‘I’m coming, I’m coming!’ The cloud was already thinning. The man appeared in the blocked doorway just as she reached the exit. Eddie propelled her through, following as the gun snapped up and fired. The round struck woodwork in his wake, splinters stabbing at the back of his bald head.

He shouted for the others to keep moving, but held position. The rattle of laden coat hangers told him the gunman was moving the clothing rack. He peeked around the door. The drag queen ducked fearfully under the countertop. Beyond her, the blond man grunted in annoyance as he forced the heavy rack aside. He still held the gun. The Yorkshireman looked for anything that could even the odds. All that was within his reach was clothing . . .

And shoes.

He snatched an item from the closest rack and withdrew as the gunman pushed into the room. It was Nina’s turn to call for him to hurry. He waved for her to keep going, then looked back into the dressing room – using the mirrors to see without putting his head into the gunman’s line of sight. He was taking a risk: if his opponent used the same trick to spot him, he could shoot him straight through the wooden wall . . .

But his pursuer’s gaze was fixed on the exit as he rushed past the drag queen. Eddie tensed, waiting for him to get closer—

Then attacked.

The Yorkshireman spun out, swinging his weapon – a glossy black PVC thigh boot with a six-inch platform and a ten-inch stiletto heel. The towering sole weighed well over a kilogram, striking the blond’s skull hard enough to send him reeling into the clothes racks. One of them toppled, burying him amongst its sequinned and feathered wardrobe.

Eddie hurled the boot at his head, drawing a yell of outraged pain. He looked for the gun. His adversary’s right arm was pinned by the overturned rack. He threw clothing aside, trying to snatch the pistol from his hand—

Noises from the passageway. The downed man’s comrades had caught up. Eddie instantly abandoned his search and ran through the exit.

Nina waited at the top of a flight of stairs, Krämer and the panting Cheng beyond. ‘What happened?’ she asked.

He vaulted up the steps. ‘I gave him the boot.’

Her response to the feeble pun was a long-suffering sigh. Cheng’s, on the other hand, was confusion. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I whacked his head with a kinky boot. That’s nothing,’ he added on seeing the student’s befuddlement. ‘I once broke someone’s jaw with a foot-long dildo.’

‘Not ours, I hasten to add,’ said Nina as they hurried through some swing doors.