Praise for Cut to the Bone

‘A series that gets stronger with every book. Roz Watkins is up there with the best.’ Cass Green, author of The Killer Inside

‘I love the acerbic wit of Meg Dalton, and this is a brilliant read. Compelling, beautifully crafted, with murder and twists aplenty.’ Amanda Jennings, author of The Storm

‘Intelligent, propulsive and incredibly atmospheric, Cut to the Bone is not only a riveting thriller but a thoughtful portrait of modern society.’ Kia Abdullah, author of Take It Back

‘Roz Watkins ups the ante and gives us a rollicking crime adventure laced with plenty of dead bodies, a touch of gothic mystery, dark humour and Meg’s trademark acerbic wit. I loved it. A real page-turner that also gets you thinking.’ Sophie Draper, author of Cuckoo

‘A taut, richly atmospheric and original thriller that will keep you glued to your seat. I loved it!’ Jane Isaac, author of For Better, For Worse

‘Another ripper from Roz! It’s just gone 7 a.m. and I have had a brief pause for sleep to race through her latest detective thriller. BRILLIANT!’ Suzy K Quinn, author of Not My Daughter

‘A heart-in-your-mouth read which made me gasp out loud on more than one occasion! Roz’s best yet.’ Jo Jakeman, author of Safe House

‘True to its name, Cut to the Bone has the precision of a surgeon’s scalpel. Each razor-sharp chapter slices deeper. I barely came up for air!’ Jo Furniss, author of All the Little Children

‘What a protagonist! A chillingly compelling and utterly twisted plot. Loved it!’ Danielle Ramsay, author of The Last Cut

ROZ WATKINS is the author of the DI Meg Dalton crime series, which is set in the Peak District where Roz lives with her partner and a menagerie of demanding animals.

Her first book, The Devil’s Dice, was shortlisted for the CWA Debut Dagger Award, and has been optioned for TV.

Roz studied engineering at Cambridge University before training in patent law. She was a partner in a firm of patent attorneys in Derby, but this has absolutely nothing to do with there being a dead one in her first novel.

In her spare time, Roz likes to walk in the Peak District, scouting out murder locations.

Also by Roz Watkins

The Devil’s Dice

Dead Man’s Daughter

Cut to the Bone

Roz Watkins

ONE PLACE. MANY STORIES

Copyright

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2020

Copyright © Roz Watkins 2020

Roz Watkins asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © June 2020 ISBN: 9780008214722

Version 2020-06-06

Note to Readers

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 Page numbers taken from the following print edition: ISBN 9780008214708

For Starsky the dog, whose foul woodland scavenging started all this.

And to the animals in intensive farms who don’t get that freedom.

Contents

Cover

Praise

About the Author

Booklist

Title Page

Copyright

Note to Readers

Dedication

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Extract

Author’s Note

Acknowledgements

About the Publisher

1

Meg – Present day

Monday

The road swooped into the valley, its sun-beaten tarmac melting into the hillside. The car smelled of petrol and hot plastic, and the steering wheel stuck to my hands. DS Jai Sanghera was sprawling in the passenger seat beside me, legs thrown apart, head back, and we were embroiled in a pointless argument in which I’d found myself defending his girlfriend for a reason I could no longer remember.

Jai’s manspreading was reaching such critical levels it was impeding my access to the gearstick. ‘I know you’re hot,’ I said. ‘No need to turn it into performance art.’

Jai dragged himself forward to fiddle with his air vent. ‘Let’s just agree to disagree, shall we? I think if Suki’s serious about me, she should try harder with the kids; you clearly don’t. We’ve got a missing person to focus on.’

‘Fine.’

I eased my foot off the brake and let the car accelerate through the treacly air. The wind curled round my damp face, and my shirt flapped against my stomach. I fanned myself, trying to let the tension dissipate.

In the distance I could see the dazzling surface of Ladybower Reservoir. We were heading for a valley to its east that looked like a huge meteorite crater, but had probably been caused by some dramatic event in the last ice age. The hot summer had turned the grass yellow, and the bowl of the valley was surrounded by rocks. They jutted up like teeth, as if we were driving into a gaping mouth. In the centre, where the tonsils would have been, was an ugly industrial building. Gritton Abattoir.

I forced my tone to be friendly. ‘What do we know about her?’

Jai took a long breath and when his voice came out, it was normal, not pissed off. ‘Eighteen-year-old girl. She was working at the abattoir overnight and when they got in this morning, her car was still there but no sign of her. You know who she is though?’

‘No. Who is she?’

‘Violet Armstrong.’

I looked at him for a beat longer than the driver should, our disagreement forgotten. ‘The Violet Armstrong?’

‘Yep. Bikini-barbecue-babe Violet Armstrong. Poster girl for carnivores everywhere. Missing from an abattoir.’

‘Jesus. What was she doing at an abattoir?’

‘I think she works there. Bit weird, I know. Especially with someone as controversial as her. It’s when “turning up in one piece” is way too literal.’

‘Thanks for that, Jai. No doubt there’ll be some banal explanation involving a dodgy boyfriend or a runaway pig.’

Jai laughed and I felt the atmosphere loosen. ‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘If I was a pig I’d run away from her and her barbecue tongs.’

On the horizon, tendrils of smoke drifted upwards, reminding me we were near the wildfire. ‘This weather’s got to break soon,’ I said. ‘We’ll get monsoon rains.’

‘Most of which will no doubt end up in my basement.’

I hadn’t yet been inside Jai’s new house, even though it was round the corner from mine, but he seemed obsessed with his damp basement. Maybe he’d been droning on to Suki about pumps and that was part of her problem.

We followed a narrow lane through gates into a concrete yard. A slab-sided grey building sat in front of us, sanitised and anonymous, giving away nothing about what went on inside.

‘Are you going to be okay with this?’ Jai said.

My head filled with images from abattoir videos posted by animal rights groups and shared by my friends on Facebook, just to improve my mental well-being and sleeping patterns. I didn’t need to see the real thing, especially in my current state of mind. Or hear it. This abattoir did pigs. Pigs squealed.

‘I’ll be okay,’ I said. ‘I’m more worried about the missing girl.’ But it struck me like an electric shock that I wasn’t that worried about the girl – at least not to my usual PhD-level. Was I so worn down from watching Gran die that I’d lost some vital part of myself? It scared the hell out of me. If I didn’t care about my job to the point of virtual mania, who even was I?

‘You do know she’s famous because she barbecues burgers in a bikini?’ Jai said. ‘A phrase I wouldn’t advise saying when drunk.’

‘Yeah. She simultaneously dumps on feminism and animal rights in an impressive double whammy.’ I could keep the banter going while I had my mini existential crisis, but our camaraderie felt forced. I’d thought I was doing the right thing by being super-nice about his girlfriend, thus removing any question of whether I liked him a little too much for a colleague, but I’d obviously got it all wrong.

We pulled up in the yard and heaved ourselves out of the car. The sun sliced through the hot air, making the car windows so shiny it hurt to look at them. A few uniforms were buzzing around. We had a lot of missing person calls, but this one had triggered a red-button-push.

The door to the abattoir building swung open and a skinny blonde woman came out at a gallop. ‘Goodness, it’s warm. I hope we’re not wasting your time. I’m not wanting to make a fuss, but I thought we should call just in case …’

‘Shall we pop inside a minute?’ I said. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Meg Dalton and this is Detective Sergeant Jai Sanghera. What’s your name?’

‘Anna Finchley. I own the abattoir.’

I wasn’t sure if it was subconscious sexism or ageism, but I was surprised at that revelation. There was a touch of the gangly teenager or new-born foal about her, although she must have been in her thirties. She didn’t look like an abattoir-owner.

‘Not being melodramatic, but do you think it’s the animal rights people?’ she said.

‘What makes you say that?’

‘We’ve had threats. And someone’s smashed the CCTV.’ Anna shook her head. ‘But surely, they wouldn’t … Maybe she went for a walk or …’

I looked at the sun-scorched hills in the distance. A faint smell of smoke hung in the air. It wasn’t an ideal spot for a hike.

‘How far are we from the reservoir?’ Jai said.

The beauty of Ladybower Reservoir seemed to act as a magnet for death. It was well known, to us at least. If some poor soul was planning to slit an artery and bleed to death in north Derbyshire, there was a fair chance Ladybower would be the destination of choice.

Anna said, ‘It’s just over the hill.’

‘Let’s take a few details inside,’ I said. ‘Can we see the smashed CCTV?’

Anna led us through a door into a grey corridor and on into a small room. The building was functional rather than swish, but had been recently renovated. So far, it was mercifully free of butchered animals.

I leaned to peer at the CCTV box, which looked like it had been set about with a baseball bat. I stepped back to let Jai see. ‘They’ve taken the hard drive,’ he said.

‘Let’s get this area sealed off and processed,’ I said.

We shuffled out of the room. A man was walking towards us down the corridor. He was lean, toned, and good-looking in a rough, footballer kind of way, and he moved like a man with something to prove.

Anna said, ‘What is it, Gary?’ I sensed tension between them. A slight narrowing of his eyes; a fractional curling of her upper lip. ‘This is my brother,’ Anna said. ‘He works here too.’

The man held up an expensive-looking, glittery, and clearly now evidentially compromised object. We needed to get the scene under control. ‘I found a watch,’ he said. ‘It—’

‘That’s Violet’s,’ Anna said. ‘Why on earth would she take off her watch? Where did you find it?’

‘If you’d let me finish, I’d tell you. I don’t know why she’d have gone there – it wasn’t in the area she cleans. It’s bloody weird, if you ask me.’

‘Just tell us where it was, Gary!’

‘It was beside the pig pens.’ He shot Anna a look that was almost accusing. ‘And there’s blood on it.’

2

Anna Finchley led us into an office containing a desk and four chairs. White-painted walls were covered with a surprising collection of abstract art – the kind with blobs of colour that my dad would say a three-year-old could do – and a prominent TV screen. Anna sank down on one of the chairs, crossing her legs and arms as if protecting herself.

‘Sit on that side if you want the window-view and the art,’ she said. ‘I sit here so I can monitor the CCTV. When it’s working. And I hate to be negative, but Violet’s not careless with her stuff. Why would she have dropped her watch? She shouldn’t even have been by the pig pens. And why would it have blood on it?’

Jai and I sat opposite her and didn’t answer her questions. She could run the scenarios on her own. I watched her face as she did so. Not giving much away.

‘When did you last see Violet?’ I asked.

Anna blinked a couple of times and looked to the ceiling. ‘The day before yesterday,’ she said. ‘I stayed late and I saw her at the start of her shift.’

‘And how was she?’

Anna shook her head and frowned. ‘Not that I’d necessarily notice, because I didn’t spend long talking to her, but she seemed fine.’

‘Could you talk us through this morning? Were you the first to arrive?’

‘I got here at about eight. Daniel had come in earlier and fed the pigs. Daniel Twigg. I think he’d messed up the amounts though, because they’d left loads. Maybe it was because he wasn’t feeling well – he’s gone home ill. I didn’t realise anything was wrong at first. Violet’s car’s parked round the side so I didn’t see it.’ Anna pushed her hair back behind her ears. ‘I got the pigs killed. Then cleaned up their pen. And the lorry arrived to take the Category 2 waste away – that’s the animals’ innards and other bits we can’t use – to be rendered, and when it went round the side, I noticed Violet’s car. It’s not normally parked that far round, so I hadn’t seen it at first. Anyway, I looked for her everywhere I could think, and tried her mobile but there was no answer. I phoned Esther – my partner, who Violet lodges with – and she’s not there. I phoned Violet’s parents in Sheffield but there was no answer. Then I went to check the CCTV, and when I saw it was smashed, I called you.’

Anna was providing a lot of detail in her descriptions. That could be normal. She might have just been a very helpful person, a kind-of human Lassie dog. Or not. It was too early to tell.

‘The Category 2 waste …’ I said. ‘Would that have included any meat waste from yesterday or last night?’ Our assumption was that Violet was alive, but I wanted to know what had happened to those waste products.

‘Yes,’ Anna said. ‘Yes, it would. And from this morning. It’s all been taken away. It goes to be rendered.’

‘Do you have details of the company that takes it?’ I asked.

She froze a moment. ‘Why would … Oh, okay.’ She reached into a drawer, fished out an invoice and passed it over. If she’d worked out what this could mean, she kept it to herself.

I turned to Jai. ‘Do you mind calling them now? And checking on the searches.’

Jai took the paper and left the room.

When I turned back to Anna, her fists were clenched tight in her lap, knuckles shining white.

‘Violet was on a night shift?’ I said.

Anna nodded rapidly. ‘Ten till two thirty. Cleaning. She has a summer job here.’

‘Why did she come to work in an abattoir?’

‘It’s strange, isn’t it? When I found out who she was, I was baffled. I did ask her and she was rather vague. I can’t say for sure, but I got the impression she wanted to come to Gritton for some other reason, and this job was an excuse.’

‘Okay, thank you. And had she worked her shift last night? Could you tell this morning if the cleaning had been done?’

Anna frowned. ‘I’m not sure … We have such high standards here, it’s not as if she was mopping up blood – it’s more of an extra clean. We have what we call a “clean side” and a “dirty side”. She was on the clean side – meat only, no live animals – which is why it’s so strange that her watch turned up near the pig pen on the dirty side. She’s been given specific instructions not to go on the dirty side when she’s cleaning.’

‘Okay. Could you have another look – the guys will tell you where you can go. See if there’s anything to suggest she did or didn’t clean up.’

‘Yes, of course.’

‘Is there any CCTV other than the broken one? Any camera footage that would show if anyone else was here last night.’

She shook her head. ‘Sorry, no. Not on site.’

‘Where were you last night?’

‘At home. But Esther was with me. She doesn’t live with me, but she stayed over. She can confirm I was with her.’

‘Violet lodges with Esther?’

‘Yes. Yes, she does. I helped that girl a lot, even letting her live with my girlfriend.’ Was that a hint of bitterness in her tone?

‘Did Violet not appreciate that help?’ I asked.

‘Oh yes, I’m not saying she didn’t appreciate it.’ A somewhat tight-lipped response.

‘Do you get along with Violet?’

Anna swallowed. ‘She’s all right, I suppose. A good employee generally.’

‘Generally but not totally?’

Anna’s eyes hardened briefly. A flash of steel. ‘Just a turn of phrase. She’s fine.’

