Chapter 36

Iris freezes. Literally freezes... I'm not even sure she's breathing. She just stares at me. Or in my direction, at least, but I don't think she's really seeing me. And I know, almost instantly, that Val was right.

I have an aunt.

Had an aunty, I corrected myself. If I'm to believe Val's story, then Sarah is missing. But her name definitely wasn't on the memorial stone. I'd have remembered if I'd seen a Miller inscribed on there. There wasn't, but that doesn't mean she isn't missing. I don't believe the whole 'the gytrash has taken her' rubbish, but she certainly isn't in Oakton. Unless Iris has some secret basement dungeon where her daughter is chained up, there's a story here. And I'm going to find out what it is.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Iris says after a long moment, and she lowers herself into the armchair before glancing out at the street through the window. But she's lying. I know she's lying. I don't know how I know that- call it intuition, a g