After finding out that the garage was also a sorting office for the local drug trade, the rest of her day had been spent dealing with repercussions. Summoning enough support to close the business and get everyone safely arrested had taken a few hours, followed by further interviews with Kask and his workforce, during which she was forced to accept that, if any of them did know who the dealers were, they weren’t keen to risk their lives by telling the Met.

Having failed to extract anything useful, she had left them all in the cells at Streatham station to consider their options. Hopefully her parting caution to Kask – that refusing to assist the investigation made it more likely he would take the blame – might fester to her advantage.

She gathered the packs of meat to begin cooking, only then noticing Mike’s lowered brow. ‘What?’

Maguire rubbed his chin, a day’s growth creating a soft crackling sound. ‘What’s the name of the repair shop?’

She hesitated, trying to fathom his glare. ‘… Streatham Motors.’

‘Voss Court.’

‘Yes.’ She frowned. ‘How do you …?’

He stood, running a hand over cropped hair. ‘It was you.’

‘What was me?’

‘Jesus, Toni, why the hell didn’t you call me?’

She flared without thinking. ‘My team are perfectly capable of handling a few small-time drug-runners. I thought I was doing you a favour.’

‘How does that even begin to help me?’

‘It’s one less outlet for your people to worry about, for a start.’

‘Oh, is it?’ He nodded slowly, eyes wide. ‘Wanna hear how I knew where your breakthrough bust happened? Streatham Motors ain’t no back alley afterthought; it’s controlled by one of the biggest drug cartels in London. My guys have been watching them for eleven months. We were close to making a move, except this afternoon all the major players just dropped off the grid, like they knew one of their outlets was getting raided. That the kind of favour you mean?’

‘We followed procedure,’ she fired back. ‘No uniforms, no marked cars, no big scene. None of the staff knew anything was going on till they were being arrested, and we took the cars inside to load everyone up. Whatever spooked your dealers, it wasn’t us.’

‘Bullshit,’ Mike snapped. ‘One of our informants called this morning, same time you were at the shop. He said something huge must be going down, ’cause the damn grapevine just lit up like a row of Christmas lights, telling all their people to disappear. Word got out, Toni, you know it did.’

‘Fine!’ Hawkins held up her hands. ‘If it was us, then I’m sorry, but it was hardly planned. I was trying to link three murder victims. I only found out the garage was involved with drugs while I was there, so then I had to deal with the situation. How was I supposed to know they were in the bloody Narcotics Hall of Fame?’