Muttering my excuses to Jemima, I head to some seats in the back row, draping my coat on the back of a chair just below the army of tripods. Everything should feel a bit lighter now we’re out of the rain and drying off a bit, but my clothes still feel heavy on my body. I keep expecting to see Dominic as the room thickens with people.

‘The cavalry’s arriving, I see,’ Jemima says as she flops into the seat next to me. ‘What a performance … I need another coffee, obviously. Things like this only ever happen when I’ve not slept for two nights and had to watch the same hideous tapes at least eleventy-thousand times.’

‘Stay there, I’ll get them,’ I say, jumping to my feet, sure I’ll find Dominic in the crowd outside.98

I push my way through the incoming traffic to the machine in the corridor, plastic cups dropping and filling without so much as a sound. All that hiss and fuss and sigh of Costa, I think. Maybe it’s their fancy machines laughing at how stupid we all are. I join the line shuffling back into the room, scanning up and down for familiar faces.

‘Cheers,’ Jemima says, lifting and slurping as soon as I pass over a cup, squeezing back into my seat. ‘This is such a circus. Apparently every news outfit in town is showing up…’

She fades as I twist around, still looking for Dominic.

‘Shouldn’t we save some more seats? He’ll be here any minute now, surely?’

‘He’ll stay away if he knows what’s good for him,’ Jemima replies between gulps. ‘He’s his own worst enemy sometimes. Almost always too strung out to realise, but who could blame him, I guess. And now is definitely not the time to put a loose cannon in the room.’ I stare at her immaculately woven head glistening under the lights lined up behind us. ‘He needs to be careful, and he knows it. Better that he stays with the pack outside and listens in. Mary will pipe the audio of whatever’s being said into his earpiece so he doesn’t miss a word. We don’t want him drawing attention to himself for all the wrong reasons. If he’s in here, you can bet he will start yelling inappropriate questions.’

‘Is that what you meant about a grudge? When you told him not to let it get in the way of the right decision?’

‘I know what I said,’ she interrupts, crunching her cup into her hand. ‘You really don’t get it, do you? Haven’t you ever wondered why Dominic is so keen to show up every Met police failing he comes across? Or are you still green enough that you genuinely think no one in the news business has an agenda other than holding power to account?’