Gerry made her way carefully up the stairs, her night vision improving as she climbed. Jade was waiting for her at the top. “Someone might notice a light,” she said. “There’s not supposed to be anybody here. You parked round the corner like I said, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

She led Gerry into what had most likely been one of the bedrooms. “We’ll have to sit on the floor unless you want to stand. It’s a bit dirty.”

Gerry sat cross-legged beside her, wondering not for the first time why the hell she had let herself be talked into doing this. But she soon had her answer.

“I’m sorry about all this cloak-and-dagger stuff,” Jade said, “but I’m really shit scared. They might be watching me. They know I was Mimsy’s best friend. I’m sure they don’t know about this place, though. And it’s not as much of a trap as it looks. There’s passages through the attics. You can get to nearly any house in the block and out the back if you hear anyone coming. Mimsy and me used to go exploring.”

“Who are ‘they’?”

“Did you bring that sarnie?”

Gerry felt around in her bag and brought out the package wrapped in foil. “Here,” she said, handing it over.

Jade ripped off the foil and took a bite, then spoke with her mouth full. “What the fuck is this?”

“It’s brie and cucumber,” Gerry said, feeling herself blush. “On sourdough bread. Sorry, it was all I had. There’s an apple, too.”

“Thank heaven for small mercies. Brie and fucking cucumber? Sourdough?” She continued to munch away on the sandwich despite the disgust and horror in her tone.

“Who’s ‘they’?” Gerry repeated, determined to regain control of the conversation.

“You must know. Don’t you know?”

Gerry couldn’t see Jade’s expression but gathered from her reply that she was a little surprised by the question. “We have our suspicions,” she said, “but as yet we haven’t had any confirmation that we’re right.”

“Sunny and his mates,” Jade went on. “There’s four of them: Sunny, Faisal, Ismail and Hassan. At least, they’re the ringleaders. There’s lots of others, all over the place, but those are the main ones here, the ones we knew. They’ve stopped now, though, now Mimsy’s dead. When she disappeared they told us to stay away, lie low and say nothing. Everyone’s gone to ground. I think they’re still keeping an eye on us, like I said, or they have people to do it for them. Tariq and his pals. That’s why I asked you to meet me here. I still have to be careful.”

“Who’s ‘us’? How many of you are there?”

“Seven.” Jade sniffed.