‘I’m a divisional detective constable. We don’t have heroes at my level.’

‘And this’ll keep you down there for ever.’

‘And how will that stack against the outcome you’ll face? Because the moment my lot learn the truth, your lot will too. You think Wild Bill will settle for denying you promotion?’

‘It’ll be bad, there’s no question,’ he agreed. ‘It won’t be pleasurable for either of us … but I think I’ll be able to handle things at my end.’

‘You don’t sound too certain.’

‘We’ll only know when it happens, won’t we? But I’m not just going to run.’

Fleetingly, that statement sobered her. The man in front of her had exerted life-and-death power many times. He was respected and feared across the underworld of the Northwest. Even the cops considered him untouchable because he had so many attack-dog lawyers at his beck and call, so many judges and jurors on his payroll, and so many fall-guys around him to take the rap, that he was almost impossible to prosecute. While if his reputation alone wasn’t enough to protect him from gangland rivals, his army of enforcers and gunmen would. And yet here she was – ‘a slip of a tart,’ as Les Mahoney had called her – an everyday detective constable with a blemished record, and yet she was so positioned that with a single sentence she could place him in serious jeopardy. She literally had him on a cliff edge. It almost made her queasy. And not in a good way.

‘Why don’t you make it easy on both of us?’ she said. ‘Promise not to contact Mum again.’

His expression hardened. ‘And I don’t respond well to threats.’

She shook her head. ‘This has got to be a wind-up.’

‘Why? Because I’ve found something in life I actually value? You think there’s no heart at all beneath this steely exterior?’

She backed away but pointed a finger. ‘This is the last warning. You are not inveigling your way back into our lives. You’d better believe that’s more important to me even than my job.’

‘We’ll see.’

‘Don’t test me, Dad.’

He leaned against his Bentley, nonchalant again, the casual, confident achiever.

She turned and stumbled back to her Jimny, fiddling clumsily with the keys, numbed at how badly that had gone and how little she’d obtained from him.

‘Rarefied atmosphere up on that moral high ground?’ he called after her.

She didn’t look back, just hit the fob and opened her car.