I paused to write in my notebook. Anna kept her face expressionless. She clearly didn’t like Violet. Could be relevant. Could be nothing. I spent half my life wanting to throttle my colleague Craig and I hadn’t murdered him yet.

‘How long has Violet been working here?’ I asked.

‘About a month. I can’t—’ Anna swung her gaze around the room as if Violet might be hiding in a corner. ‘Let me ring Esther again. Violet’s probably home by now.’

‘Okay, you do that,’ I said.

Anna fished out her mobile and dialled. The phone must have been picked straight up at the other end. ‘Is she back?’ Anna’s voice was loud and sharp.

I couldn’t hear the answer but Anna’s face dropped. She spoke into the phone. ‘No, nothing.’ There was a muffled reply, the words audible though my brain could make no sense of them, and then Anna said, ‘Oh, come on, Esther, you don’t believe that rubbish—’

Anna frowned at the woman’s response and ended the call with a brisk, ‘Okay, bye.’

‘No sign of her?’ I asked.

‘No, I’m afraid not.’

‘Okay. And what rubbish does Esther not believe?’

Anna shook her head. ‘It’s nothing. What else do you need to know?’

My brain got there in the end with the words I’d heard. ‘Did she say something about a pale child?’

Anna shifted papers around her desk before looking up and staring straight at me. ‘Not to cast aspersions on the people in this village, but they don’t get out enough. The Pale Child thing is all nonsense.’

‘Who is this Pale Child?’ I asked.

Anna gave me a strange look. Like somebody remembering a scene from their distant childhood. When she spoke, her voice was cracked, like sun-scorched earth. ‘As I said, it’s not real. Are we done here? Because I have things I need to be getting on with. It’s bad enough you people saying I can’t kill animals today, but if I don’t make a few phone calls soon, it’ll be too late to cancel, and they’ll be turning up here. I suspect you don’t need a bunch of condemned pigs marauding around the place.’ She wasn’t in Lassie-dog mode any more.

‘You make your phone calls,’ I said. ‘We’ll need to take a formal statement from you later. But first, could you tell me who else could have got into the abattoir last night.’

‘My brother, Gary, who you just met, has keys. He’s outside looking for Violet. And Daniel Twigg – the one who over-fed the pigs earlier.’

‘You said he was unwell, didn’t you? What’s the matter with him?’

‘Said he felt sick.’

‘Okay, we’ll talk to him. And before we go, even if it is nonsense, what’s the story about this Pale Child?’

Anna sighed. ‘It’s nothing. Just idiot-talk from the people in the village. It’s not relevant.’

‘Fine. Tell me anyway.’

‘People see her in the woods around the village. A girl dressed in white, old-fashioned clothes. Supposedly, if she sees your face, you’re going to die.’ She lowered her gaze. ‘Which is clearly not true.’

‘So she’s a child who lives in the village?’

‘She’s not a real child. The whole Pale Child thing is a myth. I don’t know why Esther even brought it up.’

‘Did Violet see this Pale Child?’

‘Of course not. I don’t know why you’re even asking about this.’

I wrote ‘Pale Child’ in my notebook and underlined it twice, then looked up and said, ‘Okay, tell me about the threats you mentioned earlier.’

Anna’s leg jiggled up and down before she stilled it with a hand. ‘You obviously know who Violet is. Her videos?’

‘I know she’s famous for videoing herself cooking meat-based products in a bikini.’

Anna sighed. ‘Maybe we used her, you could say.’ She fiddled with a loose thread on her vest-top. ‘I’ve been wanting to start a blog for a while, to debate this stuff. Meat, the environment, welfare, etc. Violet helped. She got us attention. I never knew it could be … dangerous.’

‘Okay, you’d better tell me from the beginning.’

‘It’s all so polarised now, like everything. I wanted to have an intelligent discussion. We set the website up – The Great Meat Debate – and put videos and posts on it. Discussions about the ethics of meat, and about how we’d designed the abattoir. Gary does stupid strength challenges with vegans. Lifting vans and ripping up books or whatever. I mean, that wasn’t part of the intelligent debate, but people love that kind of thing. As for Violet … well, Violet’s just Violet, and she brought us most of our visitors.’

‘You’ve had threats?’

‘Yes. I never expected that to happen. It’s not like we’re doing anything bad, but we attracted a load of attention. You know what it’s like – sometimes the more ethical meat producers come in for more vitriol. As if it’s almost worse to be nice to the animals before you kill them. People can’t seem to handle that. Like that farmer who let kids meet the turkeys at Christmas. It’s irrational, but there it is. We get a lot of haters. Especially a group called the Animal Vigilantes. Do you know them?’

I nodded. They’d been on our radar for a while. They wore clothing printed with a design that made it look like their skin had been removed and you could see their insides. They looked like meat. And their violence levels had been escalating.

‘Daniel can tell you more,’ Anna said. ‘He was really worried about it, and he tried to look into the Animal Vigilantes and who was behind them. Maybe he was right to be worried. He said they were getting more aggressive. And he thought they might follow through on their threats.’

‘What kind of threats did they make?’

She swallowed. ‘They said they were going to slit Violet’s throat.’

I left Anna Finchley and made my way through the grey corridor back into the scorching heat outside. This was not our usual kind of missing teenager. For some, going AWOL was practically a weekly occurrence and the police a free taxi service. Violet wasn’t one of those. Besides, someone had threatened to slit her throat.

A man was walking down the verge of the lane, heading away from the abattoir. He was bashing at the undergrowth with a long stick, the effort showing in the sweat soaking his shirt under the armpits and down his back. I called to him, and he jumped and spun round. It was Gary. Anna’s brother who’d found the watch earlier.

I pointed at his stick. ‘You can leave that now. We’re doing a search. It’s best you don’t do it.’

Civilian searches were appalling evidence-manglers. I mentally noted where Gary had been hacking at the undergrowth, just in case he’d been deliberately destroying evidence. He’d already manhandled Violet’s watch.

‘Whatever,’ he said.

‘Can I ask where you were last night?’

‘In bed at home.’

‘Can anyone verify that?’

‘My wife can.’ Gary smacked his stick against the ground again, contrary to my instructions. His attitude made me suspicious. For people who had never been in trouble, your typical questioned-by-the-cops look was a mixture of terror and the eagerness of the schoolkid at the front of the class with their hand up. Gary didn’t have that look. This one was hanging around the bike-sheds and claiming the cigarettes belonged to his mate.

I looked at his stick and he let it drop to the ground.

‘I don’t know why Anna’s giving you this I’m so worried bullshit,’ he said. ‘She bloody hates Violet.’

‘Anna hates Violet?’

‘Yeah. She thinks Violet’s a pain in the arse. Always moaning about the way things are done.’

‘What kinds of things?’

‘Everything. Violet knows best. The way we clean, the way we process the meat, even the way we kill the pigs.’

‘Does that cause conflict?’

‘You could say. Not my problem though. I’m just the minion, aren’t I? Anna’s the boss.’

So was that the tension? Gary didn’t like his sister being his boss? I had to admit, it was an unusual set-up, practically guaranteed to offend any fragile male egos involved.

‘Anna employs you?’

He opened his mouth as if to speak, then shut it again. ‘Yes.’

I softened my stance and gave him a conspiratorial smile. ‘It’s never easy working with family.’

‘No. And stuck in this shithole.’

I wanted to know why he would stay at the abattoir, working for his sister, if he hated it so much, but I sensed it wasn’t the time to get the truth out of him. Thankfully, when it came to criticising Anna, he was happy to spill all.

‘Do you think Anna might harm Violet?’ I asked.

Gary laughed. ‘God, no. Anna wouldn’t have the balls to do that. She’s not what you think, you know. She makes out she’s this tough country girl, so at home running the abattoir and hanging out with proper farmers, but you know what she wants? To live in the city, surrounded by poncy art galleries and theatres, where she’d never have to smell pig shit again in her life. But will she admit it? Will she, bollocks! Anyway, that’s not your concern. It’s the animal rights lunatics who’ve hurt Violet. I just think Anna should drop the Oscar-winning performance of being all upset about it.’

That was quite a speech to blurt out spontaneously. I didn’t comment – it’s best to let people carry on when they’re mid-rant. But he didn’t say any more.

‘Tell me about the animal rights lunatics,’ I said.

‘You know they’ve threatened to kill Violet?’

‘Who threatened to kill her?’

‘Idiots online. Posting sicko stuff about her. But they’ve had a go at all of us. Come to think of it, maybe that’s what Anna’s upset about.’ He let out a sharp laugh. ‘She’s not worried about Violet – she thinks it’s her next.’

‘What exactly have these people said?’

‘Called us murderers. Said they’d come and slit our throats. Messed-up shit.’

That did sound messed up, even by internet standards. ‘Did you take it seriously?’

‘It’s hard not to, when psychos are threatening to kill you. Daniel’s totally freaked out by it, but then he’s a right pansy at the best of times. That’s probably why he’s gone home. When he saw Violet was gone, he must have realised they meant business. You know he’s a junkie? Claims it’s for his back, but it doesn’t do him any favours.’

Gary’s phone pinged and he fished it out of his pocket. Pressed a few keys. ‘Yeah. Look at this.’ He showed me the phone. ‘If it’s not them, how do they even know to post this?’

I looked at the screen. It was the Great Meat Debate website that Anna had told me about. Gary had scrolled down to the bottom of the comments on the home page. One was posted under the name ‘Animal Vigilantes’. It said, Violet got what she deserved.

3

‘Media are going to go mental for this,’ Jai said, as we drove up the lane away from the abattoir. The reservoir sat low in the valley, sparkling turquoise and white in the sunshine, contrasting with the darkly jutting rocks which loomed above us on the gritstone edge.

‘I know,’ I said. ‘The best thing that’s happened to the meat industry since the invention of the burger, and she goes missing from an abattoir.’

We were on our way to see Daniel Twigg. To find out what he’d seen that morning and what he knew about the threats from the Animal Vigilantes. To find out why he was so scared.

‘Do you think the Animal Vigilantes have done something to her?’ Jai said. ‘They’re quite full-on.’

‘It’s possible. I’ve asked the techies to trace who posted the throat-slit comments, and the one that said Violet got what she deserved. Do we know what happened to the waste products from last night?’

‘Bit weird, that. The company who’d sent the invoice said their contract was cancelled a few weeks ago. But Anna Finchley claims she didn’t know and has no idea who replaced them. She reckons someone must have changed contractors without telling her. She’s checking with them urgently.’

‘You mean we don’t know who took the waste this morning, or where it’s gone?’

‘Er, no. Not yet. We’re on it.’

I didn’t want to go there in my mind. For now, the girl was missing, not dead. Missing, not murdered and thrown into a vat with pigs’ intestines and snouts and trotters.

There was nothing about Violet on our system. No previous disappearances, no suggestion she’d self-harm, no criminal record, no domestic violence complaints. She was a blank slate. Blank slates were tough. They gave you no clues.

We’d pulled out all the stops to look for her. Her car had been seized and taken off on the back of a truck. We’d arranged dogs and a drone, a unit to her parents’ place in Sheffield in case she was holed up there, house-to-house in the village, checks for any cameras, people bagging up all her things from her landlady’s house. The local mountain rescue would be brought in if she was missing much longer.

Above us I could see the black speck of the drone hovering like a mutant insect, while in the distance smoke was still rising from the wildfire. Together they induced a sense of end-of-the-world doom. Plagues and fires and all that good stuff. But I was lacking my usual big-case emotions – a mix of excitement and terror akin to what Eddie the Eagle must have felt standing at the top of the ninety-metre ski jump. So far all I felt was the crushing weight of responsibility and a dose of low-level depression.

‘Why come to Gritton and work in an abattoir?’ I said. ‘A beautiful young woman, who must be well-off, yet she’s cleaning up pigs’ guts in a backwater village.’

‘It is weird.’

‘Anna Finchley said she thought Violet had come to Gritton for another reason and the job was an excuse. We need to know that reason.’

‘Did you talk to the brother?’ Jai asked. ‘Gary, was it?’

‘Yeah. And that’s another odd set-up. I got the impression he can’t stand this place and he and his sister hate each other. It’s all simmering under the surface.’

‘It’d be more than simmering if I had to work with my sister.’

‘Ha, I’m sure.’

I wished I could have had the chance to simmer about my sister.

‘Sorry,’ Jai said. ‘That was insensitive.’

‘It’s fine. She died twenty-five years ago. You don’t need to be sensitive. In fact, I’d worry about you if you started being sensitive.’

A mile later, we came to a sign: Welcome to Gritton. Please drive carefully.

I pulled around a steep bend and looked at the road ahead. A flush of adrenaline hit my stomach and I slammed on the brakes.

‘Bloody hell,’ Jai said. ‘What’s that?’

In front of us, the road seemed to have collapsed into a spectacular sinkhole, but as I looked more closely, I could see it was in fact an image painted onto the road. ‘Wow,’ I said, allowing the car to crawl towards the crater and fighting the urge to shut my eyes as we drove over it. ‘That slowed me down.’

‘It’s good to see that you shut your eyes when things get tricky,’ Jai said.

‘I just squinted a little! But you wouldn’t want to drive here if you had a weak heart. I suppose it must be to slow people down, but it’s a bit brutal.’

Once we’d passed the fake sinkhole, the lane rose steeply beside a row of stone houses with freshly painted windows in Farrow & Ball colours. On the other side was a park, tree-fringed and pristine, a children’s play area at its centre. Every lawn was immaculately mown and weed-free, every garden fenced with railings, every door beautifully painted. The street lamps were Victorian-style. There weren’t even any people, as if they’d lower the tone. The only things that disturbed the look were notices attached to the lamp posts, although even they were tastefully done. Don’t Build on our Burial Grounds! Stop the Development!

‘Is this a real village or a filmset for a period drama?’ Jai said.

‘It’s creepy,’ I said. ‘And everything’s fenced in. Look at the railings by the sides of the road. That would annoy me. You can only cross in designated spots. I’d feel the need to climb over them.’

‘That could end in tears,’ Jai said.

‘I hope you’re referring to my dodgy ankle rather than the size of my arse.’

Jai laughed. ‘Naturally. But yes, it’s almost too perfect.’

‘The village or my arse? Because that’s far from perfect.’ That had popped out before the censorship lobes in my brain had a chance to click in. Trying so hard to get our banter back that I crossed the line into dodgy territory. ‘Yes,’ I said hurriedly, cringing inside. ‘It’s quite Stepford. Almost ominous. But there are cameras everywhere. That could help us.’

