Tom dropped his gaze from Clara’s. ‘Everything’s fine,’ he said, abruptly getting to his feet. Let’s pay at the bar, shall we?’

Amy Lowe lived in a small house down a cul de sac of 1930s semis. Clara and Mac paused in the front garden for a moment, taking in the broken swing set and stack of roof tiles piled high amongst the weeds. On the chipped front door was a peeling sticker with the words ‘BEWARE OF THE DOG’, illustrated by a toothy Doberman. From inside they could hear the sound of a TV at top volume, a girl’s voice wailing, ‘Mummy he hit me! Jakey hit me, he did! Mummeeeeee!!!’ They glanced at each other and shrugged, before Mac pressed the bell.

A boy of about six answered. He was dressed in a Superman onesie and the small round face below his buzz cut was covered in freckles. He glared at them suspiciously. ‘You selling stuff?’ he asked. ‘Mum says she don’t want any.’

Mac laughed. ‘No. We just want a word with—’

Suddenly Amy came up behind him. ‘Yes?’ she said sharply. ‘Can I help you?’

She’d changed little since her teenage years, Clara thought. A fraction heavier, a few lines here and there, but still the same doll-like eyes, the tousled blond curls, the careless, unassuming attractiveness. Her face cleared. ‘Oh my God!’ she said in a thick Suffolk accent. ‘Mac!’ She smiled then, and for a moment she looked sixteen again, exactly as she had in Luke’s pictures. ‘Haven’t seen you for years! What the bloody hell are you doing here? I thought you lived in London these days?’

‘Hi, Amy, good to see you,’ Mac said. ‘This is Clara, Luke Lawson’s girlfriend.’

At this Amy gave a start of recognition. ‘Yeah,’ she nodded, ‘I saw you on the news, it’s all anyone’s talking about around here.’

‘I’m sorry to turn up out of the blue like this,’ Clara said. ‘I … we wondered if we could have a word with you?’

She frowned in surprise. ‘If you want. Come in.’

They traipsed after her down the narrow hallway, its walls covered in pictures of Amy in a wedding dress next to a chubby, grinning groom, the living room they passed on the way to the kitchen seemingly full of kids crowded around the telly where some kind of Wii tournament was going on. ‘’Scuse the mess,’ Amy muttered. The kitchen was a pleasant, cosy room with lilac walls and a round pine table around which were crammed several chairs. ‘You want a cuppa?’ she asked, removing a pile of washing from the table.