Hannah clicked onto Rosie’s Snapchat locator. ‘You’re in Bawdeswell?’ She knew of the village. It was about twenty miles from Wells. ‘I’m out with the dogs. It’s going to take me a while to drop them off and get to where you are.’

She waited for Rosie to respond, but there was just silence.

‘Rosie?’

Still nothing.

‘ROSIE?’

‘What? Yes, I’m here. I thought he had woken up.’

‘Rosie, if you’re in danger, I need to call the police.’

‘No police! Promise me, Hannah.’ Rosie sounded on the verge of tears and Hannah’s gut twisted, wondering what the hell kind of trouble she was in.

‘Okay, I won’t call them. I’ll be as quick as I can.’

‘Just hurry, okay? Message me when you get here and I’ll sneak out.’

All three dogs were looking at Hannah as the call ended and she hurried them homewards, grateful that they belonged to neighbours who were on her route. Normally she would stop to chat, but Rosie’s call had spooked her. Who the hell was she with and what had happened to her?

Wondering how wise an idea it was to show up at this man’s house alone, she called her ex-husband on the way to Bawdeswell.

She could hear the exasperation in Josh’s voice the moment Rosie’s name was mentioned.

‘You know this is going to be another case of cry wolf, don’t you, Han?’

‘She sounded really upset.’

‘Of course she did. She plays you like a fiddle every time.’

There had never been any love lost between Rosie and Josh, even though they were two of the closest people in Hannah’s life. Josh thought Rosie was a drama queen, while Rosie couldn’t understand why Hannah kept him around. ‘Ex should mean ex, as in good riddance,’ she had said on more than one occasion.

Truth was, Hannah and Josh worked better as friends than as husband and wife. Their marriage had been short-lived, over when they were still in their mid-twenties, and it wasn’t until they were divorced that they really started to understand one another. Hannah still loved him, but she wasn’t in love with him, and this last eight years as friends, Josh Cole had become more like the brother she had never had.

He might have had his doubts about Rosie’s emergency, but he still insisted Hannah call him when she arrived at the address. As she pulled off the road and into the driveway of the house that she had nearly missed due to the high hedgerows of the narrow twisting country lane, she was glad he had. Part of her wondered as she tapped his name into her phone whether she should be ignoring Rosie’s wishes and calling the police anyway.

‘Are you there yet?’