I’m forced to admit that someone – probably Joanne herself – cleaned up the Internet pretty well in order to get the awful drowning incident forgotten.

The fact is, though, you might be able to erase Google results, but you can’t throw an invisibility cloak over real-life historical records.

I tell Mum I have to attend a conference away and she agrees to look after Maisie.

The trip up to Scarborough takes two and a half hours. The traffic during the day is quite light, and although I stick an audiobook on to listen to on the way, I barely take any of it in.

Making this trip was an impulsive decision, but checking out the woman who is almost certain to become Maisie’s stepmother is absolutely vital. I know I’m doing it for the right reasons, whatever others might say.

I don’t know who I need to speak to or what I’m hoping to find out. But I have to act on this drive, this gut feeling that there will be people there who remember the accident that killed Joanne’s husband and his daughter.

I know it’s no use trying to get answers from the Marine Accident Investigation Branch; they’ll be bound by data protection. But local people are free to talk, if I can just find the right person.

Thanks to the newspaper article, I know that the incident centred around the harbour, as well as initially being out at sea. There are bound to still be people around there that remember that terrible day.

After I’ve parked the car, I walk down there, salty wind whipping through my hair and my ears filling with the screeching of seagulls.

I spot a small café tucked away between the harbour buildings and decide this might be the perfect place not only for a much-needed cup of tea, but also for the lowdown on who I need to speak to.

The jolly plump waitress comes over right away.

‘What can I get you, love?’

I order tea and a toasted teacake and we get into polite conversation about why I’m here.

‘I’m just stopping off in the middle of a work trip, actually. My friend and his daughter drowned here in a terrible accident a few years ago. I’ve never been here since and… I just wanted to pay my respects, I suppose.’

Her face grows pale.

‘Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that. I wasn’t around that day but it was a terrible, terrible thing that happened; people talked about it for years later. Still do sometimes.’

‘I wondered… would there be anyone on the harbour who was actually there that day? Who I could speak to, just to hear about it first-hand? It might help a little, with the closure.’

‘I think Jack Hufton was down there earlier. He was there that day. Let me see.’ She stands on tiptoe and cranes her neck to stare down at the sloping harbour. ‘Yes, he’s still there, I can see his woolly yellow hat. He’ll be going out on the fishing boat any time, though, I should think.’

‘Thanks,’ I say, standing up and heading for the door.

‘Oh! What about your tea and teacake?’ she calls, but I’m too focused on the stocky figure in the yellow beanie hat at the quayside to reply.

Jack Hufton turns out to be a bullish man in his fifties with a craggy, weathered complexion. He looks up sharply as I approach him and runs a thick, mossy rope through his hands as he watches me negotiate the harbour slope in my fashionable ankle boots.

The wind whisks hair from my clip and splays it over my face. I forge through the freezing bluster of the wind and instinctively duck as a seagull soars just above my head with an ear-splitting screech.

I’m relieved when the fisherman smiles and I find him instantly friendly and approachable when I introduce myself and tell him the lady in the café said he might be able to help me.

He pulls off his knitted cap to reveal a head of thick salt and pepper hair and accepts my reasons for asking about the incident, no questions asked.

‘I’d really appreciate if you’d tell me, in your own words, what happened that day, Jack. I’m after the truth, not just what the papers said.’

‘I still have nightmares about it on occasion,’ he says softly in his broad Yorkshire accent. ‘I’ll never forget it, I know that. I’m sorry for your loss.’

I swallow down any temptation to provide him with further fraudulent reasons for my interest and listen intently as Jack provides a concise recap of the tragedy that day.

‘I don’t like idle gossip,’ he begins. ‘But you’ve asked for the truth and there were witnesses here, people I’ve known for years and trust, who said that the couple had been arguing like cat and dog, even before taking the vessel out.’

‘This is Paul and Joanne?’ I clarify.

‘Aye. Husband and wife, weren’t they? So you might say nothing unusual there. My own Mrs can certainly get a bee in her bonnet at times and—’

‘They say the sea was calm and untroubled, and yet somehow, Paul’s daughter, Bethany, fell in,’ I say, purposely getting him back on track. I didn’t read that in the online reports but I have to get him to believe I know a bit about the tragedy and steer his memory to certain parts of it.

‘I don’t know about calm, I reckon it was fairly choppy out there. Anyway, the child should have been wearing a life jacket, calm or not.’

He nods when shock registers on my face.

‘That’s right, that little lass had no protection out there. She was in charge, the woman; Joanne. It was her boat. She should’ve known better than to take a child out without observing the most basic safety guidelines.’ His expression is grim. ‘They said, when she was unable to turn the boat around, she threw a life belt to her stepdaughter and then raised the alarm.’ He blows air from his mouth, short and sharp. ‘Bit like shutting the door after the horse has bolted, if you ask me.’

‘Bethany was the first one in the water, then?’

‘Aye.’ Jack nods, looking out to sea. ‘So they said.’

When he stays quiet, I stare myself for a few seconds, mesmerised by the dark grey water that whips into a maelstrom of white peaks when it hits the harbour wall.

