“Okay, but you can’t just … Al? Hello, Al? Can you hear me? Al!”

The phone goes dead and when I try to ring her back, it goes straight to voicemail. I text her my postcode anyway, and then look at the time. 8.15 p.m.

“Anne?” I sprint down the corridor towards reception, desperately hoping she hasn’t already left. “Anne?”

“Yes?” She pauses in the door to reception, holding it open with a gloved hand, her duffle coat buttoned up to her neck. She’s clutching her car keys in her free hand.

“I need to go, there’s been an emergency. I wouldn’t ask you unless it was really important, but please could you talk to the volunteers for me, and then lock up?”

“But I was just—” She gestures towards the dark yard. We’ve been waiting for Derek to install a security light since the break-in, but he discovered some kind of problem with the electrics that confounded him.

“I know.” I grip the reception counter with both hands. “I know you were just leaving, but this is so important. I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

Anne looks me up and down then purses her lips and sighs.

“Okay, but if there isn’t some kind of chocolate or cake-type affair on my desk first thing tomorrow,” she says as she unbuttons her coats and slips it off her shoulders, “you won’t hear the last of it. I promise you that!”

Chapter 48

Chapter 48

It’s 8.40 p.m. when I arrive at my cottage, breathing heavily, sweat rolling down my cheeks. There are no cars in the drive and no sign of Al, so I prop my bike up against the side wall and let myself into the cottage. The door catches on a pile of post, and I stoop to pick it up then double lock the front door. I move through the house, checking all the windows are locked and all the curtains are closed, then head for the kitchen and perch on a chair as I flick through the post. It reveals nothing – just junk mail and bills. I bin the junk mail, put the bills on the Welsh dresser and check the time on the kitchen clock. 8.50 p.m. Ten minutes until Al arrives. I sit down again and check my phone, but there are no missed calls, no texts, no Facebook notifications.