His eyes narrow as he stares back. Rangy and tall, salt-and-pepper hair aging him well past his baby face, he’s too filled-out to be junkie-thin-reliable. But I don’t have to trust him if Jemima’s here too.

‘Funny,’ he drawls after a snort, turning back to her. ‘So this is your grand plan for trawling the dark net? We simply exploit the unpaid assets? All our actual news producers – apart from your good self, that is – too knackered after our summer of terror attacks?’

I catch my breath.

‘Funny yourself,’ Jemima says, glaring at him. ‘Those underground online chatrooms, my friend, are your preserve. Neither Marie nor I are going anywhere close to those deviant hubs until the groundwork is done and we’re good and ready for undercover. But unless you want to spend the next month inside the Home Office’s online data portal, pulling together human trafficking trends, locations and routes, past arrests, demographics—’257

‘OK, OK, OK, OK…’ He holds up his hands to cut her off. ‘Blind me with drudgery, why don’t you—’

‘I studied that as well,’ I interrupt, even though I’ve never so much as heard of an online data portal. Portal? Pen and paper, Marie. Good old-fashioned door-knocking. Nothing is worth the screen it’s typed on the internet…

‘I’m surrounded by the funny today, apparently…’ Dominic’s expression freezes as he looks between us. ‘Fine, then. Whatever you want, Jonas. Since this is a long-term project. And if it is just for statistics…’

‘So tell us what you need,’ Jemima says smoothly, throwing me a sidelong grin.

‘Numbers,’ he replies after a moment, brushing the other perfect arm. ‘Details of all past and current police operations on human trafficking. Someone needs to interpret the graphs, figure out where the weak points are, where we might be able to find an in.’

‘There are tonnes of reports.’ Jemima turns to me. ‘Some of them are thick as books. There are massive amounts of data available – the Met has to make it all a matter of public record. You need to go through every line, every page. They always bury the detail that matters. Identify the most common trafficking routes, locate the countries where the law is flimsy enough for trafficking kingpins to bypass without raising eyebrows. We’re interested in where there could be a business at work, the industrial-level stuff.’

‘Of what?’ The question is out before I can stop it.

Dominic snorts, before stalking off, shoving his perfect hands into his perfect pockets. I stare after him as Jemima rounds on me.