Ava admitted to having fallen asleep. ‘I’d told Dougie not to come back from the boathouse until it was dark. I didn’t want anyone to spot the girl and wonder who she was.’ She paused, thinking. ‘Could we tell if the boat’s gone? If it’s not in the wreckage, then maybe the three of them took off in the Fear Not, despite me telling Dougie not to.’

Please God, they did, she thought.

‘We can’t check that out until the debris cools,’ Magnus said. ‘In the meantime, we should take a look around for Finn.’

He didn’t say ‘a hurt or dead Finn’, but that was what Magnus was implying, because if the faithful collie was alive, and in the vicinity, he would surely have made his presence known by now.

For Ava, a picture of a dead Finn had now supplanted the one of a burning Dougie in her mind.

61

The vibration of her mobile broke through her dreams as it rattled across the bedside cabinet. Rhona’s first thought was that it must be her alarm, then reaching out, she realized it was barely light outside.

Grabbing the phone, Rhona rose, taking it through to the kitchen to answer. If Magnus was calling her at this hour, then it had to be important.

She barely got to greet him before he said, ‘McNab’s okay. He called late last night. He’d been lifted off the street when he went to meet Cleverly and held captive, but got away.’

The relief was instantaneous. ‘Thank God,’ Rhona said, her heart lifting. ‘Where is he now?’

‘Still in London. He called to warn me that the people who grabbed him have his mobile and he was worried they would use it to locate Ava.’ He hesitated. ‘I think they may already have done that.’

Rhona listened as he described the fire.

‘When I got there it was well ablaze, but from the smell, there was no one inside, although Ava said that Dougie and the girl from the Orlova had gone to the boathouse earlier.’

‘Ava told you about Nadia?’

‘Yes.’ Magnus didn’t ask how long Rhona had known because he didn’t have to.

‘You think Dougie and the girl have been abducted?’ Rhona said.

‘The rain’s just come on, so the embers will soon be cool enough to check if Dougie’s boat was in there. If not, there’s a chance they may have got away.’

‘Then who set the fire?’

‘No idea, but someone did. I could smell the diesel.’ He continued, ‘Erling’s spoken with DI Wilson and there’s a search party out for Dougie and the girl.’

So Erling knew about Nadia now too, which was a relief. ‘How is Ava?’ Rhona said.