A rare day off from policing leads DCI Vera Stanhope across the tidal causeway to Holy Island, the lure of crab sandwiches there too hard to resist.
While on the island, she is reminded of the day decades before when, as a teenager, she went with her father Hector on another day trip. The day she watched him meet with a mystery woman on the beach...
Vera already knew then that Hector kept secrets, but this time the fledging investigator was determined to find the truth of why he was meeting the woman on the island, never realizing it would mean taking her first step onto a path to becoming a detective...
In this wonderful short story, Ann Cleeves shows us the origins of Vera as a detective, and showcases the setting for her next novel, The Rising Tide.