Praise for Hitwoman

‘Hitwoman is funny, sexy, and strangely relatable. I cheered for the protagonist even as she committed multiple murders and loved the rom-com style romance.’

Tasha Coryell, author of Love Letters to a Serial Killer

‘Who’d have thought murder could be such fun? This gem will have you rooting for the delightful Maisie as she strives to be the most ethical of assassins until she finds herself in the crosshairs. A wonderful not so cosy crime masterpiece.’

Graham Bartlett, author of Bad for Good

‘Hitwoman is the most fun I’ve had reading a thriller this year! Elsie Marks has created a fun, funny, and fast-paced romp that’s pitch-perfect to take on vacation or read over a weekend spent in bed. I never thought I’d be rooting for an assassin until I was introduced to Maisie Baxter.’

Kellye Garrett, author of Missing White Woman

‘This fun, quirky read really hits the mark!’

The Sun

‘A fast-paced plot that will make you feel like you’re watching a film in your mind.’

Daily Express

About the Author

Elsie Marks is the pen name for Louisa Burden-Garabedian and Neil Weaving, a writing duo from the UK now living and working in Beijing.

Also By Elsie Marks

Hitwoman

HQ

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

HarperCollinsPublishers

Macken House, 39/40 Mayor Street Upper,

Dublin 1, D01 C9W8, Ireland

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2026

Copyright © Elsie Marks 2026

Emojis © shutterstock.com

Elsie Marks asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

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Source ISBN: 9780008762544

E-book Edition © September 2026 ISBN: 9780008762551

Version: 2026-09-02

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Chapter 1

It’s a hardy few who would brave Fisherman’s Walk in Canary Wharf on a night like this: the sort of night that makes you believe the Thames used to freeze solid every winter. It’s snowing, and the biting wind isn’t scattering the snowflakes so much as firing them sideways. You might think it’s bad at street level in a decent coat, but spare a thought for those of us sixteen floors up, in just a cocktail dress, balanced on a concrete beam and pushing an object shaped like a golf ball through a ventilation grille.

That’s me, by the way. Maisie Baxter. Professional hitwoman recently gone freelance and, as of this moment, bloody freezing.

It’s warmer back in the restaurant. The Dovecote Lounge supposedly combines the cosy luxury of a countryside lodge with the modern elegance of a penthouse bar: outside is all hard glass and sharp concrete, but in here the woods are dark, the fabrics thick and textured. Weighty candles on all the tables make the space look warm, while a robust central heating system facilitates the real thing. It is, if anything, too warm, but that doesn’t stop me from shivering as I retake my seat.

My date’s voice carries the hint of a Spanish accent. ‘Everything OK? You may have gone somewhat pale.’

I saw how I looked in the mirror of the ladies’ toilet as I climbed back inside after my little excursion. Peaky would be one way of putting it – if Mount Everest was the peak in question.

A performative cough gives me cover to blow into my hands, hoping to infuse a bit more give into my stiffened knuckles. ‘Just a cold. I always get them at this time of year – don’t you?’

‘Nothing catching, I hope.’ His tone is wary, but the twinkle in his eyes gives the game away. Will Thomas, aka Agent Perseus, my boyfriend (of, what, five months now?) knows exactly why my cheeks and forehead are bone-white, my nose and ears are bright pink, and my so-called waterproof mascara has smudged, though, thankfully, only a little.

‘I’m joking, I’m joking,’ he reassures me, still speaking in a voice that’s not quite his own. He’s a little more Mancunian usually, a little less Madrid. ‘You’re as beautiful as ever. Although you have some …’ he reaches out to take something from the side of my head, then flicks it away, ‘ice in your hair.’

Shit. I glance around for the waiter, anxious that I’ve blown my cover. If anyone saw …

Will leans forward. ‘Don’t worry,’ he whispers, sounding more like himself again. ‘They don’t suspect a thing.’

I blow him a kiss then hold up a hand over the tabletop, my fingers splayed in that timeless invitation to link palms. He responds the only way he can without attracting undue notice, placing his hand against mine and making a lattice of our fingers. He almost doesn’t react to how cold my hands are. Almost. A flash of discomfort around his eyes tells me that no matter how tough a man can get – and though he might not look it in his cashmere sweater and silk scarf, Will Thomas is among the toughest – the feeling of icy hands on warm skin is enough to startle anyone.

‘Anything the matter?’ I ask, squeezing my ice-block fingers into the back of his palm.

‘Of course not.’ He smiles back at me. ‘I was just wondering when our food would get here.’

