‘Yesterday was the five-year anniversary,’ Marcus continued. ‘You must have seen the stories in the press?’

Rachel nodded. She’d heard something about it on the radio during the week. But Ade had been in the car with her, talking about a man she’d been on a date with the previous evening, and Rachel hadn’t paid too much attention to what was on the radio.

‘Apparently the survivors get together every year to remember those poor people who died. This year, they came here. Not all of them. Two of them live in Greece and, understandably, they chose not to fly to the UK for the anniversary.

‘We were hugely honoured to host the event. Mr Murray is an absolute pleasure to deal with. He organised the whole thing. As the head of the foundation, I suppose he feels it’s his duty to organise these events every year.’

‘Hang on.’ Rachel held a hand up, needing him to slow down. ‘Can we go back a bit? Who is Mr Murray?’

‘Adam Murray, the man behind Vivienne Kinsella Foundation.’

Rachel recognised the name. Adam Murray was an author and inspirational speaker whose wife had died in the crash. He’d set up a foundation, in her name, to support all those affected by the tragedy.

‘He wrote the book about his wife,’ Marcus said. ‘You must know the one I’m talking about?’

Rachel nodded. She knew the book, all right. Vivienne: a memoir. She’d bought it after seeing multiple copies in Waterstones soon after it was published. Rows of hardbacks lined up with the covers facing out at her. The title in white print beneath a photo of the dead actress. Dozens of identical images of Vivienne Kinsella’s face smiling from the shelves. The book, when Rachel finally got around to reading it, had been such a saccharine account of Adam Murray’s ‘perfect marriage to my perfect wife’ Rachel hadn’t been able to get past the first few chapters.

‘My neighbour went to see him speak last year and described it as a transformational experience.’ Marcus stopped speaking and smiled. ‘Sorry. I’m going on a bit, aren’t I? It’s the shock, you see. One simply doesn’t expect something like this to happen here. It’s one of the reasons I took this job. I spent most of my career in LA, managing a luxury hotel in Malibu. Beautiful location, but it was a big operation. I got burned out after a few years. So I moved back to England and looked for a smaller job, something a little less stressful. Running this place was just the ticket. Until now.’

Resisting the urge to grab him by the shoulders and shake him until he pulled himself together, Rachel asked him – as gently as she could – to go back to the events leading up to the discovery of Nick Gilbert’s body on the beach.