He ran to his room, grabbed the bag of Haribo that he’d bought from the village supermarket, and ran down the curving staircase to the ground floor. Mum and Dad were still on the balcony, deep in conversation. Their heads were close together, like they were talking about a top-secret thing. Something told him that he shouldn’t disturb them so he went back into the villa, down the steps into the games room and out the side door which led straight out to the pool. There was no one around. The wind was whipping up little waves on the surface of the swimming pool and big grey clouds filled the sky, covering up the sun so it looked more like home than being on holiday. The clouds made it weirdly dark already, like it was almost bedtime.

Daniel made his way down through the garden – avoiding the patches of sick that Jake had done last night and the grown-ups hadn’t got around to clearing up – and out through the big iron gate into the vineyard.

Hallway down the hill, he flinched at a colossal crack of thunder almost directly overhead.

And then the rain came.

Just a few spots at first, pit-patting on the vines alongside him, warm drops on his forearms and cheeks, growing faster and faster, every new drop followed by two more until, within a matter of moments, it had turned into a continuous roar as the full fury of the storm broke overhead. For a second, he thought about turning around and going back up to the villa. But Lucy was down in the woods, waiting for him. He didn’t want to let her down. And she had a present.

He decided to run instead.

A flash of lightning hit across the valley and another furious boom of thunder ripped the sky, so loudly that he hunched his head into his shoulders as he ran. It sounded as though the thunder was right above him, right on top of him.

At the edge of the woods, near a burned patch of grass, he stopped to catch his breath. The rain pounding on the leaves of the trees was a continuous barrage of noise and his T-shirt was already drenched. His hair was plastered to his scalp with rain and his glasses were smeared with raindrops. He took them off and wiped them on his sodden T-shirt, but as soon as he put them on they got smeared again. It was like looking through a car window when the wipers weren’t going fast enough. He peered into the woods.

There. A glimpse of his sister’s blonde hair moving through the trees.

He set off after her.

Chapter 78

78

I thought I’d misheard him.

‘Lucy did what?’

Sean didn’t break eye contact.

‘Did you know they were in a relationship, her and Alex Bayley?’

‘What? No!’