Lucy dashed through to the kitchen, where half a paving stone had been flung through the main window. A third assailant was in the process of climbing through after it; she saw a gangling body in dark leather, long stringy hair hanging over wizened features, a straggling beard and moustache.

He locked eyes with her, and went for his partly unzipped jacket, beneath which she spotted the handgrip of a firearm. Lucy had no time to think, she simply snatched the heavy, old-fashioned kettle which her mother had recently boiled, flipped its lid, and hurled its still scalding contents into his face. As he roared in agony and grabbed at his eyes, a heavy steel pistol landed in the sink, smashing crockery. Lucy swung at him with the kettle. It bounced across his head, buffeting him sideways against the broken window, the serrated edge of glass biting into his neck.

Eyes screwed shut, one hand clamped to the wound, he rocked perilously on the sill. Lucy levelled the kitchen mop and drove it at him like a spear, catching him end-on in the chest, and levering him backward. He fell out into the yard, landing heavily on the flagstones.

‘Lucy!’ Cora cried from the hall.

Before Lucy ran back to meet her, she took the gun from the sink. It was a large-frame double-action revolver, a six-shooter, its 50mm barrel inscribed with the make and model, Colt Anaconda, no doubt packing the much-feared .44 Magnum cartridges. Lucy had never been firearms-authorised and had never particularly sought to be – the last thing she’d ever wanted to do on joining the police was shoot at someone.

But times change. And so do people.

As she re-entered the hall, her mother was rounding the foot of the staircase, carrying the extendable baton in her left hand and the phone in her right. ‘Who do we ring?’ she gabbled. ‘Who’ll—’

Before she could finish, the boom of what had to be a sawn-off shotgun reduced the left side of the front door to smithereens, what remained of it swinging inward on warped hinges.

Cora shrieked, falling face-down onto the hall carpet.

Lucy bullocked forward, the Anaconda levelled in both hands. She caught a glimpse of the tattoo-faced woman behind the splintered door, and heard the clack-clunk of the shotgun slide.

There was no option; Lucy squeezed the trigger – once, twice, three times.

The recoil was fantastic, the big gun bucking wildly, giving her no real aim, but that was no concern. She was trying to back them off, not kill them – and it seemed to work, because as what remained of the door came apart under the impact, she saw Tattoo diving out of the line of fire. Lucy kept the gun trained on the doorway, as Cora tried to get back to her feet.

‘You hit?’ She hooked a hand under her mother’s elbow, to assist.

‘I … don’t think so …’