If it didn’t seem inappropriate, Boateng would have described the office of Lewisham Major Investigation Team as dead that morning. His MIT colleagues had open cases, of course, but none pressing enough to warrant a Saturday at work. Boateng’s own team had been working an attempted murder in New Cross. Knife attack outside a nightclub. There were witnesses, decent forensics and a teenager in Lewisham hospital with a stab wound who could tell them the story. Most importantly, they had a suspect on remand. The rest was essentially paperwork. Not an uncommon incident: violent altercations peaked in the summer months when more people were out and tempers flared in the heat. This new case taking priority was altogether different. There was planning, detail, calculation.

Boateng didn’t want anyone on his team who wasn’t up for the challenge. No pen-pushers, no jobsworths. Just men and women who wanted to catch people who were making London more dangerous. Those driven to never let a criminal get one over on them. Experience showed these were the coppers who’d go further, who’d always put in the extra shift. The ones who made it personal: us versus them.

Detective Constable Nasim Malik was one such officer. After Jones’s call he’d been first in. A faint whiff told Boateng he’d not had time to shower after working out, but at least he’d changed shirts. As usual, his beard was meticulously shaped, a high fade in the short black hair. Malik was a broad-shouldered twenty-four-year-old whose parents had fled Iraq under Saddam Hussein after the Gulf War. Born and raised in Acton, Malik grew up hearing stories of police you couldn’t trust on the streets of Baghdad. Balaclava-wearing men who’d shake you down for a few dinars, bang you up for your faith. Execute a man just for his name. At eighteen he’d signed up for the Met to be part of something he believed in: justice that was the same for everyone. Twenty-one years’ service made Boateng question if that really existed. But experience had not diminished Malik’s motivation and he was reliable and hard-working.

Ten minutes later a muddy DS Connelly arrived straight from the allotment in Herne Hill. Depending on the season, they could expect bagfuls of free veg to turn up in the office. The more the better as far as Boateng was concerned, even if they weren’t the staples of West African cooking he and Etta loved. At fifty-two, Connelly was one of the oldest in Lewisham MIT. He was a wiry ex-boxer with a crooked nose and full head of curly grey hair. Bushy eyebrows danced when he spoke, his accent still strong. As a young man in County Wexford, Ireland, he’d chased the ladies until his parents chased him off to London to get a job at sixteen. In Southwark he’d progressed through the building trade, from labourer to plasterer’s mate and on, for two decades before deciding there was more job security in the police. That was important when you had three kids. They were adults now and his marriage had long since broken up, but Connelly had found his new home in the Met. And despite his lack of formal education, common sense had carried him slowly up the ranks to Detective Sergeant.

As they pulled chairs around the briefing board, Boateng poured out mugs of coffee. Malik dumped three sugars in his, black, while Connelly had insisted on brewing his own mud-thick tea. The board was practically the only free wall space in their room. They’d moved into the new office two years ago, and while top brass had given orders to be ‘paperless’, no one seemed to have told the MIT. Computers lay buried under files, notes taped to the walls, boxes crammed under desks. On her first day, Jones had asked how anyone found anything.

‘Victim is Ivor Harris,’ began Boateng, pinning an A4 mugshot to the board. ‘Deptford pawnbroker. Forty-three, unmarried, lived alone above his shop. When Kat and I saw him this morning, he looked like this.’ Another photo, from the crime scene.

Connelly and Malik exchanged a glance.

Boateng described Harris’s injuries and their theory about who might have wanted to do this to him. He sat down, took a big slug of coffee to give them a moment to process. ‘Kat, what did you get on the person who found the body?’

She glanced down at her notebook. ‘Rosa Lopez. Female, fifty-seven, market trader. Sells second-hand goods. On her way to set up the stall this morning. Passed Harris’s shop, saw the light wasn’t on, looked closer—’

‘And got one hell of a fright,’ interjected Connelly.

‘She was pretty shaken up. I had to calm her down. Uniforms gave her the usual info about seeing your doctor if you get nightmares. She’s got family at home to look after her.’

‘Did she know Harris?’ asked Malik.

Jones checked her notes again. ‘Said she saw him most days she ran the stall. He was usually in early. They’d sometimes exchange pleasantries, nothing more. Lopez thought he seemed a quiet sort.’

