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“Ssh, that’s enough,” his father cautioned.

“I’m telling you this,” the woman shouted through her car window, “if my girl gets thrown out of school I won’t be the only one coming after you.”

As Jenna turned back inside she saw the younger ones watching from the stairs, round-eyed with fright. “It’s OK,” she told them gently. “It was someone who…” Someone who what? What could she tell them?

“It was someone who should know better than to go round shouting at other people,” Richard provided. “Between us, I think she was a bit drunk and didn’t realize she’d got the wrong house, so don’t you worry about her anymore. She’s gone now and she won’t be coming back.”

“She’d better not,” Hanna muttered as they returned to the kitchen. “If that’s the kind of family the girl comes from, it’s no wonder she’s like she is.”

Shaking his head, Richard said, “I’m gathering from this that the chief bully in the case is Kelly Durham, daughter of Wendy, who just graced us with a visit?”

“Do you know them?” Jenna asked.

“I’ve had occasion to represent various members of the family,” he admitted. “The father’s a car dealer, currently in prison for tax evasion. His brother’s about to be prosecuted for the same. And one of the mother’s sisters is on a suspended sentence for aggravated assault. She attacked the manager of a store who apprehended her for shoplifting.”

Jenna could hardly believe it. “And it’s someone from that family who’s been picking on Paige? Dear God, is it any wonder no one wants to stand up for her?”

“I think you ought to tell the police she’s been here,” Hanna stated.

Jenna nodded. “I will when Euan turns up.”

“Where is he? I thought he was following us.”

“He popped home to see his family for a while. Jack’s rung,” she added after checking her mobile. Quickly connecting to him, she took the phone into the dining room to speak more privately.

“Sorry, I was asleep when you rang,” he said. “I take it there’s still no news.”

“No. Where are you?”

“At home.”

At home? Isn’t this his home?
“What did the police have to say?” she asked.

“Are you pretending not to know, or do you really not know?”

Moving past the belligerence, she said, “I told them it was nonsense. I know nothing like that ever happened.”

“Of course it didn’t, and I’d like to get my hands on the kids who tried to make out it did. Can you imagine how it must have made her feel? It’s no wonder she didn’t want to talk to me. She probably couldn’t even stand to look at me without thinking of what they were saying.”

Realizing that was probably true, Jenna told him, “We’ve just had a visit from the bully’s mother. If you’d seen her…heard her…Our lovely girl must have been terrified out of her mind, and what were we doing all that time? Thinking about ourselves, not sparing—”

“Just a minute,” he interrupted. “I hope you’re not about to start blaming me for any of this.”

Stunned, Jenna retorted, “You can’t seriously think you bear no responsibility at all. If you hadn’t gone off in pursuit of your own—”

“Jenna, I really don’t need this.”

“Nor do I,” she cried furiously, “but for me there’s no escaping it. She’s missing, no one seems to have the first idea where she is or who she’s with, and if we end up not being able to find her then let me tell you, I won’t only be holding you responsible, I’ll be making sure the rest of the world does too.”

As she ended the call she was so incensed by his words and disbelieving of his attitude that she had to give herself a moment before she could return to the kitchen. When she did, Jack rang again. She couldn’t answer. She was too wound up to be able to deal with whatever else he had to say. So she sent him a text.

I know you care about Paige and want to find her as much as I do, so we have to try to support each other, not keep attacking,
she wrote.
The children need you. They’re scared and I hardly know what to tell them. It would help if you were here, but only if you can control the way you’re speaking to me.

It wasn’t until after Richard and his sons had gone home and she was getting the children ready for bed that he texted back.
I’m sorry for what I said. After the things I’ve been accused of today I guess I wasn’t thinking straight. I want to help with the children, please let me. I want to be there for you too.

Deciding to call him, she went into her bedroom and closed the door. “If you want to come and spend the night here you can,” she told him. “I can’t imagine either of us will get any sleep, but I know I wouldn’t want to be on my own right now, so there’s no reason why you should be.”

