Bello thought about it. Abdul was planning to bring Peterson here, but after all the errors to date, he liked the idea of insurance. He had instructed George Selaissie to locate and track Peterson’s children. Selaissie had orchestrated the Plymouth bomb. He knew the UK very well. He was the one who’d said they couldn’t just take this Captain Peterson, that they’d be noticed immediately, they had to create chaos. He’d identified the ball as the perfect place for a pretend terror attack and also found their willing bomber. So Bello knew he was a man of talent. He also knew Selaissie was keen to make up for the way things had gone since the bomb. But Bello didn’t want to undermine Abdul. His uncle thought highly of the man. And while Abdul came over as calm and measured, Bello knew a snake when he saw one. ‘You stay with Harry, but send someone with the children. I want the children.’

‘And the woman?’

‘Who is she? The mother?’

‘No. Peterson’s girlfriend.’

‘Take her too.’

58

A little later, Bloom met up with Jameson in the same cafe and ordered drinks at the counter. She bought a bottle of water for Harry, a large cappuccino for Jameson, a cup of tea for herself and a flat white too.

‘Karene’s not coming back,’ said Jameson when she placed the flat white in front of the empty seat. ‘She’s taking the kids home.’

‘That was tough,’ said Harry. ‘They’re so grown up, almost adults, it’s …’ He stared out of the window at the station entrance.

‘It was always going to be hard,’ said Bloom. ‘Seeing them again. They’re the one thing that makes this real.’ Bloom took her notebook out of her bag and removed a printed copy of the picture from Julian’s Facebook post. ‘It’s not as tough for them though. They haven’t lost all that time with you.’

‘Sophie’s struggling with it.’ Harry looked down at the picture. ‘What’s this?’

‘Karene will help her. You couldn’t ask for a better person to support them through this. It’s a picture Julian posted on his Facebook page a week before his murder. It was a memory post, a photograph taken two years earlier at a fiftieth birthday celebration that Julian had hosted for this lady.’ Bloom placed her finger on the picture.

‘That’s his lady friend. What’s her name? Isobel, I think.’

Bloom nodded. ‘And do you recognize any of the others in the picture?’

‘Was I there?’ Harry picked up the printout and looked closely.

‘No.’

He put it down again. ‘Sorry. I don’t.’

‘You have no idea who this girl might be?’ Bloom placed her finger on the dark-skinned girl dressed in black.

‘Should I?’