Boateng tapped his pen on the table. ‘Any chance she was involved?’

‘Unlikely,’ replied Jones. ‘Physically she couldn’t have managed it – on her own at least – and her behaviour was pretty consistent with shock. But they’ve swabbed her anyway and I can check her alibi for 5 to 7 a.m.’

‘Let’s do that. Once they’ve processed the DNA and fibres that’ll probably exclude her.’

‘Should be ready by tomorrow.’

‘Thanks, Kat. Alright.’ Boateng stood again. ‘First things first. Nas, can you run Harris through our system, see if there’s any record on him.’

‘On it.’ Malik slid the chair over to his desk and began tapping away at his PC.

‘There must be CCTV for the surrounding area,’ continued Boateng. ‘Pat, I want you to check if we’ve got a camera active on the High Street. Then find out what other surveillance is going on there – banks, council, shops opposite.’

‘Grand. Three or so hours beforehand on the footage?’

‘To start. Then make it six if we need to. Jackpot’s the back alleyway around 5 a.m.’

Connelly smiled, jotting notes. ‘You’re hoping for the luck of the Irish there.’

Malik pushed back his chair. ‘Boss, I’ve got a hit.’

Boateng spun round. ‘Our man?’

‘Seems like it, name and date of birth match. But I don’t understand… Have a look.’

They gathered round the monitor.

Jones read off the screen. ‘“You are not permitted to access this file.” What’s that about?’

Boateng studied the text. He’d seen this once before. ‘It means Harris was into something bigger than just running a pawnshop. He was cooperating with us in some way.’

She frowned. ‘A protected witness?’

‘Maybe.’

‘Informer?’ suggested Connelly.

‘Probably.’

Informants, officially titled ‘Covert Human Intelligence Sources’, were the murkier side of the Met’s work. Forensics could only go so far. And if you were gathering DNA, fibres and toxicology reports, it was already too late. Across all command units, officers relied on agent reporting to spark investigations, raids, arrests – ideally before the crime. Many risked their lives to provide intelligence. But it came at a price, financial or otherwise. With each case, the big guns had to make a call on how far the Met would go to get their tip-offs. Boateng wondered what Harris had been doing in secret. For now, they were in the dark.

‘I’ll call DCI Krebs. She’ll need to authorise it for us. Meantime, Kat and Nas, can you make calls on the neighbours around Harris? Someone might have heard or seen something this morning, or be able to give us some more background on him. Drop into his flat while you’re there. Pat, crack on with the CCTV. I’ll try and find his next of kin.’ He scanned their faces. ‘Let’s do this.’

---

Trudging up the tiled path and steps to their Victorian terraced house on Tressillian Road, Zac felt exhausted. A twelve-hour day, and they hadn’t got much further. No clues from the CCTV at the front of the shop, except Lopez approaching the window at 6.57. Not a lot more from the back. There were no cameras in the alleyway, just one belonging to the council on a street leading into it. That produced a few poor-quality frames of a hooded individual in near pitch-darkness entering the alleyway at 5.23 a.m., and leaving at 6.04. Chances were this was their man. Seemed to support the lone attacker theory. Connelly had dispatched twenty-eight seconds of footage to the tech guys for enhancement, but they were still tied up trying to get anything from CCTV inside the shop.

The neighbours hadn’t said much to Jones and Malik about Harris; he kept a pretty low profile. Many didn’t even know his name. Zac had drawn a blank so far on next of kin. And by the time Krebs had returned from her hundred-kilometre bike ride and begun the chain of authorisation, it was already late in the day. The earliest he could access the restricted file on Harris was tomorrow morning, from the central repository at Scotland Yard.

Entering the hallway, he slipped off his shoes as the smell of jollof rice hit him. Result. Both his Ghanaian family and Etta’s Nigerian relatives claimed it as their country’s dish. Truth was the Senegalese probably invented it. But that was academic when it came to eating the stuff: his wife made the best outside West Africa.

‘Hello, love.’ Etta emerged from the kitchen, wiping fingers on her apron, hair tied up. ‘How’s my hero?’

