It was only just after six and there wasn’t much traffic around at this time of the morning. Living rough, Porter had learnt there was no such thing as a quiet time on the London streets: it was a cliché, he knew, but the place really had forgotten how to sleep. Still, as the BMW turned up through Pimlico and Kensington on its way to meet the M4 heading out towards Heathrow, the school-run mums hadn’t yet started wheeling out their Chelsea tractors, and the delivery vans hadn’t begun their rounds, so the place was relatively calm. He watched as the silent, darkened streets slipped past, recognising places where he’d kipped down for the night, tried his hand at begging, or grovelled to some puffed-up arsehole for a few hours’ work washing up or sweeping steps.

I might never see this place again, he thought. And so what? I won’t miss a single street of it.

He’d come down to London after Diana had thrown him out. They had a house they’d bought together soon after Sandy was born on the outskirts of Nottingham: Diana liked it because she’d grown up there, but Porter had come from Luton, and had never really felt at home that far up into the Midlands. Without Diana, there hadn’t been much reason to stay, and, if he was being honest with himself, if you were a heavy drinker, it wasn’t a great place to hang around: the pubs all got to know you, and wouldn’t serve you any more after your first ten or twelve drinks. He’d come down to London to try his hand on the security circuit, and he’d managed to get a couple of bodyguard jobs, but after they caught him with alcohol on his breath that work had all dried up. Nobody wanted some drunk bastard looking after them. He’d stayed in London, though, even as his life gradually fell apart. You could always get a drink, so long as you had a few pounds in your pocket, and sometimes even when you didn’t.

‘Sleep OK?’ said Layla, sitting by his side in the back of the BMW.

He glanced at her. She was dressed more casually today, in jeans, and a white blouse and blue jacket, and her hair was tied back in a ponytail. She had brought an overnight bag with her, even though she was planning on getting the afternoon flight back to London, because anyone who turned up at airport without any luggage automatically made themselves look suspicious.

‘Pretty good,’ said Porter gruffly.

That just about described it, he reflected. After making love to Danni for the second time, he’d fallen fast asleep in her arms, and slept probably better and more deeply than he had done for years. By the time he’d been woken up by the ringing of the alarm clock, she was gone, with just the lingering smell of her perfume, and a thin trace of lipstick on the pillow to remind him that she’d ever been there at all. I’ll probably never see her again, and might not even want to, he’d thought as he stepped into the shower. She was way too young for their relationship to be anything more than brief or physical, but the few hours they’d stolen together had been memorable all the same. Something to cheer myself up with when the ragheads are about to put a bullet through my head or a sword through my heart.