Eric would sort it. Right now she had to check if the dinner preparations were going okay, and the welcome drinks party people had remembered to put up the Silver Ski Company banners for any cameras that might be there. And of course, make them put out the company napkins with the nibbles.

Yeah. Go count some napkins. That would take away the thought of that boy in the trees.

Maybe.

Katie had waited last night until four-thirty in the morning to phone Craig. She had nearly called him three times before that, but her mind was doing crazy things and it took a long lonely night to decide that maybe they should both be crazy together.

It was hard to make Gerry and Ann go, especially after the visit she’d had from those grim-faced cops that followed McGee’s visit, asking questions that hurt, but mercifully cleaning up the remains of sweet Bart. But she’d convinced them she would be okay. Katie saw in one alarming moment on Gerry’s face, that he wasn’t worried about her spending the night alone, but more concerned that Sam might come back. It was no use any more asking herself how this had come about. It had. Everything had changed, and the only thing to do now was to find a way to deal with it.

She’d dialled Craig’s home number first, the one he’d written on the back of his card, and there had been no reply. She wasn’t thinking straight yet. A murder investigation didn’t let its investigators go home to cocoa and bed. She called his detachment and the noisy babble in the background as the guy put her through confirmed that theory.

‘Craig?’

‘Yeah.’

‘It’s Katie Hunt.’

‘You all right?’

‘Yeah. Nothing’s changed here. I just need … I just think it would be good to talk about some things.’

‘Now?’

‘Uh-huh.’

He was over in less than fifteen minutes, stopping briefly outside in the falling snow to talk to the guys who were watching the Hunt house. She let him in like they were both doing something wrong and they braved the kitchen almost as a dare. The floor was shiny where she’d knelt like a peasant and scrubbed the last of the blood off with a bristle brush until her arms ached. Craig said nothing, and sat at her table as though everything was normal.

The old coffee machine went through its noisy faltering cycle and Katie sat down with him while it got on with it.

‘They took photos and then put him in a bag.’

‘Yeah. I know it seems weird. They know what they’re doing.’

She nodded, staring at the table top and playing with a strand of her streaky blonde hair. Then she looked up at him with red eyes.

‘Why did your constable write the word Isksaksin?’