He’s hardly finished speaking when a waiter appears, a plate in each hand. ‘For sir,’ he says, placing one before Will. ‘Our slow-cooked leeks, preserved black truffle, poached carrots, and frozen tarragon.’

If that sounds like a fancy way of saying Will’s ordered a plate full of vegetables, it’s because he has – and no, it’s not part of his cover story. He might be in disguise as international art buyer Pedro Serrano, just as I’m supposed to be London gallery maven Felicity Levesque (the story is I’m selling him a painting and we’re having an affair), but all of Will’s secret identities are vegan unless he absolutely can’t avoid it.

‘And for madam …’ One look at my plate will tell you that I don’t share my boyfriend’s diet – not when my food has eyes that look back. ‘Grilled whole sea bream, served with French green peas and Japanese wasabi. Can I get you anything else? More wine?’

We decline politely. A glass of white each as we arrived was the cost of appearing normal, but where this night is going, neither of us wants to be tipsy.

‘We should do this more often,’ I say once the waiter has left, excising a chunk of fish just south of its neckline.

He laughs. ‘What, put a date night on your gallery’s card? I’m not sure we could afford this without, you know …’

‘Something more … cheap and cheerful, then.’

He winces apologetically, and I know that it’s Will, not Pedro, doing the wincing. I already regret bringing it up – it’s not something we can talk about now – but it stings a little that the first time we’ve been to a restaurant in weeks, it’s because we’re planning to murder the chef.

‘We’ll make time soon,’ he promises me, his voice low and genuine. ‘Once things quieten down.’

Now I’m the one to wince. I want to believe him, but the thing is, it’s not his fault that we’ve not been going on dates lately. It’s mine.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Five months ago, when Will and I teamed up to knock off the homicidal CEO of an agritech firm, it was the biggest job of our careers. We’d been looking forward to a good bit of time off once the money came through: time to travel and just enjoy being together without having to kill anyone.

For just over a month, that was exactly what we got. After Liv’s birthday in September, we spent five beautiful weeks falling from European hotel to European hotel, enjoying a cross between a honeymoon and a never-ending third date. We drank champagne with views of the Eiffel Tower, sipped port in a port in Porto, and mixed ouzo with water on the streets of Athens and the beaches of Crete. It was beautiful … and expensive.

It’s amazing how fast you can spend money when you’re in love.

Then my mum came back from Thailand, where she’d been living with a man who’d convinced her that her chronic health condition could be cured with yoga and expensive teas. It couldn’t – predictably. By the time he dumped her, he’d only succeeded in curing her of her savings and saddling her with an eye-watering amount of debt.

‘We can call off the sale,’ Will suggests, reading my expression. ‘If you don’t want to part with the piece now, we could just enjoy this wonderful evening.’

It’s a tempting suggestion. It would be so easy just to disable the device I pressed into the kitchen’s air intake: a few taps on my smartwatch, a white lie to our client to explain why we got cold feet …

But we need the money. I need the money. And if we don’t stop him now, it’s only a matter of time before the Michelin-star chef whose fish I’m chowing down on kills again.

He is, unfortunately, a cannibal. That’s why I didn’t order the pork.

I shake my head. ‘I’m not pulling out. Unless you are …?’

Will sits back in his seat. ‘No. But we don’t need to discuss business right away, do we?’

I glance at my smartwatch. According to the timer hidden in the watch face, we still have fifteen minutes. I smile. ‘No, I don’t suppose we do.’

Will smiles back, and it gives me the same rushing feeling in my stomach as it did the first time I saw it, when he was just a one-night stand at a farm show where we were both undercover. Before either of us knew what the other did for a living; before we’d ever traded a kiss or held each other at gunpoint. Then my gaze travels from his lips to his beautiful ice-blue eyes, and I’m grateful that his disguise for tonight didn’t require contact lenses.

Sure, it’s not quite as good when we have to avoid saying anything that could reveal our true identities to whoever might happen to be listening, but at the end of the day, a date is a date. For now, all we have to do is act natural and avoid attracting suspicion. We might as well enjoy ourselves as we do. And however weird I feel about eating it …

‘It’s crazy how good this food is,’ I say through a mouthful of fish. ‘How’s yours?’

He nods, wiping his lips on a serviette. ‘It’s incredible.’ A wistful look passes over him. ‘God, it’s so hard to find high-quality vegan food that justifies the price. Imagine how annoying it is to find it here, of all places.’

I reach out a hand and give his wrist a sympathetic squeeze. ‘Maybe they have the sous-chef handling the veggie stuff.’

