The pizzas were delivered as usual. Michaela had devised nicknames for their captors, in an attempt to humanize them which she said would also diminish them as threats. This sounded like self-delusory nonsense to Nick, though he played along. Baseball bat man had become Chas, pizza man Dave and their limping accomplice Butch. Chas seemed to have run out of sarcastic remarks. He and Dave went about their business that evening in silence. Not that there was any need for them to speak. Nick and Michaela both knew the drill. Stand back against the wall. Take delivery of supper and a clean bucket. Push the used bucket out. Eat supper. Wait for the lights to go out.

As they did, an hour or so later.

And then, after an unmeasurable period of time, they came on again.

The roller door rattled up. Nick was so dazzled by the sudden glare that he never actually saw Chas and Dave crossing the floor towards him. He heard the jangle of the key in the padlock on his cage. He began to scramble to his feet, his vision still blurry. The door of the cage was flung open. Chas grabbed him and pushed him back against the rear wall of the cage. He heard Michaela shout his name, perhaps in warning. But it was too late. He felt a familiar stabbing sensation in the side of his neck. He knew what was happening to him, but knowing made no difference. He seemed to be falling. The fall accelerated. Then there was only darkness.

When he recovered his senses, he was in the rear of the van, half folded in an oil-stained sheet, his left arm snagged above him. He looked up and saw he was handcuffed to the grab-rail next to the side door. Michaela lay beside him, still unconscious, handcuffed like him to the grab-rail.

The van was moving fast but smoothly through the night. The only light was from the dashboard display, which he could see through the wire barrier separating him from the driving compartment, and the headlamps of oncoming vehicles, their beams moving at intervals across the windscreen. Chas was behind the wheel, while Dave and Butch sat shoulder to shoulder on the bench seat. The droop of Dave’s head suggested he might be asleep. Tina Turner was singing ‘I Can’t Stand the Rain’ on the radio and Chas was accompanying her in a tuneless mumble.

Nick glimpsed an illuminated sign ahead and craned his neck to see what it said, hoping for a clue as to where they were going. Honiton 15, Exeter 28. So they were in Devon, heading west. But why? What was their destination?

Chas must have noticed Nick moving in the rear-view mirror. He turned the volume down on the radio and reached up to adjust the mirror. ‘Look lively,’ he said, nudging Dave. ‘One of the sleeping beauties is awake.’