Читать книгу Her Last Breath: The new gripping summer page-turner from the No 1 bestseller - Tracy Buchanan, Tracy Buchanan - Страница 13

Thursday, 4 May

Estelle stared out of the window as a taxi drove her through Lillysands four hours later. She felt tears flood her eyes, her tummy tingling with nerves. She hated this jumble sale of feelings: trepidation and excitement, sadness and giddiness. She hadn’t felt that in such a long time. The past few years had been plain sailing, very clear, no confusing emotions. But now everything seemed to be unravelling … including her relationship with Seb. The fact she’d barely thought of him during the long train journey suggested she’d made the right decision. She’d instead tried to focus on looking through a copy of her book to find quotes to read out at her upcoming launch party. But it was impossible, her mind filled with Poppy, Poppy, Poppy.

And Aiden.

She needed to tell him face to face about the child they’d conceived. It felt unimaginably cruel for him to hear it second-hand from the police.

But this trip was more than that. She had a feeling all the answers to Poppy’s disappearance lay in Lillysands. The people who knew about Estelle giving birth all lived in Lillysands. Even her social worker hadn’t found out, she’d kept it so carefully concealed. But the information must have got out somehow and someone was using it against her. But why? And who? She didn’t have any enemies in Lillysands, not that she knew of anyway. But Lillysands was a strange place, close-knit and judgemental. She’d learnt that a long time ago.

The air inside the taxi felt close and stale. She powered down the window.

‘You all right, love?’ the taxi driver asked, a local man with greying dark hair.

‘Fine, thanks, just breathing in the seaside air.’

The air seemed to rush in at her a million miles an hour, bringing with it a montage of memories, like the first time she’d been driven to Lillysands by her social worker that freezing December day eighteen years ago. She hadn’t been delighted at the prospect of staying by the sea. The first seven years of her life had been spent in a grotty seaside town, sand in her sodden nappies, shoulders red raw from sunburn, the echo of screeching seagulls the backdrop to her stoned mother’s snoring. So the seaside just meant neglect and pain for her. But as her social worker’s car had rounded the corner and the whole town came into view, Estelle realised Lillysands was nothing like the rotting town of her childhood. Colourful houses dotted the cliff; sailboats gleamed under steel skies; people strolled by with smiles and expensive winter coats, faces pink from the cold sea breeze.

‘Lots of money here, Estelle,’ her social worker had explained. ‘Don’t mess things up, this place could be good for you.’

‘It’s Stel.’

Her social worker rolled her eyes. ‘Alright, Stel. But listen, this is the best placement we’ve had for you, even better than the first one. So behave.’

The first one. Her social worker always held that up as the holy grail, better than the care home and the other unsuccessful foster placements. But it hadn’t exactly been wonderful. A run-down house with a huge garden. Three dogs and two sneery teenage girls. And then Julie and Pete, friendly enough faces but clearly in desperate need of money. Even at seven, Estelle noticed the mounting bills and scuffed wallpaper; the overheard arguments between the couple about money, making it even more obvious. She’d been placed in a box room that had obviously been home to other kids like her, scrawled messages on the walls not very effectively hidden by carefully placed cushions. She remembered curling up on the bottom bunk bed that first night, yearning to be back home with her parents despite what they’d done to her. At least her filthy childhood flat was familiar. The new place seemed alien to her, scary with the angry teenagers and barking dogs. She was quickly removed from there a month in after the couple split up, and she ended up at a tiny house with an older couple who kept telling her to ‘talk for god’s sake, child’ when all she wanted to do was sleep and wait until she was back with her parents.

After that followed a succession of foster homes, some stints in care homes. She preferred the care homes at times, bumping into familiar faces, a semblance of independence. Just before she went to live with the Garlands, she fell in with a bad crowd at the care home: skipping school, drinking, kissing boys, the sorts of things a twelve-year-old shouldn’t be doing. Something inside her stopped her going too far though: placing that bottle down when her head swam too much; pushing the boy away when his fingers reached inside her waistband. It was like standing on the precipice and knowing that even though what greeted her at the bottom could be sweet oblivion, it would also mean no coming back. And there was an urge inside her to come back, instilled ironically by her dad’s boasts about what he could have been if he hadn’t injured himself as a young footballer. Every week in care would begin with Estelle wanting – needing – to do better. Head down at school, reading, writing, baking – she particularly liked baking. But then something would happen. A girl shoving her. A boy telling her she was a skank. A woman passing her on the street who looked like her mum. A missed visit by her parents. And she’d be at square one again. Bunking off school, drinking. In the end, the pool of foster parents willing to put up with her narrowed, especially when she accused one of abusing her – a stupid lie to get her placed elsewhere. So the time she spent in care homes in-between being with foster parents began to increase, and started to look like a permanent prospect.

