They strolled in warm sunlight along the path up by the Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park, drinking in the view over London, the Thames flowing sedately between the Old Naval College and Canary Wharf’s glinting skyscrapers. Kofi ran ahead, dribbling his football. Given the number of people around, Zac had encouraged the lad to work on ‘close control’. Etta held his right arm, the one that didn’t have a bullet wound in the shoulder. He’d been discharged from Lewisham hospital after three days, doctors telling him once more how fortunate he’d been that his mobile had altered the round’s trajectory, missing his lung. Stitches had come out a couple of days ago and there was some mobility in the joint now. His bruises were fading too.

‘How’re you feeling?’ asked Etta.

He shrugged, winced a bit. ‘Fine, pretty much back to normal. Still can’t quite hold the sax, but that’ll—’

‘I mean about Amelia,’ she said, cutting him off gently. ‘It’s five years on Friday.’

He kicked a stone off the path. ‘OK, I guess.’

‘Only OK?’ She studied him as they walked.

‘Yeah, only OK. You?’

‘I’m coping, I think. Main thing is that we talk about how we’re doing, you know? Tell me about “OK”.’

Wallace had been remanded in custody after his discharge from Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Woolwich. Surgeons removed a 5.56 mm hollow point which had mushroomed in his chest. The type of ammo used by Special Forces. Zac didn’t think there was much chance of tracing the sniper – the MoD had been no further help and the inquiry was with a local MIT now anyway. Krebs had called it ‘speculation’ that this was the same person who’d threatened Harvey Ash in his caravan and ordered them to prioritise other cases.

The first hearing date had been set for Wallace to have charges read: the murders of Ivor Harris, Trent Parker and Derek Howell. There was no record of his confession for the newsagent shootings in Peckham Rye Park on 21 July 2012. Wallace now denied having anything to do with it, and with Boateng’s mobile in pieces, no evidence existed to the contrary. Given the nature of the killings he was accused of committing, Zac and his team were confident of getting the murder charges to stick. He’d receive three life sentences: probably a minimum of thirty years before consideration for parole. Not a bad result in a business where lawyers tied you in knots until the best you could hope for was a verdict of manslaughter to put your suspect away: fifteen years on paper, six to eight served. That never felt like enough. But neither did thirty years for Wallace.

‘I wanted to bring him to trial for killing Amelia,’ he replied eventually. ‘Get the closure she deserved.’

‘You know the way you got his confession would be considered inadmissible. His brief would plead it was only given under duress, and in the absence of other evidence…’ She let the sentence hang unfinished.

Zac dug hands into his pockets. ‘Absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence.’

‘You don’t need to tell me that, I’m a solicitor. But the jury can only go one way without proof. You wouldn’t even have enough to charge him.’

‘But where was the evidence? Five years ago, I mean. That’s what I want to know.’

‘Time to let this go, Zac, move on. We know who did it and he’s behind bars. The rest is vanity, box-ticking. We should focus on Amelia, not Wallace. You’re lucky to still have a job.’

Boateng turned away, pissed off. Because he knew she was right. He swallowed his pride and told her so. He was fortunate to have avoided disciplinary proceedings. He and Jones had stuck to the story about the Glock belonging to Wallace. He’d denied it, of course, but he denied everything else too. Forensics tied Wallace to the pistol and it became no more than a footnote in the case they were putting together. The angle grinder found at the docks was a match to the wounds on Parker and Howell, where Wallace had made less effort to cover his tracks. Connelly and Malik thought they should push for attempted murder – of a police officer – to be added to the list of charges against Wallace, but that fell into the ‘harder to prove’ category and Boateng had vetoed it given the strength of their other cases.

Explaining his presence at Trinity Buoy Wharf had been trickier. Had to have a quiet word with the Grant family on that. Neon’s mum had been terrified that charges would be brought against her for aiding and abetting a fugitive. She told the police that Wallace had intimidated them into it, on Zac’s advice. Coupled with his statement that the Grants had volunteered information on Wallace’s Internet use to Zac that night, they were off the hook. He still faced a bollocking from Krebs for not calling in help earlier at the docks, but he cited urgency in tactical decision-making and the boss was getting applause from her superiors, so basically everyone was happy. The trade-off for all that was a feeling of unfinished business. He kept thinking about Wallace’s words that night: The man you want is the one who sold me the nine. One of your lot. Same guy that made sure I never got caught.

They went on in silence awhile before he spoke. ‘I have to find this Kaiser. If he’s one of us – if he’s police – I can’t let that go.’

‘What did I just say to you?’

Zac stopped. ‘Could you live with it if a colleague of yours was involved in Amelia’s death?’ He looked at her, but she was searching the crowd for their son.

‘Kofi!’ she shouted. ‘Don’t get in people’s way! Come back to us.’

Zac waited for her answer. It didn’t come.

‘You’re a good man.’ She squeezed his arm. ‘But you’re damned stubborn.’

He gave a small laugh. ‘I prefer dogged.’

‘Inflexible,’ she countered.

‘Single-minded.’

Etta gave him a playful punch. ‘There are more than fifty thousand people in the Met. Human nature and the law of averages says there’ll be a few rotten apples in there. You guys have a whole department whose job it is to pick them out. It’s not your responsibility, Zac, there have to be some limits. Take it to the DPS.’

‘But they won’t listen to me, cos—’

‘You haven’t got any proof. So, you can bang your head against a brick wall for another five years, or you, me and Kofi can get on with our lives together.’

He glanced across to see their boy dribbling back towards them, tongue protruding in concentration. He turned and kissed her. ‘Sounds good to me.’

‘Which option?’

‘Both.’

Etta smiled, shook her head. ‘Come here,’ she said, pulling him into a hug. Kofi ran over, flung his arms around them. ‘Just don’t go putting yourself in danger for the sake of your own ego, do you understand me, Zachariah?’

‘Would I do that?’ He cracked a grin.

Kofi looked up at his father, squinted into the sun. ‘Can we play, Dad?’

Zac flicked the football up into his hand, nodded at the park below. ‘Course we can. Let’s go.’

‘Yes!’ Kofi snatched the ball off him and dribbled away, shouting something about beating his dad again.

Zac and Etta watched their boy run ahead. She slipped an arm through his and they began walking together.

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