LITMIR.BIZ

      Contents

       Cover

       Title Page

       Dedication

       Acknowledgements

       Chapter 1

       Chapter 2

       Chapter 3

       Chapter 4

       Chapter 5

       Chapter 6

       Chapter 7

       Chapter 8

       Chapter 9

       Chapter 10

       Chapter 11

       Chapter 12

       Chapter 13

       Chapter 14

       Chapter 15

       Chapter 16

       Chapter 17

       Chapter 18

       Chapter 19

       Chapter 20

       Chapter 21

       Chapter 22

       Epilogue

Dedication

      This book is dedicated to all those who work with children in any capacity. I am filled with admiration for those who strive to make a difference in the lives of those who need someone to listen.

Acknowledgements

      I would like to thank my wonderful agent, Andrew, and Vicky and her team of super beings at HarperCollins who work tirelessly to ensure my words make it out there. As ever, special thanks to my friend and mentor Lynne, who is there, always, to get me back on track no matter what dramas life bestows.

Chapter 1

      There are jobs and there are jobs, and my perfect kind of job has always been the kind where you wake up Monday morning with no idea what the week might have in store.

      Which was exactly the kind of job I did have, so it was definitely a blessing that my home life was, in contrast, so predictable.

      ‘Mu-um!’ came my daughter’s plaintive voice from upstairs. ‘I can’t find my other black shoe! I have five minutes to get out of the door and I can’t find it anywhere! Have you seen it? Someone’s obviously moved it!’

      I shook my head and sighed. That was typical of Riley. She was 18 now and we were so alike, in so many ways. Same black hair, same laugh, same taste in music and fashion. But in one important respect we were different. Where it was my life’s mission to try and make the world a tidier place, Riley was the opposite: she was just about the most disorganised person I knew. I knew where her shoe would be. It would, same as ever, be in exactly the same place as it landed when she last flung it off.

      I headed upstairs anyway, however, because I had the luxury of an hour till I needed to leave for work, whereas she really did only have five – no, four – minutes. She’d secured a great job after leaving college, and she was really enjoying it. She worked in a travel agents, which she said gave her ‘that holiday feeling every day’. But it wasn’t a holiday – there was an end time and, more pertinently, a start time. Just as well she had such an understanding boss.

      I was halfway up the stairs when she appeared on the landing. ‘It’s okay,’ she said, hopping as she pulled the errant shoe on to her foot. ‘Panic over. Someone must have

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