Summertown, Oxford
That afternoon

Professor Tom Bradbury shut the front door behind him, put down his old briefcase and laid his car keys on the oak stand in the hall next to the vase of flowers.

The house was quiet. He hadn’t expected it to be. Zoë should be home today, and her presence was always made noticeable by the hard rock soundtrack that she insisted on blaring at full volume from the living-room hi-fi.

Bradbury wandered through to the airy kitchen. The patio windows were open, and the scents of the garden were wafting through the room. Remembering the half-finished bottle of Pinot Grigio from the night before, he opened the fridge. Inside was a freshly prepared dish of chocolate mousse, Zoë’s favourite pudding, which her mother always prepared for her visits home.

He tutted and poured himself a glass of the chilled wine. Sipping it, he stepped out into the garden and saw his wife Jane kneeling at the flower-beds, a tray of brightly coloured annuals beside her.

‘You’re back early,’ she said, looking up and smiling.

‘Where is she?’

‘Not here yet.’

‘I thought it was quiet. Expected she’d have got in by now.’

Jane Bradbury stabbed her trowel in the ground, stood up with a grunt and dusted the earth off her hands. ‘That looks good,’ she said, noticing his glass. He passed it to her and she took a sip and smacked her lips. ‘I wouldn’t worry about it,’ she said. ‘You know what she’s like. She probably stopped off to stay with some friend in London.’

‘Why couldn’t she just come straight here? She’s always with some friend or other. We hardly ever see her.’

‘She’s not a child any more, Tom. She’s twenty-six years old.’

‘Then why does she act like one?’

‘She’ll call. Probably turn up tomorrow like the bad penny.’

‘You indulge her too much,’ he said irritably. ‘You’ve even prepared her favourite pudding.’

His wife smiled. ‘You indulge her as much as I do.’

Bradbury turned towards the house. ‘The least she could do is bloody well let us know where she is.’