak to her before. But maybe, given the circumstances …’