Rebus was seated at the desk in Wester Hailes police station, the one with the boxes of folders next to it. He’d already been there over an hour and it wasn’t quite half past eight.

“Morning,” he said, as Fox hung up his things. He’d bought a coffee from a petrol station on his way into work, but the inch or so left of it was stone cold.

“Maybe there’s some other reason why you seem so interested in being here when I’m not?” Fox went on, rubbing at his hair to dry it.

“You’re keen,” a fresh voice added. Siobhan Clarke was standing in the doorway, paperwork clutched to her chest.

“Maybe it’s because you’ve won me over,” Rebus said.

“In what way?” she asked, stepping into the room.

Rebus tapped the sheets on the desk in front of him. “Say you’re right and Saunders was killed by one of the Saints. From what I’m seeing here, we’re not going to find proof from Summerhall. Any amount of paperwork could have been tampered with or removed. At most we’d find anomalies and things that can be explained away as admin errors.”

“Okay.”

“And if we go asking Stefan Gilmour to account for his movements on the night Saunders died…well, we’re dealing with a pro—you can bet he’ll have set something up that’s as watertight as it can be.”

“Leaving us where exactly?” Fox asked, resting against a corner of the desk.

Rebus looked from him to Clarke and back again. “It might be that the best way to get to him is to go after the others. It worked before. He fell on his sword precisely so that the Complaints didn’t tear apart the rest of the Saints.”

“We bring in Paterson and Blantyre?” Clarke guessed.

“You sweat them,” Rebus agreed. “You let Gilmour know you intend to prosecute all three.” He held up a finger. “Blantyre was at the autopsy when it was rigged and he never said anything.” A second finger. “Paterson meantime had the gun in his desk drawer. Gives you the opportunity to say you intend taking them all down.”

“And you really think that’ll be enough to get him to confess?” Fox asked, sounding skeptical.

“With all he’s got to lose?” Clarke added.

“You won’t know till you try.”

Clarke looked at him. “And where are you when all this is going on?”

“I know my place, Siobhan—I’ll be nowhere near.”

“And if one of them implicates you…?”

“Up to you to decide if they’re lying.”

Clarke’s focus had shifted to Fox. “What do you think?”

“I really doubt it’ll work—but right now I’m not sure what else we’ve got.”

Clarke nodded slowly, then turned to leave the room.