The wild web of deceit that Alfie Moon (Shane Richie) has spun to wife Kat (Jessie Wallace) over her daughter Zoe Slater (Michelle Ryan) whereabouts starts to unravel next week in EastEnders.

Called in to assist while Zoe crashed with cousin Stacey Slater (Lacey Turner), Zoe told her family that she didn’t want to be reunited with her mum, threatening to disappear if the issue was pushed.

She created a fabricated tale to extract cash from Alfie, having already been accused of stealing Stacey’s credit card, later bolting to Barcelona, amid worries that something she’d done would taint her family’s view of her forever.

Alfie’s been wily and thus far, evaded detection from Kat as he desperately tries to track Zoe down and return her to Albert Square. Stacey covered for one sojourn, lying that Alfie had suffered another cancer scare. Kat put an end to that by ‘killing off’ Mo Harris (Laila Morse)

Another disappearance had Jean Slater (Gillian Wright) presume that Alfie had gone to see Hayley Slater to help with his daughter, Cherry.

Alfie, fearing the jig was well and truly up, revealed all on a voicemail to Kat, although she still didn’t find out what her husband was up to and her phone was stolen by a mugger.

So the message is lost forever, right?

As if. This is Walford.

Amidst Joel Marshall’s (Max Murray) search for work, he resorts to making some quick cash via Harry Mitchell (Elijah Holloway), who sub-contracts Okie’s (Aayan Ibikunle Shoderu) request to wipe a bunch of stolen phones clean to be sold on to the toxic teenager.

Joel ropes Tommy in and, upon discovering Kat’s phone amongst the pile, listens to the voicemail, revealing everything.

Tommy furiously confronts Alfie, who enlists Stacey to help him convince Tommy to keep quiet. When he’s involved in a heated argument the next day between Joel, Lily Slater (Lillia Turner) and Amy Mitchell (Ellie Dadd), Kat drags Tommy home.

Tommy and Kat go head to head, and Kat is left reeling by what her son has to say. When Alfie comes home and drops a further bombshell, Kat is floored.

The following day, Tommy has disappeared, sending the entire Moon-Slater clan into sheer panic. As Jean encourages Kat to pull the family together to find him, little do they know that Tommy has a plan of his own.