Friday night on Berwick Street and the punters were quietly slipping in and out of the sex shops on the corner with Peter Street. The market had closed but the pubs and the record shops were still open and a steady stream of media workers were threading their way home through the tourists. I took some time to check the front of Simone’s house—up on the top floor the light was on.

I didn’t like the idea of Simone and her sisters just disappearing at the hands of Caffrey and his lads. I believe in the rule of law and this was, however weird, a police matter and I was a sworn constable who was about to exercise his discretion to resolve a breach of the Queen’s Peace.

Or as Leslie would have it—I was out of my fucking mind.

I pressed random buttons on the intercom until someone answered.

“Come to read the meter, love,” I said and they buzzed me in. I made a mental note to pass the number of the building to West End Central’s crime prevention team for a stern lecture and started up the stairs.

They hadn’t gotten any less steep. No wonder Simone and her sisters had to suck the life force out of people.

I was just catching a breather in front of their door when somebody grabbed me from behind and held a knife to my throat.

“It’s him,” she hissed. “Open the door.”

Because of the height difference she had to reach up under my armpit to get her blade, an old kitchen knife I thought, against my neck. She would really have been better off threatening my back or stomach. If I’d been desperate I could have chopped down with my arm and forced her hand away. It would have depended on how fast she was and how willing to kill.

The door opened and Simone looked out.

“Hello, Simone,” I said. “We need to have a chat.”

She looked stricken to see me.

The woman with the knife pushed me and I edged carefully into the room. Peggy was in there too, still dressed in dungarees, hair still spiky, face pale and scared. That meant Cherie was the one with the knife. Simone closed the door behind us.

“Get his handcuffs,” said Cherie.

Peggy groped me around the waist. “He hasn’t got any.”

“Why haven’t you brought your handcuffs?” said Simone. “I told them you’d have handcuffs.”

“I’m not here to arrest anyone,” I said.

“We know,” hissed Cherie. “You’re here to kill us.”

“What, just me on my own?” I asked, but I was thinking of Caffrey and his posse drinking tea back at the Folly. Only by now they’d have finished their tea and were probably in a van, a nondescript Ford Transit most likely, doing last-minute checks on their weapons and night-vision equipment.