‘There are tunnels in this area,’ Jai said, ignoring my babbling. ‘I wonder if that’s why they have all the fences. Are they scared of kids wandering off and falling into them? I heard they stretch for miles. Old lead mines and stuff. I’ve seen videos on YouTube. I wondered if you fancied dragging me down there? Maybe at night? In a storm? When they’re about to flood?’

I laughed, relieved I’d got away with the inappropriate arse comment. ‘Honestly, Jai,’ I said. ‘One little incident where we nearly die in a flooded cave and you won’t stop going on about it.’

We reached the rim of the valley, where the road sloped down again. A sign said, Thank you for driving carefully through Gritton. Underneath, in very faint letters as if they had been repeatedly scrubbed clean, were the words, Village of the Damned. It was almost reassuring that there were vandalising teenage scrotes in residence amongst all the perfection, but I wondered what the village had done to earn that accolade.

In another half-mile, we drove through red-brick housing which looked more normal and messy, as if people actually lived there, although there were still barriers to the pavements and some of the roads were gated. Ahead was rocky moorland and in front of it a field containing a collection of dubious-looking run-down caravans in various shades of dirt-colour.

‘That must be the place,’ I said.

I pulled up and climbed from the car, narrowly missing a neatly curled dog turd. The place contrasted so extremely with the main village, it was almost as if it was trying to make a point.

‘Nice.’ Jai unfolded himself slowly as if he didn’t want to get out.

Ten caravans were spread over a field of unkempt grass. No people were in evidence but one or two curtains twitched, and there was the muffled sound of kids screaming and dogs going ballistic inside the caravans.

‘The shutters are going down and the hackles are going up,’ I said.

‘Yeah. The cop-detection radar’s good in places like this.’

The largest caravan was aligned in front of the others as if on guard. Its wheels had either disappeared or sunk into the ground, so it looked as if it had sat down. The door squeaked open and a ginger Staffie charged out at us, barking and slavering. Jai and I both took a hasty step back and crashed into one another, demonstrating our smooth professionalism.

A boulder-shaped orange-haired woman emerged from the caravan, lunged forward, and grabbed the dog by the scruff of its neck. It carried on barking but at a more strangled pitch.

The woman gave us the same look I’d given the dog turd. ‘What?’

I flashed ID. ‘We’d like a word with Daniel Twigg. Which is his caravan?’

‘Why are you after him?’

‘Which is his caravan please?’

‘How do I know you’re not those animal activists? They’re dangerous, you know.’

I held up my ID again. ‘Because we’re police. Feel free to call and check.’

‘Why aren’t you wearing uniforms? You look too scruffy to be police. Well, you do.’ She pointed at me. ‘He looks okay.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ I said. ‘Which is his caravan?’

She frowned at us, causing creases in her face which matched her dog’s. After pausing long enough to demonstrate that she was still sceptical about me and was complying out of her good nature and not because she had to, the woman gestured towards a small caravan with trails of green mould drifting down its side. ‘He’s not well. He’s come back from work, so don’t go bothering him.’

‘Thanks.’

We moved gratefully away from the dog, which was baring its teeth and salivating.

‘What on earth …?’ On each side of the caravan door was a pile of rocks. But pile didn’t properly describe it. The rocks were balanced on top of one another in teetering stacks about four feet high, even though the base rocks were smaller than the higher ones.

‘Rock-balancing art,’ Jai said. ‘It’s what constitutes a wild time round here. No glue or cement or anything – just gravity and physics.’

‘I like them.’ I stepped between the rocks, worried about knocking them over.

I tapped on the door. It opened abruptly, causing the entire caravan to wobble and making me fear for the rock art. A man appeared. White-faced, nervous-looking. Mid-thirties. Longish hair. Delicate, unshaven features. Arctic Monkeys T-shirt.

Jai spoke first. ‘Are you Daniel Twigg? This is DI Meg Dalton and I’m DS Jai Sanghera. Can we ask you a few questions?’

‘You’d better come in.’ He stepped back to allow us to climb up.

The inside of the caravan was steaming hot, grubby, and smelled of cooked broccoli. We could only see one side of it, the other being separated off with a partition. Our half had a tiny kitchen area and some benches to sit on, and presumably the other half contained somewhere to sleep and a loo.

We accepted an offer of tea with some reluctance, and Daniel fished cups from the not-very-clean draining board and milk from a mini fridge.

We perched on a cramped bench while Daniel shuffled around awkwardly in the limited space. He didn’t make a drink for himself.

‘I’ve only got oat milk.’ Daniel sat opposite and plonked mugs in front of us. He grabbed a lump of what looked like Blu-tack and started fiddling with it. He had a slightly spaced-out look, and I remembered Gary saying he was a junkie, and something about pain in his back. He was moving stiffly.

‘Have you hurt your back?’ I asked.

He frowned. ‘A long time ago. It’s okay, but I have to take very strong painkillers. So bear with me. They affect my concentration sometimes.’

‘Do you have any idea where Violet is?’ I asked.

‘No.’

‘So talk us through this morning please.’

‘I arrived at the abattoir at seven, like I normally do, fed the pigs, then I felt ill. I came home, and I only found out Violet was missing when Anna phoned.’

‘Anna thinks you may have over-fed the pigs,’ I said. ‘Do you think you might have done that?’

Daniel looked up sharply. ‘What? No. Of course not. I gave them the right amount for twenty pigs. Why?’

‘They’d left their breakfast.’

Daniel’s eyes widened. ‘I didn’t give them too much.’

‘Okay, we’ll look into that. Have you got details of the new people who are taking the Category 2 waste?’

‘What new people?’

‘The contractor’s been changed. Did you organise that?’

He shook his head. ‘No, not me. I don’t know anything about that. Maybe try Gary?’

I sat back and let Jai ask questions while I watched. ‘When did you last see Violet?’ he said.

Daniel was making a miniature version of the balancing rocks – blobs stacked on top of one another. There was a tiny tremor in his hands when he manipulated the Blu-tack. How could he stand the heat in this caravan? ‘Friday, at work,’ he said.

‘How has she been recently?’

‘Okay, I think. But I don’t know a lot about her.’

‘What’s Violet like as a person?’ Jai settled deeper into his seat and put on his mates-at-the-pub voice. ‘You know, away from all the internet stuff.’

Daniel swallowed. ‘She was all right, I suppose. I didn’t give it much thought.’ His eyes flitted nervously between Jai and me. Mates-at-the-pub wasn’t working.

Jai shot me a discreet look. Daniel had used the past tense about Violet.

‘Do you know something, Daniel?’ I said. ‘You seem very upset.’

Daniel shifted back as if I was intimidating him. ‘Of course I’m upset. They were threatening her. Really badly. All of us – but Violet got it the worst. It’s been horrible. Scary.’

‘Tell us about it.’

He looked at his new sculpture – eight or nine Blu-tack blobs balanced on top of one another – and then crushed it with his thumb. ‘The website was Anna’s idea – I don’t know why I got involved. I’m not someone they should be attacking. I care about the animals. I suppose I can see why Gary and Kirsty piss people off. And Violet. But not me and Anna.’

‘Who’s Kirsty?’

‘Kirsty Nightingale. She’s got a pig farm over the valley.’

‘So the people involved in the website are yourself, Violet, Anna and Gary Finchley, and Kirsty Nightingale? Five of you?’

He nodded morosely. ‘I wish I’d stayed out of it.’

‘What did Gary and Kirsty do that pissed people off?’

Daniel picked up his blob of Blu-tack and rubbed it between his finger and thumb, looking at the Blu-tack rather than at us. ‘Gary’s just a dick. He was supposed to be doing strength challenges and stuff, but he’d stick in snide comments about vegans and vegetarians, saying they were weak and pasty. And Kirsty deliberately winds people up – it’s as if she enjoys it.’

‘So you think the Animal Vigilantes are responsible for Violet’s disappearance?’

He looked away. A tiny muscle above his eye twitched. Possibly nerves at being interviewed by cops, possibly something else. ‘Yes, I do.’

‘You believe they would hurt her?’

‘To make an example of her, yes. Of us, maybe. She might be just the first.’

‘What did you see this morning?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Did you know Violet was missing? Did you see something that worried you?’

‘No. I didn’t realise her car was there.’ He looked right at me when he said that, very deliberately. That made me suspicious. Along with mentioning not seeing the car. People rarely mentioned things they hadn’t seen.

‘Do you know what brought Violet to Gritton in the first place?’ I asked. ‘It seems a strange choice.’

‘I won’t argue with that. But no, I don’t know.’

I waited a second or two, but he said nothing more. ‘Has Violet had any arguments with anyone else that you’re aware of? Besides the animal rights people?’

‘She was annoyed with Gary.’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘He comes on to her all the time. He’s always been an arsehole.’

Back to present tense. ‘In what way?’ I asked. In my experience, there were a multitude of ways to be an arsehole.

Daniel shrugged. ‘He’s an arrogant tosser and a racist. Been like that for years. And he leches after Violet.’ A flash of emotion across Daniel’s face. Jealousy?

‘How does Violet react to that?’

‘She didn’t dare say anything – he’s her boss.’

‘But Anna runs the abattoir, not Gary?’

Daniel gave a tiny smile. ‘Yes. Their parents left it to Anna. Thought she was more responsible. Even though she doesn’t want to be here.’

‘Is that a problem for Gary?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why does he work for his sister if he hates it so much?’

Daniel shrugged. ‘Don’t ask me how Gary’s mind works. But I guess she pays him well and is softer on him than any other employer would be. He’s not the most diligent employee.’

‘Does Violet have a boyfriend or girlfriend?’ I asked.

‘I don’t think so. If she does, they wouldn’t want to see the way Gary fawns over her.’ He stood, grabbed our empty cups, pivoted round, and dumped them in the sink. His arm went to his lower back and gave it a quick rub.

‘Where were you last night?’ I asked.

Daniel ran the tap over the cups, then leaned forward to splash water on his face. ‘Here, in bed.’

‘Can anyone confirm that?’

‘I doubt it. I was on my own. And we don’t have twenty CCTV cameras for every caravan here. Not like the main village.’

‘Are you from round here?’ Jai asked.

Daniel turned to face us, dropping his hands by his sides and leaning against the sink. ‘Yes, I grew up in Gritton.’

‘Do your parents still live here then?’

‘I never knew my dad, and my mum moved away. She won’t ever come back.’

‘Why not?’

‘Can’t stand the place.’

Again the strange undercurrents. ‘Do you like living in Gritton?’ I said.

‘You drove through the village?’

I nodded.

Something dark and desperate passed across his face. ‘Can you imagine growing up there? Spied on the whole time, fences everywhere so kids can’t even leave their gardens, constantly corralled like prize ponies until they go crazy.’ That was the most animated he’d been since we’d arrived, his voice quick and forceful.

‘Did it drive you crazy?’ I said.

‘A little. A long time ago.’

The situation with Anna, Daniel and Gary made my detective nose twitch. They all worked at the abattoir and yet none of them wanted to be there. I got the impression they didn’t want to be in Gritton at all, and yet they were trapped in this place, bound together somehow.

‘Do you know anything about the Pale Child?’ I asked.

Daniel gave a small shake of his head.

‘If she sees your face, that means you’re going to die?’ I added.

He clenched his hands together, knuckles tight. ‘It’s not real. I told you – people here are strange. The old people moved here when their village was drowned under the reservoir in the 1940s. They claim you can still hear the bells of the old church ringing, even though it’s underwater and had been knocked down anyway, plus the bells had been taken to Chelmorton and Chaddesden. That’s how reliable the locals are. They’ll tell you about a vicar who gives a sermon for the dead once a year. The Pale Child thing is just an offshoot from all that. There’s nothing in it.’

‘What’s the story behind it?’ I asked.

A muscle twitched under Daniel’s eye. ‘She’s supposed to be a child who died in Victorian times. People see her through the trees. Or her ghost or whatever. If she sees your face, it means you’re going to die.’

We were all silent for a moment, then I said, ‘Did Violet see the Pale Child?’ I recalled that Anna had claimed she didn’t.

A flash of fear passed across Daniel’s face. Then he gave a quick nod and said, ‘Yes. At dusk in the woods on the edge of Gritton. She was sure the Pale Child saw her face.’

4

We pulled up outside the home of Anna’s girlfriend, Esther, where Violet rented a room. It was one of a row of stone cottages facing a park. Roses and hollyhocks around the door; full-on chocolate-box front garden. It was in the excessively perfect part of the village, bordering the valley that swooped down to the abattoir, but far enough away that the abattoir didn’t make its presence felt.

The bucolic view was ruined by a police van and assorted members of the search team. There was always a conflict in these cases – preservation of life came first, so we had to comb the area with the thoroughness of a Labrador looking for treats. But if this turned out to be a crime scene, we’d have inevitably compromised the evidence. We got out of the car and suited up.

‘What was that about a child?’ Jai said.

I filled him in on what Anna had told me. ‘She was reluctant to talk about it,’ I said. ‘And she claimed Violet hadn’t seen the Pale Child, whereas Daniel just said she had.’

‘Hmm. Weird.’ Jai struggled with one of his overshoes. ‘Daniel likes Violet, doesn’t he?’

‘Yes. And there was a hint of someone a little less passive under all that hippieness.’

‘It’s always the quiet ones,’ Jai said.

‘Except it isn’t. It’s often the belligerent, aggressive and extremely loud ones. But yes, I wonder what Daniel’s like when he’s angry. And I think he saw something this morning at the abattoir that he’s not telling us about.’

One of the plants in the garden was scenting the air with a sweet and nostalgic fragrance. A memory hit me from childhood. From the time after my sister became ill. Playing in the garden, me wanting Carrie to be her old self and help me make a mud-castle for worms. What a strange child I’d been.

We made our way to Violet’s small bedroom. It was simple and serious-looking, not what I’d expected from someone who frequented YouTube in a pink bikini. A bookcase dominated one wall, the bed was covered by a plain white duvet, and a printer sat neatly on a desk in the corner.

I walked over to Violet’s bookcase and scanned the titles. A wide range of novels, from detective fiction through to a cluster of magic realism and a whole shelf of orange-spined classics.

‘Poncy books,’ Jai said. ‘Not your Fifty Shades type of girl.’

‘And look at the non-fiction,’ I said. ‘Journalism after Fake News, Journalism for the Internet World, The New Feminism, Women and Art.’

‘Feminism?’ Jai said. ‘She prances around semi-naked on the internet. Does that count as post-feminism?’

