With Joe now promoted Vera and her new sergeant, Aiden Healy, investigate a fatal explosion at a caravan park which killed Deena Viner, sister of the park's owner Jim. Deena and her friend Sally had been part of the stag night party for Ryan, boyfriend of Jim's daughter Claire, and, after evidence that Sally had slept with Ryan, Claire tells Vera he was growing cannabis in the caravan that was destroyed. Sally and Ryan both benefit financially from Deena's death but Deena was also involved with Ryan's teen-aged brother Riley who has no alibi for the murder. The mystery deepens when Vera is told that Deena was killed and then placed in the caravan before it blew up. With the park in financial difficulties largely caused by Deena and a resentful resident in the trailer next door Vera has several likely suspects before she can solve the case. Written by don @ minifie-1

The pursuit of joy riders into woodlands unearths the skeleton of schoolgirl Carrie Telling, who went missing thirty years earlier. Her father Bill believes that at the time the police were more interested in confronting striking miners than searching for her and Vera accepts that there is no love of the police in the former pit village. Less the innocent daughter than Bill believed Carrie had apparently persuaded school-friend Michael Tennant, now a member of parliament, to steal a credit card from his boss Arjan Banerjee, possibly to fund an abortion whilst Carrie's mother Beryl, long estranged from Bill following an affair, points Vera towards former bad boy Terry Manttan, whom Carrie often visited in jail. When Terry is also murdered it becomes apparent to Vera that the killer is somebody who had something to hide in 1985 that Carrie exposed and that they are still prepared to kill to keep their secret. Written by don @ minifie-1

Farmer Danny Pryor discovers the corpse of young Jack Reeves in his slurry tank. Danny employs Kosovans, one of whom has also recently died in suspicious circumstances but Vera discovers that Jack was a traveller, who had left his camp after a row with his parents. The travellers had been in a land dispute with Danny, whose publican brother had also barred Jack after a fight and, to complicate matters, Jack had broken off his engagement to another traveller, Sigourney - much to her father's anger - because he was gay. Vera locates Jack's camper van, containing a wad of notes, suggesting he was involved in something illegal, possibly with the Kosovans. However it is Danny's little boy, the profoundly deaf Toby, who gives Vera the means to solve the case. Written by don @ minifie-1

Dock worker Owen Thorne falls to his death from the top of a multi-storey car park. His family, including adopted daughter Lila, adored him but he was disliked in the community after apparently causing an accident which killed a young co-worker. The boy's father Mick McKittrick rang Owen the night he died and Lila's criminal father Logan also fought with him. Vera learns that he was in frequent touch with Hannah, a young runaway, though solely as a platonic helper, but then it transpires that they actually had a very different relationship and another person in that relationship could well be Owen's killer. Written by don @ minifie-1