DAY ONE
It ’ s early. Too early. There ’ s little movement in Ashton Grove save for a cat mooching through a torn bin bag, looking for food. He stops when he hears a car with a knackered exhaust race past the end of the grove. At this time in the morning, with everything else so quiet, it sounds like a Formula One car heading for the pits mid-race. The cat legs it, following a well-worn path around the edge of a wildly overgrown lawn then scrambling over a fence.
Ashton Grove is asleep. Save for the kid upstairs in number eighteen who ’ s still playing Xbox and hasn ’ t yet gone to bed, and the guy who lives on the third floor of the maisonettes who works permanent nights and has only just got home, barely anyone moves.
Except Keith.
He ’ s up and out of bed before the alarm clock, but
