Serrailler was not having a good day. He had come up against a brick wall on a reinvestigation into a cold case, the murder of an elderly man whose family had never accepted ‘By person or persons unknown. File remains open. June 1987.’

At 11.10 he downloaded a report on firearms containing a large number of graphics, which had crashed his computer. IT had told him they might get round to it by the end of the afternoon but no promises. Simon groaned, picked up his jacket, pushed his blond hair back from his forehead, and walked out of the station. The coffee in the canteen was undrinkable, but at the end of the road in the Cypriot cafe, it was the best outside London. He was thinking about his first double espresso as he started to cross, saw a car bearing down on him, calculated that he would outrun it and sprinted, but he had misjudged its speed and had to leap for the pavement. The silver BMW convertible stopped dead with a squeal of brakes and a slight skid, the driver leaning on the horn. He went over to apologise, summoning up all his best, rueful charm.

‘Bloody hell, what were you thinking? That was nearly one dead Chief Superintendent,’ Rachel Wyatt said.

Deep violet eyes in a heart-shaped face, creamy skin, hair pulled back in a comb. In the seconds it took him to lean in through the passenger window, Simon had a flashback to the first time they had met, placed next to one another at the Lord Lieutenant’s Banquet, gold and silver plates, crystal glasses and chandeliers catching the light from hundreds of candles, and the diamonds round her neck and at her ears, beautiful jewels but somehow not at all ostentatious.

He blinked, the banqueting hall vanished and Rachel was in the driver’s seat of her car, still looking cross.

‘Hey, were you heading to the station?’

‘No, I was heading home.’

‘Going in the wrong direction.’

‘I’ve moved. And you had better move too or you’ll lose another of your lives. How many would it be now?’ A van had slowed behind them and waited as Simon still leaned on the door, talking to her, looking at her.

‘Pull in over there.’

The van driver blasted his horn, Rachel shrugged and did as he suggested, but once parked, she did not switch off the engine.

‘I was just going down to the Cypriot to get a decent coffee. Come with me, I need to talk to you.’

‘Need?’

‘Yes – and want and would love to.’

She hesitated.

‘Park in the forecourt – you can use the space next to me.’

‘Where it says “Strictly police officers and station staff only”?’

‘Right.’

Rachel smiled.

‘Too long,’ Simon said, when they had sat down. ‘Where have you been?’

‘New Zealand. New York.’

‘By yourself?’

Her look silenced him.