Gina sprinted across the car park, watching as they wheeled their mystery woman into the accident and emergency ward. Smith pulled up behind the ambulance and caught up. As she turned to enter through the main hospital entrance, she almost bumped into a girl with a dressing on her head. ‘Sorry,’ she said as she stepped past and walked through the main door. A woman sitting by the reception desk glanced up. ‘DI Harte, I’m looking for an Elisa Stanford, brought in yesterday.’

‘She’s my daughter,’ the woman said. ‘We’re just waiting for the discharge papers.’ The woman stood up from the plastic seat and threw her empty styrofoam cup into the overflowing bin.

‘Would it be okay if I spoke to her? I know she’s had a tough night but it’s important that we find whoever chased her in the woods.’

‘Bastard, I hope you catch him quick. She was so upset when I arrived. After a tough night, she’s calmed down a lot now. She’s just outside, said she hated the hospital smell. It was making her nauseous so I told her to wait out there while I got her papers.’

‘Mrs Stanford—’

‘Gillian, please.’

‘Gillian, shall we go outside to speak, if that’s where Elisa’s comfortable?’

The woman nodded. Gina followed her out, into the sunshine. She caught sight of the shimmering horizon over the houses in the distance. The girl she’d almost bumped into was staring at the ambulance across the path. ‘This is Elisa.’

The tiny girl only looked about thirteen but Gina knew from her notes that she was actually seventeen. Her petite features made her seem even more delicate than the dressing to her head did. ‘I’m DI Harte. Sorry for nearly bumping into you a moment ago. Are you okay to talk about what happened yesterday?’

The girl nodded and sat on a bench beside the sliding door. Every time Gina took a step back, the door opened. She stepped into the sunshine, away from the annoying sensor, and grabbed her notebook.

‘My mum messaged me to say she’d be late so I messaged back to say I’d walk home. I wanted to get back so I could get ready to go out with Ethan—’

‘Ethan is Elisa’s boyfriend. I don’t approve when he races off our drive in his souped-up car. I do worry.’ Gillian Stanford pulled a pack of cigarettes from her bag and lit one up. Gina remembered having the same worries when one of Hannah’s first boyfriends passed his driving test and whizzed off their drive.

‘I understand. Could you please tell me what happened next? You started walking home?’

‘Yes. I was listening to my music and I didn’t hear him pull up. It was just before I reached the woodland. As soon as I spotted the car, a silver Mercedes, I got scared. I’d heard something on the news about a girl being found in a shallow grave in the woods and I ran.’

‘Did you recognise this person?’

‘Yes, he’d come into the shop before and creeped me out. He was just walking around, not really looking at what was on the shelves. He asked me if I worked there alone. I just wanted him to leave. I was working alone in the shop but one of my employers was upstairs. I remember hearing the printer chugging above. It wasn’t the first time the man had come to the shop. I spotted his car on the drive a couple of days before. Do you think he’d been watching me?’

‘We’re not sure yet, that’s what we’re trying to find out. Did he buy anything?’

‘He bought a few jars of honey. He overpaid too and didn’t want his change. Really odd. He looked me over before leaving. Creep.’

Gina almost gasped. Her mind flashed back to the photos that Wyre had shown her, from the Norths’ house. The jars on the side were jars of honey. They had been so easy to spot as the rest of the house had been uncluttered. Along with the description that Elisa had given them, she was now even more certain that the man who had chased her was Stan North. ‘So you ran, what happened next?’

‘I almost reached the scary house, the one near where the girl was found buried. We all think it’s scary anyway as the old woman was found dead there not long ago. Everyone says she had been left there ages and was all scabby and mouldy. They say that her ghost wanders the grounds, looking for souls to devour. I know it’s just a scare thing but it still freaks me out. When it first happened we used to go up there and dare each other to stand in the garden alone and try to conjure her spirit.’

Gillian Stanford pulled a grimacing face as she sucked on her cigarette and exhaled a plume of smoke. ‘Elisa!’

‘Sorry, Mum, we were just mucking about.’

‘You were running and—’ Gina wanted to bring the girl back on track. For someone who looked so poorly, she could talk and Gina wanted to hear what she had to say.

‘He kept telling me to stop. There was no way I was stopping in the middle of the woods so that he could rape or kill me. I saw the house and the police tape.’ She paused in thought. ‘I lost concentration and was wearing those stupid flat dolly shoes. They’re no good for running in. I lost my footing and went flying into a tree trunk or something, hitting my head. I blacked out for a while, possibly only a couple of minutes. When I came round, he was gone. Another man was calling me and said his name was Bryn.’

Gina recalled that Bryn Tilly had gone over to the property and found the girl. It was at least forty-five minutes after Elisa finished work. Gina had seen the call logs. Maybe Elisa had been unconscious for longer than she’d thought as there had been at least a twenty-minute time gap that hadn’t been accounted for.

‘I heard him calling an ambulance too. I called Mum from his van. Then he took me to the hospital, my mum met me here and that was it.’

‘You’ve been really helpful, Elisa. Thank you for speaking with me. Here’s my number if you remember anything else.’ As Gina handed her card to Gillian Stanford, the receptionist came out with Elisa’s discharge papers.

‘Thank you.’ Gillian stubbed her cigarette out on the wall, took the papers and placed them in her bag. ‘Right, home we go and it’s straight to bed for you, young lady.’

Elisa smiled as her mum placed an arm around her, obviously enjoying the loving attention she was receiving after her injury. ‘Can I just see if Mrs Hanley is okay?’

‘We’re not dropping by the farm shop today, sweetie. You’re just going to have to call in and tell them you’re not well enough to work for a couple of days.’

‘No. You’re not getting me, Mum. I just saw her being wheeled into A & E. Something’s happened to her. I wondered if she was okay.’

‘When did you see her?’ Gina asked, her heart drumming away.

‘Just as you bumped into me. The woman that was being wheeled out of the ambulance. That’s Mrs Hanley, my manager at the Taste of Nature farm shop. I just hoped she was okay and wondered if Mr Hanley knew as he wasn’t with her.’

‘You’ve been really helpful, Elisa. Take care. You’ll be hearing from us soon,’ Gina said as she hurried across the car park, phone in hand. Their mystery woman had been identified and Gina knew where she worked. O’Connor answered her call. ‘Find out all you can on Mrs Hanley, the one who runs or owns the Taste of Nature farm shop. Our mystery woman is only Mrs Hanley.’

‘I was just about to call you too. A car registered to a Mrs Hanley was ticketed in Cleevesford. She’d parked in a resident’s only space. It has been there since the drug bust. I’m on it now.’

‘Any news on Stan North?’

‘Nothing. He’s completely off radar. He hasn’t made any phone calls or been home. His car hasn’t shown up anywhere and Mrs North is still calling every five minutes. She’s doing our heads in with her whiney voice and patronising tone. She called me an incompetent muppet.’

‘She sounds a handful. I’ll be back in five. Gather in the incident room, I’m leaving the hospital now. Call everyone in.’ As she ended the call, she noticed a missed call from Bernard. He’d only call if he had forensics results.