I dismissed her thanks with an easy smile. “You can thank me when our investigation is mentioned on the national news.”

While Kerry was ringing Lulu’s PR people I contacted her agent, but smacked into a brick wall straight away. “Lulu is in the middle of rehearsals for her It’s Not All About Me tour,” snipped one of her management team. “I’ll be sure to pass on your interest.”

The remainder of the week was proving to be one of mixed fortunes.

Kerry told me she had managed to extract a couple of quotes from Lulu’s people about the products “tearing up the rules of skincare and starting a revolution reflecting the stringent research undertaken” and another from a poverty charity that had Lulu as its ambassador who expressed their surprise and concern that “Ms Stark was involved in such a costly enterprise”.

“Excellent!” I grinned at Kerry as we hovered by the stairwell. “I’m going to keep pestering Lulu’s management. They’ll probably resist us for another week or so and then realise they could be doing themselves more damage by not speaking to us.”

“And I’ll see if I can get anything else from a couple of the other charities Lulu Stark works with,” chimed in Kerry.

“Good.” I frowned. “It all seems rather odd, though. I’ve never met Lulu Stark, but she always came across as one of the genuine ones.”

“I know what you mean.” She swung around in her leather boots before turning back to me. “You know something, Leonie? I think I’m beginning to enjoy myself working here. That’s thanks to you.”

I pulled a playful face. “Yes, well don’t enjoy yourself too much, otherwise you really will give the game away!”

Apprehension began to crawl over me about the impending meeting with Flynn Talbot. I tried to dispel the doubts. Something told me I hadn’t thought this through as much as I should have done… That should be the inscription on my headstone, I thought to myself.

And so Friday rushed up to greet me and before I knew what I was doing, I was stationed at a table in the impressive surroundings of the Sycamore Tea Rooms, on Glasgow’s Buchanan Street.

The atmosphere was one of genteel decadence, emphasising the tea room’s stature as the oldest of its kind in the city.

I was sitting at a table across the room, nursing a pot of tea and trying not to look conspicuous – and failing.

I tried not to make it obvious I was staring at the entrance, waiting for Flynn Talbot to arrive. This in itself was crazy, as I didn’t even know what the man looked like. I had double and triple checked and there were no photographs of him on his Facebook account and he didn’t have a Twitter or Instagram account either.