‘Knackered.’ He grinned and kissed her, drawing her into his arms. She was curvier than when they’d first got together and he liked that. She’d probably say the same about him, not to mention the grey flecks in his close-cropped hair. They’d met eighteen years ago. He’d gone to give a briefing at the London Bridge law firm where Etta worked – where she still worked – and was so smitten he’d forgotten how to begin his talk. She’d stayed to ask him a question. Legal points turned to personal chat and by the time he left they had a date planned.

She smiled and jerked a thumb towards the garden. ‘There’s someone who’d love a teammate out there. Food’ll be ready in half an hour.’

‘Can’t wait.’ He grabbed his trainers and made his way past the family photos in the hall. Sunny beach holidays mostly: Gambia, Spain, East Coast of America. The formal portrait from his ’96 Hendon Police College graduation stood out – Zac alone, rigid in uniform – but Etta insisted on hanging it there. He stepped into the kitchen and through the French doors onto the decking.

‘Dad!’

‘Who’s this superstar in our garden?’ exclaimed Zac, wide-eyed. ‘It’s the future captain of England, Ko-fi Bow-a-teng!’

Kofi giggled and blasted the football to the end of the garden. They chased it together, Zac slowing to let his son get there first.

‘Tackle me, Dad,’ cried Kofi, dribbling back towards the house.

Zac nipped the ball off him and spun around, shielding it with his body as Kofi ran circles trying to retrieve it. Eventually he grabbed Zac’s leg and kicked the ball from under his foot.

‘Foul!’ demanded Zac. ‘Where’s the ref?’

Kofi booted the ball between two small trees that served as their goalposts and it clattered into the wooden fence. ‘Goal!’ he shouted, leaping and punching the air before running a victory lap around the garden.

At these moments Zac wished time could stand still. That they might stay cocooned in this home together, safe from everything bad that lurked out there in the world. That he could protect Kofi and Etta in the way he should have looked after Amelia. Joy abruptly turned to unresolved shame.

‘Come on, Ko, let’s wind it down now.’

‘Da-ad,’ he protested. ‘I want to keep playing.’

‘Hey.’ Zac knelt down, eye-level with his son. ‘If you’re a good boy and brush your teeth properly, I’ll come and read you a story in bed.’

Kofi’s face lit up. ‘Promise?’

‘Promise.’

---

After turning Kofi’s light out, Zac headed back downstairs. They had a dining room but preferred to eat at the smaller kitchen table. There, golden chicken thighs were piled atop steaming rice, fried plantain and greens on the side. He put some jazz on low, poured the wine, then planted a huge kiss on Etta’s forehead as he sat down. ‘Thank you. Exactly what I needed.’

She clinked glasses with him and sipped. ‘Tough day?’

Zac nodded, mouth already full.

‘Any progress?’

‘Not a lot,’ he managed through bulging cheeks. Sometimes he told Etta about his work; her methodical brain helped him register an omission or error of logic. In other cases – usually the most violent – it was better to say nothing. She knew which it was now.

‘Better luck tomorrow then?’

‘Has to be.’

Etta laid a hand on his.

Zac’s smile faded as he caught Amelia’s photo on the side. ‘Five years coming up.’

She followed his gaze to the picture and paused, weighing her words. ‘We’ll never forget her, but we’ve got to move on, love.’

‘Don’t know if I can,’ he replied, taking a large gulp from his wine glass. ‘When the bastard who did it’s out free.’ He spat the words.

‘Revenge won’t do any good.’

‘I’m not talking about that,’ he snapped. ‘I mean justice.’

‘Then why are you angry?’

‘I’m not, I just—’ He stopped, put down his cutlery and took her hand. ‘Sorry.’

Etta leaned over and slid her arm round him as they both looked towards Amelia’s portrait.

‘How was your day?’ he said eventually, calm returning to his voice.

‘Alright. I went to the gym while Kofi was over at Neon’s house.’

‘On the estate?’

‘It’s not that bad, Zac. And Neon’s a nice boy. Kofi had fun.’

‘I know, I just want to make sure he’s safe.’

‘Me too. But he’s got to play, see his friends. Have a life.’ She took a sip of wine. ‘We can’t protect him 24/7.’

Zac considered this. ‘You’re right.’ He smiled and took up his knife and fork again. ‘I should’ve learned by now – you normally are.’