After three months of “mysterious disappearance”, Billy Fletcher suddenly reappears in Emmerdale – but he is not the same person, but a man with dark and heavy secrets.

Rumour has it that during the time the village thought he had disappeared, Billy was forced to be a pawn in a drug network or held hostage – which details are true, to this day remains a mystery.

Billy’s return is marked by a scene at The Woolpack: he walks in, his figure tired, his eyes hazy, dark circles prominent.

He says: “I don’t remember everything… but there is someone I need to confront.” This brings the whole pub to a standstill.

Dawn – his wife – stands firmly on her back to hug her husband. Cain – her brave brother – stands behind, cold eyes looking at Billy with a deep warning: “If you are going to lie, you will not be safe.”

For the next few days, Billy kept to himself, refusing to answer any clear questions. When Chas asked, “Have you ever been threatened?”, Billy only replied vaguely: “If I tell, someone will die.” The statement raised the question: was someone in the village holding a knife behind Billy?

One night, Billy secretly asked Robert Sugden to go behind the storage room. He pulled out a blurry photo from his pocket: two men standing in the dark, one looking like Ross Bartons, the other like Vinny Dingle, and wrote a handwritten note: “Met on the night of September 30th at Hoa Le Farm.” Robert was startled, his eyes worried. Billy was silent, saying half-openly: “I don’t know Ross or Vinny — but they are the link in the ‘project’ I heard about.”