I walked over to Violet’s desk. There was no sign of a laptop. I leafed through a pile of papers by the printer. Articles from the internet: ‘Art and ethics’, ‘Creepypasta and internet memes’, ‘When stuff goes mad on the net’, ‘Why stripping can be a feminist act’ and ‘Why stripping can never be a feminist act’.

‘Looks like there’s more to Violet than meets the eye,’ I said. ‘Nothing about meat though, or the threats from the animal rights people.’

‘Hang on,’ Jai said, and reached for a paper from the floor. He held it up for me to read: ‘When online threats turn to physical violence’.

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘She was worried.’

I turned to Violet’s bed. The duvet had been dragged across it in a half-hearted effort to make things look neat, but you could still see the indentation in the pillow where her head had been the last time she’d slept there. On the other pillow was a neatly folded cotton nightshirt with a penguin on it.

I stared at the penguin. I could feel the old me starting to come back. Struggling to get to the surface like a drowning swimmer. I wanted this girl to be okay.

Back at the station, I stood in the incident room we’d been allocated, wondering if the temperatures were breaching any health and safety regulations. The place had the ambience of a Turkish sauna. I eyed my team. They were fanning themselves and muttering about the heat, sweating extravagantly.

In front of me, too close, was DS Craig Cooper. Red-faced, puffy, damp. There was a small cut above his right eye. I knew this was a bad thought, but if someone had smacked him, I reckoned he deserved it. Next to Craig – turned slightly away – was DC Fiona Redfern, usually competent almost to the point of being annoying, but currently distracted by a workplace conflict I hadn’t got to the bottom of. Then Jai, not looking too bad, but unable to stop moaning about the weather for more than five seconds, partly to wind up Craig, who could never grasp that Jai had been born in England and was not acclimatised to the weather in the Punjab. Then a few more DCs I didn’t know well, and then the indexers, including a new civilian investigator called Donna, shipped in and paid a pittance to type stuff into our HOLMES database. She was a retired crime scene officer, so at least she knew the ropes.

I steeled myself to do the briefing. This case had all the makings of being seriously high profile and I knew my boss, DCI Richard Atkins, would be concerned about me. My gran had recently died in circumstances which he knew had pushed all my buttons. But if anything it had left me numb, lacking in emotion, closer to what Richard would find desirable in a detective. Maybe this could be a chance for me to not get too involved. To prove I could follow the rules and do everything by the book. But for now, Richard wasn’t around. He was on his way home from sunning himself in a secret location that we were all very intrigued about.

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Let’s get started. Yes, it’s a little warm and it would be nice if we had air-con, but we don’t, so let’s consider all the moaning about that done. We have a high-risk misper, Violet Armstrong, aged eighteen, disappeared from the abattoir at Gritton village yesterday evening. The last person to see her was a neighbour, when Violet went out at around eight.’

All eyes were on the over-sized image of Violet’s face – dark eyes bright with expectation, confident straight-toothed smile, peachy skin.

‘The actual Violet Armstrong?’ Craig said. ‘Bikini-strutting Violet?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘The actual Violet Armstrong.’

‘Wow.’ Craig licked his lips in an unpleasant manner. ‘Her videos are—’

‘Yes, thank you, Craig,’ I said. ‘We’re all familiar with her videos.’

Craig smiled. ‘Oh, are you? There’s a thought.’

‘A more pleasant one than picturing you leering over them,’ Jai said.

‘Enough of the videos,’ I snapped. ‘She’s a high-risk missing person. Treat her like anyone else.’

Fiona gave Craig a look of contempt before turning back to me. ‘Why was she at the abattoir at night?’

‘Works there. Why she would have chosen to work in an abattoir in an obscure Derbyshire village is one of the things we need to find out. This morning, her car was there, but no sign of her. No note. The CCTV was smashed. And her watch was by one of the pig pens, with the strap broken. There was blood on it, which has gone to be tested.’

‘By the pig pens?’ Fiona said. ‘Was that where she’d been cleaning?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘She shouldn’t have been in that area. We don’t know why she went there.’

‘I don’t suppose she was petting the pigs,’ Fiona said. ‘Given her views.’

‘CSI are there,’ I said. We were supposed to call them CSI now, just like on the TV show. I felt for the general public when our lot turned up sweating profusely inside their protective gear, instead of a bunch of Hollywood-polished Americans. ‘We have her laptop, which was in her locker with her bag and keys. Her purse was there, with her credit cards, and her passport was at home.’

‘She didn’t leave of her own accord then,’ Fiona said.

‘There are definitely some worrying signs. Violet had been receiving threats from animal rights activists. Social media comments saying she was asking to have her throat slit, and one this morning from a member of the Animal Vigilantes, suggesting she’d got what she deserved. We don’t know how the commenter knew Violet was missing.’

‘Shite,’ Craig said. ‘I always said those animal rights people were nuts. They’re the ones that wear those meat suits, aren’t they? What do you think, Meg? You hang around with those sorts.’

I sighed. ‘Just because I’m vegetarian doesn’t make me an animal rights activist, although I wouldn’t rule it out for the future.’

‘I can’t believe you even respond to him,’ Fiona said. She’d been short with Craig recently, and she had a point. Ignoring him was usually the soundest strategy, but I had an enduring sense that deep inside (very deep indeed) there was a decent guy trying to get out.

‘Anyway,’ I said. ‘I don’t want us to assume Violet’s disappearance is anything to do with animal rights. It’s much more likely it’s a family member or boyfriend.’

‘Is she in a relationship?’ Fiona said.

‘Not that we know of – yet. But that doesn’t mean she isn’t. Her best friend’s coming in.’

‘What about family?’

‘Her parents are on holiday in New Zealand – of all the inconvenient spots. They’re on their way back. No siblings.’ I fanned my face and took a swig of water. ‘Christ, this weather.’

‘Not going to break for a week or more now,’ Jai said. ‘And the abattoir’s not far from the wildfire, so if she has wandered off for any reason, let’s hope she hasn’t got too close to that. It’s not under control yet.’

‘It’s been a nightmare for the poor firefighters,’ Craig said. ‘They’ve been missing their afternoon naps.’

‘Well, I’m sure the weather will break soon, and they can get back to posing for calendars and naked kitten-rescuing.’ I wiped my forehead. I’d never sweated so much in my life. I was even repulsing myself. ‘If it carries on much longer, I might have to dig out my dress.’

Jai fanned himself. ‘If it carries on much longer, I might have to dig out mine.’

Craig snorted.

‘Why not?’ I said. ‘It’s ludicrous that it’s not seen as okay for men to wear dresses. It says all sorts of things about society’s attitudes that you really don’t want me to go into right now.’

‘No, we really don’t,’ Craig said. ‘And we also don’t want to see Jai in a dress.’

‘Anyway,’ I said. ‘The people who have easy access to the abattoir are: Anna Finchley, who owns it; Gary Finchley, who’s Anna’s brother and works there; and Daniel Twigg, who also works there. They all hate each other. Gary said Anna can’t stand Violet. He reckons Daniel’s a junkie, but he appears to be functioning. I think it’s drugs for pain relief – he has a bad back.’

‘Gary sounds like a nice chap,’ Jai said.

‘Yes, God love the bitter ones. Anyway, there’s that lot, and others could have got into the abattoir if they were loaned gate-clickers and keys. Or Violet could have let someone in. But if she wasn’t due at the abattoir till ten, why did she leave home at eight? It’s only a five-minute drive. Did she arrive at the abattoir early, maybe to meet someone? Or did she go somewhere else?’

‘Then there’s the abattoir waste,’ Jai added. ‘The Category 2 waste had been taken away before we arrived this morning, and we’re having trouble tracking down the company that disposed of it.’

‘Make no assumptions,’ I said. ‘We don’t have a body. We’re treating this as a high-risk missing person. Okay? We think she was wearing white overalls and DM-type boots. Witnesses say she always wears a brooch on a chain around her neck: a pelican. Never takes it off. There are lead mines in the area – the dogs should find a scent if she’s wandered off and fallen into one. There aren’t many houses nearby, but in the main Gritton village there’s loads of CCTV, so that should help us.’

‘Have we got her phone?’ Fiona said.

‘Unfortunately not.’

‘We’re on to the service provider to get call records and tower data,’ Jai added. ‘But if she didn’t make any calls, we’re screwed. And even if she did, the data doesn’t always help – there aren’t many towers in that area. But the techies are doing what they can. And before you ask, there was no sat-nav in her car.’

I was conscious of a general shuffling of feet, as if they were keen to dash off. To catch the golden hour.

‘Without veering into the realms of the very unlikely, I reckon there are four basic scenarios,’ I said. ‘One – she’s alive and she left the abattoir on her own; two – she’s alive and she left the abattoir with someone, possibly against her will; three – she’s dead and someone disposed of her body at the abattoir, possibly with the missing waste; four – she’s dead and someone took her body away from the abattoir. If she’s alive and left with someone, or if she’s dead and someone took her away, that would most likely have involved a car. Which somebody may have seen. Do you agree?’

They all nodded earnestly – except Craig, who was looking at me with the expression of a dog eyeing up a lamp post.

‘Anything else?’ I asked. ‘No matter how unlikely.’ I tried to soften my tone. I did my best to make the briefings non-scary, so people could talk without fear of having the piss taken, although it could be challenging with Craig and Jai around. I was well aware that if I wasn’t careful, I could end up with a queue of introverts at my door straight after the briefing, jostling for space with the folk from intelligence strategy, CSI, forensics, and family and media liaison. That I did not need.

But nobody said anything. They were too far into greyhounds-in-starting-boxes mode.

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Dismiss nothing at this stage. We’ll do a short press briefing later today – get the photos out and an initial appeal. And let’s find that abattoir waste before it’s turned into puppy food and porky twizzlers.’

5

Violet’s friend Izzy sat in one of our nicer interview rooms looking very young and overwhelmed. She had a standard-issue teenage look with long, straightened hair and highly defined eyebrows. I was hoping Jai would turn on his charm and get her talking, because if anyone knew what was going on with Violet, it was likely to be her best friend.

Izzy fiddled with her hair, stroking it like a pet. ‘Is Violet okay? She’s gone like totally off-grid.’

Jai activated big-brown-eyes mode. ‘When did you last hear from her?’

Izzy softened. Brown-eyes mode successfully received. ‘Yesterday afternoon. She said she’d come up with more info and she’d be in touch later. But she never called and she hasn’t posted anywhere. Something must have happened to her.’

This was kids nowadays. Anyone who was out of the social media loop for more than a few hours was assumed dead or at least in a coma.

‘Have you still got the message she sent you?’ Jai asked.

Izzy fished out her phone and tapped the screen. ‘Here.’

Five p.m. on Sunday: Think I might be on to something. Let you know later xx.

‘On to something about what?’ Jai said.

Izzy sniffed. ‘Probably about her real dad.’

‘Her real dad?’ Jai said.

‘Yeah, she was adopted.’

I glanced at Jai. He raised his eyebrows. We hadn’t known that.

Izzy carried on: ‘She doesn’t talk about it much. Her real mum’s dead, but Violet knew she originally came from Gritton. She doesn’t know who her dad was.’

‘Is that why she found a job in Gritton? So she could look for her biological father?’

‘Yes. But she didn’t want anyone to know. With her being … who she is and all that. She was really messed up about it. I told her it might be best to leave it be, but she wouldn’t. Do you think she found him and …’

We waited, but she didn’t say more. At least that answered the question of why Violet had come to a backwater village in the boonies. ‘Did she have any idea who her biological father was?’ Jai asked.

‘No. She knew her mother’s name – Rebecca Smith – but she died when Violet was a baby. So Violet was asking questions in the village, hoping to find out who her dad was. But, like, carefully, not telling anyone why she was asking. I wondered if somebody had told her. And if Violet was going to try and see him. Last night, I mean.’

‘If she found her biological father,’ I said, ‘do you think there’s a chance she might stay with him for a while and not tell anyone?’

‘She’d contact me. She’d know how worried I’d be. And she’d want to tell me she’d found him.’

I was holding on to the possibility that Violet had disappeared voluntarily, even as the likelihood slipped away with each passing minute. ‘You know you have to tell us if she’s been in touch, Izzy, don’t you?’ I said. ‘Even if she made you promise not to? We’re very concerned about her.’

Izzy shook her head, hair flying. ‘She hasn’t been in touch! I’m not lying. Honestly!’

I should have let smooth-operator Jai carry on asking the questions. I didn’t have the knack with this one.

I smiled at her, trying to get her to calm the hell down, and indicated to Jai to carry on. ‘How does Violet get on with her parents?’ he asked. ‘Her adoptive parents, I mean.’

There was a tiny wobble to her chin, but Izzy spoke confidently. ‘She’s fallen out with them – her dad especially. They never wanted her to go to Gritton. They said it was a horrible place, full of pig farms and abattoirs. That’s when Violet started doing the videos. To piss them off. Her mum’s vegetarian.’

‘She made the videos to annoy her parents?’

‘At first, yeah. We were messing around, having a barbecue. Violet had bought steak to irritate her mum, and I videoed her cooking it in a bikini. We uploaded it, for a laugh. And it went crazy. Thousands of views and all these people saying how hot she was. She didn’t realise it would get nasty, and part of her liked it. As for pissing her parents off – she hit the jackpot. Plus she’s making money now, you know, from adverts. And then some burger company paid her to eat their stuff and put photos on Instagram. But it’s not like she was ever a massive meat-eater. So she’s being a bit of a hypocrite. Before she was, like, the face of steak, she had a go at some lad at our school about eating factory-farmed meat. Said it was like rape.’

‘What did she say exactly?’ Jai asked.

‘This boy had said the usual thing about bacon, like, Oh but it tastes so good. Like the fact he enjoyed eating it meant it was okay, no matter how hideous a life the animal had had. And Violet said, And that’s enough reason? That it tastes good? Would you rape someone, if it felt good to you? It was harsh, but her reasoning kind of made sense in a Violet sort of way. It got a bit heated.’

That sounded more like the Violet who had the feminist books on her shelves. ‘So it’s a bit of a turnaround, then, doing what she does with the videos?’

‘Yeah, I suppose … But, like I said, she wanted to annoy her parents. She got a kick out of people going on about her and saying she’s hot. Violet’s … well, she’s complicated.’ Izzy’s face crumpled briefly before she regained control.

‘What’s it been like for you, Izzy?’ I asked. ‘With Violet suddenly becoming so well known?’