The Garlands were her last chance. But she’d messed that up too in the end, falling pregnant too, giving her child up.

And what of that child? Had Poppy run away to give herself a chance at something; at finding her birth parents and maybe herself in the process? Estelle felt a pinch of guilt. There had been times over the years she’d considered tracking down the newborn she’d given up. But she knew she wouldn’t be allowed to search for her daughter until the girl turned eighteen. She hadn’t even known her name, for Christ’s sake. Autumn and Max had said giving her daughter a name might make Estelle form an attachment to her. She’d agreed numbly, just as she had to everything that day – too weak, too traumatised from what had happened to argue.

How naïve she’d been, to think something as simple as giving a name to a child was what caused attachment. Those first few months after, no matter how hard she’d tried to forget, it was a knowledge, a bond that curdled inside her. But time had made it fade. And while there were days, weeks, when her mind would be dominated by the baby she’d given away, she felt sure, even now, that she’d done the right thing. What sort of life could she have provided for the girl?

Estelle looked out of the window, shielding her eyes from the morning sun as she peered out at a Lillysands that had barely changed. She resisted the impulse to put her arm out of the window, just as she used to when Max would drive her up this very road in his bright red convertible.

The town was dominated by a huge white cliff face, the pastel-coloured houses lining it painted pretty blues and pinks, yellows and greens, perfect postcard fodder. Along the bottom of the cliff was the town’s famous white beach and pretty marina, a plethora of shops and buildings sitting on cobbled stones across from it. And overlooking it all, Lady Lillysands as the locals called it, a huge hourglass shape that curved in from the cliff face, created from years of wind and rain. It looked like the side profile of a woman’s body, hence its name, and folklore had built up around it over the centuries, one of the reasons tourists flocked to Lillysands so regularly.

As they drove further into town, Estelle noticed colourful posters stuck to walls and lamp posts, advertising the upcoming festival. It was an annual event held in May to celebrate the legend of Lady Lillysands. Lots of stalls, games, entertainment and fun.

‘They still hold the festival here?’ Estelle asked the taxi driver.

‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘You’re not new to the place then?’

‘No, I used to live here a long time ago.’

‘In Seaview Terrace?’

‘Yes.’

The taxi driver’s face darkened. He went quiet and focused on driving further up the cliffs, passing streets of small pastel-coloured houses. The farther up she got, the more people watched the car suspiciously. Tourists rarely ventured up here so it was unusual to see strangers in taxis this far up. The people of Lillysands didn’t take to strangers, unless they were tourists ploughing money into the town. And even they weren’t supposed to venture beyond the centre. That was why it felt so wonderful to have been accepted as Estelle was back then. As cold as Lillysands could be with strangers, it was irresistibly warm to those it knew and trusted.

As the taxi reached the street where the Garlands lived, two terraced cottages came into view: one pretty blue cottage with a well-kept front garden, the other pink and long abandoned with boarded-up windows. The cottages weren’t officially part of Seaview Terrace, that started with the grander houses farther up the street.

Estelle leaned forward as the car approached the cottages, gripping the taxi driver’s headrest. ‘Can you stop here? I can walk from here.’

The driver came to a stop in front of the cottages and helped Estelle with her large bag as she handed him his money. He peered further up the road towards the Garlands’ mansion, a frown puckering his brow. ‘You take care, alright?’ he said.

Estelle looked into his eyes. He seemed wary of Autumn and Max. But then Estelle remembered there had been jealousy in the town, the rich residents sometimes sneered at by the less well off.

As the taxi drove off, Estelle didn’t go straight to the Garlands’ house, instead walking towards the pink cottage, memories accosting her of her foster sister Alice sitting cross-legged on the dusty floorboards, red hair dangling to her knees as she read a book; Aiden sitting on the windowsill, strumming his guitar as he looked out over the sea. And Estelle – or Stel as she was known then – her long brown hair a tangle around her shoulders, lying on the floor next to Alice, drumming her fingers to the music as she watched Aiden. She quickly peered into a window to double check it still wasn’t occupied, finding the same empty rooms and peeling wallpaper. Still empty, just as it had been when she’d been a teenager.

