Even at one remove, Abbott could hear the bewilderment in Phil’s voice.

‘I’m sorry,’ she tried to placate him. ‘I’m so, so sorry.’

‘We have to go,’ Abbott told her softly, quietly, aware that McGregor was hopping about, wanting Tess to wind-up and trying to arrest Abbott’s full attention.

‘Abbott, we’ve got to go. We’ve got to get them,’ said McGregor. He was pointing now – pointing across the quad to the conference-room door.

‘Wait,’ Abbott told him furiously. ‘Wait – we’re not doing anything. Nothing until I say so, OK?’

But that wasn’t good enough, not for McGregor. Before Abbott could stop him, he’d grabbed his weapon from the waistband of Abbott’s jeans and was darting out of the guest suite. He was halfway around the balcony before Abbott could even react.

And something occurred to Abbott. He wondered why they had neither seen nor heard anything of the Nortons.

He wondered why there had been no guard stationed at the door of the conference room.

As he made it to the door of the guest suite, he shouted a warning across to McGregor. If there were no guards outside then they were inside, and if they were inside then McGregor was a sitting duck.

Except it wasn’t that, was it? Because as McGregor reached the door and recklessly threw it open to storm inside, Abbott from his vantage point could see directly through the anteroom and into the conference room.

Which was empty.

And too late, he saw the trip wire.

Epilogue

EPILOGUE

The gravedigger sat on a bench beneath a tree watching the funeral that was taking place a hundred yards or so away. Apparently, the deceased who had died of a heroin overdose went by the name Simon Norton. The gravedigger had never heard of him, but since he was the son of Sir Charles Norton, the famous billionaire, also recently deceased, he got a proper send-off and a place in the family plot.

Expensive cars had decanted immaculately dressed mourners who were all now clustered around the grave edge as the priest went through the service. Not a huge attendance by any means. Looking at them, the gravedigger thought that they were probably all immediate family. There was a much older woman, for example, who was probably the widow of Sir Charles. Now, what was her name? There was a glamorous woman the gravedigger took to be the mother of the deceased. Another man. The father? A slightly scruffily dressed young man. A brother, perhaps? It was difficult to tell.

Standing slightly to one side was a cluster of men in dark suits that he took to be assistants and/or security men.