As they retraced their journey, she said nothing, feeling the waves of his anger beat against her. How swiftly he’d changed from the man on the beach to the one beside her now, she thought.

What would happen if he ever found out the truth of what she was doing, or the real reason why she’d come here?

Barely giving her time to get out at Beanach, he roared away without even a goodbye.

Greg

Glancing in the rear-view mirror, he saw Joanne watching him drive off.

Even from a distance, he could read the consternation on her face. What the fuck would she be thinking? Jeez, he’d gone from a funny, affectionate lover to a raving loony in seconds.

Shaking with anger at himself, he gripped the wheel tighter. He should never have let his guard down, pretending that shite wasn’t happening, that they hadn’t found Ailsa’s body . . . if it did prove to be her.

God, he was doing it again. Trying to fool even himself. Of course it was Ailsa. He’d known it from the moment he’d seen the blonde hair in the light of his head torch.

But how the hell had she got there?

He forced himself to think back to that night, aware that he should have talked to Caroline sooner. Got their story straight again, before the police started their interviews.

He tried to recall what exactly he’d said last time, because no doubt they would have the records of all those interviews from five years ago as the case had never been closed.

Did they still have the DNA records of every man in Blackrig? Or was it not the case that, if you weren’t convicted of a crime, they had to remove your profile from the DNA database in Scotland?

He realized that it didn’t matter, because they would simply do the tests again. And fingerprints, of course.

Colin had said that Harry thought they’d got trace evidence of her attacker from the remains. And five years, he reminded himself, was a long time in the world of forensics. God knows what they could do now.

Arriving at the village hall, he joined a line of vehicles parked outside, most of which he recognized. Across the road, the village car park was busy too, with holidaymakers’ cars and a couple of campervans.

The Scottish schools had broken up at the end of June; the English wouldn’t until the third week in July. So he had to assume for the moment that the tourist traffic was mainly from other parts of Scotland.

No doubt more folk would come, if or when the discovery of the body made it into the mainstream media. With no TV or radio at Beanach, maybe the news was already out there and he just hadn’t heard it.

It was too late now to check online. He would have to do that later.