Ben was already delving into his phone to search online for Stuart Corporate Investments Ltd. He quickly found the company website, which was just as impressive as Monty had described. The site proudly vaunted its international footprint but capitalised most of all on its Scottish roots, getting maximum wow-factor value from the multiple panoramic shots of the magnificent estate and spectacularly grand Highland castle that served as its corporate headquarters.

But it was its location that mainly interested Ben at this moment. The damn place was just a few miles north of Fort William. Which also placed it just a few miles south of Kinlochardaich. Almost exactly equidistant. Slap bang right in the middle of all the action that Ben and Grace had just left behind. And to which they’d soon be returning.

Ben had been around long enough, and seen enough weird and crazy things, to know that coincidences did happen. But this connection was hard to dismiss so easily.

He said, ‘Grace, I think you and I need to head back north and go and say hello to this Mr Stuart.’

Chapter 42

At the same moment Hacker was getting on the phone to Graham, who was still hiding at Hope’s cottage with Carter.

Hacker asked, ‘Well? Have they come back yet?’

Graham replied impatiently, ‘If they’d have come back yet, don’t you think I would’ve called you? How much longer do we have to sit here freezing our bollocks off?’

‘Quit whinging. You’re getting well paid for it. Call me the moment anything happens.’ Hacker ended the call and turned to Stuart, who was pacing the floor in agitation with his hands clasped behind his back. They and Banks were in the industrial-scale kitchen in the bowels of the castle. The room was filled with the rich aroma of Italian dark roast coffee filtering through a percolator on a range the size of a locomotive. Banks was sitting hunched over the enormous table with a steaming mug and the dismantled pieces of a pistol in front of him, which he was assiduously cleaning with a copper wire brush and a rag.

Hacker said, ‘Hope and the woman are still out there somewhere.’

‘I know they’re still out there somewhere,’ Stuart snapped back at him, still pacing. ‘I’m not deaf. Or stupid. Which is why Macleod and Coull have been instructed to keep an eye on every inch of road for a fifty-mile radius in case they show up.’

‘On their own?’