The baby-faced one leaned closer so she could see right into his angry bobbing little eyes.

‘You will tell us exactly what kind of business you’ve been doing,’ he said, each word spat with venom.

In preparation for exactly this kind of question, Bailey had gone through police files to get ideas for a selection of plausible-sounding schemes that she’d been involved in. Her goal was to give the impression that she was a busy hustler juggling a number of deals at the same time. After all, she knew that a good villain could place you with just about anything you might want to acquire, the more illicit, the better.

She reeled off the list of schemes that she’d memorised, injecting just enough swagger to give them confidence in her abilities.

They listened intently without interrupting, five pairs of eyes piercing her all the while. When she’d finished, she waited apprehensively, holding her breath for their response.

After what seemed like an aeon it was Nancy who broke the silence.

‘Diamonds. Cars. Drugs. Antiques,’ she murmured softly. ‘Got your fingers in a lot of pies.’

‘A real grafter,’ said Rick. Bailey couldn’t work out if he was being sarcastic or not.

The room again lapsed into awkward silence.

Nancy picked up her gold lighter and flicked it open. It made a distinctive musical ‘cling’ as she did so. In the dead quiet of the room, it sounded like the ominous ringing of a church bell in a spaghetti western. She snapped it shut again without lighting it.

‘Have you ever done time?’ she asked.

‘No,’ retorted Bailey. The last thing she was going to do was mention HMP Foxbrook. Her cover had been blown there and if they probed around in any kind of depth they’d soon find out she was a cop.

‘Never done time, eh?’ said the baby-faced one. ‘You’ve done all these things and you’ve never once been in the jug?’ His voice dripped with scepticism. Again he was staring fixedly into her eyes, almost as if conducting some kind of retinal examination. She found it deeply unnerving.

‘I’m very careful,’ she replied.

She turned her gaze to Rick. She knew he was extremely careful, knew he’d gone to great lengths to ensure he’d never been caught for anything serious. But once again he gave nothing away.

‘And I make sure I only deal with people who I can trust,’ she added.

She was turning it back on them slightly, throwing them the implicit challenge that they had to be just as trustworthy as they were expecting her to be. She saw them bristle slightly, and wondered if she’d overstepped the mark.

Nancy took a sip from her bone china teacup and massaged the soft ruff of her Pomeranian, never once taking her eyes off Bailey.

The distant muted jackhammer thumped out its rhythm in parallel to Bailey’s beating heart. She licked her dry lips and flexed her sweating palms as the adrenaline pumped through her system. Surrounded by villains, alone with no back-up, not knowing if she’d succeeded in outsmarting them, the fear drove a perverse exhilaration, that unique feeling she craved that only undercover work could give her.