Estelle’s fingertips glanced over the cottage’s bumpy walls as she walked around its side, heading towards the small garden at the back with its large tree, branches trembling in the early summer breeze. She paused. Was it her imagination or did there seem to be barely any garden left now? The tree she was sure used to sit in the middle of the garden was now so close to the cliff edge. Perhaps she’d just remembered it wrong.

She paused as she peered past the tree. At the edge of the cliff was a withering bunch of flowers. Pink roses, edges browning, green stems wilting. A memorial to a life long lost.

‘Oh Alice,’ she whispered to herself.

‘I thought it was you.’

She turned to see a man in his fifties with glasses and greying hair standing behind her. She frowned. ‘Do I know you?’

He smiled sadly. ‘I’ve aged that much, have I?’

She looked at him in shock. ‘Mr Tate?’

He nodded. He had aged. Mr Tate had been the school’s most beloved teacher, one of those hip teachers who let you sit on your table and discuss the interesting anthropological learnings from last night’s Eastenders when you should have been learning about the Treaty of Versailles. And yet he still managed to get top marks for his students.

Estelle had been particularly impressed by him. She’d come to Lillysands being suspicious of teachers, her first experience of them in her old primary school chequered. But soon she grew to adore Mr Tate just as much as everyone else did.

‘I’m surprised you recognise me,’ she said to him with a smile.

‘The famous chef? Of course I do. So, what brings you back to Lillysands? Autumn’s sixtieth?’

Estelle closed her eyes. Oh god, she’d forgotten it was Autumn’s birthday that weekend. This was the woman who’d been like a mother to her for several years. But, then, Estelle hadn’t been in touch with her for even more years.

Thinking that made her feel even worse.

‘It’s going to be quite the party,’ Mr Tate continued. ‘I hear they’re even getting in caterers.’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘But then the Garlands have always known how to throw a party.’ He’d never been a fan of Autumn and Max. Maybe as a self-proclaimed leftie, he found their excesses a bit much.

‘No, it’s just a fleeting visit,’ Estelle explained.

He flinched. ‘Look, there’s something I’ve been meaning to get in touch about.’

‘The journalist?’ Estelle asked, thinking of what the journalist who’d visited her had told her about speaking to Mr Tate.

He nodded. ‘It was Mary. She answered the phone to him, he got her talking. By the time I realised who it was …’ He sighed. ‘Sorry. I tried to remedy it by talking to him but I probably just made it worse.’

‘It’s fine, really. How is she?’

He peered towards the blue cottage where he lived with his wife, another teacher who’d been at the school when Estelle was there. His brown eyes filled with sadness. ‘She’s ill, I’m afraid. Cancer.’

‘Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that.’

‘We’ll fight it, don’t you worry,’ he said, clearly forcing himself to be bright. ‘I retired early to make sure I’m there for her.’

Her heart went out to him. She’d always liked them both.

He looked towards the dried flowers at the side of the cliff. ‘It still pains us to think of what happened to Alice. She was such a bright girl, had so much promise.’

Estelle followed his gaze. ‘Yes, she did,’ she whispered.

Fifteen years ago, Alice had jumped from this very cliff. They’d discovered Alice’s body the day after Estelle gave birth, swept up on the beach at the foot of the Lady Lillysands cliff, a suicide note eventually found in her room.

‘She’d have been proud of how far you’ve come,’ Mr Tate said. ‘I’m proud. You did it. You really did. And with a recipe book too.’ He put his hand on her shoulder, looking into her eyes. ‘You’ve come a long way, Estelle.’

‘Thank you.’

He sighed, peering back over his shoulder. ‘I better get back to Mary. I just saw you here and thought I’d come over to say hello. Hopefully see you around?’

Estelle smiled. ‘Hopefully.’

‘Take care, Estelle.’ Then he walked off towards his cottage.

She watched him go, noticing how he limped slightly. Would Autumn and Max appear aged as well? Somehow, she couldn’t imagine it. They’d always seemed invincible and timeless to her. Only one way to find out.

She shrugged her bag over her shoulder, walking up the road towards Seaview Terrace, home to the huge house where the Garlands lived.

