‘Doesn’t that concern you?’ A doubt was beginning to eat at the back of Hale’s mind. The sort of thing that would bother Levy, he thought. ‘That sort of an obsession?’

‘Should it?’ King asked.

‘I don’t know. It’s just . . . it’s just, you know, an obsessive killing their obsession? That’s not unusual. In fact it’s common enough that we know how they tend to do it: they almost always do it themselves. Close up and personal. But if Burrell was behind Ferris’s death, he has to have hired someone else to do the job. It’s . . . it’s just not typical.’

Hale shook his head. Perhaps he was trying too hard to ape Levy. He forced himself to dismiss the thought.

‘It’s probably nothing,’ he said. ‘I mean, this was a business thing, first and foremost. So let’s just get that little shit into an interview room and get some answers.’

Hale took one final look around the room and – as much as he resisted it – the same doubt resurfaced. He forced it back down once again and turned towards the door. Just as an SO19 officer walked through it.

‘Sir.’ The officer made a direct line for Hale. ‘I think you’d better see this.’

‘What is it?’

‘Drugs, sir. More drugs than I’ve ever seen.’

Hale moved quickly. King too. They followed the SO19 officer out of the room. He turned left and moved up to the second tier of the staircase, followed by the more senior officers.

It took them up one more floor. To a room just as big as the office below.

‘Jesus Christ.’

Hale could think of no other words. What greeted him as he stepped through the door did not need them. The sight spoke for itself.

‘Holy fuck.’ King was just a step behind.

The room was directly above Burrell’s office but it had not enjoyed the same attention. It was nothing but floorboards, whitewashed walls and windows covered in masking tape. Like a room awaiting the attentions of a decorator.

That must be the intention, Hale thought as he gazed at the room’s contents. To fool the people in the buildings across the street.

It would have been an effective deception from out there. But not from inside, where it was spoiled by four wooden pallets that sat in the centre of the room.

Each pallet carried a full load of conspicuous white powder, tightly wrapped into kilo-sized bricks.

‘Is that what I think it is?’

King spoke without looking at Hale. His eyes stayed fixed on the pallets.

‘It has to be.’

‘Have you ever seen that much in one load?’

‘I haven’t seen that much ever. Not if you add up every arrest in my whole career.’

‘Shit.’

King estimated the value of what was in front of them. He let out a whistle as he passed twenty-five million.

‘That’s one shitload of—’

King never finished his sentence. It was interrupted by the sound of gunfire.