‘I was just following everyone else,’ she said and claimed to have been a bit squiffy. One of the guys might have known the codes to the security doors – she thought his name was James, but she didn’t know his surname. So it could have been James Murray, the unfortunate Christina’s boyfriend, but you can’t afford to make assumptions like that. She did know the names of Albertina Pryce, a fellow student at St Paul’s, and her boyfriend Alasdair somebody or other who was at Westminster, Maureen who was someone’s older sister and Rod, whatever that was short for, Crawfish or something like that – definitely Scottish.

‘He had one of those posh Scottish accents,’ said Olivia.

Guleed circled around the names and the timeline for twenty minutes, twenty minutes being about the amount of time it takes your average suspect – sorry, I mean witness – to forget the details of the lies they’ve just told you, before asking about the drugs.

‘What drugs?’ asked Olivia, her eyes flicking towards the walnut reproduction French farmhouse cupboard with, I was pleased to note, one shelf that displayed a 1977 Jubilee commemoration plate along with two more plates with photographs custom printed on them – one each for Olivia and her brother from at least three years ago. Judging by the pained expressions, formal pose and school uniforms they’d been reproduced from school photographs. My mum has a shelf like that in the living room with, amongst others, a Lady Diana commemorative plate set and my Hendon graduation photo.

‘These,’ said Guleed and showed Olivia a picture on her tablet – a spray of small pink pills lay across a sheet of white paper. Each one was marked with a smiling elephant’s head – Magic Babars.

Olivia glanced at the picture, then sideways at her mother, and I saw her make the wrong decision. But, before I could say anything, she opened her mouth and stuck her future in it.

‘Yeah, I bought those,’ she said. ‘What about it?’

2 Teenage Kicks

2

Teenage Kicks

Guleed had to arrest her; she had no choice. The brief knew it, too, but before he could get his mouth open Guleed was on her feet and doing the caution. Lady Ty, who’d been staring disbelievingly at her daughter, snapped her head around to look at Guleed — and there was an expression I never thought to see on her face. Abject fear. It was gone in an instant, replaced by a look of calm determination which is the signal for any sensible son of West Africa that it is way past time to be vacating the area. She stood up, and as she did I felt a sudden drag, as if I’d been caught in an icy undertow. I swear the mugs on the drying rack by the sink started to rattle.

I followed her up and said her name as loudly and as forcefully as I dared.

‘Tyburn.’