For a second she looked like she was about to cry. She shoved a strand of hair into her mouth, caught herself, and took it out again. ‘It’s okay, I suppose.’

It clearly wasn’t okay.

‘Is Violet in a relationship?’ Jai asked.

Izzy’s eyes widened. ‘No. No, she isn’t.’

‘Anything casual? Anyone she hooks up with?’

She blinked. ‘No. I’m pretty sure there’s no one.’

I made a note to follow that up. I didn’t trust Izzy’s answers.

‘Have you visited Violet in Gritton?’ I asked.

Izzy reddened. ‘Once. We went out for a drink with some people she knew.’

‘Oh? Who was there?’

‘The people from her work.’

‘How did Violet get along with her colleagues?’

Izzy swallowed. ‘Same as Violet always does. Being the centre of attention. That guy Daniel was mooning over her.’

That was interesting. Daniel had told us that Gary was the one doing the mooning.

‘What did Violet think of Daniel?’

‘Not much. I’m not sure she even noticed him. He’s like really old.’

‘Did Violet talk about anyone else she’d met?’ I asked.

Izzy shook her head.

‘Did she mention anyone she’d fallen out with?’

Another shake. ‘No. But … I think she’s in trouble. She’s …’

‘What, Izzy?’

Izzy swallowed. ‘She’s my friend, so … I like her despite this, but she does get on the wrong side of people. I mean, she deliberately winds people up, and the threats were getting worse and worse. I think she might have pushed it too far and those awful Animal Vigilantes in the meat suits have hurt her.’

Jai had gone to investigate Violet’s parentage while I mulled over progress so far. Violet’s parents were still on their way home from the other side of the planet. At least we could rule them out. The obvious candidates for hurting Violet were the Animal Vigilantes, but then again all her colleagues were a bit dodgy, and we’d want to take a close look at the biological father if we could find him. Plus I couldn’t let go of my hunch that there was a relationship in the background. Relationships were always interesting, especially ones that people wanted to hide.

I browsed the comments posted on Violet’s videos, getting a strong gag-reaction from reading both the enthusiasts (‘We want to spit-roast you, Violet’) and the haters (‘You deserve to spend your life locked up in a cage and then get your throat cut’). I highlighted anything particularly virulent from both sides.

I looked up to see Jai approaching with two cups of coffee. He placed one on my desk. ‘We’ve got her adoption papers. As Izzy said, the mother is Rebecca Smith. No father listed, but we’re investigating. You look stressed.’

‘Thanks.’ I gulped the coffee down. ‘Doesn’t get any better, does it? I keep hoping one day I’ll come in and a rich benefactor will have bought us an espresso machine.’

‘Vivid imagination you have.’

‘Not as vivid as the people commenting on Violet’s videos,’ I said. ‘Have you seen this stuff?’

‘I had a quick look. Pretty dispiriting.’ Jai perched on my desk and flipped a knee up so his calf was across his thigh.

I recoiled. ‘Christ, Jai. Is that some kind of primitive display ritual? Imagine if I did that on your desk.’

‘It’s a flimsy desk, Meg – British workmanship. I wouldn’t risk it.’

I tried not to smile. Clearly Jai and I were getting back on track, but I vowed to avoid mentioning his girlfriend and her conflicted attitude to his children. ‘Sit on the bloody chair, with your legs reasonably close together, and shut up.’

Jai hoicked himself off the table and sat unwillingly in my guest chair.

‘Right,’ I said. ‘These comments on Violet’s videos – loads have appeared today saying she’s been killed, but we’re obviously more interested in the ones from before her disappearance was made public. Even the ones who like her turn potentially homicidal if she doesn’t respond to their pitiful observations.’

‘Yeah, and it’s not like they even start subtle. But whether they’d harm her in real life, I don’t know.’

‘Rejected men do have that tendency, Jai. Although I agree, the online ones usually stay there, where nobody can see how pathetic they are.’

‘I’m not sure why the pro-animal ones hate her so much. What has she actually done? She’s not drowning puppies.’

‘She’s making meat look sexy,’ I said.

‘But it’s not enough for someone to harm her, surely?’

‘Izzy said she deliberately winds people up, and there are so many people at the moment who are permanently furious, maybe she pushed one of them over the edge and they came to the abattoir to confront her. Anything on the biological father yet?’

‘No,’ Jai said. ‘But we’re carrying on with the house-to-house. Hoping someone in the village had told Violet her dad’s name. Or maybe we’ll find a lead on her laptop. You reckon she might be with him?’

‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘Kids can be remarkably forgiving of some bloke that shot his load two decades ago, as opposed to the poor sods who slaved to bring them up.’

‘But why leave the car and go missing in the middle of the night? Why not contact Izzy?’

Fiona poked her head around the door. ‘I think we’ve found out where Violet was between eight and ten last night. Results from the house-to-house. Someone saw a car that matches Violet’s.’

‘Excellent,’ I said. ‘Where?’

‘Visiting a man called Tony Nightingale. He’s the father of Kirsty the pig farmer – you know, the one who’s on the Great Meat Debate website with Violet and co. He’s a pig farmer as well – with a farm at the edge of Gritton. I’ve spoken to him and he’s confirmed Violet did visit, and apparently she was saying strange things. He’s happy for someone to call on him.’

I groaned and looked at my watch. ‘Oh God. Why did I arrange for Hannah to come this evening? I’ll have to feed her from the freezer.’

‘Hannah will be devastated,’ Jai said. ‘She’ll be expecting eight courses of cordon bleu cuisine, based on your past performances.’

‘Sod off, Jai. Those chips I got you from George’s were a perfectly nice supper. And as I recall, I offered you cereal for pudding.’

‘I rest my case.’

‘I suppose the lovely Suki whips up fresh and fragrant curries every night?’ Damn it, I’d gone there.

Jai looked down. ‘She’s away at the moment. She’ll be glad to miss the kids at least.’

‘Right. Okay.’ There was a pause while my brain searched for something non-inflammatory to say about Suki and the kids, while contemplating Violet’s visit to this pig farmer. ‘Listen, Jai … You’re only round the corner now. Why don’t you come over tonight after we’ve visited the pig farmer? You could meet Hannah. I can’t believe I’ve never introduced you. You’ll like her.’ And I’d make sure I didn’t mention Jai’s girlfriend, and we could go back to being normal with each other again.

‘Ah, no, I couldn’t crash your party,’ he said.

‘You may as well. Witness the rare event of me providing food, albeit from the freezer?’

He hesitated, then said, ‘Yeah. Okay, I will. Thanks.’

‘Good. First, let’s see what Violet was doing visiting a pig farmer last night.’

6

Jai and I pulled onto the road out of Buxton. The sun was a vivid orange, and smoke from the wildfire was drifting up from the hills, leaving a hint of bitterness in the air.

‘Did you get any more info on him?’ Jai asked.

‘Tony Nightingale? Pig farmer and all-round country gent, from a long line of similar. Rolling around in cash, by all accounts – and owns a lot of the land around here. Violet turned up at his house around eight, saying she was related to him. Could be a good lead. Maybe it’s all a bit Thomas Hardy and he’s her biological father?’

We drove through Winnats Pass, a spectacular, steep-sided limestone valley with cliffs on all sides, formed from a long-ago collapsed cave system. It had once been the main route between Sheffield and Manchester, famous for its bad weather and bandits. We went another mile or so in silence, and then ground to a halt in the traffic of Castleton. Tiredness was catching up with me, and I wished again that I hadn’t invited Hannah over.

We chugged onwards, leaving Castleton and heading through the Hope Valley and up through Bamford, before reaching the outskirts of Gritton.

A red-brick farmhouse sat by the road, a tree-lined lane curling round behind it. A fence corralled a small garden, and an old path overgrown with weeds led to what looked like the original front door. A sign proclaimed Mulberry Farm – Rare Breed Pork. It was a decent-sized house, set apart from the neighbours, but wasn’t that grand for a supposed country gent.

I drove round to a yard at the rear, passing a field inhabited by pigs wallowing in mud. I regarded them with envy.

‘Nice,’ Jai said. ‘Shame they’re going to end up on someone’s breakfast plate.’

‘You could always go veggie,’ I said, ‘if you’re feeling bad.’

‘But bacon tastes so good …’

I remembered what Violet apparently said. That using the taste of bacon as an excuse for eating it was like saying it was okay to rape someone if you enjoyed it. Definitely an odd thing for our bikini-wearing sausage-sizzler to come out with.

We knocked on a solid, newly-painted door at the back of the house. To the side was a rose garden, overgrown and knotty, with long grasses growing between thorned stems.

The door was opened by a man with the corduroyed, bespectacled look of a university professor. He didn’t fit my image of a pig farmer, although I told myself there was no rational reason why a pig farmer should look like a pig. Then I noticed he had a thin covering of light, fair hair, almost like the hair on a pig’s back, and I felt strangely reassured.

We showed the man our ID and he nodded calmly, confirmed he was Tony Nightingale, and ushered us inside. The door led into an unmodernised farmhouse kitchen, complete with Aga, non-fitted wooden units, and pungent, aged black Labrador. We sat at a Formica table while Tony Nightingale made tea. The Labrador lay on its side, only raising an eyebrow in greeting.

‘Violet Armstrong came here last night?’ I said.

‘Yes.’ Tony placed a teapot, cups, and a milk jug in front of us, and lowered himself into a chair. ‘I’m sorry. It’s all such a shock. She said some rather strange things.’

‘What did she say?’ I asked.

Jai fished out a notebook and pen.

‘I didn’t know who she was. I don’t know about blogging and videos or whatever it is she does. But she told me not to tell anyone she’d come because she didn’t want any publicity. And then …’ He put his cup down with a trembling hand. ‘Sorry. She said she was my granddaughter. She said her mother was dead and she wanted to find her relatives. And to find out who her father was.’

‘Did you get to the bottom of it?’

He folded his arms. ‘She’d been told that her mother was called Rebecca Smith. My daughter is Rebecca and she took my sister’s name, Smith, when she went to live with her. But my daughter, Bex, isn’t dead.’

‘Did your daughter have a baby?’

Tony looked out into the garden. The evening sun was glistening on a climbing rose. A flash of anguish passed across his face. ‘If she did, she never told me.’

‘How old would Bex have been eighteen years ago?’

‘Only sixteen.’

‘Was she living with you at that time?’

Tony looked down. ‘She lived with her aunt. My sister, Janet.’

‘Oh?’

‘Yes, I’m afraid so. It was … hard. My other daughter, Kirsty, lived with me.’

‘What was the reason for Rebecca – Bex – living with her aunt and not with you?’

Tony jumped up. ‘I forgot the biscuits.’ He opened a wall-mounted cupboard and fished out a biscuit tin which he placed on the table with a flourish. ‘Only Rich Tea, I’m afraid.’

‘Thanks.’ Jai was straight in there, as was the aged Labrador, who’d done a Lazarus-like manoeuvre and was now sitting staring dolefully at Jai while he rummaged in the tin.

‘Ignore him,’ Tony said. ‘Burglars could maraud through the house unimpeded as far as he’s concerned, as long as they didn’t open any food containers.’

‘Aw,’ Jai said. ‘He’s hard to resist.’

I smiled. He was indeed hard to resist. I blamed those hypnotic eyes. ‘So, Bex went to live with your sister?’ I said.

‘Yes. My wife, Nina, and I split up. Nina was from the Ukraine and she returned there when Bex was only three. I found it difficult to cope with two children.’

‘Nina left the children with you?’

He nodded. ‘I suppose she thought they’d have a better life here. I was terribly upset with her at the time, but now I think she was suffering from depression. I should have given her more support.’

I spoke gently. ‘If Bex didn’t live with you, is there a chance she could have had a baby eighteen years ago?’

‘She was only sixteen. And Violet was sure her mother was dead. I tried to call Bex, but she hasn’t got back to me. Then I phoned Kirsty, to see if she knew anything about it, but she didn’t. I can’t ask my sister – she died of breast cancer two years ago.’

‘I’m sorry about that. We will need to speak to Bex. You say she took your sister’s surname when she went to live with her?’

‘Yes. Smith. For all intents and purposes, my sister adopted her. It was much easier with schools and things if she took her name.’

‘Okay. We’ll take her contact details from you.’

‘Oh Lord.’

‘Before we go, we’d like to clarify – the missing girl, Violet, was born in May 2000. When did you last see your daughter before and after that date?’

A look of shame crossed his face. ‘She stayed here for a month the summer before that. I haven’t seen her since 1999.’

‘Is there a reason you haven’t seen her?’

He swallowed. ‘She doesn’t like coming to Gritton, and it’s hard for me to get away, what with the animals.’

‘Why doesn’t she like coming to Gritton?’

He looked out of the window at the old rose garden. ‘I think she just has a very busy life. She’s a dog trainer.’

I knew all about fathers who didn’t see their daughters, but a ‘busy life’ didn’t explain what was going on here. I was very keen to meet Bex.

‘I love my daughter,’ Tony said. ‘It’s just … shocking the way the years slip by.’ He pointed to a framed photograph on an old dresser. ‘That’s her. That’s my Bex.’

The photo was small and I had to stand and take a step closer to see it clearly. A slim, dark-haired girl of about sixteen stood next to a huge, spotty pig, smiling with exactly the same radiance as Violet.

‘Do you think this Violet might be my granddaughter?’ Tony said.

Looking at the photograph, he must have suspected as much. ‘We’re investigating that possibility.’

Tony nodded slowly. ‘Right.’

‘What time did Violet leave your house last night?’ I asked.

‘About nine thirty. She said she had a job at the abattoir. She had white overalls on, so I suppose she planned to go straight there. But she was agitated when she left.’

‘Violet didn’t react well to your conversation?’

‘She was upset. Kept asking me who her father might be. I said I had no idea and she didn’t like that at all. I’m afraid she left here in a terrible state.’

7

Bex – August 1999

Bex sat in the back of the taxi twisting her fingers and praying the driver wouldn’t start talking again. The closer they got to Gritton, the more her stomach climbed towards her mouth. It took all her energy to clamp her lips shut instead of shouting to the driver, No! Turn round! Take me back to the station so I can go home!

The driver lifted his chin. ‘Visiting relatives?’

She didn’t want to talk. She had no idea what might spew out. His previous comments had required no answer. Everyone thinks taxi drivers are racist, don’t they, love? But I don’t mind immigrants. We had a Polish bloke do our bathroom. She’d been able to sit and smile and nod, while her own private mental battle raged on.