Then Jack tells me that Paul Stafford jumped straight in to try and save his daughter. He had a frozen shoulder, a problem he’d suffered from for some time, and he quickly tired in the cold water.

By the time rescue teams reached the boat and pulled Paul out, he was already dead.

‘There was an investigation, of course, went on for a while. It was a very big deal around here and everyone became obsessed with it. Those of us that work on the water felt a strange sort of responsibility.’ His voice softens. ‘The little lass washed up just over there.’

He drops the rope and points to the slick wet bend of the harbour wall, just over the other side of the slope where we are currently standing.

We’re both silent for a moment and I shiver, but not because of the arctic air. It feels like shreds of the horror of what happened still hang in the air down here, worming their way into my very core.

I pull my coat closer to me and try to focus on finding out as much information as I can from Jack while I have the chance.

‘You mentioned there was a lot of local interest. Did people suspect foul play?’

‘Interest is perhaps the wrong word. People were concerned, wanted to know a process was being followed to find out exactly what happened.’ He hesitates. ‘In their rush to blame, you always get some folks who can be unkind and say some pretty serious things without having any evidence.’

‘What kind of things?’

He looks around him and speaks a little more quietly. ‘Oh, you know, that the woman had it planned. Joanne. Wanted the kid off the scene.’

‘I see.’ I manage to say, shivering when I think about the time Maisie spends in Joanne’s company.

‘The little girl, Bethany, she was Paul’s own daughter, you see.’ He pauses to think. ‘I seem to remember they had a younger child together, who wasn’t there that day.’

‘Piper,’ I say faintly.

‘Rumour was, Joanne Stafford wanted rid of little Bethany so she could play happy families with her husband and their own child. So, when Mr Stafford went below deck, she pushed Bethany overboard, knowing the kid wasn’t a strong swimmer. Some folks reckon she wouldn’t have expected him to jump in after her, what with his shoulder problems and all, but he came back up on deck unexpectedly and that’s exactly what he did.’ Jack frowns. ‘No surprise to me. Any father would do the same.’

‘How did these rumours start, if the three of them were out there alone with no other witnesses?’

Jack shrugs. ‘Joanne was devastated when her husband drowned. They brought her and the boat back in but she didn’t mention Bethany until people started trying to comfort her. Then, they said, she seemed to realise all eyes were on her and she seemed to flick a switch inside herself and suddenly started acting very differently.’

I don’t know what to say, so I stay quiet.

‘I know it all sounds a bit heartless. But what I’m telling you is first-hand from the folks that were there with her that day.’

He nodded across to the other side of the harbour.

‘Joanne stood over there, shaking, waiting while they dragged her stepdaughter out. Apparently, she blabbed stuff out to one of the rescuers, told him what really happened on the boat. That’s where the rumours came from; her own mouth. The people around her said it felt like she was acting, playing the role of grieving mother. They didn’t find out until afterwards she wasn’t the child’s mother. She denied it all afterwards, of course. Said it was the shock making her talk nonsense, said she loved the little girl like her own daughter.’

‘Was she arrested?’

He shakes his head. ‘She was questioned a few times, but her being a lawyer, she just tied them up in knots. No evidence, you see. The folks around here were convinced there’d been foul play, but nobody listens to idle gossip without any substance, least of all the authorities.’

Back home, I thank Mum for looking after Maisie but I act purposely distant.

The way she’s started looking at me, the off the cuff comment Shaun made about the two of them speaking… I know I can’t share what I found out about Joanne today. Not if, at some point, custody of our daughter is in the balance. Joanne was never arrested nor charged; I can just imagine Shaun using my trip to the coast to prove I’m totally paranoid.

Jack seemed so totally convinced that something didn’t add up that day. If she could plan and implement something as terribly callous as pushing Bethany overboard, there’s now no doubt in my mind she’s responsible for psychologically damaging Maisie to drive her away, make her lose the will to live. Yet the only person who seems to buy into that theory is me.

I need some time to think, time to consider my next move.

‘Maisie’s been asleep most of the day,’ Mum says. ‘Or at least she appears to be resting when I put my head around her door. I think if she doesn’t improve, I should take her to the doctor’s again.’

When Mum has left, I pace the house, debating whether to contact the other partners, Dan and Roy, at work right now, tell them what I’ve discovered. I know they must be unaware of Joanne’s past; they’re sticklers for squeaky-clean histories for all their staff.

Still, the echoes of Damian haunt my thoughts. And that strange loose feeling in my guts is back, when I start to wonder if ultimately, I’m to blame for his death.

Plus, Maisie’s relationship with Joanne is bound to strengthen as time goes on. She doesn’t want to go over to her place right now, but I know Shaun won’t accept that for long.

My heart fills with ice when I think about the trips Maisie takes out with them. Shaun mentioning applying for custody of our daughter…

If I reveal Joanne’s secret, I have to be prepared that anything could happen. What would she do to protect her past?

The other side of her, the side that I’ve heard about today, would be capable of anything, I think.