When she’d first arrived there as a child, a large sign had welcomed her: ‘Seaview Terrace. Luxury 5- and 6-bed clifftop houses for sale, the ideal seaside home or holiday let.’ Her foster father Max had developed these houses with an investment from his rich friend Peter. They were so grand and modern, a dozen pastel-coloured houses, the jewel in Lillysands’ property crown.

Estelle approached the Garlands’ house now, the first of the houses, heart thumping. Its pale lilac walls felt so familiar to her, the pebble-lined lane that ran up to the glass front door like a walkway through her memories. She remembered how it had felt to look at the house all those years before. She’d been used to the houses she was carted off to getting progressively worse (cause enough problems with foster carers and word gets out). But this house had blown her mind.

Autumn was the first one to come to the door when Estelle arrived there as a girl. Estelle had been as awestruck at her as she had been the house. Autumn was so glamorous, with blonde hair tumbling down her shoulders, wearing a long-sleeved blue dress, neckline plunging. She’d met Estelle’s eyes, compassion in her own green ones, as Estelle had trudged up to the door.

‘Come here, darling,’ Autumn had said, opening her arms to her.

Estelle had recoiled.

‘Come on,’ Autumn had coaxed.

The social worker had shoved Estelle towards Autumn and Estelle had taken a reluctant step, peering suspiciously at a man who’d appeared in the hallway behind the woman. He was tall with short spiky white hair and sparkling blue eyes.

‘It’s only a hug,’ Autumn had said. ‘It won’t kill you.’

So she’d stepped into Autumn’s arms, flinching, and Autumn had held her close.

‘You’re home,’ she’d whispered into Estelle’s ear. ‘You don’t ever have to be scared or alone or hungry again.’

Estelle had seriously thought about bolting then. But she knew if she did, that would be it, her social worker had told her that. No more chances. She’d be thrown into the melting pot, a lost cause. A small part of her feared that. So she’d let Autumn hug her despite hating every minute.

That was the thing back then, she was so unused to affection. Her father had come from a family who’d rather die than show anyone anything close to warmth. Estelle still remembered the occasional visits to her grandparents’ house in those very early days before they passed away when she was six: her parents showering and pulling on their best clothes (the ill-fitting navy suit her father always wore to court; a tight black dress and ugly red jacket for her mother). They’d put bows in Estelle’s curly brown hair, force her into a pretty but oversized dress and shoes so tight they made her cry. She’d grizzle throughout the entire thing and it would make her parents argue, make her grandparents tut and roll their eyes. ‘Can’t control her,’ they’d mutter under their breaths. ‘Look at her filthy face.’ No love, no hugs. Nothing.

It seemed to pass down to Estelle’s birth parents. Instead, hands reaching out for her would often scare her, signalling a telling off, a gripped wrist, slapped cheeks. Looking back now, Estelle could see why her parents were the way they were. Her mother’s parents were alcoholics, neglectful and violent. Estelle’s father’s parents were lacking in a different way. On the surface, they seemed like upstanding members of the community. But beneath it all, they were harsh with their son, judgmental and critical. It made Estelle’s father so angry at the world, always trying to prove himself. He liked to tell her and anyone else who’d listen he’d have been a famous football player if it weren’t for a knee injury he’d sustained as a teenager (caused by a fight with another kid – the same fight that had got him slung behind bars for eighteen months, Estelle eventually found out). ‘We could be living in a mansion right now, Estelle. A proper mansion with a butler and everything.’ To give him his due, Estelle had once found a grotty much-used article of him holding up a medal for being ‘player of the match’, black hair sweaty, brown eyes sparkling. She remembered staring at that athletic fourteen-year-old, trying to find the skinny, angry, spotty father she knew.

When she’d first walked into the Garlands’ house, she’d remembered her father’s boasts. Now, this is a mansion, she’d thought to herself.

Estelle peered up at the house now, battling a riot of emotions as she smoothed her white cotton dress down, tucking her sweeping fringe across her tanned forehead.

Then the front door suddenly opened – Autumn appearing there as she had all those years before. She was wearing a long white dress and gold sandals, her lips painted red, her eyeliner a bird’s wing above each green eye. Autumn’s hair was a little shorter, but she looked the same as she had fifteen years before, bar the odd wrinkle or two.

