‘Caroline, the ballistics woman, she’s found your cartridge.’

Clare grinned. ‘That is good news. Where was it?’

‘In the guttering.’

Clare glanced at Chris. ‘But we were up there, Jim. I remember looking down at it. I’m sure I’d have seen a cartridge.’

‘I think ballistics missed it first time. The gunman too. A professional hitman wouldn’t have left anything behind. Caroline reckons the cartridge was ejected out the side of the gun and must have ricocheted off the slates. She found it further along the guttering. You wouldn’t have seen it from the window itself and nor would our sniper.’

‘Where is it now?’

‘Off to SOCO. But she did say the gun’s a Dragunov, right enough. Pretty serious bit of kit, apparently.’

Clare nodded. ‘It is that.’ She saw another call was waiting. ‘Jim, I need to go.’

‘No worries – that’s all I had for you.’

Clare thanked him and clicked to take the other call. ‘Raymond, hi,’ she said. ‘You got the cartridge?’

‘Eh? Sorry Clare. No idea what you’re talking about.’

‘Sorry. There’s a cartridge heading your way. Probably from our murder weapon. If you could check it for prints and DNA.’

‘Okay, I’ll add it to the list. Meantime…’

‘The jacket?’

‘The jacket.’

‘And?’

‘Sorry.’

‘Oh.’ Clare couldn’t keep the disappointment out of her voice.

‘I can’t find it if it’s not there.’

‘Does that mean he couldn’t be our gunman?’

‘No,’ he said, ‘I’m not saying that. That’s for you lot to work out. All I’m saying is the person who fired the gun probably wasn’t wearing that jacket. He might have taken it off or he might have been wearing some kind of PPE. I don’t know, Clare, but there is no residue on that jacket.’

Clare ended the call and sat on, thinking for a minute. Then she came to a decision. ‘Change of plan. The clock’s ticking on Zac Buchanan. I want to have another go. See if he’ll tell us why he stayed on after Abe stole the car.’

Chris looked doubtful. ‘Guys like Zac tend not to talk.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘We could hang onto him until SOCO’s examined the cartridge.’

She shook her head. ‘That could take a while. I doubt we’ll get a result on it today. But if he is our sniper and he knows we have the cartridge, he’ll also know it’s only a matter of time until we have the forensics on it. He might just talk.’ She pulled her seat belt back on. ‘I’m convinced he wasn’t acting alone and I want the name of whoever’s behind this.’

‘Told ye,’ Zac Buchanan said when Clare revealed the absence of gunshot residue on his jacket. ‘I told ye it was nothing to do with me.’