are no police cars. No uniforms, no flashing lights. No helicopters buzzing overhead. Just the wind high up in the trees, bare autumn branches swaying against a gunmetal grey sky. The sound of dogs barking furiously comes from somewhere around the rear of the house. I jump out of my car, shoes crunching over the gravel, looking into each of the cars in turn. A doll discarded on the back seat of the Mercedes; no movement behind any of the windows at the front of the house. The front door itself is ajar, only a few inches, but it’s enough to see a thin slice of the dark hallway beyond.
Is Dominic Church here? Someone is here.
I stop in the doorway, strain my ears for any sound.
Nothing. Just the wind, tree branches clicking and scratching against each other next to the high stone wall. I reach into my handbag for a weapon but there is only the attack alarm, the noisemaker, which will be useless in a place as isolated as this. My fist closes around my bunch of keys instead.
I take another two steps, pushing on the front door. All my instincts tell me not to call out, not to alert anyone to my presence. Instead, I listen again for any human sound, any movement or conversation.
Silence. Even the dogs have stopped barking.
I push on the door again and it swings noiselessly open. There are no lights on and the hallway is dark even though it’s barely noon. I stand completely still, willing my ears to pick up something, anything from inside, straining to hear the sound of a baby’s cry from somewhere deeper in the house. But the only sound is the insistent, steady tick of a grandfather clock opposite the front door. Apart from that, The Grange is utterly, completely still, as silent as a funeral.
I step over the big stone threshold and move around the door. And that’s when I see him.
Gerald is lying on his back in the hallway. His jaw and the left side of his face almost completely blown away, the thick cream carpet beneath him a mass of red. A double-barrelled shotgun lies on the floor next to his hand.
I know instinctively that it’s hopeless but I force myself to kneel beside him anyway, putting two fingers against the big carotid artery next to his windpipe. His skin is still warm to the touch but there is no pulse, no sign of life. He’s gone.
He’s lying on his back, only a few feet from the front door. I try to picture it, imagine him suspicious, on edge, arming himself from the gun cabinet in the lounge when he hears the ring of the doorbell. Pulling the front door open and being shot immediately, barely a chance to register the gun in Dominic Church’s hands. No chance at all to defend himself.
I’m not going to let the same thing happen to me.
I pick up the shotgun, remembering the first time I met Dominic Church, only five days ago. Can it really be only five days? Don’t make the same mistake twice. With blood thumping in my ears, I press the barrel release lever and the gun clicks open, revealing the circular brass caps of two shells, side by side. Loaded. Neither have been fired. Gerald didn’t even have a chance to get a single shot off. I snap the gun shut again, the polished walnut stock smooth against my palms.
Where the hell are the police?
Still crouching, I lay the heavy weapon across my lap and dial Gilbourne’s number on my phone. An engaged tone comes beeping back into my ear. Shit.
A sound. A voice. What was that? Faint, from somewhere else in the house, from above me, the first floor?
Mia?
I have to move. I slip the phone back into my pocket. With multiplying terror at what I’m going to find in the rest of the house, I heft the gun in both hands and make my way upstairs, my shoes sinking into the thick carpet. On the first floor landing I wait, listen again, straining my ears to pick up the slightest sound.
Still nothing. The master bedroom is empty, the bed neatly made, the room tidy, nothing that looks out of place. Keep going. I go to the spiral staircase to the second floor and move quickly up it, expecting the blast of a gun with every step that takes me higher. There’s a very particular smell in my nostrils, growing stronger the higher