Ted stood in the yard, looking around him, a tingle of fear fizzing in his head. He just couldn’t work it out. He’d rung Idris, his policeman friend, so he knew that his family hadn’t been arrested. So, where are they? This was their home, their livelihood, everything they owned. They didn’t have any money, for God’s sake – he was in charge of all the finances and they didn’t have debit or credit cards, so they couldn’t have gone far. And they hadn’t taken the car, so someone must have come to collect them. But who?

A movement made him turn his head and his heart leapt when he saw a police car, followed by a police van, heading up the track towards him.

His breath stuck in his throat, refusing to go in or out as he watched the vehicles come to a halt. Two policemen got out, his dogs running up to them, barking and snarling, as if they were going to bite. Ted knew they wouldn’t, but it was quite scary when they were like that around people, baring their teeth, and had proved an effective deterrent to uninvited guests.

‘Can you take control of your dogs, please?’ the driver said, using the car door as a shield while three dogs launched themselves towards him, claws clattering and scratching at the paintwork. He was a stern-looking man, with a square face, short grey hair and dark eyes, who didn’t look like he was the life and soul of the party.

Ted forced a tight smile. ‘Sorry, we don’t have many visitors. They get a bit excited.’ He whistled and the dogs slunk back to him, cowering on the ground by his legs, their eyes still on the police officers.

‘Can you put them away somewhere, sir?’ the man said. ‘We need to have a chat.’

A chat. That didn’t sound good. That sounded like there was something to discuss, which suggested knowledge, which— Ted told himself to stop, to focus and not do anything that could be viewed as suspicious. He forced a smile. ‘Of course, just hold on a minute while I get them in the shed.’

Ted’s heart pounded in his chest as he walked across the yard, over to the outbuilding where they manufactured and stored the cannabis capsules. He glanced over his shoulder and saw two springer spaniels being unloaded from the second van, which he could see was labelled ‘North Wales Police Dog Section’.

Sniffer dogs! His jaw tightened, teeth grinding together. This is trouble. Big, big trouble. He hadn’t had time to check how well everything had been hidden and he’d only been able to speak to Phil on the phone, so there was no saying what had actually been done. Sweat beaded on his brow and stuck his T-shirt to his back as he closed the dogs in their pen. He wiped his face with his sleeve and made his expression as noncommittal as he could before walking back towards the officers. He didn’t know these men. They must be from police HQ up the coast, not the local officers he knew and supplied with capsules. These two didn’t know him from Adam.

There were four officers huddled together, studying a map, pointing and looking around at the layout of the farm. A couple more were waiting by the car. Ted ran his tongue round dry lips, his mind a blank, rubbed clean by panic as he struggled to work out how to keep them away from the hiding places.

He gave them a friendly smile as he approached, trying to look unconcerned. ‘How can I help you, gentlemen?’

They turned to look at him. ‘Are you Mr Edward Roberts?’ the stern man asked.

‘Ted.’ He stuck out his hand for a handshake and dropped it when he realised it wasn’t going to happen. He puffed up his chest. ‘This is my farm.’

‘I’m DS Davies,’ the stern man said. ‘And this is my colleague, DC Jones.’ He indicated the tall thin man who’d been in the passenger seat of the car. ‘Then we’ve got PCs Pritchard and Jeffries with the dogs, and PCs Evans and Dean assisting.’

Ted widened his smile. ‘Nice to meet you all.’

The men all stared at him, the silence filling Ted’s head until it felt like it was stuffed with cotton wool.

‘We’ve had a tip-off that cannabis is being grown here,’ DS Davies said eventually.

Ted swallowed, raised his eyebrows. ‘Cannabis?’ He laughed, wanting to sound incredulous, but it came out as a strange bark of a sound. He cleared his throat and made himself meet the man’s stony gaze. ‘No, well, you’ve got that wrong. The only thing we grow here is sheep and cows. And a bit of veg in the polytunnel.’

‘Well, we have a warrant to do a search.’ DS Davies handed him a piece of paper, which Ted pretended to study, his eyes skimming over the words as his mind exploded with expletives. There was nothing he could do. Nothing. He just had to hope that all the precautions he’d taken actually worked.

He shrugged as though he didn’t mind, wondering if they could tell how hard his heart was hammering in his chest, whether they could see his body juddering with the force of it. ‘I honestly can’t think why you’d believe I’d be growing cannabis. Who told you that?’

The man stared at him and Ted struggled to maintain eye contact. ‘Anonymous tip- off.’

Ted huffed. ‘That’s nice. People causing trouble.’ He spread his arms wide. ‘Help yourselves. Just be careful of the livestock. Not everything is friendly.’

He stood in the yard, shivering in the cold wind that blew up the valley while he watched the officers at work. He winced as the sniffer dogs got closer and closer to the outbuilding where the stash of capsules was stored up in the crog-loft. He was confident it was not somewhere a dog would be able to reach, given that he’d hidden the ladder in the barn before he’d gone up to the Lake District. He’d stacked a pile of straw on top of it, so he was pretty sure it wouldn’t be found. Anyway, his dogs were in there now. That would help mask the scent.

The next problem, of course, was the plants. They were all over the place, the main growing area being behind padlocked doors in a small stone barn that sat in a field opposite the house. It looked disused, slates sliding off the roof, but a new shell had been built inside, rows and rows of growing lights installed. That’s where their main crop was. Another outbuilding housed a germination area, but fortunately nothing was sprouting yet and the plant pots could contain anything.

One of the loft spaces in the house contained a second growing area. It was where it had all started, but Ted was pretty sure the dogs wouldn’t smell anything up there, given the layers of insulation and the fact that the hatch was hidden behind a false ceiling panel.

He had talked himself into a state of calm when he heard a whirring sound overhead and looked up to see a helicopter flying up the valley towards the farm. His chest clenched so tight he thought he was having a heart attack. The police helicopter! Probably with thermal imaging equipment on board that would detect the heat profile coming from the lamps in the barn and the house and would know instantly what was going on.

His legs felt weak, his whole body threatening to crumple to the ground. There was no denying any of this now. He gritted his teeth and watched one of the dog handlers turn and look at him as he listened to something on his radio.

Ted glanced round, wondering if there was a way out, but the police car and the dog handlers’ van had been parked across his exit route, and the helicopter would be able to follow him if he ran. He let out a desperate groan. There was no escape.

His hands clenched so hard his nails dug into his skin. Goddammit, this is all Luke’s fault. If he hadn’t come back none of this would have happened.