Last Seen: A gripping psychological thriller, full of secrets and twists. Lucy Clarke

side,’ I tell him.

      Nick heaves the case over, his jaw tight. ‘It needs a code!’

      ‘One, two, three.’

      ‘Inspired.’ He turns the digits and then the case springs open, the metal buckle snapping against his knuckle. ‘Shit! Why do you even lock these bloody cases?’ he fires. ‘Bedding. You’re locking away bedding? Jesus Christ!’

      I ignore the remark. We’re both exhausted and quick to anger.

      We’re searching through the boxes in our garage, like the police suggested this morning, to determine whether anything is missing. We’ve already spoken to the tenants renting our house, and they’ve not seen Jacob. It is possible that he’s been in the garage unnoticed as we keep the spare key hooked beneath the bird feeder in our front garden, so it would have been easy enough for him to get in.

      These past few summers, when we’ve rented out our house, I’ve cleared it of our personal belongings – and also put away the good things, too, like the special tablecloth my mother gave me, and the bed linen that I don’t like to put in the tumble dryer – and stored everything here in the garage. Despite the effort involved, I find the process therapeutic, as it forces us to thin out our possessions. Minimalize. There’s less stuff in our lives.

      I step over a box of files that have tipped over. I gather them up from the concrete floor and place them back in the box. Beside it there’s a bundle of post for us. We have an agreement with the renters that they gather our post and place it in the garage each week for us to collect. In amongst the bills are two birthday cards addressed to Jacob. I open them both. The first has a US stamp and is from Nick’s brother. He’s enclosed a generous music voucher and instructed Jacob to, ‘Kill this on some new hip-hop tracks. Love Snoop-Teddy and the fam.’ I smile to myself as I think of Nick’s well-to-do doctor brother, who plays hip-hop with a thudding bass in his family sedan.

      I pass the card to Nick, then open the second envelope, recognizing my mother’s writing. A cheque flutters to the ground. The message reads, ‘To my darling Jacob on your seventeenth birthday. Pop this in your savings and spend it on something important to you when the time comes.’ I bend down to retrieve the cheque, my eyes widening.

      ‘Five hundred pounds!’ I turn the cheque to face Nick. ‘My mother has given Jacob five hundred pounds!’

      ‘Bit extravagant.’

      I raise an eyebrow. That’s exactly like my mother.

      ‘What are you doing?’ Nick asks as he sees me taking my phone from my pocket.

      ‘Calling her.’

      Nick lifts his hands. ‘Listen, Sarah—’

      She answers on the third ring.

      ‘Sarah. Any news?’

      ‘You sent Jacob five hundred pounds for his birthday?’

      ‘His birthday. Yes. There’s a card. I—’

      ‘Don’t you think it’s a little over the top?’

      ‘Well, I … I just thought it’d be nice for him to add to his savings. You know, he could put it towards university, or something, perhaps.’

      ‘He doesn’t have savings. He’s seventeen.’

      There’s a pause.

      Then I realize: ‘This isn’t the first big cheque you’ve given him, is it?’

      ‘Well, no. I gave him the same amount for Christmas.’

      ‘Mum!’ I say, exasperated. ‘You could have told me!’

      ‘I assumed Jacob would have.’

      The comment feels like a barb – a reminder that my son and I don’t communicate. I’m seething, an anger that only my mother can ignite. ‘Giving him a chunk of money won’t buy his affection.’

      ‘Sarah!’ Nick is shaking his head at me. He extracts the phone from my grip, and says calmly into the receiver, ‘Barbara, Nick here. Listen, Sarah and I are both just extremely tired and anxious right now—’

      My mother will be speaking, as Nick is quiet. ‘Yes. Yes, you’re right. I know. I will, I will. Of course, of course. I know you were. Okay, yes, I’ll do that,’ he says with warmth in his voice. Sometimes I wonder if my mother likes everyone else in my family more than me.

      When Nick ends the call, he says, ‘At least we know where the cash in Jacob’s drawer likely came from.’

      ‘Yes, my bloody mother!’

      ‘She’s just trying to help. Give her a chance.’

      I purse my lips, but say nothing further as I continue checking through our belongings. A few minutes later I come across a large red shoebox that has Tights scrawled across it in marker pen. I glance over my shoulder and see Nick is busy looking through a black sports bag of Jacob’s, so I carefully open the lid. Inside there are a medley of items, but my fingers reach out to a small model of a horse, no longer than my little finger, cast from iron.

      It’s the first thing I ever stole.

      I remember the way my fingers closed around it, like I was trapping a bird. My sister and I were both obsessed with Black Beauty, especially the scene where the horse gallops along the beach, wild and muscular, and is eventually tamed by a young boy. We imagined ourselves as that boy, and we’d practise our taming techniques on garden birds and squirrels – with limited success.

      I’m not even sure who gave Maggie that tiny iron horse, but I do remember she wouldn’t be separated from it. The horse came to school in the pocket of her uniform, and it watched over her as she slept. It took on a mystical presence in our young lives. Even when Maggie grew out of make-believe, she still kept it in the centre of her windowsill. I wasn’t allowed to play with it, touch it, or even breathe too close to it. Those were the rules that older sisters enforced, and younger sisters obeyed.