“I’ll find it. I’ll call you back.” Taylor hung up. She couldn’t imagine where that lead would take Rehman, but she suspected the detective wasn’t going to get any further than she already had, and she didn’t have time for it now. Owen Hayes, the office night manager, knocked on her door.

“Were you here running searches last night? An officer code: DX/3372?”

Taylor froze.

“Why?” she said.

“Personnel called.”

“Saying what?”

“Saying you should speak to them.”

“Was it Laura Whitemore?”

“Yes.”

The previous night’s transgressions flooded back. Taylor called Whitemore on a direct line.

“DX/3372?” Whitemore said.

“Yes, that was me. Who are they?”

“Are you working with the Global Issues desk?”

“No, why?”

“I don’t have information on this officer; it’s missing. I’m looking into that. But someone else was asking after it yesterday, in Global Issues.”

“Who?”

“Chris Hawkes.”

“Do you know why he was asking?”

“No. He just said it was urgent. He’s in now, I just spoke to him.”

“This is sensitive, Laura. Does anyone else know I was looking?”

“Just me.”

“Let’s keep it that way. Thank you.”

D7, the Global Issues Controllerate, had been set up as the Cold War began to wane and the intelligence service, feeling the need to rebrand, put increasing resources into investigating organized crime. A few years later, when terrorism became the biggest game in town, the department was well placed to draw in resources: Everything, it turned out, came back to organized crime—arms, drugs, money laundering.

Taylor crossed the sprawling open-plan office to Hawkes’s desk. He had his phone to his ear, standing in front of a monitor filled with photographs of badly mutilated corpses. The bodies had been shot or hacked to pieces or both. One had a rope tied around his wrists. Hawkes looked wired, tie askew, his usual good looks grown pallid.

“DX/3372,” Taylor said. Hawkes glanced at her, told the caller he’d get back to them, and hung up.

“Is it you?”

“No.”

“Who is it?”

“I don’t know, but I’d also like to find them.”

“Why?”

She looked across the images: a man lying on the floor of an inflatable lifeboat filled with blood; two men bound together and shot in the head in what looked like a ship’s hold.

“What is this?”

“Trouble. Why are you chasing it?”

“I’ve got an issue on Ascension Island. I believe that the officer who used that personnel code knew something about the place. Where is this?”

“A long way from Ascension. I’ll tell you what I know.”