Halfway down its length he was pushed into a room. The door closing behind him with a disturbingly quiet click. The walls seeming to eat up any sound, and the air itself hushed. And found himself face-to-face with a man in his mid-forties. Black hair, heavy stubble. If the big man who’d abducted him was daunting for his size and aggressiveness, something in this man’s eyes was equally frightening. More so.

‘Well now. Here he is. Mark from the Clarion.’

‘You can’t—’

The big man slapped his head. Hard enough to get his attention, not hard enough to dull his wits. His grating voice menacing in Mark’s ear. ‘That’s a warning. The next one will put you on your knees.’

Mark mused unhappily that with his wrists tied behind him, he’d land on his face. A disquieting thought. Made worse by the discovery that the floor onto which he’d faceplant was ridged with drainage channels. Leading to a grille in the middle of the room. Oh fuck.

‘Thanks, Lewis. Now, where was I?’ The man facing him affected a moment’s thought. ‘Oh yes… Mark, from the Clarion. The paper that’s been haunting me for the last month.’

Watching Mark intently, he grinned evilly as the penny dropped.

‘So, who do you think I am?’

‘You’re him. Joe Castagna.’

‘Well spotted. Although given the number of pictures of me and stories about me you lot have published, I’d have been amazed if you hadn’t sussed it.’

When he spoke, Mark noted the same strange, dull quality to his words that had reduced the door’s click to a tiny sound. Joe noticed him looking around at the walls. Sheets of plaster board riddled with thousands of tiny holes in concentric patterns.

‘This is what we call the games room, Mark from the Clarion. Can you hear it?’

Mark nodded, realising that was exactly what he’d noticed. The complete lack of any echo or reverberation from the gangster’s words.

‘It’s soundproofing. Me and my man Eddie there put it in years ago. When we realised we needed somewhere really private. A place where we could express our disapproval of our competitors’ activities without their counterarguments being heard.’

The big man sniggered behind him. And Mark realised that he was holding on to the contents of his bowels only by dint of a considerable effort.

‘I say “their counterarguments”, when what I really mean is their screaming, of course.’

Mark now staring at him in horror. As he realised that he was in by far the deepest shit of his life.

‘And now, of course, you’re thinking: “He’s told me who he is, he’s bound to kill me”. Aren’t you?’

Mark nodding, reluctantly. Unwilling to even admit the possibility of what was staring him in the face.