“They can have them back when I’m paid my thirty grand. And since I hear Yasmin Lloyd’s due a bit of a windfall, that shouldn’t be a problem now.”
“Where did you hear that?”
Huw, the one person in Cwm Coed who can match Ffion for stubbornness, taps the side of his nose. They stare at each other, and for once it’s Ffion who looks away first.
“I’d better go.”
“I’ve been thinking.”
“You’re supposed to check with a doctor before taking up new activities.”
“We could have a drink sometime. Like before we got married. No pressure, no baby talk, just a drink. See how things go.”
The wind whips Ffion’s hair across her eyes, and Huw reaches up to push it back, a gesture that a year ago, Ffion would hardly have noticed. She steps back hurriedly, forgetting where they are, and sees the alarm in his face as she clutches at the scaffolding.
“Jesus, Ffi. Am I that much of a bastard?”
“You’re not a bastard.” She’s the one at fault, the one who finished things. She pushes her hands into her pockets to stop herself from reaching for him. She’s promised herself she won’t hurt him any more than she already has, but he still loves her, and so much about that is tempting.
“That drink, then? I’m out with the mountain rescue lads tonight, but—”
Ffion takes off the hard hat and hands it to him. “Maybe once this job’s out of the way.”
She has five missed calls from Leo. She deletes the notifications and switches her phone to silent, then sits in her car and scrolls through her emails. The crime analysts have dug into the applications downloaded on Rhys’s phone, and Ffion opens the attachment. Most of the apps are familiar to her—a fitness tracker, social media, various shopping platforms—and there are several music apps listed, including instrument tuners and a vocal warm-up. It’s strange to see someone’s life listed in this way, their priorities and privileges categorized into folders and shortcuts. Ffion imagines her own digital footprint on display: photo editing and pizza vouchers, wind speeds and stargazing apps.
DC Thorngate, from Crouch’s team, has been tasked with looking into the various dating apps Rhys used—some of which were deleted from his phone several weeks prior to his death—but Ffion’s curious about the other apps.Number 36is listed as a membership club.
I was having a drink at my club in Soho, Rhys said in his statement about the evening the unknown woman visited his home, threatening Yasmin.
Is Number 36 the Soho club? A limited amount of data has been retrieved from the app and is recorded beneath the listing. Rhys made reservations there most weeks until June last year, when his membership ended. Lack of money? Perhaps Rhys was starting to feel the pinch without work coming in.
Ffion googles the club. Number 36 doesn’t appear anywhere, and there’s nothing on social media. The investigating officer in Rhys’s harassment case is listed on the scanned statement Leo shared with her, and Ffion fires off a quick email asking what he knows about Rhys’s club. It feels dodgy to Ffion. Even if Number 36 is stuck in the dark ages, nowadays every business hassomekind of online presence, doesn’t it?
Unless it doesn’t want to be found.
Seventeen
January 5
Leo
Leo is running a personal errand on job time. This is such an unprecedented occurrence that he can feel his pulse quickening, and he wonders if Ffion “Lone Ranger” Morgan operates in a constant state of stress, fueled by adrenaline and caffeine, and whether it bothers her. He suspects not.
He’s standing on the doorstep of where he used to live, a three-bedroom house on a respectable estate in Chester. Allie—or, more likely, Dominic—has painted the front door a glossy black, and a FOR SALE sign skewers the front lawn. After their divorce, Allie had bought Leo out, leaving him with not quite enough to start over—not once you factored in the monthly direct debit Allie insisted on.
“I gave up my career to look after Harris.”
“Oh, come on,” Leo had said. “It was hardly acareer.” He’d regretted it as soon as he’d said it, knowing it would find its way into Allie’s little black book of Leo’s wrongdoings. Before Allie fell pregnant, she had been office manager at a removal firm. They’d offered her part-time hours, but she had declined, putting Harris into full-time nursery when he was six months old and spending the day doing fitness classes.
She’s in her gym wear now, answering the door in burgundy leggings and a matching top, a tight Lycra band around her hair. “What do you want?”
“Can I come in? It’s freezing out here.”
Allie hesitates, then sighs and walks inside. Leo follows her into the kitchen. A pile of cream invitations sits on one side of the table, matching envelopes on the other. In the center is a printed spreadsheet on which Allie has ticked some of the names.
“Wedding invitations,” Allie says. She sits and pulls one off the pile, checking her list and writing a name across the invite before sliding it into an envelope and licking the seal.
Leo’s heart has long since stopped hurting, so he ignores his ex-wife’s lack of tact and sits opposite her. “Please don’t take my son away.” He’s been awake most of the night, having this conversation in his head.