Fire shocker as John and Nate story takes huge twist in early Emmerdale ITVX release

John Sugden took drastic action once more (Picture: ITV/Metro)

The following article contains spoilers from an episode of Emmerdale that hasn’t aired on ITV1 yet, but can be viewed on ITVX.

John Sugden (Oliver Farnworth) resorted to desperate measures once more in Emmerdale tonight, as he grew paranoid about Nate Robinson’s (Jurell Carter) murder being uncovered.

This week, Cain Dingle (Jeff Hordley) has attempted to contact Nate after learning how much Tracy Shankley (Amy Walsh) has been struggling since his disappearance. He rang his son’s phone which was answered by John, but that’s as far as he got.

Frustrated, Cain concluded that if he was to go to Shetland and face Nate, he’d have no choice but to give him some answers as to why he’s ghosting Tracy and little Frankie.

A few days ago, Tracy broke down to John at the surgery and opened up about how difficult life is as a single mum. To Tracy, John checking-in on her later in the week seemed like an act from a mate but to John, it was done to simply keep an eye on how suspicious she is about Nate’s disappearance.

John orchestrates situations that he knows he can fix, so he looks like a good man (Picture: ITV) John organised to have Nate’s belongings removed from the house (Picture: ITV)

It was during this moment where John discovered Cain’s plan to go to Shetland. Knowing the pace would pick up by the time Cain got home and announced he couldn’t find Nate, John had to do something.

Tracy was utterly taken aback in tonight’s episode when a man arrived and revealed he was there to pick up Nate’s belongings. It was the first sign in months that Nate really didn’t want anything to with life in the village anymore – and it hurt Tracy a lot.

Once Cain learnt of the development, he pondered over whether he should go to Shetland at all. To Tracy, searching the island high and low for a man who didn’t want anything to do with his daughter was pointless.

As the episode drew to a close, Tracy admitted to Cain that Nate moving his stuff out of the Dales really does feel like the end of a chapter.

Unbeknownst to them, John had got his hands on the boxes from the house. He was in the woods pouring petrol over Nate’s belongings and then set fire to them.

The chapter of Nate’s life in the village has most certainly ended but once his body is discovered in the lake, a darker one will begin…