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“Then I’ll be there within the hour.”

—

It was just after seven-thirty the following morning that the police rang to speak to Jenna. She was already awake, though huddled under a blanket on the sofa, while Jack slept in Josh’s room. The children were spread out around her, with Hanna and her mother dozing in the armchairs until the phone roused them.

Torn between hope and dread, Jenna clicked on the line and waited for the person at the other end to speak.

“Mrs. Moore? It’s Lesley Mariner.”

“Have you found her?” Jenna asked faintly.

“I’m afraid not, but a dog walker’s just called in…”

Jenna didn’t hear any more. It was always dog walkers who found bodies. “No!” she sobbed wretchedly. “Please, please no.”

Hanna rushed to her.

“I don’t think you heard me,” Mariner was saying. “Are you still there, Mrs. Moore?”

“Yes, I’m here,” Jenna whispered, stilling Hanna.

“This person is claiming to have seen a teenage girl on Whiteford Sands about half an hour ago,” Mariner told her.

Jenna was trying to make sense of it. A teenage girl on the beach a few miles away, at this hour…“Was…was it her?” she asked.

“We don’t know, but she fits the description, so the search-and-rescue team is on its way. I thought you’d like to know.”

“Of course. Thank you. I…” She was trying to think. She needed to go over there, and she needed to go now. “There’s been a sighting at Whiteford Sands,” she told the others. “They don’t know if it’s her, but it was a teenage girl who fits the description.”

Dashing upstairs, she roused Jack and ran back down again, not even taking the time to splash water on her face or comb her hair. It was going to be Paige. It had to be, and if it was, she needed to get to her as fast as she possibly could.

Minutes later she, Jack, and Hanna were in the car with Waffle in the back. “He’ll find her,” Jenna declared, brimming with confidence. “He’s her dog. He’ll know where she is. We should have taken him yesterday. Why didn’t I think of it? She wasn’t there, though, was she, so he couldn’t have found her then. But he will this morning, won’t you, sweetie? You’re going to find Paige, and then we’ll bring her home.”

Jack glanced at her worriedly, while Hanna put a hand on Jenna’s shoulder as though to calm her.

“It’ll be her,” Jenna insisted, her eyes swimming in tears. “I know it. I swear, it’s going to be her.”

By the time they drove into the quaint little hamlet of Cwm Ivy, heading for the wooded hillsides around Whiteford Sands, the place was already teeming with police cars. Recognizing Jenna, a uniformed officer waved them through, and directed Jack to pull up at the side of the track.

Leaping out, Jenna ran to the back of the car for Waffle. “Go find Paige,” she instructed urgently. “Go find her, there’s a good boy.”

Obediently Waffle bounded off down the track, sniffing and swerving, kicking up dust as he went and barely pausing to query a scent.

Jenna, Jack, and Hanna ran after him, but there was no way they could keep up.

“He knows where she is,” Jenna cried excitedly. “I can tell. He knows where he’s going.”

She received no contradiction; the others were too full of hope themselves to try to rationalize hers.

Waffle was at least fifty yards ahead, almost at the end of the track, ready to run up into the dunes. In the distance they could see the beach, swarming with police and tracker dogs. It was a beautiful morning: sunlight was sparkling over the sea, the sky was blue, and the sands were as softly golden as the sun itself. It was like being in a dream. Everything seemed so perfect that nothing could go wrong now.

She was here. Jenna could feel it. Her baby was close now, and at any minute she’d be holding her in her arms.

Please God, don’t let me be fooling myself. I have to be right about this.

All of a sudden Waffle turned off the main track and started along another, where he came to an abrupt halt in front of a five-bar gate. He sniffed around it, frantically trying to find a way past. In the end he squeezed through a tiny gap at the side and charged on.

“Waffle, wait!” Jenna called. “We’re going to lose you.”

