‘Stage four pancreatic cancer?’ she gasped.

He nodded slowly. ‘The doctors say it has metastasised to my liver and spleen.’

Bailey swallowed. The words seemed unreal. She didn’t need to be an oncologist to know that this was indeed a grim diagnosis.

‘They say I’ve got six months. At the outside.’ His voice, although level in tone, rung with a bleak finality.

Bailey blinked in disbelief and looked up at her mother who was sitting on the other side of the bed clutching a Bible in her hand. Janet Morgan looked small and frail, racked with fatigue, like she’d been up all night every night for a while. Her husband, ironically, looked in better form than she did, but Bailey knew appearances could be deceptive when it came to cancer, and people could switch from healthy-looking individuals to walking skeletons in the space of just a few weeks.

‘I had all the tests last week,’ he said. ‘One of those full-body CT scans. An MRI for my liver. Various X-rays. I didn’t want to tell you until I got the full prognosis back.’

‘I tried to call you earlier, Bailey, but I couldn’t get through,’ said her mother.

‘I’m so sorry,’ said Bailey, remorse filling her. ‘I was busy. Work. I’m currently on an operation. My normal phone was switched off.’

She was struck by a wave of self-reproach at the thought of her parents going through all this without telling her, and then cruelly being unable to get through to her when they finally had decided to break the bad news.

‘That’s okay,’ said her father with a gentle smile. ‘More important that you’re out there catching criminals than worrying about me. Anyhow, it’s a friendly enough place here.’ He gestured around the ward at the other patients lying in their beds. He was currently residing in the gastroenterology ward in the Princess Royal Hospital in Orpington, not far from Bromley.

Bailey felt tears come to her eyes and everything went blurry. Her father. He had always been there for her. She loved him so much. And now he was going to die. In a short while, he’d no longer be there any more. Ever. She felt her inner world collapsing.

‘No,’ she whispered. ‘There must be a way. There must be some treatment.’

He squeezed her hand and shook his head fatalistically. ‘The cancer has spread too far through my body. It’s too late to do anything now.’

‘But what about chemotherapy or something?’ she said desperately.

‘I’m talking to the consultant about it at the moment. He told me I could choose to have the chemo if I wanted, but he explained that all it’ll do is just keep me going for a bit longer. When the cancer is as advanced as mine, it’s probably not worth it.’

Bailey sat there shaking her head, finding it hard to accept what he was telling her.

‘I’ve got some important decisions to make,’ he continued stoically. ‘About where I want to spend my remaining time. They told me I could be moved back home if I wanted, or I could go into a hospice.’