Autumn shielded her eyes from the morning sun with her hands as she looked at Estelle. Then her eyes widened. ‘Stel?’ she called out.

‘Yes, sorry,’ Estelle said, walking up the path, memories chasing her with every step: Alice and her skipping down this path, arms interlinked. Aiden and Estelle whispering their goodbyes in the darkness, lips briefly touching before sneaking back into the house. ‘I should have called. It was quite impulsive.’

‘No, no, not at all, you’re always welcome!’ That was the way it was with the Garlands; their door was always open to the people they cared about. But it had been fifteen years. Autumn grabbed Estelle into a hug anyway, as if those fifteen years hadn’t passed, her musky perfume overwhelming Estelle with memories. Estelle peered over her shoulder towards the house, looking in at its beautifully wallpapered cream walls. Autumn had it redecorated every couple of years by her interior designer friend Becca so it always looked clean and fresh. Estelle remembered feeling filthy in the house’s presence the first time she arrived; her dark hair a tangle down her back, her tartan trousers grubby and her black jumper too tight.

Now she felt clean by comparison, so clean she could almost smell the scorching bleach come off her.

Autumn pulled back, looking into Estelle’s eyes. ‘I just had a feeling when you called me yesterday, we’d see you before too long. Please, come in,’ Autumn said, beckoning her inside.

Estelle paused a moment before stepping over the threshold. The house seemed to reach out to her, pulling her towards it, and she felt a heady mixture of an intense need to get in there and a roaring desire to run away.

‘Max!’ Autumn shouted, her voice echoing around the large hallway and giving Estelle no choice but to step in as she gently led her inside.

Max appeared at the top of the stairs, looking the same too with his short white hair and sharp blue eyes.

‘Look who’s come for a visit,’ Autumn said.

Max peered closer at Estelle then shook his head in disbelief. ‘Is it really you, Stel?’ he asked, laughing his charming laugh. The sound of it took her right back in time. It was overwhelming. How had they barely aged? ‘Autumn’s been dreaming about this for years,’ he said, jogging down the luxuriously carpeted stairs. ‘You never call, you never visit,’ he joked, reaching out to Estelle. She walked towards him, letting him envelope her in his arms.

‘I’m sorry I left it so long,’ Estelle said, eventually extracting herself from his grip. ‘Life caught up with me.’

‘Stop with the apologies,’ Autumn said, stroking Estelle’s short hair. ‘You’re here now and that’s what counts. Look how different your hair is!’

‘It suits you,’ Max said. ‘Must’ve been a long journey. You’re in London now, right?’

Estelle nodded, taking in the vast hallway with dark wooden floors and walls adorned with various family photos – including one of Estelle, face calm as she looked out to sea, her long dark hair in a ponytail. Estelle looked at that girl, tried to find herself in her face. But all she could see was Poppy.

She’d looked just like Poppy. How could she not have seen that before? But then she didn’t have many photos from her childhood like other kids did; she’d left it all behind.

‘Look at this place,’ Estelle said, dragging her eyes away from the picture and feeling like that awe-filled teenager all over again. ‘It looks just as amazing as it did the first time I was here.’

‘Bet it’s bringing back some memories,’ Max said, his arm back around her shoulder.

Estelle nodded, stepping away from him. She should be used to the over-affectionate ways of the Garlands, but it all felt like too much now. That was the thing with them. Nothing by halves. All the emotion and the love thrown at you until you just found yourself wrapped up in it and rolling down a cliff so fast you forgot the old you was standing at the top, watching.

She supposed that’s how she felt all those years ago, standing in the very spot she was standing in now, peering up at the large balcony above and trying to reconcile it with the house she’d lived in as a child with her parents: the tiny cramped hallway with used nappies on the floor, dirty toys flung all over, empty wine bottles and discarded filthy scraps of foil, her mum weaving towards her, ash falling from her cigarette.

‘You must be starving,’ Autumn said, taking Estelle’s hand and leading her through the house. Estelle stopped as she reached the threshold of the kitchen, mouth dropping open. It looked just like her kitchen at Seb’s house. White floor-to-ceiling cupboards across the wall to the left with a line of low units dominated by a pale blue Aga cooker. Then, in the middle, a sleek wood-topped island with four chrome stools overlooking the stunning views outside.

Had she unwittingly moulded her kitchen design from memories of this place, without even realising?

