Emmerdale spoilers: Samson investigates huge secret after Lydia’s devastating exit

Emmerdale’s Samson Dingle (Sam Hall) is a bright lad. We know this because people keep telling him he is, and he spent a great deal of time after the birth of his daughter Esther telling people that he wasn’t ready to be a dad because he wanted to do something with his life because he’s better than that.

He thought he’d found an outlet for his intelligence when Craig Reed (Ben Addis) offered him work experience at his video games company. Samson seemed to do very well, but it was hard to tell how much was real and how much was Craig manipulating him after raping Lydia (Karen Blick).

Since that horrific crime Samson’s world has been turned upside down. The man he thought of as a mentor turned out to be a vile rapist, and as a result of what happened his step-mum Lydia has recently left the village to stay with her mum as she tries to process everything that happened.

Viewers saw emotional scenes in which Sam (James Hooton) tried to reach out to help his wife but Lydia was determined that she had to have some space to work things out for herself.

He’s suspicious

Of course Samson wasn’t part of these conversations and in Monday (December 11)’s episode it was clear that he has questions. In the shop Tracy (Amy Walsh) asked after Lydia, and Samson noticed Sam’s shifty response and asked his dad what he was hiding. When Kim (Claire King) came in, Sam sent Samson outside while he had it out with Kim about telling Lydia that she was riding the horse when it killed Craig.

Samson saw the mood Sam was in when he left the shop, and later in the Woolpack he demanded to know what was going on, but was only met with silence from Sam.

When Samson saw Kim he confronted her, saying that Lydia leaving must be down to her. Again he got no answers, and back home Sam had a go at him for having a go at Kim, while Mandy (Lisa Riley) and Cain (Jeff Hordley) tried to change the subject.

Cain knows perfectly well what part Kim played in Lydia’s story as he was on the scene soon after the horse kicked Craig. Samson noticed that Cain was behaving suspiciously. He was setting the table, for one thing – something Samson had never seen him do before. He was clearly there to keep an eye on Samson, reasoned the young detective.

‘You’re barking up the wrong tree,’ Sam told him.

‘But there is a tree,’ said Samson, unwilling to let it lie. ‘You know when you know that everyone else knows something?’

Sam – who was hankering after simpler times when it was just him and his pigs – said that if there was anything Samson needed to know he would have told him.

We hadn’t seen the last of Lydia, though. Sam and Samson video called her later, and she reiterated what she’d told Sam last week – that she loved them both but she needed some space and her mum’s mustardy mash.

‘There’s no place like home,’ she told them. Will it be enough to satisfy Samson, or will he keep going until he uncovers the truth about Kim Tate?