my dog to the front door. I was right. It was them again, DS Clarke and DC Stevens and, feeling suddenly shaky, I showed them into the sitting room, sending Albert to the kitchen again. We sat down in the same positions we’d been in that morning, me on the sofa, DS Clarke on the armchair opposite, his colleague remaining standing, hovering. I had the sudden, almost irresistible urge to cover my ears with my hands and sing ‘la la la’ like a child. The police officers’ faces were serious, and whatever they were about to say, I could already tell I didn’t want to hear it. I didn’t think I could take much more.
‘Mrs O’Connor, Gemma … is it OK, if I call you Gemma?’
DS Clarke’s voice was gentle, his eyes kind, and I nodded.
‘Yes, fine. Please … is there any news?’ My voice sounded shrill, reedy, not like me at all.
He paused, glanced at DC Stevens, then looked back at me.
‘Well, sorry to disturb you twice in one day, but there is news of sorts, yes. We haven’t found your husband though, not yet. I’m sorry.’
I nodded again, feeling tears pricking my eyes once more.
‘OK. So – what’s the latest?’
DS Clarke looked down at the notebook he had pulled from his pocket and placed on his lap when he’d sat down.
‘Well, we’ve done a little more digging, since discovering that Danny hadn’t started his new job in Bristol after all. Checked out his finances a little. His final salary payment from his previous company, Hanfield Solutions, went into his bank account at the end of January, as it seems to have done every month for the past few years – correct?’
‘Yes. He’d worked there for, I don’t know, four years maybe?’
At least that hadn’t been a lie, I thought.
‘Right.’ DS Clarke cleared his throat then continued. ‘So that money went in as usual. And we noticed some other big payments into the account too, a few times a year over the past few years, also from Hanfield Solutions. Would that have been bonuses, maybe?’
I nodded.
‘Yes, he got bonuses every few months. A few thousand at a time, they were pretty generous. The company was doing well and they shared the profits with their staff.’
‘OK, well that’s all fine then.’
The DS paused for a moment.
‘The thing is, since that last salary payment at the end of January, there’ve been no further payments into his account of any kind. And – and this is the really interesting bit – no money taken out either. Other than a direct debit to a letting agency, which we’ve assumed is the rent payment on this house … actually, can I confirm that? It’s rented via Pritchards?’
My head was starting to spin again, but I blinked and replied.
‘Pritchards Lettings Agency, yes. Danny was covering the rent and I was doing the bills, electricity and so on. But what do you mean, no money’s been taken out? Do you mean since Friday, when he went missing?’
DS Clarke shook his head.
‘No, Gemma. I mean no money’s been taken out of his account for weeks. Since …’ he looked back down at his notes, running a finger across the page, ‘since Thursday the thirty-first of January. So that’s, what? Four, four and a half weeks ago. Does that make sense to you?’
I stared at him. What? Of course it doesn’t make sense. That can’t be right.
‘No. No, that’s not possible. He took money out, of course he did … he paid for lots of things since we moved in.’
I looked around the room, starting to feel frantic.
‘That, look.’ I pointed to the coffee table in front of the sofa, its dark oak top piled high with interiors magazines. ‘He paid for that, for example. I saw it in an antiques shop in Clifton Village a couple of weeks ago. I took a photo of it and showed it to him when he came home from work that night …’ I paused, realizing what I’d said. ‘Well, when he came home from wherever he’d been. And he said he’d buy it for me, if I liked it that much, told me to order it, get them to deliver it. I mean, I could have bought it myself, but he insisted. He gave me the cash right there and then. It was a hundred and fifty pounds, but he said he’d just been to the cash machine.’
DS Clarke was listening carefully.
‘There haven’t been any cash withdrawals, Gemma, not for weeks as I said. No debit card purchases either. Not a single one, not from his current account. He has a savings account too, and we’ve checked that, but it’s empty …’
‘Well, yes. We both emptied our savings accounts to pay for the move, and buy new furniture, stuff like that. We haven’t really saved that much up until now, we spent Danny’s bonuses on trips away and nice dinners and stuff, treated ourselves, but we were going to start saving seriously from now on, get a deposit together to buy a house. Look, Danny must have been using his bank account. I don’t understand. He paid for loads of stuff …’
I raked my fingers through my hair, my mind racing, aware of two pairs of eyes fixed on my face.
‘I mean, takeaways. He always paid for those with cash when we had them. And he came home with a new cycle helmet he’d bought only last week. He was making withdrawals, paying for things, of course he was. The bank must have made a mistake. I’m sorry, but you’re wrong, DS Clarke.’
His dark eyes were still glued to my face, and for a moment we just stared at each other, my brow furrowed with fear and confusion, his expression calm, unreadable. Then he turned to DC Stevens again.
‘Can you show Gemma the app, Frankie?’
He looked back at me.
‘We’ll forget about the bank account for now. I’m not sure what that all means, but we’ll come back to it later. DC Stevens is going to show you something on his tablet, and I want you to tell me if you’re familiar with it.’
The DC, who’d been clutching the tablet under his arm since he’d arrived, was opening it up, tapping the screen. He crossed the room and sat down beside me on the sofa. He smelled faintly of cigarettes, and I began to feel sick again.
‘What is it?’
He angled the screen towards me.
‘It’s a site called EHU. Have you heard of it?’ he asked. He had a soft Scottish accent, and I realized that this was the first time I’d heard him speak more than a couple of words.
‘EHU? That’s that dating app, isn’t it? The one everyone says is going to be as big as Tinder soon?’
I leaned forwards, puzzled. Why was he asking me about a dating app? He tapped the screen and a myriad of smiling faces began to spin around a logo, and then a log-in box appeared.
‘Hold on, I’ll just …’ the DC tapped in a password, ‘and you’re right, yes, it’s a dating app. EHU, acronym for Elite Hook Ups. I want to show you something.’
‘OK.’
I frowned, squinting at the screen. DC Stevens had clearly logged in and was now swiping rapidly up and down a list of what looked like dozens of profiles. Photographs of men, some close-up head shots, others full-length, men in football kit, in tennis whites, in suits. The …
‘Oh my GOD. What … that’s … that’s Danny!’
DC Stevens stopped swiping, and tapped on the photograph, enlarging it, then turned to look at me. I ignored him, my heart beginning to pound, staring at the screen, my whole body suddenly feeling weak. The name next to the photograph said it was somebody called Sean. But … it was Danny. My Danny, smiling at me from the tablet, wearing his favourite red T-shirt. A selfie, by the look of it, the top of his arm visible, outstretched, chin tilted towards the camera. My husband,