Styles had already moved past him. Porter heard him talking into his handset, low and urgent, as he checked the next room along. Porter stood up and went to join him, leaving Dawson crouching over Anderson. They checked the other three doors on the sides of the corridor, sacrificing stealth for speed. Nothing. Piles of cardboard boxes stacked too low to offer any cover to a man like Bolton. They’d all be searched eventually, but their priority today was the man, not his product.

The final door at the end of the corridor was locked. Porter took a few steps back, lifted his knee up to waist height, and tilted his hips forward, channelling all of his bodyweight into the kick. It landed flush beside the handle and the lock gave way. The door flew open, catching something unseen behind it and juddering back towards them. The loud crash faded, replaced by the low hum of activity in the warehouse beyond.

Porter placed a hand on the door frame and leant his head first to the right, then the left. No sign of Bolton. He stepped through into the warehouse itself, with Styles close behind. It reminded him of a trip to Costco, wooden pallets on the ground nestled underneath shelves bolted together, reaching up like the skeleton of a skyscraper towards the ceiling. They stretched off in both directions, punctuated by gaps that he assumed were aisles up which the forklifts he’d seen outside could drive to deposit their cargo.

Styles drew level with him, and he sensed more movement on his right, turning to see Jon Whittaker flanked by four AFOs, Carmichael, Palmer, Everett and Kaye, Heckler & Koch MP5s held at shoulder height. Porter whispered hasty instructions, sending Carmichael and Palmer scurrying away to the left with Whittaker, while Styles, Everett and Kaye followed him in the opposite direction. The right-hand path would take them to what he hoped was a central aisle, ploughing a furrow the length of the building. With two men hugging the left, and more down the centre and right, they would catch anyone lurking in the rows of parallel aisles from both sides, penning them in.

They reached the break in the towering shelves and turned a sharp ninety degrees, stopping abruptly to avoid colliding with two men slouching around the blind corner. They both wore hard hats and luminous vests, like bees that had lost their stripes. The man closest to Porter flinched and blinked like he was transmitting in Morse code. They spoke in tandem, words overlapping.

‘Whoa, watch where you’re going mate,’ from the closest man.

The other, clipboard in hand giving him the pretence of authority, spoke in a haughtier tone. ‘Who the bloody hell are you?’

‘Police,’ Porter snapped. He didn’t recognise either man. ‘James Bolton. Daniel Stenner. Alexander Locke. Where are they?’

They stared at him blankly, clipboard man breaking first with a shrug. ‘No idea. You tried the office?’