The dog wasn’t listening. He bounded on, past a small bungalow tucked into the trees, around a bend in the trail, and disappeared into the woods.

“Waffle!” Jack shouted as they climbed the gate. “Waffle, wait, boy!”

By the time they reached the bend, breathless, hearts pounding with exertion and hope, there was no longer any sign of the dog, only a fork in the track that left them not knowing which way to go.

—

There was a part in the book
The Lovely Bones
when the girl who was dead realized her dog could see her, which meant he was dead too. It had always made Paige cry. This was what she thought of when Waffle bounded in through the door of her shelter and jumped on her in slobbery glee.

We’re both dead,
she was thinking as she hugged him, and though she was happier than she’d ever been in her life to see him, she was devastated too. Waffle was dead. She didn’t want him to die, ever.

“Hello,” she whispered, squeezing him with all her might.

He licked the tears from her cheeks and wagged his tail so hard his back legs lifted.

Waffle was here for her. He’d come because he didn’t want to let her down the way everyone else had. Especially Julie, who had directed her to this place that was a shack, but like someone’s home with sofas and chairs, a kitchen and fireplace. There were even beds in other rooms and a bathroom.

But Julie hadn’t come.

Paige had waited and waited out here in the woods, all alone, terrified, and confused, desperate to find the courage to act alone—until finally she’d walked into the waves, never to come back.

So now she was dead. She didn’t exist anymore, but like the girl in
The Lovely Bones
she could see and hear everyone else, even though they couldn’t see or hear her.

Her mother was shouting for Waffle. “Where are you, boy? Waffle, come back.”

“Waffle!” Auntie Hanna called. “Here, boy.”

“They want you,” she told him, “but you’re here now, we’re together, and I won’t let you go.”

A shadow filled the sunlit doorway.

Paige kept her face buried in Waffle.

“Oh my God. Oh my God,” she heard her mother sob. “Paige…”

“No!” Paige cried, leaping to her feet and backing away. “Don’t touch me! Don’t come near me.”

Her mother stopped.

“It’s your fault,” Paige sobbed wildly. “I could have done it if it weren’t for you.”

Her mother’s arms were outstretched, and so were Paige’s, blocking her from coming any further.

“I don’t understand,” Jenna whispered. “Please…”

“They said I’m not supposed to think about anyone else, or care about them, or do anything except think about me, then it would be all right, I’d be ready to do it, but I kept thinking about
you
! I couldn’t stop thinking about
you.
You were here in my head all the time, you wouldn’t stop, wouldn’t let me go, and I have to because I can’t take any more.”

“Paige, listen to me,” Jenna implored. “It’s going to be all right…”

“No!
No!
It’s never going to be all right because I love you too much and if I didn’t I could have made everything stop….” Tears were streaming down her cheeks, and her whole body was jerking with violent sobs.

Jenna tried going forward, but Paige backed further away.

“Darling, we’re going to work it out,” Jenna told her. “The bullies are already being dealt with, and Dad’s here….We know what they said about you and him, and we know it wasn’t true. Everyone does.”

“Then why did they say it?”

“Because they’re mean and spiteful and they don’t have dads who love them anywhere near as much.”

“So why did he leave?”

“Paige,” Jack said, stepping into the room, “I swear it had nothing to do with you. I love you more—”

“No! You’re with
her
now. You don’t care about us.”

“That isn’t true. Please try to understand how sorry I am that I’ve done this to you. If I hadn’t, I know you’d have talked to me and Mum about what was happening.”

Paige’s eyes shot to the door as a police officer appeared.

“It’s OK,” Jenna told him. “She’s fine, we all are. If you could give us a minute…”

As he stepped back Jenna moved closer to Paige. “Can we take you home now?” she asked softly.

Paige started to shake her head, but there was nothing she could do to stop herself falling into Jenna’s arms, whispering, “Mummy, Mummy, Mummy.”