It was the best soulless shithole that she could pay for but the sight of it still filled her with guilt and despair. It wouldn’t matter if the staff were actual angels with wings and haloes, serving him nectar, ambrosia and thirty-year-old single malt on a golden tray, she would still hate the place because he was seeing out his life in it. She shook her head slowly, breathed deeply and got out of the car.

She walked through the home on auto-pilot, treading the well-worn path to his room. No matter how often she went, it would never be enough, not in her own head. She would always owe him more than she could give. Did the walls of this place really have to be such a soul-destroying shade of bloody yellow?

Halfway along the last corridor, the narrowness of it squeezing the remaining drops of hope out of her, she had to stop when a young woman emerged from one of the rooms and stepped across her path. She looked up to see Narey and her mouth twisted.

‘He’s not had a good day.’

Maybe it was meant as an early warning, maybe it was supposed to be sympathetic or helpful. But she heard it as reproachful.

The carer’s name was Jess and Narey had never liked her. She was in her late teens or early twenties, small and slim with dark hair pulled back tightly from her face. She would probably have been very good-looking if not for the near-permanent scar of irritation that she wore on her face. It seemed something was always bothering Jess and it was always someone else’s fault. Narey frequently wanted to slap her.

‘He’s broken a glass and the lampshade next to his bed. And he’s had an accident.’

Narey bit her tongue and confined herself to a sharp nod to say that she’d heard. She eased past the girl and opened the door to her dad’s room. He was sitting up on the bed, fully dressed and staring sadly towards his lap. He didn’t stir when she was fully in the room and she cleared her throat to say she was there.

He looked up as if he’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t and for a second she saw him as a ten-year-old, tousled fair hair and boy’s blue eyes. That moment passed when his eyes clouded over in doubt, wondering who she was and why she was there. It was like a dagger to her heart every single time.

Three years he’d been in this home now. Three long years for her and well, who knows how long it seemed for him. Time was a slippery fish for her dad, a wriggler that writhed in his hands and turned head over tail in the blink of an eye. Ask him the date he started with the police or the day he got promoted to Detective Chief Inspector and he’d trot the answers out. Ask him the name of the song he’d sung to her mum the day they learned she was pregnant and he’d have no problem. Ask him about the broken glass or, God forbid, the little accident, then chances were he’d have no recollection. Not this day anyway.

‘How are you, Dad?’

It was always a tough choice whether to call him Dad when he didn’t recognize her. Sometimes it frightened him, confused him further. Sometimes though it ticked a box, joined a set of dots and a smile would spread over his face. Not this time.

‘I don’t know you. Do I know you?’

‘It’s Rachel, Dad. Your daughter.’

His face scrunched up in deeper puzzlement. His mouth bobbed open and closed a couple of times but no words came out. After a bit, he let his gaze fall disconsolately to his lap again.

She sat gently on the edge of the bed, wary of going too close too soon. If at all.

‘It’s cold out there tonight. Freezing wind too. You’re in the best place in here.’

He looked up. ‘I could go out. If I wanted. But if it’s cold I’d need to wear a . . . wear a . . .’

She’d learned not to finish his sentences for him. Better to let him get there himself, however slowly, than to demean him further by filling in the gaps. Better too not to correct him when he got it wrong. Upsetting him would just mean upsetting them both. Lots of tears had proven that little truth.

‘A coat. I’d need a coat. A warm coat.’

There you go, Dad. Well done. She scolded herself for patronizing him even if it was just in her own head. Every little triumph, every small bit of joy was to be savoured. He remembered coat. That meant a synapsis had correctly conversed with another synapsis. It meant a path he could walk on and she was grateful for every single one of them.

She reached out a hand towards him.

‘Yes, you couldn’t go out without a coat. Far too cold tonight. Feel my hand.’

He looked first at the hand then at her. Then at the hand again. Slowly, he reached out his own, large and soft where it was once strong, peppered with liver spots and streaked with veins. He placed it over her hand and held it gently.

‘Oh yes, you’re right. Very cold. You need a coat. And gloves. You need gloves.’

He didn’t take his hand away after checking her temperature; instead he left it there for a bit then slid it underneath so his fingers curled into hers. They sat in silence, he looking at the bed and she at him. Occasionally, he squeezed and she knew it was her dad doing that, calling to her from inside.

With one particularly firm squeeze, he looked up sharply and she felt the tug of want inside her, pleading for him to make the connection. The flesh and blood he was holding was his own, surely he felt it, sensed it. His eyes furrowed and she waited, barely daring to breathe. Nothing. Not this time.

She sat for as long as she could. Talking about the weather and her job, sneaking in references to her mum, his wife, to holidays they’d taken when she was a kid. Nothing registered. Not today. Still she talked and he listened. And he held her hand. Winning small battles in a losing war.

After he’d warily let her kiss him on the forehead and she’d closed the door behind her and left, she stood for a moment with her back to it and contemplated bursting into tears. Any prospect of that disappeared when Jess the carer loomed into view from the other end of the corridor.

‘I could have told you he wouldn’t know you tonight. He’s not had a good day.’

Narey was torn between keeping on the right side of this girl who would be left alone with her dad or grabbing her by her hair and smashing her face against the wall. As she moved swiftly towards the girl, she wasn’t entirely sure which option she was going to take.

She put the brakes on just in time and stood close enough for the little bitch to feel her breath on her pinched face. She paused just long enough to see a flash of worry across the girl’s features.

‘I’m just popping in to see Mrs McBriar. I want to pay for the glass and the lampshade. You’ll make sure my father is comfortable, won’t you?’

Jess nodded as quickly as she could.

‘Good.’

Narey looked into her eyes and nodded back. Message understood.

She knocked briskly on the door of the woman who doubled as the home’s owner and manager and entered without waiting for a reply. McBriar looked up from behind her desk, clearly surprised.

‘Miss Narey. Is something wrong? Can I help you?’

‘Yes you can. I’d like to talk to you about Jess.’

Chapter 7

Robert Henaghan. Richard Hendry. Ravindra Hegde. Ryan Hughes. Robert Hillman. Rohak Handoo. Reggie Haynes. The seven adult male missing persons in the UK with the initials RH. Narey already knew the names off by heart and recounted them over and over as she walked round the mortuary at the Southern General. It wasn’t the perfect place to be immediately after a visit to the nursing home but it was where she needed to be. She needed to work.