Hamish cleared his throat. ‘How old is this house?’
Tina caught the faint narrowing of William’s eyes, the practiced tilt of Penelope’s head, her smile cool and curated. But Tina knew what was happening. Hamish wasn’t drifting off into the sixteenth century – this was Hamish the historian, observing,deducing,trying to figure out an explanation from the facts.The focused, capable, brilliant man beneath the affable surface. ‘Parts date back to the Domesday Book,’ Penelope replied with a rehearsed flourish. ‘Though much was added by the sixth Viscount, and of course during the Regency era ...’
‘Did your family break with Rome?’ Hamish pressed, eyes flicking across a carved lintel. ‘Any priest-holes the kids could have crawled into and got stuck?’
‘Of course!’ William said, sudden energy sparking. He turned like a hound on a scent. ‘This way!’
They pounded up the back stairs – Tina panting, her heart thundering in her ears. William moved with military precision, barking Ben’s name at each landing. Tina followed, all her senses heightened – wood smoke, fingers on the smooth polished banister she used to guide her upwards, the iron tang of fear rising in her throat.
Behind her, Hamish’s breathing grew ragged. Up they ran. Tina’s coat caught on a newel post, and she shrugged it off, not waiting to see it land.
Please be here. Please, just be hiding.
William stopped in the upper corridor, dropping to one knee and prising up a loose floorboard, exposing a black iron lever. He yanked the lever. With a groan of ancient hinges, a wall panel swung open. The air that wafted out was dry and smelled of wood long forgotten. They peered inside.
Darkness. Cobwebs. And emptiness.
A hollow place, meant to save lives, now holding nothing but dust and disappointment.
‘Outhouses next,’ William said, the words flat, as if trying to inject hope into his weary troops, ‘then the woods.’ Some of the steel had gone from his voice.
Before he could leave, Penelope moved. She glided a half step closer, one hand brushing her husband’s sleeve, not clinging, just enough contact to anchor him. Her expression remainedperfectly composed. ‘Do take a torch,’ she murmured, almost absently. ‘Though of course you’ll have thought of that already, army training and all.’ The corners of her mouth lifted in a delicate, admiring smile, the kind worn by someone who believes herself to be stating an unshakable truth, not avoiding conflict – the way Tina had for the past decade.
Tina stood in the hush, heart heavy, andthen– finally – noticed Penelope’s performance in full: the way she soothed William with studied elegance; the carefully placed suggestions, the perfectly timed smile. The way shenevercontradicted him directly, just offered distractions and redirections. Social defence mechanisms, disguised as charm. Using those dramatic credentials earned at Oxford. A shield of good breeding and curated poise.
And all at once she saw herself – her own years of smoothing conflict, suppressing her instincts, apologizing for shadows she didn’t cast. In her own way, she’d staged that same performance, hadn’t she? Used it to avoid the truth. To avoid herself. Avoidance had shaped so much of her life. The truth about her father. The shame she’d carried. The guilt that drove her to forgeries. The marriage she’d seen teetering but hoped would save itself. She must be bolder, be herself, stop assuming problems would miraculously resolve themselves.
William’s shoulders twitched, then straightened. He didn’t look at his wife, but he nodded once – more to himself than anyone – turned and clattered back down the stairs, Hamish following.
Penelope turned to Tina, reaching for her hand. ‘Come with me, darling,’ she said firmly. ‘It’s simply ghastly outside. Let the men search the barns and sheds. They’re so good at the practical things.’
It was the final straw. Tina stared at her, saw the certainty in Penelope’s eyes, the presumption that Tina would retreat, let the world spin without her, and wait prettily for others to fix things.
‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘Your son is missing, Penelope. Your son and my daughter. I know you’re handling this differently from me, but I must help.’
And with that Tina ran off down the stairs, her shoes clacking on the steps as if spurring her on.
The beam of Christina’s torch cut through the vast greenhouse like a scalpel, slicing open the gloom to reveal suspended droplets of condensation that hung in the air like frozen stars. She had been walking for nearly a minute and still couldn’t see where the glass and iron structure ended. Built against one side of the old walled garden, the Victorian greenhouse loomed larger than she’d imagined, its curved ribs disappearing into darkness, its breath of damp earth and old ferns pressing close around her. Her breath came in shallow gasps, fogging before her face in the evening chill. ‘Elspeth!’ Her voice cracked, ricocheting off the glass panes. ‘Elspeth, darling, if you can hear me—’
Nothing. Only the drip, drip, drip of the automatic watering system and the rustle of leaves in the darkness beyond the Victorian ironwork.
Christina’s hands trembled as she pushed deeper into the greenhouse, her sleeve snagging on a wooden stake. The earthy smell of compost was overwhelming, mixing with the sweet rot of fallen fruit. She kicked aside a terracotta pot – too hard – and it shattered across the flagstones.
Eleven years old. What eleven year old went anywhere without their phone? Unless they didn’t have a choice. Unless—
No. No, Frank wouldn’t. Even furious by what she’d done, he wouldn’t stoop tothat. Would he? But Frank knew people. All those years on the force meant he knew exactly the sort of people who’d do anything for cash. The sort with dead eyes and no questions asked. Tina’s stomach lurched. She thought of handsclamping over mouths. Of a van with its lights off, screeching away with a cargo of bound and gagged prisoners.
Why hadn’t the children just told Penelope where they were going? Ben adored his mother – he wouldn’t want to frighten her. Unless theycouldn’t.
The image crashed through her mind before she could stop it: Elspeth’s terrified face, a stranger’s hand twisted in her hair, pulling—
Christina pressed her forehead against the cool glass of the greenhouse, leaving a smudge of condensation. She could hear Hamish calling from the stables, his voice distant and hollow. William’s deeper shout followed. But here, in this cathedral of glass and shadow, there was only her ragged breathing and the mad hammering of her heart against her ribs.
She left the greenhouse, moving to the potting shed, wrenching the door open and sweeping her torch across every shadow that might hide a child, all the while her mind whirring with ever more dreadful possibilities. The only living thing she spotted was a spider, crouched on a windowsill.
She stepped outside. The Devon countryside stretched into infinite darkness, dotted with the occasional light from a distant farmhouse. ‘Elspeth! Whereareyou?’ Christina’s voice broke into something animal.
They couldn’t have gone far. They couldn’t have. Then a ping from her phone. She nearly dropped it in her haste to check. But it was from Hamish:
