TOYL

had left it on Thursday evening. Satisfied, but disappointed that nothing was missing from the flat, Emma went to the bedroom to pack some extra clothes. Lizzy put the kettle on for a cup of tea, having discovered that there was still some milk in the fridge.
    ‘Here you go,’ Lizzy said, handing her a cup of tea. ‘The milk is just about okay, but you might want to drink it quickly.’
    ‘Thanks.’
    ‘That’s a nice photograph,’ Lizzy noted. ‘He looks young there.’
    ‘He is,’ Emma said, admiring the photo she’d taken down from the window ledge. ‘It was when he was at university. I don’t know why I always liked it so much – I didn’t even know him then. Maybe that’s it though – it shows me what things were like before we met.’
    Lizzy watched Emma stare into the photograph as if she was looking at some faraway object. ‘You won’t just have those memories. You’ve both got a great future.’
    ‘I hope so,’ Emma replied. ‘But who knows.’
    Lizzy put an arm around her.
    ‘You and Dan will be fine.’
    ‘I just need an explanation, Lizzy. I can’t take not knowing.’
    ‘I know.’
    Emma looked up towards the television, and that’s when she realised that something was missing.
    It was a framed photo of her and Dan, which they had taken on a recent holiday to Rome. They were stood in St Peter’s Square, with the famous basilica rising in the background. Usually the photo was on top of the television. She got up and searched behind the set, to see if it had fallen down the back, but it wasn’t there.
    It couldn’t be him again, could it?
    Emma moved out of the lounge and hurried down the hall towards the bedroom, the terrible thought nagging at the back of her mind.
    ‘You okay, Emma?’ asked Lizzy, following her.
    ‘Just checking something,’ she shouted, not slowing her pace.
    This time she knew what she was looking for. She surveyed the bedside cabinet and the wall opposite the bed. Her suspicions were confirmed. She’d been focussing so much on the expensive items that she’d missed it completely.
    ‘They’re all gone,’ she said, as Lizzy entered the bedroom. ‘All the photos of Dan and me. They’re gone.’

11

    ‘Why would someone take those photos?’ Lizzy asked, as they were sitting on the sofa in Emma’s flat.
    ‘I don’t know. But I do know that the police will see it as more evidence that it was Dan who did that to Richard.’
    ‘You think?’
    ‘I can just imagine what they’d say now,’ Emma said, thinking back to how the detective had announced that Mrs Henderson had seen Dan running from the apartment. ‘They’ll say he took a couple of reminders of me and him, before running away.’
    ‘They might not,’ Lizzy offered.
    ‘They will, Lizzy. You saw for yourself – they’re convinced Dan did it.’
    ‘But what if he is guilty?’
    ‘You can’t mean that,’ Emma replied, shocked at the suggestion. ‘You can’t think Dan could be capable of doing that.’
    Lizzy turned away somewhat apologetically. ‘I’m sorry, Emma, but we just don’t know, do we?’
    ‘I don’t believe you. I thought you of all people would support me – and Dan.’
    ‘I do.’
    ‘Then don’t give up on Dan, please.’
    But as they sat in an uncomfortable silence, it was getting harder and harder for Emma to ignore the voice in her head: the voice suggesting that Dan was guilty.
    ‘Look, Emma,’ Lizzy said, after almost a minute of silence. ‘I’m sorry. I want to believe that Dan is innocent, and I do believe it really. But there is a chance, no matter how much we don’t think it, that Dan did do that to Richard. We just don’t know what happened, do we?’
    Emma couldn’t find the words. To admit that she did agree with Lizzy would feel like a terrible betrayal. And in a strange way she felt that to even entertain the possibility that Dan was guilty would make it more likely to be true.
    ‘Maybe Dan had a really good reason for doing what he did,’ Lizzy continued. ‘Maybe he did it in self-defence. What if Richard came round to the flat and for some reason they started to fight – I don’t know why – and as they fought Dan hit Richard just that bit too hard?’
    Emma shook her head.
    ‘No.’
    ‘I read a story last year about a man who got into a drunken fight in a nightclub – the argument was about nothing important. He banged into the back of his girlfriend and the guy took offence. The man threw one punch and the other guy