First Published: 2016
SPOILERS!!!
In this novel which takes place in the north of Scotland the police are bewildered when the bodies of three young women are found in areas around the Black Island. The disconcerting thing is that their graves are marked with candles and roses.
Alec McKay leads the investigation, and this case touches him close as he lost his eighteen-year-old daughter recently. Lizzie was waiting the bus, and she was run over. Her death was deemed accidental, but Alec and his wife Chrissie think that it may have been suicide as Lizzie has always struggled with anxiety and depression. Now things are not easy for him and Chrissie.
Another reason why Alec feels strong to discover the murderer is because six months ago another young woman disappeared, but he was unable to find out what happened to her. As he and his partner, DS Ginny Horton investigate, they discover that these three women had something in common: they were women who were allegedly abused by their fathers and left home when they had the chance.
Apart from that, the young woman who discovered the first victim, Kelly, remembers the girl who went missing months ago, Lizzie, because she came across her as she worked briefly for her boyfriend', Greg's father. What she knows is that Lizzie was working in a dodgy pub, and when she sees a help wanted notice in the same pub, she decides to get the job. The landlord Dennie Gorman is a leech, but she tries to keep him away. When she mentions Lizzie, the man changes and keeps saying that Lizzie just left. And then one day when Kelly is in the basement, he tries to grab her but she elbows him and runs away.
That is why she calls Alec and tells him, and he and Ginny go to talk to Denny. The landlord is drunk and when McKay presses him, the man confesses that before Lizzie left, one night they drank too much and he took her to bed. She returned to the pub the next day, but shortly afterwards she simply disappeared. Alec warns the man against trying anything with any other women working for him, and when they leave, Alec and Ginny think that what Denny must have done to Lizzie was rape, but they can't prove it.
McKay and his wife, Chrissie, are struggling in their marriage, and she thinks that they need to do something. She suggests counselling, and McKay agrees reluctantly. The therapist is someone called Jack Robinson, and McKay finds his face familiar. The session is uncomfortable for him. Then the next day after the incideent with Denny Gorman, he remembers that Jack Robinson is Lizzie Hamilton's father, who went by Jack Robbins when McKay talked to him, and that makes him suspicion. His boss, Helena, tells him that they can't jump to conclusions. That night he and Chrissie have a terrible row, and McKay runs out of the house and makes the mistake of going to see Jack.
THe next day the police discover that Jack's van was caught in CCTV going to Manchester. Then two incidents take place. McKay and Helena find Jack's find empty and when they look through the window, everything was in disarray, so they push their way inside, and they find blood there, but Jack is nowhere to be seen. The same happens in Denny's publ. The regulars hear screams, but the landlord is not there, and the police find blood there.
A repor about a 4x4 places Jack in a coastal town, and Ginny goes there, but the car is gone. Then she sees a figure on the beach, and when she comes closer, the girl seems lost and confused, and keeps saying that she is safe now, and as her father said, the first time is easier. Then Ginny discovers that there are two bodies laying on the sand. These are the bodies of Jack and Denny. When Ginny tries to discover if Jack is alive, the girl, who is Lizzie Hamilton, attacks her and she has to be restrained. McKay comes with backup, and they take care of the situation.
That night when McKay returns home, he finds the house empty and his wife gone, and there is a piece of paper which he puts off reading.
The next day he goes to talk to Lizzie, and she tells him that her father treated the three victims because they were her father's patients as they were abused by their parents but then Jack also abused them. She mentions that Denny Gorman raped her and when she left, she was scared that she may be pregnant, so she called her father because she needed money. And then it was when the murders happened. McKay leaves the hospital wondering if Lizzie is telling the truth because she mentioned the candles and roses, but this is a detail the police never disclosed. So I also wonder if maybe Lizzie is the murderer not just of her father and Denny.
The book ends with Helena asking McKay to have a drink with her, but there are some loose ends which I imagine we will find out in the next book in the series.
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