Gina drove in the midday heat through the snaking country roads as Wyre enjoyed the sun-drenched views. She listened to the birdsong through the open windows as she slowed down on the gravelly road. The smell of farm hung in the air; a cross between manure and cut grass, with a distant hint of smokiness. She slowed down a little more as she twisted and turned the car, avoiding potholes along the remainder of the road.

Trees sprouting from each verge met above them in a grand-looking arch. Dandelion seeds floated through the air and in through the car window. As they reached the main road, coming out of the short cut, she could see Crump Lane Petrol Station in the distance. The small independent station was a rarity, offering only two grubby pumps and a couple of spaces to park in for customers using the small shop. Behind it were fields of rapeseed flowers, covering the landscape like a thick yellow blanket. Just beneath the brow of a hill a patch of woodland met the cloudless sky.

She turned in, parking in one of the two spaces. ‘Let’s go and see what they’ve got.’

Wyre smiled and nodded, grabbing her pad and pen.

Wasps buzzed around the overflowing bin that welcomed customers as they entered. Wyre batted them away with the back of her hand as they rushed through the door, then were instantly hit by the air conditioning.

The shop was small, offering a few sandwiches and cans of pop in a fridge, the usual essentials such as bread and milk and racks of chocolate bars and crisps. A coffee machine whirred away in the corner as the shop assistant grabbed her almost finished drink and headed back behind the counter. She spotted the woman’s name badge. Beryl Day – Manager.

‘DI Harte and DC Wyre. We called earlier today. We’ve come to see the CCTV footage of Saturday morning, between six thirty and seven thirty.’

‘Oh, of course.’ She placed her coffee down. ‘Come through.’ The woman lifted a hatch and guided them into the small serving area. From the counter Gina could see the large split screen showing four active cameras and just under the counter sat a hard drive that was gently whirring away. The air con blasted onto the woman’s grey bun, almost unravelling a few of her loosely pinned hairs. ‘Sorry about the chill. I get far too hot in this weather.’

She needn’t have apologised. It was a relief to be cool. The humidity was getting worse as the hours in the day passed. Twenty-eight degrees, the morning weather report had warned. Wyre began to mark out a CCTV viewing log, ready to document times and movement. ‘What is your write-over period?’

‘Thirty days. Everything will still be on there for last Saturday. Here we go.’

‘Start at six in the morning.’

The woman pressed play and they watched until the front end of Darren’s van came into view.

‘Do you have any CCTV footage that covers the back of the van?’

‘Sorry, this is as good as it gets.’

The man got out of the van and slammed the driver’s door. Although not the clearest of images, she could definitely tell it was Darren. She watched as Wyre noted the time.

Six fifty-one in the morning.

They watched as he stood next to his van, grabbed his phone and pressed a button. Holding the phone to his ear, he began to pace. He placed the phone in his pocket and walked to the shop. At six fifty-six he left, holding a cup of coffee. With his spare hand, he made a one-handed call, pressing a button with his thumb and scrunching the phone between his ear and shoulder. He kicked the front of the van and placed the coffee on the ground before attending to the call properly. It looked like he was shouting but he turned his back to the camera as he spoke. He placed his phone back into the pocket of his long khaki-coloured shorts and turned around. They had a tear in them like a fashion tear at the knee. Gina made a note too. He was wearing a company T-shirt. He swigged his coffee and poured the rest on the road before wheel-spinning off in the direction of Laurel Lane. That was all they had.

‘I’ve put the footage on a disc for you.’ Beryl handed a box to Wyre who logged the item on her form. ‘It also contains the footage of him coming into the shop. All he did was come in, go to the coffee machine and leave.’

‘Did you see anyone else around that time or earlier?’ If she had seen someone around, a young girl maybe, her information might back up Darren’s story, showing that he didn’t know she was in his van.

‘No. It was a quiet morning being early and a weekend. I think he was the first. I didn’t see a soul around before he turned up.’

‘Well, thanks for the footage.’

‘Always happy to help. Is he in some kind of trouble? I heard on the news, about the girl and something about an accident.’

‘We’re just following up on all enquiries at the moment.’ Gina headed back through the hatch and grabbed a bar of chocolate. ‘Do you want one?’

‘Me, chocolate? I’d need to do an hour and half on the cross trainer to undo that damage, guv,’ Wyre replied with a smile.

Gina placed her lunch on the desk and fished through all the rubbish in her trouser pocket to find some change. As the woman rang up the transaction she couldn’t help thinking about what they’d seen. Darren had looked agitated while on the phone, like he’d been arguing with someone. He hadn’t mentioned stopping to chat on the phone during his interview and he’d made two separate calls, one that looked to connect with the caller and another that appeared to ring out. Were they to the same person? He’d been so angry, he’d kicked his van. Were things not going to plan? They had his phone, soon all would be revealed when it came to his call activity.

‘There is something about that lad, that I think I should mention, you know, if he’s a suspect.’

‘Anything you can help us with would be most appreciated, Ms Day.’

The woman came to the other side of the counter and led them to the door. ‘I quite often come out for a gander, you know how things are. I sit here all day, sometimes with very few customers. They tend to come mostly in the mornings before work, or during lunchtimes. I have a chair.’ The woman pointed to the side of the building and Gina spotted the plastic garden chair. ‘When it’s quiet, I sit there, with a book. Anyway, he’d gone. I watched his van chugging up the hill towards Cleevesford. See that layby there?’ Gina shaded her eyes from the sun as she gazed into the distance. She could just about make out a large gated field with a small space in front of it. ‘He pulled in there and started talking on his phone again. He saw me watching so I went inside. I was watching and I suppose I was being nosey, but he wasn’t exactly hiding.’

‘Did you see anyone else come or go when he stopped on the hill?’

‘Not while I was out there. I did come in though, when he saw me. I wasn’t out there watching all the time.’

‘Thank you again, Ms Day. If you remember anything else, give me a call.’ Gina passed the woman a card and headed over to the car. ‘Can you give the station a call, find out when the search of Mason’s house is taking place?’ Wyre nodded. Gina gazed across at the hill as they stepped into the car. ‘Only a few seconds before, he’d stopped at the petrol station to speak on his phone. Why had he travelled up the road and stopped again so soon?’

It was her mission to find out.