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Becca Meredith?”
    Johnson looked surprised. “Becca? No. Not since Sunday, on the river. She had a good row. Why?”
    â€œShe went out last night, and her boat’s not back.”
    â€œHave you tried ringing her?” Johnson asked with a casualness that Freddie found suddenly infuriating.
    â€œOf course I’ve bloody tried ringing her.” He turned to Milo. “Look, I’m going to check the cottage.”
    â€œFreddie, I think you’re overreacting,” said Milo. “You know Becca has a mind of her own.”
    â€œNo one knows that better than me. But I don’t like this, Milo. Call me if you hear anything.”
    He went out the way he’d come in, rather than going through the crew quarters in the club. He walked round the lawn to the car park, unmindful now of his shoes or his damp jacket.
    Maybe he was overreacting, he thought as he climbed back into the Audi. But he rang her mobile once more, and when the call went to voice mail, he clicked off and started the engine. She might chew him up one side and down the other for intruding, but he was going to see for himself.
    Although it took a bit of maneuvering to get the Audi out of the deep, slushy ruts in the gravel, he eventually managed.
    A remembered dialogue played in his head. From Becca, Why can’t you get a sensible car for once?
    Because you can’t sell expensive property if your prospect thinks you can’t afford the best, he always answered, but there were days he’d kill for four-wheel drive, and this was one of them.
    Once out of the car park, he pulled onto the main road and turned immediately left into Remenham Lane. As he drove north, he could see the clouds building again in the western sky.
    The redbrick cottage, surrounded by an overgrown garden, was set between the lane and the river. It had been Freddie’s job to keep the grounds, which he had done with regularity if not much talent. Becca had simply let things go until the place had begun to resemble Sleeping Beauty’s briar thicket.
    Her battered black Nissan 4-4 sat in the drive. Becca had no interest in cars either, except as a means to pull a boat. If the Nissan wasn’t mud-spattered, it was only because the rain had washed it off. Her trailer had been pulled up on the patch of lawn beside the drive, and the Filippi was not on it.
    Just as Freddie opened the Audi’s door, thunder clapped and the sky opened up. He sprinted for the cottage, sliding into the porch as if he’d just made a wicket and shaking the water from his hair.
    No lights showed through the stained glass in the door. The bell didn’t work—he’d never managed to fix it—so he banged on the wood surround with his fist.
    â€œBecca. Becca! Answer the bloody door.”
    When there was no response, he fumbled for his keys and put the heavy door key in the lock.
    â€œBecca, I’m coming in,” he called as he swung the door open.
    The cottage was cold and silent.
    Her handbag sat on the bench below the coat rack, where she always dropped it when she came in from work. A gray suit jacket had been tossed carelessly beside it, but otherwise, the sitting room looked undisturbed. Her yellow rowing fleece was missing from the coat hook, as was her pink Leander hat.
    He called out again, glancing quickly into the kitchen and dining room. A stack of unopened mail sat on the buffet, a rinsed cup and plate in the sink, and on the worktop a bag of cat food for the neighbor’s cat she sometimes fed.
    The cottage felt, in some way he couldn’t explain, profoundly empty of human presence. But he climbed the stairs and looked into the bedroom and the bathroom. The bed was made, the skirt that matched the jacket he’d seen downstairs lay across the chair, along with a white blouse and a tangled pair of tights.
    The bath was dry, but the air held the faintest trace of Dolce & Gabbana’s Light Blue cologne, one of Becca’s