Michael paused, thinking back to that first encounter. Those pale, unflinching eyes. It was all coming back to him. All the horrors he had banished from his mind, as he did at the end of every trial so steeped in evil. Forcing himself to forget these things was the only way to survive his job, the only way to sleep at night. But now, as the memory of Hirst’s case was flooding back to him, one thought dominated Michael’s mind.

I should have known it was Hirst sooner. I should have found out he was no longer inside, and I should have gone to Levy.

The guilt threatened to break him, but he could not let that happen. For now the priority had to be the capture of Hirst. And for that, Michael needed to finish his story. He forced himself to continue.

‘Derek and I were in the cells at the Old Bailey at 9.30 a.m. First ones in. It took maybe five minutes for the cell staff to bring Hirst to us. And maybe five minutes more for Hirst to convince me that he was guilty as hell and needed to spend the rest of his life in prison.’

‘Five minutes?’ Now the questions came. This one from Levy. ‘What the hell did he do in five minutes?’

‘Everything he needed to.’ Michael paused for a beat. Long enough to find the right words. ‘I didn’t come from the kind of world that produces barristers, Joelle. I grew up around all kinds of people. Plenty of them were decent folk. But plenty weren’t. I might have been young but I’d seen enough thugs and psychopaths to recognise one in front of me. And when I met Hirst I could see that he was a whole other level of sick.’

‘But what told you that? He must have done or said something specific?’

‘He was too smart for it to be something specific. And he didn’t tell us anything. You know how it works, Joelle; if Hirst had told us he was guilty we couldn’t have defended him properly. Couldn’t have gone into court and advanced a version of events we’d been told was untrue. It’s against all the rules.’

‘Then what?’

‘It’s impossible to explain. But it was everything, I guess. It was all off. Don’t get me wrong. Hirst stuck to his story. Claimed he had nothing to do with the kidnapping. With Tommy’s death. With the robbery. With any of it. He maintained he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Out looking for his lost dog when a police helicopter started hovering overhead and he was arrested at gunpoint. If it was anyone else then maybe I could have believed it. But the way he told the story? Smiling the whole time? A smug, superior smile that just didn’t slip, no matter how upsetting the detail got.

‘Looking back, he was making no effort to have us believe him. No effort to convince us that he was telling the truth. He didn’t care. He knew the case against him was crap; he thought he’d be walking if we did our job just half well. And he knew Derek’s reputation. “Half-well” wasn’t an option. Derek was too good for that. So that was it, really. I walked out of that room knowing Hirst was guilty, and knowing that – in a few weeks – we’d have that piece of shit back on the streets.’