‘I’ll walk with you, if you like.’

They stroll down Henrietta Street and cross at Bedford Street.

‘Thank you for the tea,’ says Archer.

‘Perhaps we can go for a drink sometime?’

A date is the last thing on her mind right now. Not only is the case filling her head, but the situation with Dom needs to be resolved. As much as she knows it’s over, she also knows that they will have to properly talk at some point. She had stupidly thought things between them were improving before she’d moved into Grandad’s, but she couldn’t have been more wrong and his betrayal hurts, more so because she didn’t see it coming.

Jamie can see her hesitation. ‘Listen, no pressure. Do you still have my card?’

‘I do.’

Jamie smiles. ‘Then call when you are free.’

*

Back in the office Quinn is holding a rolled-up copy of Mike Hamilton’s grubby tabloid. ‘You might not want to read this,’ he warns.

Archer feels nauseous recalling her confrontation with Hamilton that morning. Has he dragged something up from her past already?

Quinn hands across the paper.

Archer unrolls it and scans the article. It’s an opinion piece on the investigation peppered with veiled hate against the homeless and a caustic judgement on the killer’s so-called artistic bent. Hamilton clearly has a low opinion of her and how the investigation has been conducted so far. This is bad publicity for the Met and will not give the public any comfort. That aside, she is just relieved he hasn’t written anything about her past.

She crumples the rag and tosses it into the wastebasket.

‘You know what struck me the most about that piece?’ observes Quinn.

Archer removes her coat and hangs it on the coat stand.

‘What a piss-poor writer he is?’

Quinn smirks and then frowns. ‘You read my mind. How did you do that?’

‘Grace, Harry,’ calls Klara, ‘you might want to take a look at this.’

They enter her small office, a space that has been transformed into a computer hub festooned with green, yellow, red and black cables that provide power and connectivity on a grand scale.

Klara crouches in the doorway bunching loose wiring with cable ties.

‘Is it safe in there?’ asks Archer.

‘If there was a serious water leak, we might be in trouble. I think we’re OK, though. Harry thinks I’ve created my very own Tardis console.’

‘Although it’s smaller on the inside,’ says Quinn.

‘Can’t have everything, Harry,’ replies Klara.

They squeeze behind Klara’s desk with its three elevated monitors displaying shots from the ANPR system.

‘I’ve been trying to build a story behind these images.’

On the screen are a series of photographs showing a black Range Rover Vogue with Lewis Faulkner’s messy blond mop visible behind the driving seat.