It was just under a mile from Barsall to the Height. Halliwell Way sloped down, hugging the side of the hill; there was a high wall of limestone rose to Ellie’s left, while to her right there was a crash barrier, then a sheer drop. Ellie kept as close to the rock face as she dared without risking a collision, took first one and then the other hand from the wheel as she drove to wipe sweat off her palms, and fervently regretted the three sips of whisky she’d had in the pub.

Up ahead was the bend in the road. The Height was more or less round the corner, but the hillside would no longer shield her from the wind, which meant that the blizzarding snow was about to get even worse.

Not far to go, though; Ellie kept telling herself that. Not far at all.

A sudden wave of misery and loneliness hit her, pretty much from nowhere. Blindsided, she thought dizzily. She wanted to be home, and for the first time in years she dearly wished there was someone there to hold her, cook her dinner and, most importantly, to tell her all would be well. For the first time, work no longer felt like enough. Which was one hell of a piece of timing.

So easy to roll the car in this weather. To crash and freeze to death. Or worse. Ellie’s hand strayed to the shotgun, remembering the knife in Tony Harper’s hand, the state of the Bell and Wakeman Farm, and most of all Liz Harper: You’ll all see. They’ll come for you tonight.

Enough. If she was going have an identity crisis she could do it at home, with the doors locked and a whisky poured. She’d drive to the Height, find Tom, then get the pair of them back to Barsall.

But as she reached the Height and pulled slowly into the picnic area, there was no light; just the hi-vis yellow of the Land Rover’s chequered “Battenberg” pattern flaring in Ellie’s headlights. It looked wrong, somehow. A moment later Ellie realised why: the Land Rover was overturned and lying on its roof, the windows smashed.

“Shit,” Ellie muttered, and put the headlights up to full power. The car’s interior was still partly in shadow, but there was no sign of anyone inside, or any kind of movement. Nothing in the area visible in the headlights either.

Tom had always kept a heavy police-issue flashlight – one of the spares from the old station – stowed in the X5’s passenger footwell; Ellie grabbed hold of it and climbed out of the BMW, pocketing the keys as she went. The X5 had a Runlock, so the engine kept running and the lights stayed on.