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Reid so very nearly didn’t answer the call.

It came at half four while he was pulling running kit on. He was rushing to get ready, impatient to finally leave the flat.

After that, his parents had rung him for tag-team rambling conversations, and Reid had only just managed to get them off the line, answer another query from his DS and change into his kit when the new call came through.

He growled at the phone. He was itching to get out of the flat and into the twenty-six-degree afternoon. It was glorious outside, and the last thing he needed was yet another phone call.

This one wasn’t a number he recognised, though. A mobile that wasn’t saved into his phone.

That didn’t necessarily mean it wasn’t someone known to him. Reid had changed both his phone and his SIM eighteen months ago, and he was still occasionally getting flak for not updating people. People like Tanya’s friend Midda, or his cousin Pete.

He hesitated with the phone in his hand, briefly imagining one of his team in danger. Maybe he hadn’t saved the number of one of his new DCs. Maybe they needed him.

With an exasperated sigh, he answered the call. ‘Reid Murray?’

‘Ah, Reid. I… Sorry to call out of the blue. I managed to get your number from your parents. It’s Seaton Laws. Anna’s father.’

Reid felt a surge of adrenaline so strong it was almost like electricity. It drove him up onto his feet, his running shoe falling to the floor with an unheeded thud.

Seaton. What the fuck?

Fast on the heels of that jolt of adrenaline came a feeling of nausea. He couldn’t get himself together enough to answer. Couldn’t even think. It was shameful how much it affected him: both the voice and the sound of Anna’s name.

He tried to walk away from it, unconsciously gravitating towards the kitchen. The shrapnel of his hurried lunch was still on the worktop and he found himself tidying the plate away and reaching for a cloth to sweep up the crumbs while his mouth failed to form words.

‘Ah… I hope you don’t mind me calling?’ Seaton said into the silence.

‘Right,’ Reid said in the end, pausing with the cloth in his hand and realising that it was shaking. ‘Nice to hear from you.’

Which wasn’t true. Wasn’t true at all.

He wanted to ask why the hell Seaton was getting in touch, but he also didn’t want to form the words. He wanted to shout, instead, Why now? Why, when things are just about normal again, and I don’t think about Anna every bloody half-hour any more?

‘Good to speak to you, too,’ Seaton said, as awkwardly as ever.

‘Look, I know it’s in many ways unfair to be calling, but I’m…

I’m worried about Anna. She’s gone missing.

I know that… I know that things didn’t end well between the two of you, but you were the one person she still trusted, believe it or not. ’

‘She’s… missing?’ Reid asked, his eyes still roving over the counter, looking for something to clean. A stray crumb to wipe away. He couldn’t quite identify what the feeling tumbling through him was, but it was messy and painful and unpleasant. ‘For how long?’

‘Since last night,’ Seaton said. ‘She was looking into something. A murder, actually. And I think she might need your help.’

Reid found himself leaning against the counter, the cloth balled up in his hand and a tight feeling in his stomach.

‘Tell me,’ he said.