The Greek island of Kos was blisteringly hot on July 24th,  1991, with temperatures reaching 120 degrees Fahrenheit. That sweltering evening Kerry Needham’s mother Christine, 52, battled through the oppressive heat and arrived breathless and panic-stricken at a hotel on the island where 19-year-old Kerry was working as a waitress.

She had rushed from a farmhouse which she and husband Eddy, 56, were renovating for their new life together with Kerry and little Ben.She broke the news that blonde-haired Ben, then just 21-months old, had disappeared sometime that afternoon from the gardens behind the farmhouse.

At first Christine thought Ben was with Kerry’s brother, Stephen, 32. But when Stephen returned on his moped to the farmhouse without Ben, one of the longest running missing persons cases in British history began.

Ben’s elder sister Leighanna, 12, who shares his fair complexion, was even taken to the island as a toddler to take part in a reconstruction of Ben’s disappearance but with no result other than more heartache for Kerry and the Needham family.The emotional cost to Kerry, now 34, has been immense.

“There are no more leads to follow. There is nothing left to cling on to,” says Kerry, who has always believed Ben was kidnapped for money and handed over to an illegal adoption agency. Today she believes he is living a ‘normal’ childhood, the son of a well off family in Australia or the United States.“If there was something I could do I would do it. If there was somewhere I could go I would go,” says Kerry.

“All I have left is my mother’s instinct which says ‘hold on’ because as a mother I will never give up on Ben.“I have reached the stage now where I know my family and I have done everything we can. I have searched my heart out for him.“But now I am waiting for Ben to find me because I believe one day he will. I’m not really religious but I prey that he will find me. “Wherever he is he is 16 years old now and if he is anything like his sister Leighanna he will start asking questions because he will be inquisitive.“He will ask: ‘Where is my birth certificate? Why don’t I look like my mother and father? Why do I feel different?’

“When that process happens he will find me. I believe that. I have to.”

But there are darker thoughts which Kerry has more difficulty talking about.“Sometimes I admit I believe it would have been easier on me and my family if they had found a body.“We could have moved on. But because he could still be alive we have that hope which has slowly been tearing us apart emotionally.

“I don’t think I could face another 15 years of empty hope yet if you gave me a crystal ball and it showed Ben returning to me after another fifteen years I would gladly wait. It’s hard to describe.“My father has always blamed himself because he was working on the farmhouse nearby when Ben disappeared.“Because he felt he had lost Ben he felt it was his duty to find him and for years he followed every lead. It nearly killed him and I had to tell him to stop.

”The burden of Ben’s disappearance has also taken its toll on Kerry who returned to her home city of Sheffield after losing her son. The pain drove her to attempt suicide and in the first years after Ben disappeared she took two overdoses and slit her writs. Her relationship with Simon buckled under the pressure of the relentless search for Ben and after he was convicted of robbery in 1994, just two weeks after the birth of their second child Leighanna, Kerry broke up with him.

After that there was an eight year relationship with former boxer Pierce Mount and a fling with a dancer called Jimmy Santos Yan who she met during a holiday in the Dominican Republic in 2004.“I’ve been an emotionally yo yo” says Kerry.“Pierce was Pierce. He made me laugh and Leighanna called him dad. But he couldn’t cope with parenthood.

“When he drank he got rough and that was the end of that. We split up because I didn’t want Leighanna around that sort of behaviour.“I know what has happened to Ben has made me over protective of Leighanna but I think that is only natural. I won’t take any risks with her. “After Pierce I wasn’t interested in men at all. It was me and Leighanna and the search for Ben. That is all that mattered.“But I met Jimmy on the first holiday I had had since I lost Ben.

It was a holiday romance and at the time I thought it might be the real thing.“But when I sent him $1000 to help him come to Sheffield, I didn’t hear from him again. You live and learn.”After that Kerry openly admits, “My trust in men was zero. Leighanna and I had enough to cope with without being let down by men and I kept myself to myself after Jimmy.

”Keeping herself to herself involved locking herself in her well kept three-bedroomed council house on the anniversaries of Ben’s disappearance and staring at pictures of him, weeping and then pulling herself together before Leighanna returned from school. Or falling asleep alone and experiencing the recurring dream of Ben being returned to her front door by Det Sgt Malcolm Silk of South Yorkshire Police with the words: “I’ve got someone here who wants to see you.”That is until handsome fence builder Craig Grist, 23, who is 11 years her junior, walked into her life.

Kerry was holding down a job as a receptionist at fencing firm in Sheffield, where she still works, when Craig asked her out.She turned him down – every day for 18 months – still frightened of another disappointment. But that changed just over a year ago when Kerry, who says Craig has kind eyes, wasn’t going to take no for an answer.“He’s my toy boy,” jokes Kerry, who despite the tough shell she has built around herself to survive the disappointments and heartache of Ben’s loss, still manages to be optimistic.“Actually Craig is anything but a toy boy. He is a man with two daughters of his own from a previous relationship – Kiera, five and Regan, two - and he knows how to face up to his responsibilities like a man.

“Last year on July 24th, for the first time we did something as a family to try and be happy. Craig arranged a barbeque and we had a good time. We weren’t forgetting about Ben, but I am very aware that Leighanna must come first now, and as a family we were happy. “I’m not sure what we will do this year. I will have to see how I feel. But thanks to Craig we coping better these days. ”After a whirlwind romance we can reveal the couple got married at a Sheffield registry office on April 24 this year and have just returned from honeymoon in northern Cyprus where Kerry’s mum and dad have now set up home.

“We had a wedding ceremony in Cyprus too and we have had a wonderful, wonderful time,” says Kerry. “My late grandmother Edna always wanted me to marry using her wedding ring and that is what I have done.”Craig, who is a quietly spoken but resolute man said: “The age difference is not an issue to me at all.

Why should it be? No one would bat an eye if it was the other way round.“When you fall for somebody you don’t see an age or a history you see a person who you know you connect with.“Mind you, it took 18 months of trying. When Kerry finally agreed to come out with me I just punched the air and shouted ‘Yes!’.

Since then we’ve never looked back.“I don’t talk about Ben unless Kerry wants to in which case we chat about him. But otherwise I don’t believe it’s my place.“We’ve got a long time ahead of us and whatever the future holds for Kerry, Leighanna and Ben, I’m here for them. I’m sure they know that.”Kerry is moving on with her life and trying to leave the dark days behind her. But she knows it will be a difficult balancing act.“I’m two different people living under one roof,” she says.

“I’m now Mrs Grist with a husband and duty to Craig to make our marriage a happy one.“And I’m also Kerry Needham who will always keep my hope alive that Ben and I will be reunited.“When I start to hope too much for Ben’s return I can get depressed and I have to guard against that and be Mrs Grist for my sake and for Craig and Leighanna’s sake.”

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