‘Don’t even try that, Mr Hayes. At the moment, we’ve got you for the arson at the soup shop,’ I deliberately counted out the offences on my fingers, ‘the manslaughter of Simas Gudelis and Kelly Turner, the abduction and murder of Patrick Ryan, and the murder of Ali Kousa. And a string of exploitation, drugs and firearms offences. Not to mention Abbie Turner. How’s that sounding?’

‘Like he’ll never see daylight again.’ Jackie could barely contain her glee.

Hayes paled in front of me.

‘So, we’ll leave you with your solicitor to have a think about how you’d like to proceed. Mr Taylor, perhaps, for now, you can take your client through the sentences for arson, double manslaughter, and double murder? Interview suspended at 1520 hours.’

Maya, 4 p.m.

Maya, 4 p.m.

‘Interview resumed at 1550,’ I said. ‘Present: myself, DI Rahman and DCI Lawson. We’ll move onto the next stage of the interview, Mr Hayes.’

He drained the final dregs of water from a plastic cup and lounged back in his seat.

‘Abbie Turner. Your daughter.’

‘Where is she?’ Hayes lunged towards me as he snarled the question, his face bursting with anger.

‘Sit down, Mr Hayes. She’s recovering in hospital and then she’ll be going into foster care.’

‘You can’t do—’ He crushed the cup in his hand.

‘Nothing to do with me. It’s Social Services. Thanks to the posh CCTV at the flat you’ve been renting from Tomasz Feldman, we have evidence that Kelly brought Abbie to you on Friday morning. That’s correct, yes?’

‘S’pose.’

‘Did you know your daughter’s mother was going to visit Simas Gudelis on Friday?’

‘No comment.’

‘Because here’s where I’m stuck,’ I said. ‘If you had anything to do with the arson, you would have killed your daughter’s mother . . . ’ I felt my guts crunch as I uttered the words. ‘And effectively deprived your daughter of both her mother and father for the rest of her life. How are you going to explain that when she grows up and asks what happened to Mummy?’

‘She wasn’t meant to get hurt. Neither of them were.’

‘Who wasn’t?’

‘Kelly and Simas. We were meant to give old Ma Feldman a fright. That’s what he asked me to do. But that stupid Paki kid couldn’t even get that right. He got the wrong bloody shop.’

I was filling in the blanks. ‘Let’s rewind a moment. I take it the “Paki kid” is Ali Kousa?’ I made sure Taylor had clocked the racist language.

Hayes checked in with his lawyer. ‘Yes.’

‘Who asked you to do what?’