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begun to assemble where the lane dead-ended at the meadow. Tavie’s shiny black Toyota 4×4, with the distinctive THAMES VALLEY SEARCH AND RESCUE logo emblazoned on its side, was pulled up close to the arched club entrance, flanked by two Thames Valley police cars.
    Tavie stood beside the truck, her cap of blond hair blazing like a beacon above her black uniform, waving a handheld radio for emphasis as she talked to the uniformed constables. Sharp, high yips came from the rear of the truck. Tosh, Tavie’s German shepherd bitch, was expressing her impatience.
    Kieran saw other team members’ sturdy vehicles parked near Tavie’s Toyota, and when he glanced in his rearview mirror, more were pulling in behind him. All held dog crates.
    He found a spot up against the car park fence, and as soon as he switched off his engine, Finn began to bark, answering the chorus from the other vehicles. “Steady on, boy,” Kieran told him. Time was of the essence in a missing persons search, but so was preparation. He had taken time to have a quick wash before changing into his uniform, and had fed Finn some dry food and himself a protein bar. It could be a long day and they would need all their energy.
    As he checked his gear one last time and climbed out of the truck, he saw a tall, slender man in a sports jacket come through the archway that led to the club entrance and approach Tavie, his gestures agitated.
    At first Kieran thought he might be the club’s manager, but as he drew nearer, he could see the distress in the man’s fine-boned face. This was obviously personal.
    When he reached the group, Tavie turned to him. “Kieran, this is Mr. Atterton. He’s reported his ex-wife missing. She took a boat out from the club yesterday evening and hasn’t returned.” Tavie’s voice was matter-of-fact, the tone she used to reassure relatives.
    Kieran studied Atterton, trying to pin down a nagging sense of familiarity. The man was probably in his mid-thirties, fit, with powerful shoulders that had been disguised from a distance by the elegant cut of his jacket. Where had he seen him? His uneasiness grew.
    Atterton turned to him. “Miss Larssen says you’re a rower.” His accent immediately pegged him as upper class, university educated. “So you’ll understand. I know it sounds mad, taking a shell out at dusk. But Becca wouldn’t have been careless. She’s too experienced.”
    Kieran’s heart squeezed tight in his chest, as if all the vague dread had crystallized instantly in one spot. “Becca?”
    “Rebecca. Rebecca Meredith. My wife—my ex-wife—kept her maiden name. That’s how she was known as a rower. And now she’s training again. For the Olympics.”
    “Becca,” Kieran said again, through lips suddenly gone numb. A hole had opened in the fabric of the universe, and he felt himself falling through it.
    “K ieran, are you all right?” Tavie had waited until they were on their own, and in position, before she asked.
    She’d deployed two teams on either side of the river, each team consisting of two handlers and two dogs, to cover the area between Henley and Hambleden Lock.
    Once she’d convinced Mr. Atterton that he would be more useful staying behind at the club in case his ex-wife rang or returned, she and Kieran had driven separately down Remenham Lane, then over the farm track that gave the closest access to the river path and their segment.
    They’d stopped at the last fence that lay between them and the Thames meadow. Beyond the meadow she could see the river, bisected by Temple Island, which looked absurdly manicured against the shaggy Buckinghamshire bank on the river’s far side. They would take the dogs through the gate into the meadow, boggy from the morning’s downpour, and start downriver on foot from there.
    Fortunately, the morning’s bad weather seemed to have discouraged the usual contingent of dog walkers, joggers, and pram pushers that used the Thames Path, and once the search had been