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Mr Peach had to call his name twice before he confirmed that he was present.

However, Emily’s sudden appearance in class caused barely a ripple, due to the equally sudden disappearance of Jessica Took.

The school was alight with that news. Excitement crackled through every class like cinema sweets. The ADD kids and the ADHD kids, and the kids who were simply angling for a label so they’d have an excuse, took the opportunity to be extra ‘challenging’. Knots of girls stood around outside classrooms, tearful and hugging each other as if they’d all known Jess personally – and daring the boys or the teachers to question that sisterhood. In retaliation, the excluded boys took refuge in ghoulish speculation. Words that were too harsh for girls or adults to say out loud were common currency for the boys – worst-case scenarios shouted down corridors, and kicked about freely on the daisy-strewn playing field.

‘They’ll never find her.’

‘She’s dead already.’

‘I bet her dad did it. Jess always said he hated her.’

Steven did not join in. He kept his eye on the ball and scored twice, thanks to the inattention of the opposition. He didn’t want to speculate about a missing child. Many years ago, he’d almost been one himself. Up on the moor behind the houses, a man named Arnold Avery had once done his best to murder Steven Lamb, and it had left him wary beyond his years.

That didn’t stop his friends.

Lewis was the most voluble, naturally, and had a million ideas about what had happened, how it had happened, why it had happened and what the police should do now. Lalo Bryant told them his sister wasn’t allowed out on the moor alone any more, and those boys with sisters nodded agreement that this was a sensible precaution, and that they would immediately take on the role of warden once they got home. The Tithecott twins looked particularly keen, as their sister was a notorious pain in the arse, and definitely ripe for draconian controls disguised as brotherly love.

Only once the bell had gone and they were trailing back to class did Lalo Bryant say, ‘You see that new girl, Emma?’

‘Emily,’ said Steven.

‘Whatever. She’s hot.’

‘I’d give her one,’ agreed Lewis.

There was barely a woman alive that Lewis wouldn’t give one to; for a seventeen-year-old with flaming acne, he had remarkable reserves of self-worth. Even so, Steven felt a prick of anger and a defensive surge towards the brown hair and the green velvet ribbon.

‘Yeah, but would I give you one?’

They turned to see Emily Carver a few paces behind them.

Steven blushed all the way down to his toes and the others shuffled and looked away.

Always the rubber ball, Lewis bounced back sufficiently to bluster lamely, ‘Yeah, I bet you would.’

Emily Carver stopped, looked him slowly up and down with a curious expression on her face, and then burst out laughing.

It was devastating. Nothing she could ever have said could have destroyed Lewis more completely, and his acne positively glowed. Steven was a loyal friend, so he looked away to hide the fact that he was grinning.

Still giggling, Emily walked between the boys and towards the classrooms.

Lalo shoved Lewis in the shoulder. ‘She got you, dickhead.’

Lewis shoved him back, harder. ‘Thanks for telling me she was there, wanker.’

‘I’m not your mummy.’

‘Piss off.’

Steven stayed out of it. Lewis was his best friend, but it was nice to see him get taken down now and then. He needed it. Without it he would be insufferable. Insufferable was a good word. Steven had just learned it and was trying to work it in everywhere. This was a perfect place.

He watched Emily Carver walk on ahead of them, aware that by unspoken mutual agreement his little group had slowed so they wouldn’t catch her up. It was a sure sign that she’d defeated them.

To Steven, it didn’t feel much like losing.

By the time he got home, Davey had already told Mum and Nan about Jessica Took.

Typical.

Davey was the baby and spoiled – a double-whammy that meant he sailed through life with little regard for the feelings, thoughts or desires of other people.

Steven had that regard. Regard for the fact that his nan’s son, Billy, had been stolen and murdered and lost for a generation out on the moors. And regard for the fact that he himself had almost died trying to find his body.

And so he would have told them slowly. Would have skirted the subject to see whether they knew already or whether he was going to be the bearer of bad tidings – then would have told them just enough so that they were not badly surprised by neighbours’ gossip, or by seeing the papers in Mr Jacoby’s shop. Although Steven delivered those papers around Shipcott every morning, he didn’t deliver to his own home. His mother, Lettie, was too busy working to read, and Nan bought flimsy paperbacks filled with impossible crosswords, which she said were the only thing she ever wanted from a newspaper.

Steven would have been subtle.