She felt her eyes drawn towards the view through the vast windows. An endless sea, the white of the cliffs. How familiar a sight, one that used to greet her each morning.

She walked to the windows, taking it all in. This garden seemed so much smaller now too. Her teenage eyes must have magnified things in her memories.

‘The view still has that effect, doesn’t it?’ Autumn said, squeezing Estelle’s hand. ‘I still have to stare at it for ten minutes each morning when I wake up, just to convince myself it’s real. We are so lucky to live in a town like this.’

Estelle peered out towards the heart of Lillysands and hints of the white glimmer of sails from its marina. She wondered if Aiden were out there somewhere.

Behind her, Autumn went to the fridge. ‘So, what will it be? Pancakes and maple syrup? Poached eggs and muffins? Or the full shebang, the famous Garland fry-up?’

Estelle took in the contents of the bulging fridge freezer. Autumn was a food taster for high-street stores and always brought home boot-loads of food.

‘People have between two thousand and ten thousand taste buds,’ Estelle remembered Autumn telling her on her second day there. ‘I’m one of those with tens of thousands. Taste is everything, darling. Taste is the epicentre of what it means to be alive.’

‘I ate on the train,’ Estelle said now. ‘But thank you, I appreciate it.’

‘I’m hungry,’ Max said.

Autumn rolled her eyes. ‘Aren’t you always? Tea then,’ she said to Estelle. ‘Or coffee?’

Estelle reached into her bag, handing over some sachets of peppermint tea. ‘Tea would be good, thanks. I hope you don’t mind using these for mine?’

Autumn and Max exchanged a look. Then Autumn took the teabag, holding it with her fingertips as though it were poison before dropping it into a mug.

‘Honestly, it feels like we’ve gone back eighteen years,’ Autumn said, sighing contentedly as she slapped some bacon onto a pan. ‘Doesn’t it, Max, having our Stel back in this kitchen, sitting at that stool?’

‘Poor girl,’ Max said, shaking his head. ‘Still makes me ill thinking of the state you were in when you got here. We’ve all had our fair share of difficult childhoods but yours was particularly difficult. We soon changed that though, didn’t we? And now look at you,’ he said, smiling that magnetic smile of his. ‘Author, vlogger, Olympic advisor. I’m so proud of you, and so proud we played a part in that.’

‘Yes, we really are,’ Autumn said, leaning over and squeezing Estelle’s hand. ‘It’s good to be able to tell you that to your face, darling, how very proud we are.’

‘Thanks,’ Estelle said, feeling her face flush.

‘You’ll stay tonight?’ Max said.

‘Of course she will!’ Autumn exclaimed. ‘Your old room is ready and waiting for you, I’ll even add some chocolate to the pillows,’ she added with a wink

‘Oh, you really don’t have to; I was planning to find a hotel in town.’

The truth was, she wasn’t even sure she’d need to stay overnight. She just knew she needed to get to Aiden before the police did and try to get a sense of whether anyone else knew about Poppy here. She peered out over Lillysands. Someone out there must know something. She could feel it in her gut. But the police had no hope of squeezing any information out of the people here if they decided to ask questions. Only someone who was part of the community could – or someone who used to be part of the community, at least.

‘You will not stay in a hotel,’ Autumn said, pouting. ‘If you’re going to stay, I insist it’s here.’

Estelle smiled. ‘Okay, I’ll let you know. I take it you don’t have any foster kids staying?’ Estelle asked as she sat on the stool Max pulled out for her. ‘It’s very quiet.’

They both shook their heads sadly. ‘Just too busy now,’ Max replied.

‘With the property business?’ Estelle asked.

He nodded.

‘I’ve even gone part-time with the food tasting to help out,’ Autumn said.

‘That’s good news though,’ Estelle said. ‘Means it’s expanding.’

‘Very good news,’ Max said in a bright voice.

Estelle yawned.

‘Keeping you up, are we?’ he said with a laugh.

‘Sorry! I’ve just been on the go since five this morning.’

‘Five?’ Autumn and Max exclaimed.

Estelle laughed. They’d never been early risers, she was surprised to see them awake and ready at this time in fact. ‘Like I said, it was an impulsive visit.’

‘So you just woke at five in the morning,’ Autumn said, moving the pan about as the bacon sizzled, ‘and thought “what the hell, I’ll go visit Autumn and Max”.’