“Oh, it’s not just you. It’s another case I’ve been working on. A team that’s flooding the country with fake watches. You know, Rolex copies, all that sort of thing.”

Moira nodded. “I know exactly what you mean. A lot of the guys in Bradford are into that kind of thing. It’s a nice little earner. They do a lot of fake jogging suits and T-shirts. You know, any big thing like the Batman movie, or the Teenage Mutant Turtles. They just copy the legit stuff and flog it round the pubs and the markets. The guy I worked for in Bradford even had us selling fake perfume to johns for their wives, can you believe it?”

I laughed. “Wonderful. I love the psychology.” I put Everything But The Girl’s Language Of Life in the cassette and we both settled in a companionable silence to listen to Tracy Thorn’s sensuous tones.

“So how did you track me down?” Moira asked finally as I turned on to the M6, heading south towards Jett’s mansion. The home she’d never seen, I reminded myself.

When I got to the bit about Stick asking for his four hundred pounds, she laughed out loud. “You know,” she said, “if this does work out, I might just pay him back. Mind you, he’d die of embarrassment if word got out that he took me to Seagull. Stick the hard man! He’d never live it down.”

I turned into the gateway of Colcutt Manor and wound down the window and leaned out to press the intercom button. When it crackled back at me, I said clearly, “It’s Kate Brannigan to see Jett. Don’t fuck with me, Gloria, let me in.”

As the gates opened, I caught Moira’s expression out of the corner of my eye. She looked stunned. I headed up the long drive, and the house appeared in my headlights. “Shit,” she breathed. “You might have warned me, Kate.”

I pulled up at the foot of the steps that led up to the front door and said, “You ready?”

Moira took a deep breath and said, “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

We got out of the car and I led the way up towards the door. Three steps from the top, it opened and a pool of light flooded out. Jett himself stood silhouetted in the doorway. It took only a moment for him to realize I wasn’t alone. Then he saw who my

I paused, and she walked past me. “Hi, babe,” she said, stopping a few feet short of him.

Jett’s hesitation was only momentary. Then he stepped forward and folded her into his arms. Moira buried her head in his shoulder.

Me, I headed back into the night, trying to start the car as quietly as possible. Some things don’t need witnesses. Besides, I had a huge invoice to dictate before I could sleep.