If she tried to speak, would her insides erupt? She risked it. ‘I’m visiting my dad.’

‘Do you live with your mum then, love?’

‘My mum’s dead.’ The casual lie slipped out. Easier to say than, My mum left when I was three, and went back to the Ukraine. Because what kind of mother would do that?

‘Oh, darling, I’m sorry. When did she die?’

‘Thirteen years ago.’ Bex touched the pelican brooch she wore on a chain around her neck. ‘It’s okay. I live with Aunt Janet in Southampton. She’s nice.’

That seemed to satisfy him. He didn’t ask the obvious question. Why don’t you live with your dad? She didn’t want to answer that one, even in her own mind. There was only one possible answer: Because he blames me for what happened. And she couldn’t handle that.

She needed the driver to shut up so she could prepare herself. She knew her dad didn’t want her to visit him at all, never mind for a month. Why on earth had she forced herself on him? Her aunt had been against it too – begging Bex not to go to Gritton. But Bex felt a sick desperation to be closer to her dad and Kirsty. A hollowness inside her that she was sure would go away if only she knew them properly. When you’ve already lost your mum, you need to hang on to the rest of your family. When they’d done The Importance of Being Earnest at school, she’d been the only one in her class not to laugh at the joke about losing both parents.

Her dad and Kirsty had visited a few times – she’d last seen them a couple of years ago – but it had always felt unreal, like her dad wasn’t really her dad, her sister just a stranger. Surely a month together in Gritton would fix that? So why was the prospect so terrifying?

She’d written instructions to herself in her diary that morning, which now seemed childish and pathetic.

1. Pretend your dad wanted you to visit.

2. Get on well with Dad and Kirsty.

3. Make a friend in Gritton.

She smoothed her dress over her legs. She’d tried to look nice, so they’d be glad to see her. A new yellow coat, a dress instead of jeans, girly shoes. She peered out of the window. It was dark ahead, despite only being early evening.

‘Looks like a storm,’ the driver said, and the rain came pouring down, pounding the taxi’s roof. ‘You’re unlucky – it’s been dry for weeks.’

The taxi splashed through a puddle and the driver turned the wipers up to maximum. Bex saw the sign, Welcome to Gritton, but the surroundings were hidden by the sudden downpour. She closed her eyes. She had a picture of Gritton in her mind. The dark woods behind her dad’s farm, the rocks standing on the hill like prison guards, the reservoir that drew the light from the sky deep into itself. It must have come from photographs. She couldn’t possibly remember it from when she was three, and she hadn’t been back since.

The driver interrupted her thoughts. ‘You want me to take you right into the village?’

‘Yes please.’

‘Some people get dropped here.’

‘Could you take me to Mulberry Farm please, on the Bamford road?’ Why would he not want to take her into the village, when rain was coming out of the sky like bathwater down a plug? When Bex didn’t have a raincoat, and had a large case?

The storm had darkened the sky to graphite. A fork of lightning danced over the gritstone edge above the village, and Bex cringed, waiting for the thunderclap. It came a second later, making her jump even though she was expecting it.

The lane that led to her dad’s farm had turned to a stream, and the taxi churned up a wave of water on each side as they cruised down. The driver clenched his hands around the steering wheel. ‘This village,’ he muttered.

Bex told herself it was just the weather. The black skies, pounding rain and cascades of water gushing over the hillside. But she felt it. Something ominous about Gritton.

It would be okay. She pictured herself in her dad’s kitchen. He’d be delighted to see her, Kirsty would too. They’d drink mugs of tea and maybe have cake. There would be a reason he’d not wanted her to live at the farm with them. A reason she’d been too young to understand. A reason other than that he blamed her.

The taxi driver finally pulled up at the front of the house, by an old gate overgrown with brambles. He shouted over the noise of the rain against the windscreen. ‘Here okay?’

The front door of her dad’s house was covered in chipped green paint, edged with moss. The sight of it made Bex want to be sick. The old garden gate was rusting, and the paving slabs were cracked, dandelions thrusting through.

The driver jumped out of the car and darted round to open her door. She sat a moment. ‘All right, love?’ he said, a hint of nervousness in his voice, maybe wondering if she was going to sit there and refuse to move, rain hammering the roof of the car above her. He moved away, popped the boot open, took out her case and dumped it on the ground.

She dragged herself out and grabbed her case.

‘Do you need a hand?’ the driver said, already climbing back into the car.

‘No.’ She shoved a twenty at him. ‘Keep the change, and—’

The driver pocketed the cash and accelerated away as if he had wolves at his tail.

Bex took a deep breath, then dragged her suitcase through the rusty gate and up the overgrown path. The rain and wind were so strong it was as if she was at sea, being thrown around by waves. She banged her fist on the door, but it had a dead feel, as if nobody had opened it for years. There was no bell. She kicked the base of the door, feeling her tears hot under the freezing rain. What kind of dad would do this? Not pick her up from the station, not even be at the door to welcome her.

She hauled the suitcase back to the lane and dragged it onto a path that led to the rear of the house. The weight of it felt monstrous and she had a fleeting memory of packing it, folding summer clothes and imagining herself spending mellow, warm days with her family. She swallowed a sob.

She’d expected to see a back door that she could knock on. It hadn’t occurred to her that anyone would be outside. But there were people in the back yard, visible through the drenching, buffeting rain. Three of them, encased in huge yellow waterproofs, pulling things around. They were piling up sandbags, trying to stop the torrent of water flowing off the rocks and heading for the house.

One of the people turned towards her. Kirsty, her older sister, her face half-hidden by a huge hood. Bex opened her mouth to shout a greeting, but Kirsty turned away again and carried on shifting sandbags. Had she not seen Bex? She’d stared right at her. Bex felt a flush of humiliation. Had her sister deliberately ignored her?

Bex couldn’t make herself call out. Instead she stood in the yard, invisible, rain bouncing off her stupid city coat, her case deposited in the river which gushed towards the house, her shoes engulfed in pig-shitty water, and let the tears flow.

8

Meg – Present day

Monday

I returned from creating a salad – or rather, pouring a bag of salad into a bowl – and found Hannah in my living room watching a cop drama on TV. Hamlet was sprawled over her lap, kneading exuberantly. I handed her a glass of wine and plonked myself on the sofa. My mind kept replaying the conversation with Tony Nightingale, but I tried to put Violet from my thoughts and focus instead on my evening with Hannah.

Hannah shifted Hamlet’s paws. ‘Good job I’m low on nerve-endings around there, Hamlet. Yay for spina bifida.’

‘Oh God, shall I move him?’ I could never tell how serious Hannah was being when she said things like that.

‘He’s fine. But do you need help with the food? Thai green curry. Home-made. I’m impressed.’

‘I never said it was made in this home. I got it from the garden centre last week and stuck it in the freezer. I’ve no time to cook, not with a high-profile missing person case which I can’t afford to cock up.’

‘Oh wow, you mean that girl? The sexy sausage girl? Are you on that? I’m honoured you’re even here.’

Violet’s face flashed into my mind. A girl of contradictions. A girl who was starting to wriggle under my skin. ‘I nearly cancelled. Whatever you do, don’t let me get hammered – I have to be up super-early tomorrow.’

‘What’s happened to her? Missing from an abattoir? That’s seriously disturbing. Is it animal rights people? They hate her guts. I had a look at some of her videos. Strange girl. Why would you do that? I suppose she gets money from adverts.’ Hannah was having a conversation all on her own. I wondered if I could avoid answering.

‘So, what do you think’s happened to her?’ Hannah said.

Obviously not. ‘No idea, yet.’

‘Is it the animal rights people? The ones in the hideous meat suits? I mean, I might have said those little barbecue-dances she does are a hanging offence, but …’

I gave her a stern look.

‘Okay, I get the message.’ Hannah nodded towards the TV. ‘Have you seen this new American one? I couldn’t help noticing that the female detective is always beautifully made-up and conducts her investigations in a pencil skirt and high heels.’

‘Oh, we all do that,’ I said.

Hannah snorted. ‘If you wore shoes like those, they’d have had to surgically remove a stiletto from Craig’s head by now.’

‘We’re getting along better these days. I think it’s all a cover for deep-seated insecurity.’ Although when I pictured Craig with a shoe wedged into his smug, bull-doggy face, the image lingered enticingly.

‘Isn’t it always?’ Hannah said. ‘Doesn’t make it any easier to deal with.’

On the TV, the detective chased and apprehended a criminal, still in her heels. ‘I think they must give her superpowers. Maybe I do need a pair.’ I made a Wonder Woman noise. ‘Stiletto Woman! She can run really fast without separating her legs at the thigh!’

‘How much have you had to drink?’ Hannah said. ‘I thought you weren’t supposed to get hammered.’

‘Ah, you know. It doesn’t count if you drink it while cooking. Or defrosting.’

‘So, been on any hot dates recently?’

‘No, Hannah. Seriously. I don’t need this in my life. I read this dating blog the other day and you wouldn’t believe the stories. You’re lucky if the guys you meet have just the one wife and a few of their own teeth.’

‘Yeah, I’ve got to admit, numbers of wives and children does seem subject to rounding errors.’

‘The stuff in this blog was mad. Necrophiliacs, people with walls of knives. All that.’

‘Sounds like the software engineers at work,’ Hannah said. ‘Have you noticed if someone fricassees and eats their lover’s body parts, the cook is always in IT? And talking of bad dates, one guy greeted me by saying, You’re quite pretty for someone in a wheelchair.’

‘Oh Christ, really?’

‘I can’t be arsed with trying to meet someone at the moment either. I wonder if looking for men online is more fun than actually meeting them.’

‘Much like house-hunting online, as opposed to turning up and seeing the desperation in the eyes of the poor bastards who’ve spent three hours cleaning away all residue of their sticky children and moulting dogs, and then you realise within two seconds of stepping into the house that it’s not for you, but you have to go through the whole sad rigmarole of traipsing round saying, “That’s nice,” in every room.’

‘House-hunting going well then, Meg?’

‘I’ll get there.’ My eyes drifted to the damp corner of my living room. I was fond of my rented place, despite its undoubted problems. It was on a beautiful cobbled street in Belper, and I’d started to see its uneven floors and draughty windows as features rather than irritants. It had been good in the hot weather, its perpetual dampness creating a refrigeration effect, although I’d be wandering around in my extra-long scarf tripping over penguins come winter.

‘I used to wonder if this cottage was haunted,’ Hannah said.

‘Whaaat?’ She was normally so logical, and yet she thought ghosts might be stalking the property.

‘It’s cold and there are strange noises. And you always used to look up at the ceilings …’ Hannah blushed. ‘Sorry. I know why you did that.’

‘I think we can lay the blame at the door of the geriatric boiler. You know there’s that company called Victorian Plumbing, which I always thought was a weird name. Well, my boiler actually is Victorian plumbing. And as for me looking at the ceilings …’

‘I’m sorry. I know.’

‘Yes. It’s okay. I’m over it. Most of the time I can walk into a room without thinking a family member’s going to be hanging from the rafters. It’s all good.’

Hannah winced. ‘I honestly don’t know why I said that.’

‘It’s fine. And maybe the house is haunted. It’s ancient and it has its own microclimate and socks disappear all the time. Maybe there’s a poltergeist.’

‘Ha. Yeah, why can’t poltergeists ever tidy up, if they’re in the market for shifting stuff around.’ Hannah paused. ‘Seriously though, I know you’ll battle on and work hard and get far too emotionally involved in your new case, because that’s what you’re like, but you do need time … you know, to get over your gran.’

‘Time to get over being a coward and letting her suffer needlessly, after all she’d been through?’

‘It wasn’t your fault, Meg. She said she didn’t want to go to Dignitas after all.’

‘She was just protecting us. And me and Mum knew it. We knew the kindest thing was to take her, but we let her persuade us not to.’

‘You’d been through a lot too. And you weren’t to know it would drag on so long and so … horribly.’

I felt my eyes mist over with tears. I wanted to tell Hannah how much I appreciated her, how important she was to me, even though I could be prickly. She knew what I was like, knew how I could fall into that pit. I couldn’t find the words. ‘Hannah, I’m okay. But … thanks for keeping an eye on me.’

She shook her head slightly. ‘Someone has to. And how’s your mum doing?’

I closed my eyes and pictured Mum rigid with grief and horror at what Gran had gone through. ‘She’s a lot better at coping than me. Throwing herself at causes like a silver-haired ninja. I’m not sure her reaction’s entirely normal.’

‘Since when has your mum been normal? For her, heading off to El Salvador on a mercy-mission is quite in character.’

A knock on the door. ‘Oh shit, Jai’s here.’ I blinked and leaped up, negotiating the hallway, which was narrowed by the presence of too many books. The front door had been sticking in the hot weather and I had to give it such a wrench, I stumbled backwards when it finally opened.

Jai looked at me with a slight frown. ‘Always so composed and dignified.’

‘Yeah, maybe Stiletto Woman isn’t my destiny super-hero.’ I grabbed the bottle of wine and six-pack of beer he was holding. ‘I can barely stay upright in flats.’

‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’ He caught my eye. ‘Are you okay?’

I hurriedly rubbed my face. ‘Yes, come in.’

Jai stepped in, surveying the piles of books stacked along the wall. ‘Have they been breeding? Asexual reproduction?’

‘I had to move them around to do some cleaning. They’re reeling from the shock of it, but they’ll be fine. Come and meet Hannah.’

I led Jai into the living room and made the introductions.

‘I finally get to meet him!’ Hannah cried, then turned to Jai: ‘She’s always going on about you.’

‘I am not always going on about him, Hannah. Jesus.’

I sat Jai on the chair in the damp corner. Hamlet gave him one of the slow blinks I loved so much, and settled deeper into Hannah’s knee, purring furiously. I went to check on the food.

When I returned with drinks, it was obvious they were bonding. Possibly over-bonding.

‘Does she give you that look too?’ Hannah said. ‘Like it could freeze boiling oil.’

I put wine glasses on the coffee table. ‘I am here, you know.’

‘There’s the look,’ Jai said.

I ignored him. ‘I think we’ll eat in here. It’s too cramped in the kitchen and the garden’s complicated.’

‘That’s fine,’ Hannah said. ‘Saves me having to move. Are you working on that case too, Jai? The sausage girl?’

‘She’s a real person,’ I said. ‘Just because you’ve seen her eating sausages in a bikini doesn’t mean she’s pretend.’

