The partner of Nicola Bulley has confided in a friend that he's "trying to be strong for the girls" as she's been missing for a week.
The mortgage adviser, 45, disappeared last Friday morning while walking her brown spaniel Willow along the River Wyre in the tight-knit village of St Michael's-on-Wyre in Lancashire.
The alarm was raised when someone recognised Nicola's dog running loose and found its harness and the mum's mobile phone nearby.