Lucy throttled up, flinging the bike in a U-turn across the middle of the road. As a taxi pulled an emergency stop, she mounted the pavement, circling around the back of it, before bouncing back onto the tarmac, where she swung a right and sped down Battle Hill. A second later, the F-Type reappeared in her wing mirrors, and now it wasn’t alone, another vehicle coming full pelt alongside it, a motorbike. Lucy had no clue who this might be, but it would give her more problems; if she’d only been facing the F-Type, there were places she could take her Ducati where the pursuer couldn’t go. Not anymore.

At the lower end of Battle Hill, she spun right onto Faraday Road. This was all happening so fast that she had no clear idea yet where she was headed. Robber’s Row wouldn’t be a bad shout, though that was in the opposite direction, and it wouldn’t be easy doubling back with two of them on her tail. At the junction between Faraday Road and Tubbs Lane, a bunch of Friday evening revellers were straggling across in a fancy-dressed procession. She slewed sideways to avoid them, crashing over the kerb and a triangle of uneven pavement, before hitting the blacktop and making the next turn on the edges of her tyres.

Even over the howling engine, she heard her mother’s screech of terror.

As they hurtled along Lowrigg Avenue, she risked a backward glance, and now saw only the F-Type – some forty yards behind them.

‘Where the hell is …?’ she said, at the same time glancing left.

The pursuing biker was running neck-and-neck with her, on the pavement.

It was a black Yamaha YZF600, the phenomenally powerful Thundercat. Its rider was the Maˉori woman. She wore a helmet with goggles rather than a visor, so her facial tattoos were visible, her wild, tar-black hair billowing behind. She levelled her right arm to point at Lucy … only no, she wasn’t pointing. She was aiming the sawn-off shotgun.

Lucy cut sharp right, veering across the opposing lane and swerving down Claremont Street, which was also narrowed by parked vehicles – only for a car to turn in ahead of her. Cursing, she cut through another gap and mounted the pavement.

A second backward glance showed the Thundercat aping the complex manoeuvre, no more than thirty yards behind her. Lucy didn’t hear the shot, but her nearside wing mirror exploded.

Cora squeezed her daughter’s waist so hard that she had difficulty breathing.