‘Sorry,’ Hannah said. ‘You’re right. Famous people never seem real.’

I wanted to say, She’s not what you think. She’s not just a girl in a bikini. She reads feminist books and appreciates art. But obviously I couldn’t say that.

I nipped out to check on the food and returned with three plates on a tray. I overhead Jai saying, ‘Yes, Suki wants kids of her own, but she doesn’t like mine very much. It’s as if she thinks by accepting mine, she’s giving up on having her own. But I don’t want more.’ How did Hannah get people to do this? I should have had her on the interrogation team.

I handed them plates. ‘It’s like my silver service days all over again. Guests chatting away to each other; me the irrelevant waitress.’

‘Except you haven’t chucked boiling-hot soup in my lap,’ Hannah said. She was attempting to eat her food without moving Hamlet. There’s an unwritten rule in my house about moving cats.

My mobile went. I put my plate down and fished it from my pocket, in case it was work-related. Dad. The father I hadn’t heard from in months, who hardly ever phoned me and was relatively monosyllabic when I called him. I stared at the screen, frozen. My finger hovered.

‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘It’s Dad. I’d better take it. He never calls. Something must be wrong.’

I touched the green button. ‘Dad, are you okay?’

His voice came over too loud, as if he was nervous. ‘Yes, fine. And you?’

I stood and mouthed, ‘Sorry,’ to Hannah and Jai. They were already deep in conversation. No doubt Hannah was telling him all my most excruciating stories.

I walked into the hallway. ‘What’s going on, Dad?’

‘Do I need a reason to phone my daughter?’

Irritation fought with that old desire to please him. ‘You never normally call.’

He separated his words, as if it was the early days of telephone communication. ‘I thought I might visit you.’

I sank onto the hall stairs. ‘Visit me? Why?’

‘To see you. I know your grandmother died recently. I wanted to make sure you were all right.’

I felt tears welling up. He hadn’t visited me for years. ‘Have you spoken to Mum?’

‘She doesn’t like talking to me.’

‘But Dad, she tried calling you about Gran and you didn’t get back to her.’

‘I never got those messages. So is it okay if I visit?’

‘Of course it is. My house isn’t big though. You know that? Or tidy.’

‘I heard. Your mother said you were thinking of buying somewhere.’

‘So you did speak to her?’

‘Briefly.’ No surplus information there. Dad had a tendency to miss out the bits that other people added to conversations without being asked. The bits that kept things flowing and meant you didn’t spend the whole time feeling off-kilter. I couldn’t remember the last time Mum and Dad had spoken. Dad and Gran had never liked one another, and he hadn’t come to her funeral. I felt out of my depth – the kid who didn’t understand her parents’ conversations.

‘You know what my work’s like.’ The very thought of managing both Dad and the new case threw me into a panic. ‘We’re swamped. And I’ve just taken on a case that could be big. You’ll barely see me if you come soon. When were you thinking?’

There was a moment of silence. I’d learned with Dad not to fill these gaps. You got more out of him if you waited.

‘I thought maybe tomorrow,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter if you’re busy, I can amuse myself.’

‘Tomorrow? As in the day after today?’ I pictured my spare room, the bed piled high with books, the floor covered in old paperwork, the spiders lurking in the corners with long-term tenancy rights.

‘Is tomorrow all right with you?’

I couldn’t very well say no, but this didn’t feel normal. ‘It’s fine. Just don’t expect to see a lot of me. I can’t take time off work at such short notice. If you arrive before me, you’ll have to let yourself in and make yourself at home. The key’s in the key-safe on the left side of the front door, and it’s the first four digits of root 3.’

I cursed his unwillingness to tell me what the hell was going on. Because clearly something was. There was no way this was a social call.

9

Meg – Present day

Tuesday

I woke early and flicked on the bedside light, trying to remember how much wine I’d had the night before. At least I was calculating glasses rather than bottles, which was promising. I’d stayed up late talking to Hannah about Gran. Not a sensible move in the circumstances.

Violet was still missing. With each hour, the chances of finding her alive notched down. I crawled out of bed, pulled on my dressing gown, headed downstairs and stuck the kettle on. Hamlet emerged from a cardboard box by the door and stretched a front leg at me. He gave a supportive and rousing commentary while I sorted him out a breakfast of fine fillets of horribly slaughtered animal.

While Hamlet tucked in with enviable guilt-free gusto, I plonked myself down at the table and opened my laptop. Dawn was shining through my grubby kitchen window and suffusing the room with golden pink light, the summer continuing to hold a hot, dry finger up to climate change deniers.

If Violet’s birth mother was this woman Bex Smith, who turned out to be alive after all, could Violet be with her? But why not contact her family or friends? It seemed inconceivable that someone so connected wouldn’t get in touch with anyone.

I wanted to get a feel for Violet. Who she’d been before she became a case. A few years ago, missing people were like shadows. All the information about them came from others. Hearsay. We didn’t see them talking and, unless they wrote diaries, we never heard from them directly. This had all changed. The murdered and the missing were amongst us still, with their blogs and vlogs and social media presence. Violet had taken this to a new level. There was so much online, you could practically resurrect a virtual version of her, like an episode of Black Mirror. And since everyone interacted online anyway, it would be almost as if she’d never gone, although she might not be making any new bikini videos.

I went to the Great Meat Debate website and clicked through to one of Violet’s YouTube videos. She was cooking chops, wearing the trademark skimpy swimwear and the pelican brooch on a slim silver chain around her neck. Flat stomach, cellulite-free thighs. The evening sunshine cast a rose glow on her lightly tanned skin. I wondered what it would feel like to look like that. She probably took it for granted, like I did my uncanny ability to pass exams. I prayed to the imaginary friend I kept in my head for these purposes – please let her still be smooth-skinned and beautiful, not seething with maggots in a vat of pig guts.

Violet flashed a bright smile at the camera and chucked a sausage on the barbecue. She might not be contributing greatly to the sum of human knowledge, but she’d notched up several million views.

I clicked on another video, dated a week later. It was just as well we’d had a good summer – Violet was cooking again, in another bikini. Burgers this time. Music blared in the background and Violet danced along as she tended the barbecue. Halfway through, she reached for a vest-top and slipped it on over her bikini. It was bright pink, with the caption, This Sexy Bod was Built by Meat. The comments under the video were mainly enthusiastic, if on the sleazy side. Lower down the thread was the aggression. The assertions that she was a stuck-up bitch. The suggestions that she should try having her throat slit in an abattoir.

Other contributors to the Great Meat Debate website received less attention. Anna had recorded earnest videos about how it wasn’t meat as such that was an environmental disaster but the quantities consumed and the way it was currently produced, in low-welfare systems where animals were fed grain instead of grass and straw and other foods which didn’t compete with humans. Gary had a few videos in which he showed off his muscles, Daniel explained the design of the abattoir, and Kirsty Nightingale, Tony Nightingale’s daughter, talked rather provocatively about the high carbon footprint of free-range farming methods.

I went through everything carefully. Gary did indeed make snide jokes about weedy vegans, and there was a spirited debate in the comments, in which the words game changers cropped up with some frequency. Kirsty also came in for plenty of criticism. Anna’s videos and posts were thoughtful, scientific and detailed, and nobody commented on them, which pretty much summed up the internet.

Daniel talked about the curved walkways and rubber matting in the abattoir with great passion. Having read the comments – If anyone ever slits your throat, let’s hope they do it on rubber matting – I understood his nervousness.

I leaned back and closed my eyes. Was this really about meat? Bad stuff was usually more personal, the culprit a family member or boyfriend. Or the person herself. I of all people knew that.

But recently, tempers had been rising. People were angry. About appalling animal welfare in farms and abattoirs. About carpets of pig manure from intensively kept pigs being spread over the countryside (it being particularly tragic when an animal’s waste products saw more daylight than it did). About rainforests being incinerated to provide grazing for cattle. People were asking questions. Why should your desire to eat meat every day jeopardise my child’s right to a planet that’s not an uninhabitable fireball? Meat producers had become fair game. Could one of those angry activists have decided to make an example of Violet Armstrong?

I sighed. My money would still be on a boyfriend or family member. I navigated through to Violet’s personal website and clicked on a video that looked different from the rest. Violet was fully clothed. She spoke to the camera like a professional. ‘In the village of Gritton in the Peak District, there have been strange sightings over the last thirty years. Of a mysterious girl …’

That was weird. I wondered if this was the Pale Child that both Anna and Daniel had been so unwilling to talk about. I took a swig of tea and switched to full screen. Violet carried on speaking: ‘The child is thin and light-skinned, and dressed in white, Victorian clothes. Locals call her the Pale Child.’ Violet leaned closer to the camera and lowered her voice: ‘Stories of strange, silent children are common in urban myths and creepypasta. This one is supposedly the ghost of a murdered child who lived in the beautiful manor house that was drowned under Ladybower Reservoir. People in this village don’t like to talk of the child, and are scared of her. The rumour goes that if she sees your face, you’ll die.’

How strange. I wrapped my dressing gown tighter around me, even though it wasn’t cold.

I moved the cursor to the most recent video, dated three days ago, and clicked to play. Violet looked less composed this time. Strands of dark hair fell over her face and she was wearing no make-up. ‘I talked before about the Pale Child,’ she said. ‘And … well, I think I saw her.’

So it was true: Violet had seen the Pale Child. I crossed my legs and leaned closer to the screen. Violet’s voice was quiet, and husky as if she had a cold or had been shouting. ‘On the moor in Gritton. A girl, thin and pale with blonde hair, wearing old-fashioned clothes and a creepy Victorian-doll mask. She turned as I was watching and I think she saw my face. By the time I got out my phone to take a photo, she’d gone.’

In the video, Violet reached for a glass of water and took a sip. Her voice was less resolute than her words. She flicked her eyes down as she spoke. ‘You’re probably wondering if I’m worried now. Worried I’m going to die because of the Pale Child. Well, I’m not. I’m glad I saw the girl. And I’m going to find out who she is. Because I don’t believe in ghosts.’

I sat back and studied the last frame of the video: a close-up of Violet’s face. I played the video again, pausing it now and then to look closely at her. I stared into her eyes. Behind the professional veneer, she was scared.

I nipped upstairs to shower and dress, then remembered the phone call from Dad. It felt like a drunken dream, but I knew it had been real. He wanted to visit today, of all days. I stuck my head into the spare room. Dad had always been the tidy one – trailing round after me, Mum and Carrie, tutting and putting cereal boxes in cupboards, books on shelves. When Carrie got ill, she’d had a free pass. Cancer trumps having to tidy up. Cancer trumps everything. So his full irritation had been unleashed on me and Mum. The prospect of him staying in this room didn’t bear thinking about.

At least I’d changed the sheets, and there was a path to the side of the bed. I frantically piled the books into higher towers, thus freeing more floor space, albeit at the risk of Dad becoming entombed in the night. While I worked, I thought about Violet and the Pale Child. Obviously the child wasn’t a ghost, but who was she? Was she the reason for all the fences? The sign about Village of the Damned?

The vacuum cleaner enjoyed a largely untroubled life in the corner of the spare room. I plugged it in and shoved it halfheartedly over the areas of carpet not covered by books. It made quite an impact – one advantage of cleaning on an annual basis was that you could see the difference. I reminded myself that I was in my thirties and if I wanted to live in a house with books piled on the floor and cobwebs hanging from the beams, that was my decision. It wasn’t that I enjoyed living under layers of dust, surrounded by spiders, but getting the hoover out had never been a priority in my life. Besides, spiders had the right to a peaceful existence.

I folded two towels and placed them on the bed, chucked a hotel shampoo bottle on top, and decided that would do. My eyes were drawn to a pile of framed photographs stacked in the corner. Photographs I’d not felt able to display. I fished one out and wiped the dust from it. Carrie and me on a beach, before she got ill. She was about eleven, squinting into the sun, blonde hair blowing into her eyes. I must have been around seven, although the way I was clutching a red bucket made me look younger. The colours were distorted, as if it was another world where greens were more yellow and reds more purple. I took the photograph and placed it gently on the bedside table. If Dad couldn’t cope with it, he could always put it away again.

A noise drifted up the stairs. The cat flap in the kitchen banging open. I left the spare room, resisting the urge to flick my eyes to the ceiling, and headed downstairs. Hamlet came beetling through to the hallway, his little legs a blur. I gave him a cuddle and had a quick look around with the eyes of a parental visitor. Not great.

I picked up a flyer for a pizza place that didn’t even deliver to my address, hearing Mum’s voice in my head. You need to stop trying to impress him. She certainly wasn’t trying to impress him with her recent antics. I felt a sharp stab of worry about her. I should visit but had no time. Nothing was more important right now than getting to work and finding Violet. If we didn’t find her today, we could virtually rule out finding her alive.

10

Bex – August 1999

Bex cradled a mug of tea. The kitchen was thick with the fug of wet coats and wet hair and wet dog, and she was sitting at a table with Kirsty, her dad, and the boy, plus a black Labrador who her dad had said was called Fenton. She’d tried to help them move the sandbags in the driving rain, and they were treating her as one of the heroic workers, but she knew she hadn’t been much use.

Bex had imagined it so many times, being back in Gritton, that it didn’t feel real. Kirsty was different to when she’d seen her two years ago – her edges sharper, the addition of something adult to her, a complexity to her reactions. Their dad was older, damper, less vibrant than she remembered.

Bex wanted to be nice, to get along with them, so they’d have no option but to embrace her into their lives. But she also wanted to scream at them, How could you? How could you send me away and visit me just three times in thirteen years? It wasn’t my fault!

‘You chose your moment to arrive in Gritton.’ Kirsty gave her what looked like a genuine, open smile. ‘An extra pair of hands was good.’

Kirsty was acting as if everything was normal, as if she was oblivious to the chaos of emotions Bex was feeling. But then Bex caught her eye and what she saw in those sharp blue depths made her realise that Kirsty was acutely aware.

Bex shrugged. ‘I was rubbish. Wrong clothes – I suppose I’m a townie.’ She thought of her lovely yellow coat, now sodden and smeared brown, her pretty shoes, ruined.

Her dad couldn’t look her in the eye. ‘No, you were fine,’ he said.

‘The water got into the library.’ That was the boy. About eighteen or nineteen, like Kirsty. A dark, gentle-looking sort, except that he was gulping and slurping his tea, and dunking and devouring his biscuits, chewing with his mouth open. He caught Bex’s eye, and then quickly looked away.

