Jenson didn’t have time for this. She needed to get her on her side, to find a connection. Jenson looked around the room. A picture of a couple on their wedding day stood on the sideboard. The bride, maybe aged twenty, was recognisably the old woman.

‘Is that your husband, Mrs Gladstone?’ Jenson nodded towards the picture.

‘My late husband, yes. I’ve been a widow for fifteen years.’

‘He’s very good-looking. What did he do?’

‘A scientist. Nuclear physicist. He worked in the Middle East a lot.’

That explains the weather-beaten skin, thought Jenson. ‘I studied chemistry. At Bristol,’ said Jenson. ‘I considered a career in sciences but then was lulled into police work.’

And then Jenson knew she had her. The woman’s face softened.

‘I was a chemist too – that’s how we met.’ She nodded towards the wedding picture. ‘What do you need from me?’

‘I’ll get to the point. We’ve reason to believe that one of the flats has been taken by a person of interest to us. I can’t tell you more than that, but please believe me, I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t extremely important.’

She pulled out her stash of photographs and laid them on the granite coffee table. ‘Do you recognise any of these faces?’

Mrs Gladstone puckered her face and lifted her left hand, finger outstretched. ‘It’s hard.’

‘But do you recognise any?’

She moved her long finger, wavering, over one picture. ‘I think I’ve seen him. Or someone like him. He was waiting outside the other day. But it’s hard to be sure.’

‘Thanks, Mrs Gladstone, that’s been really helpful. Do you mind if I call my boss from the kitchen?’

#

CTOC, St Pancras, London

‘I’m at the Gladstone flat.’ Jenson’s voice came over the speakerphone in the CT ops room. ‘The lady reckons she saw Tanvir Mirza here on Wednesday or Thursday. She’s also helped us narrow down the search – she’s given us a list of six flats where she knows the residents.’

‘Okay,’ said Bose. ‘Get back outside and watch the exits from the flat. CTSFO are a few minutes away.’

Bose looked up at Gabriel. ‘Still too many possible flats,’ said Gabriel. ‘That leaves twelve. We need to narrow it down. Any news from the freehold company?’

‘No, ma’am.’

Gabriel sat in her chair, hand running through her bobbed hair.

‘Okay, Eva. If you were Abu Mujahid and you wanted a safe space for a few weeks and you wanted to avoid a paper trail, what would you do?’

‘Local estate agent? Lettings agency? Time Out?’

‘Maybe. What if you were looking from overseas though? What if you were planning this from say, I don’t know, the Middle East? Surely it would have to be an online search.’

‘Agreed.’

‘So where would you go? We’ll start with the biggest. Pull up Airbnb.’

Bose opened up the browser.

‘Search for flats, Wembley area, at least two bedrooms, available at any time in the next few months,’ said Gabriel. Bose typed in the details and a map of North West London popped up. Eighteen bubbles, each containing a rental, came up.