Something small, flat and metallic flew through the air to land where I’d have been standing if I hadn’t immediately jumped backwards. It was an iPhone, and from its screen came a little wisp of blue flame. I opened my mouth to shout ‘Get back!’ But of course by then it was too late.

The phone exploded in a most peculiar way.

I actually saw the pressure wave, a hemisphere of distorted air that expanded out in a lazy, unstoppable fashion. And, as it did, everything with a microprocessor blew out. And then the wave reached me and knocked me on my back.

There was a sensation like static electricity and the smell of ozone and the taste of lemons.

Fuck me, I thought, she’s weaponised her iPhone.

And then the lights went out.

5 Mother’s Little Helper

5

Mother’s Little Helper

When we briefed Seawoll later all he said was ‘That could have gone better.’ Which, as portents of disaster go, is pretty fucking portentous.

The blast didn’t knock me out. I’ve been unconscious before and this was different. It did knock out every light in a thirty metre radius, plus the CCTV and everyone’s Airwave. Not to mention a couple of million quids’ worth of top of the line consumer electronics.

Seriously, I thought, we couldn’t have met in a Greggs? I really hoped that Harrods’ insurance covered them for Acts of Lesley.

What CCTV we had left showed Reynard making his escape down the central stairwell and out through the Food Hall. There was no sign of Lesley and, although Stephanopoulos shut down the store for a thorough search, nobody had any doubt that she was long gone. How was another question.

Crew Cut had escaped as well, but we did recover his pistol which turned out to be a suspiciously clean Glock 17 with the serial numbers erased and no matches in our or Interpol’s databases. Seawoll thought it stank of spook, but nobody was in a hurry to get CTC involved – we figured they’d be along soon enough.

It wasn’t a total loss, because back at what was left of the Montreux Jazz Café Nightingale had a strangely familiar suspect in custody.

‘Did you use the proper caution?’ I asked.

‘I believe so,’ said Nightingale.

Lesley May’s name hung between us but we had other things to deal with first.

Even though she was sitting down on a plastic chair salvaged from the café, the suspect was still obviously very tall – taller than me, in fact. She was dressed in an expensive black wool suit jacket – a Stella McCartney, we learned when Guleed surreptitiously checked the label later – a white male dress shirt and pre-faded skinny jeans. She’d dropped her chin down to her chest as I approached and let her long straight weave fall over her face but it was too late – I’d recognised her.