‘It’s fine, Daniel.’ Kirsty spoke with an edge to her voice that seemed unwarranted, given the innocuous nature of his comment. ‘We shifted the books off the lower shelves, so not a problem.’

Daniel looked up from his tea. ‘Not a problem? The library’s flooded. They’re beautiful old books in there. I can’t believe they were rescued from the reservoir and then you put them at risk here.’

Kirsty shot him a piercing look. ‘The books are okay, Daniel. Why do you get so upset about a few books?’

‘But if you’d let me divert the water to the other side of the big field …’

Bex’s dad spoke, his voice firm. ‘It’s fine, Daniel. Let it go.’

Bex flicked her eyes from person to person, feeling for the undercurrents in the conversation. Kirsty saw her and dropped her shoulders and smiled. ‘The books were from the manor house,’ she said.

‘Oh.’ Bex knew all about the drowned house. Their ancestral home, lost under the waters when Ladybower Reservoir was created over fifty years ago.

‘Daniel’s helping out this summer,’ Kirsty added. ‘Sometimes he has his own ideas about how Dad should do things. Forgets he’s paid to do what Dad wants.’

Daniel looked at Kirsty through narrow eyes, then took a breath and laughed. ‘Your dad’s put so much effort into making sure the pig barn doesn’t flood that the water ends up in the house. I just suggested we divert it.’

‘We’re not doing that,’ said Bex’s dad, placing his teacup down in a way that made it clear this was the end of the matter. ‘If the house were to flood we can always move upstairs or outside. Pigs don’t have those options. They mustn’t get flooded.’

Kirsty said, ‘It’s sweet how much he cares for his pigs.’

Daniel smiled awkwardly at Bex’s dad. ‘I’m surprised you don’t build a robot to move the sandbags automatically when it rains.’ He was obviously trying to lighten the mood, but Bex had no idea what he was talking about.

‘Dad makes robots,’ Kirsty said. ‘In fact, normally he gets the robot to make the tea.’

Bex’s dad coughed. ‘It’s a prototype. It takes a little longer than I’d like.’

Kirsty rolled her eyes.

Fenton shoved his nose under Bex’s arm, shifting it up so she spilled tea on the table.

‘Dear me, Dad,’ Kirsty said. ‘For a competent animal trainer, you’ve done a shitty job with that dog.’

‘Sorry,’ Bex said. ‘It was my fault.’ She stroked Fenton’s sleek head.

‘You’ve just rewarded him for being an arse.’ Kirsty’s tone was blunt.

Bex felt sick. Had Kirsty become one of those unnerving people who changed from sunny to scary second by second? She pulled her hand back. ‘Oh God, sorry.’

Kirsty laughed. ‘Relax. It’s fine. You weren’t to know.’

Their dad grabbed a cloth and mopped up the tea. ‘Don’t listen to your sister. She’s only teasing. She’s been so excited about you coming.’

‘So excited,’ Kirsty echoed. There it was again. Kirsty’s voice had two layers, the sarcasm so subtle it was almost not there. Bex could tell that her dad only heard one layer, but Daniel could detect the other one. His eyes flitted nervously between Bex and Kirsty.

Bex had never imagined that Kirsty might not like her, might not want her there.

‘You should get your dad to show you how he trains the pigs,’ Daniel said. ‘He’s really into animal training. The pigs are so cool.’

‘Wow, yes!’ Bex felt a sudden rush of optimism. ‘That would be brilliant.’

Her dad smiled. ‘Good. We can do that.’

At last, something Bex could do with her dad that would avoid the awkward silences. And training pigs sounded fun.

‘Soft in the head, the lot of you,’ Kirsty said. But she gave Bex a warm smile, and Bex realised she must have been wrong. Paranoid. She could be like that sometimes. Of course Kirsty was happy she was there. Nobody blamed her. The summer wasn’t going to be so bad after all.

11

Meg – Present day

Tuesday

I was at my desk skim-reading the recent statements from the house-to-house. Violet had spoken to so many people in her search for Rebecca Smith, and the residents of Gritton had been so excessively helpful, interested and keen to share their thoughts with our officers, that we were drowning in their contributions. Most of it was tediously irrelevant, the only thing of possible interest being someone’s assertion that Kirsty Nightingale – the pig-farming daughter of Tony Nightingale – dealt drugs. Surprising but not obviously helpful.

We’d spoken to Violet’s parents when they’d changed planes in Singapore, and they’d had no demands from any menacing folk about Violet, so a kidnap was looking unlikely. The search teams had found nothing, and there had been no sightings from people who weren’t attention-seeking and/or deranged, although plenty from those who were. A huge search of the moorland was underway, with help from an over-emotional public determined to get too close to the wildfire. Crime scene officers were at the abattoir, and in Violet’s room at the cottage, and the tech team were going through her laptop. There was still no sign of her phone. To use a cliché, she’d disappeared into thin air.

Fiona stuck her head around the door. ‘We’ve got some info from the house-to-house,’ she said. ‘An insomniac who spends her nights staring out at the lane by her cottage. And her lane’s on the main route into the abattoir. She thinks she saw Violet.’

‘Sounds helpful.’

‘Yeah. She was sure she saw a small, green car drive past in the direction of the abattoir at quarter to ten. And Violet’s car’s small and green, so that ties in with Tony Nightingale saying she left his farm around nine thirty.’

‘Okay, so it looks like he might have been the last person to speak to her.’

‘Yes. And this woman – a Mrs Ackroyd – was sure no other cars passed her that night, although there is another way to the abattoir – you just have to go down a really narrow lane.’

Mrs Ackroyd could of course be mistaken, as witnesses frequently were. I’d learned that the more vehement the account and detailed the description, the more likely it was that the large, black man with a beard was in fact a small, white man with a moustache. Still, if Mrs Ackroyd was right, Violet had driven from Tony Nightingale’s and gone to work at the abattoir as normal. But then what?

‘I’ve tracked down Tony Nightingale’s daughter, Bex,’ Fiona said, ‘who we thought might be the birth mother. She’s a dog trainer who lives just south of Nottingham. She says Violet’s not her child and she refuses to go anywhere near Gritton, or to a police station.’

Another one? Hadn’t Daniel Twigg said his mum refused to go to Gritton? What was it about that place? ‘Oh great,’ I said. ‘Do we know why?’

‘She won’t say, but she was very adamant.’

‘And she says Violet’s not her child? Did she have a baby at that time?’

‘Her answers were evasive.’

‘Arrange for us to go to her,’ I said. ‘This sounds interesting. And let’s have a closer look at Tony Nightingale. If Violet is his granddaughter, what are the implications of her turning up out of the blue? Could he have travelled with her to the abattoir? And what about his other daughter, Kirsty? Would it affect her inheritance or anything like that?’

‘I’ll look into it.’ Fiona left in a cloud of competence. Whatever it was that had been distracting her, she’d let it go.

My phone rang. Anna Finchley from the abattoir. ‘You’d better come and see this.’ Her voice was flat. ‘The Animal Vigilantes have put a banner up. Threatening us. It’s horrible.’

‘We’ll be right over.’

I found Jai in our tiny, sticky-surfaced kitchen, making tea. He turned to me, balancing a spent teabag on a fork. ‘Never interrupt a man who’s mashing.’

‘Even for a trip to the abattoir?’

‘Crikey, you know how to offer a guy a good time.’

‘They’ve had a visit from the Animal Vigilantes. A threatening banner’s appeared overnight.’

‘You win.’

‘Why are you mashing tea with a fork? Is that where all the forks are going? You’re nicking them for tea.’

‘No. Today the teaspoons are partying with the forks in the black hole. This is my personal lunch fork.’ He dropped it in the sink and followed me out to the car. He’d never see that fork again. He frowned. ‘You think the Animal Vigilantes haven’t finished yet?’

I pulled out of the car park and took the road towards Gritton. The heatwave showed no sign of abating and the sun battered the dry rocks and scorched grasses of the moors.

‘What about that abattoir waste?’ I said. ‘Please tell me we found it.’

‘Um … Not yet I’m afraid. Nobody admits to knowing who took it away,’ Jai replied.

‘Oh, for God’s sake. How can a ton of rotting giblets just disappear?’

‘I know, I know. Fiona’s on it.’

‘This is all highly suspicious. Did you check with the rendering plants?’

‘Yes, they all have cameras and an inspection process. They’re adamant they’d spot human remains. We alerted the local ones and they’ve checked cameras for yesterday and there was nothing suspicious, but they’ll let us know if any human heads appear.’

‘Bloody hell, Jai. All right, I get the message.’ I pictured the potential scene at the rendering plant.

‘Sorry, I imagine you don’t need that this morning.’

‘You weren’t exactly Mr Sober either. It was only Hannah being sensible. The pair of you got along well.’

‘She’s great.’

‘Possibly a little too well. Did she start telling you about my awful ex, and threatening to locate my fat baby photos?’

‘It was most enlightening. You never talk about your ex. Or your fat baby photos for that matter.’

‘He was a nightmare. Don’t assume arty, creative types can’t also be controlling bastards. And my baby photos are fodder for bad dreams. I have horrible taste in men and I was indeed a very fat baby.’

As I’d hoped, an evening of Hannah sharing my darkest secrets had settled my relationship with Jai. We felt more like buddies again, although I’d be steering clear of any conversation about Suki.

We joined the back of a queue of cars behind a car towing a caravan the size of a small planet. ‘Tourists,’ Jai sighed. ‘Why would you want to bring your accommodation with you like a giant snail?’

‘Too many terrifying B&B landlady experiences?’

Jai glanced at me. ‘I’m not sure I want to know.’

We sat in the queue for another ten minutes, with Jai cursing everyone who had ever visited the Peak District, or even looked at a map and considered it. ‘And the bikes are a pain in the arse too,’ he said.

‘Ah, come on, at least they’re doing their bit for the planet.’

‘Are they though? Think of the environmental costs of manufacturing all that fluorescent Lycra.’

Gritton came into view, the craggy edge rearing up behind the houses on the hill, the abattoir nestling in the valley, visible through a shimmering heat haze. As we headed down, I could see a shape draped over the concrete of the main abattoir building.

We drove through the gates and pulled up in the car park, outside the taped-off area.

‘That’s hard to miss,’ Jai said.

A huge banner hung from the side of the abattoir. It showed an image of a piglet skewered and being roasted above a fire, a wooden post shoved in its mouth, its dead eyes wide and terrified. Above the image were words in deep red. Animal Vigilantes! Underneath the image it said, Justice for all animals! Who will be next?

Jai and I climbed out of the car and stared at the banner.

Anna Finchley came rushing across the car park towards us, strands of damp hair stuck to her forehead. ‘Who’s done this?’ She spoke in a staccato rhythm. ‘Have they hurt Violet?’

‘Have you any idea where this came from?’ Jai asked. ‘Was anyone here last night?’

‘I didn’t see anything. Maybe I should have set up a camera, but I thought if anything had happened with Violet, it was already too late. What was the point of a camera now? This is so horrible. Why can’t things just go back to normal?’

Another woman popped out of the door of the abattoir and strode across the car park to join us.

‘This is Kirsty Nightingale,’ Anna said. ‘She’s involved with our website too.’

So this was Tony Nightingale’s daughter. And possibly the local drug dealer, which seemed implausible, but I’d learned that you could never tell. She was also potentially Violet’s aunt, and she was aware of that fact, if Tony had phoned her on Sunday night as he’d said. I recognised her from the video I’d watched earlier. She had a grounded look about her – like the junior school teacher who’d know what to do with the kid who’d swallowed a piece of Lego. She waved at the banner. ‘Horrible, isn’t it?’

I couldn’t deny it, but I’d seen similar images cheerily advertising bonfire-night parties or gatherings of boy scouts. Why was this suddenly so horrific? Was it the inference that Violet had been harmed, or just the effect of looking with clear eyes at a young animal being skewered and roasted?

‘Apparently there’s a bunch of them in the village now,’ Kirsty said. ‘With placards. Ridiculous people.’

‘Kirsty gets loads of abuse,’ Anna said. ‘They call her a murderer and a rapist.’

‘They’re disturbed,’ Kirsty said.

‘Have they been violent towards you?’ I asked.

‘Yes, they have. Those horrible people wearing the meat suits that make them look like they have no skin. I’ve had things thrown at me, I’ve been spat at. I’ve been worried for my daughter.’

‘When did you last see Violet?’

Kirsty wrinkled her nose as if thinking. ‘Er … when was it, Anna? We had a meeting about the website. Roughly a fortnight ago.’

‘How well do you know her?’

‘Not well at all.’ Kirsty laughed. ‘I’m not sure the glamorous Violet is interested in hanging around with yokel pig farmers.’

‘Okay, we’ll get someone to take a statement from you. Thank you.’ I turned to Anna. ‘Have you ever been targeted before? I mean, not just online?’

Anna shook her head. ‘Not really. One time a group came here, but they were peaceful. I went and spoke to them. This is a high-welfare abattoir. We’ve invested huge amounts in making it the best it can be. I mean, you can’t make it nice – animals don’t want to die. But we don’t use carbon dioxide stunning, and we’ve followed Temple Grandin’s principles.’

‘Oh? I’ve heard of her.’ I remembered reading about an autistic woman who’d made it her life’s work to improve the design of abattoirs. I admired that. Most people just turned away. That must have been what Daniel was talking about in his video with the rubber matting and curved walkways.

‘I told the protesters all that,’ Anna said. ‘And I said we had CCTV that’s properly monitored. They didn’t exactly agree with me, but they stopped shouting and didn’t stay long.’

‘Any follow-up? Any contact with any other groups or individuals? Any threats since Violet started working here?’

‘Only the ones on the website.’

‘Who knew Violet was missing yesterday morning?’ I said. ‘Someone commenting on behalf of the Animal Vigilantes knew about it almost immediately.’

‘Then they must be involved,’ Anna said. ‘Only Esther, Daniel, Gary and I knew she was missing, and we didn’t tell anyone.’

‘The Animal Vigilantes are dangerous,’ Kirsty said. ‘They claim to be anti-cruelty but they see the end as justifying the means. In their minds, if a few of us had to die to save a load of animals, that would be a price worth paying.’

A mobile phone rang, and Anna fished hers from a back pocket and checked the screen. ‘Sorry. Better take this.’

I could hear a loud, frantic voice at the other end but couldn’t make out words.

‘Have you called the police?’ Anna said.

More shouting at the other end. Anna let the hand with the phone drop to her side, and turned to us. ‘They’ve come for Gary.’

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