Page 99 of Good Girl, Bad Blood

‘Go to it,’ Connor said.

‘I am.’ She swapped over to the Instagram app and typed the handle into the search bar. Stella’s edited face peered up at them from the top result and Pip clicked on the profile.

Layla Mead. 32 posts. 503 followers. 101 following.

Most of the photos were ones taken from Stella’s page, her hair now a natural ashy blonde but the same piercing smile and perfect hazel eyes. There were other photos without Stella; an over-filtered shot of the pub in Little Kilton, looking quaint and inviting. And further down, a photo of the rolling fields near Ravi’s house, an orange setting sun clinging to the sky above.

Pip scrolled down to check the very first post, a photo of Stella / Layla cuddling a beagle puppy. She’d captioned it:Overhaul: new aesthetic oh and. . .puppy!

‘The first post was uploaded on February 17th.’

‘So that’s when Layla wasborn,’ Ravi said. ‘Just over two months ago.’

Pip looked at Connor and this time, he was able to read what she was going to say before she did.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘That fits. My brother must have started talking to her mid-March, that’s when his mood changed and he seemed happier again, always on his phone.’

‘A lot of followers in that time. Ah –’ she checked down the list of followers – ‘Jamie’s on here. But most of them look like bots or inactive accounts. She probably bought her followers.’

‘Layla does not mess around,’ Ravi said, typing at Pip’s computer, now in his lap.

‘Hold on,’ Pip said, fixating on another name in Layla’s followers. ‘Adam Clark.’ She stared at Connor, both widening their eyes in recognition.

Ravi picked up on the exchange. ‘What?’ he asked.

‘That’s our new history teacher,’ Connor said as Pip clicked the name to double-check it was him. His profile was set to private, but the display picture was clearly him, a wide smile with small Christmas baubles attached to his ginger-flecked beard.

‘I guess Jamie isn’t the only person Layla’s been talking to,’ Pip said. ‘Stella doesn’t take history and Mr Clark’s new, so maybe he wouldn’t know he’s talking to a catfish, if he is talking to her.’

‘Aha,’ Ravi said, spinning the laptop on the heel of his hand. ‘Layla Mead has a Facebook too. The very same pictures, the first also posted February 17th.’ He turned the screen back to read on. ‘She did a status update that day saying:New account because I forgot the password for my old one.’

‘A likely story, Layla,’ said Pip, returning to Layla’s page and Stella-not-Stella’s glittering smile. ‘We should try to message her, right?’ She wasn’t really asking, and both of them knew that. ‘She’s the person most likely to know what happened to Jamie. Where he is.’

‘You think she’s definitely a she?’ Connor asked.

‘I mean, yeah. Jamie’s been speaking on the phone to her.’

‘Oh, right. What are you going to message her, then?’

‘Well . . .’ Pip chewed her lip, thinking. ‘It can’t come from me, or Ravi, or the podcast. Or even you, Connor. If she has anything to do with Jamie, she might know how we’re connected to him, looking into his disappearance. I think we have to be careful, approach her as a stranger just looking to talk. See if we can gradually work out who she really is, or what she knows about Jamie. Gradually. Catfish don’t like to be rumbled.’

‘We can’t just make a new account, though, she’d be suspicious seeing zero followers,’ said Ravi.

‘Damn you’re right,’ Pip muttered. ‘Um . . .’

‘I have an idea?’ Connor said, phrasing it like a question, the end of the sentence climbing up and away, abandoning him below. ‘It’s, well, I have another Instagram account. An anonymous one. I’m, um, I’m into photography. Black and white photography,’ he said with an embarrassed shrug. ‘Not people, it’s like birds and buildings and stuff. Never told anyone ’cause I knew Ant would just take the piss.’

‘Really?’ Pip said. ‘That could work. How many followers?’

‘A good amount,’ he said, ‘and I don’t follow any of you guys so no connection there.’

‘That’s perfect, good thinking,’ she smiled, holding out her phone. ‘Could you sign in on mine?’

‘Yeah.’ He took it, tapping away at her keyboard and handing it back.

‘An.On.In.Frame,’ she read out the account’s name, eyes sweeping down the first row of his grid, no further, in case he didn’t want to share. ‘These are really good, Con.’

‘Thank you.’