‘What can I call you, Candice? What’s your real name?’

She took hold of his hand, put her face to it. He pointed to himself.

‘John,’ he said.

‘Don.’

‘John.’

‘Shaun.’

‘John.’

He was smiling; so was she. ‘John.’

‘John.’

He nodded. ‘That’s it. And you?’

He pointed at her now. ‘Who are you?’

She paused. ‘Candice,’ she said, as a little light died behind her eyes.

4

Rebus didn’t know Tommy Telford by sight, but he knew where to find him.

Flint Street was a passageway between Clerk Street and Buccleuch Street, near the university. The shops had mostly closed down, but the games arcade always did good business, and from Flint Street Telford leased gaming machines to pubs and clubs across the city. Flint Street was the centre of his eastern empire.

The franchise had until recently belonged to a man called Davie Donaldson, but he’d suddenly retired on ‘health grounds’. Maybe he’d been right at that: if Tommy Telford wanted something from you and you weren’t forthcoming, predictions of your future health could suddenly change. Donaldson was now in hiding somewhere: hiding not from Telford but from Big Ger Cafferty, for whom he had been holding the franchise ‘in trust’ while Cafferty bided his time in Barlinnie jail. There were some who said Cafferty ran Edinburgh as effectively from inside as he ever had done outside, but the reality was that gangsters, like Nature, abhorred a vacuum, and now Tommy Telford was in town.

Telford was a product of Ferguslie Park in Paisley. At eleven he’d joined the local gang; at twelve a couple of woolly suits had visited him to ask about a spate of tyre slashings. They’d found him surrounded by other gang members, nearly all of them older than him, but he was at the centre, no doubt about it.

His gang had grown with him, taking over a sizeable chunk of Paisley, selling drugs and running prostitutes, doing a bit of extortion. These days he had shares in casinos and video shops, restaurants and a haulage firm, plus a property portfolio which made him landlord to several hundred people. He’d tried to make his mark in Glasgow, but had found it sealed down tight, so had gone exploring elsewhere. There were stories he’d become friendly with some big villain in Newcastle. Nobody could remember anything like it since the days when London’s Krays had rented their muscle from ‘Big Arthur’ in Glasgow.

He’d arrived in Edinburgh a year ago, moving softly at first, buying a casino and hotel. Then suddenly he was inescapably there, like the shadow from a raincloud. With the chasing out of Davie Donaldson he’d given Cafferty a calculated punch to the gut. Cafferty could either fight or give up. Everyone was waiting for it to get messy ...

The games arcade called itself Fascination Street. The machines were all flashing insistence, in stark contrast to the dead facial stares of the players. Then there were shoot-‘em-ups with huge video screens and digital imprecations.