As the countdown ticks closer to zero, it becomes harder and harder to think about anything but work. We still talk, but our words aren’t meant for each other. Instead we slip into a long, meandering dialogue about incomprehensibly boring art-world drama, designed to give anyone listening in a pounding headache.

‘Was that Sandra’s show?’

‘No, Giselle’s, remember? At the Orbital? With the big green squares?’

‘That’s right. Ugh, her wine was terrible! I was there with Yuya and Mo, wasn’t I?’

‘Yes, because Mo got into that spat with Dean … or was it Paul?’

‘Paul. Dean was the one Frankie dated before their situationship with Flick—’

‘But after the throuple with Mo and Sandra, you’re so right.’

And so on and so forth. Meanwhile, I’m looking past Will’s sparkling eyes more than I’m looking into them, surreptitiously peering over my boyfriend’s shoulders to check and recheck our sightlines, the positions of customers and staff, and most of all, the door to the kitchen, which has remained closed. Will’s doing the same thing for the space behind me, both of us on alert for anything that will throw off the plan …

But nothing comes. So we wait, and we wait. Until two things happen. First my watch buzzes faintly, just once, against my skin. Then the fire alarm goes off. Just like we planned.

As the fire alarm starts wailing, the atmosphere in the restaurant changes radically. I suppose that’s to be expected. Conversations stop dead, customers clatter to their feet, knives and forks and chairs alike dropping carelessly where they fall.

For a second I worry there’ll be a stampede; thankfully, our waiter has the initiative to climb up on a stool and start waving his arms for attention. ‘Please, everyone, stay calm! Make your orderly way down the stairs, no rushing or shoving – and don’t use the lifts!’

And it works! Calmly, like they’ve drilled for it a hundred times, the smartly dressed patrons begin crossing the restaurant floor towards the exit.

At least, until one woman spots the fingers of smoke probing around the door to the kitchen. Don’t … I think. But she does. She shouts and points, and suddenly everyone can smell it: an acrid stench like bread that’s been left in the toaster way past the point of being edible. Now a glass shatters on the floor. Then the kitchen door barrels open, vomiting forth a great plume of stinking white smoke. Three men and a woman in kitchen uniforms fall out with it, coughing and wiping their eyes.

Oh shit, I think, they don’t look well at all. I glance nervously at Will, whose face is still impressively neutral. Have we over-egged the pudding?

But it only takes a second for the kitchen staff to catch their breath and start yelling ‘Evacuate!’ and ‘It’s coming through the vents!’ and I remind myself that the minor irritant we added to the smoke was necessary, given nothing is actually on fire and a cursory examination would reveal my device to be little more than a glorified stink bomb-cum-smoke grenade.

All we need is for everyone to remain preoccupied, so they don’t notice Will and me stepping back into the increasingly opaque plumes, breathing through our sleeves and ignoring the itching in the backs of our throats, as the restaurant empties.

Which is exactly what happens.

‘Ready?’ Will asks, once we’ve taken up positions on either side of the kitchen door, each of us now holding a previously concealed pistol. The smoke is beginning to clear, too, but our tech guy Jason did such a number on the alarm system that it’ll be flashing up false positives in different parts of the building for the rest of the night. He’s on holiday right now – in fact, he’ll be away for the next two months – but the script he created was designed to go off at the exact moment the timer on my watch hit zero, disrupting the alarm system and looping the camera footage to ensure no one has any idea what we’re up to. Jason is a star. Best in the business.

‘Ready,’ I say, locking eyes with Will. Then we burst into the kitchen.

Luther Pizzo, head chef of the Dovecote Lounge, is exactly where we thought he’d be: at the back of the room, hunched over the keypad on the door to a walk-in freezer – the same freezer that sold us on taking this job in the first place.

The thing is, Will and I have the same approach to contract killing. Neither of us deny that we’re doing it to make a living. At the end of the day, it’s a job like any other. Like everyone else, we need money, me especially. We’ve got bills to pay, family to support, all the usual.

But we’re not bad people.

Neither of us wants to kill anyone who isn’t making the world a worse place by being alive, and we do extensive research to make sure that’s the case. So when we were sent a contract on the ‘Canary Wharf Cannibal,’ complete with comprehensive evidence of him committing murders with a carving knife and storing body parts in the freezer of a high-end restaurant, we knew right away that it was our kind of gig. The testimonies from former employees who’d been recorded mentioning strange goings-on in the kitchen – and in one case reported them to the police – were just the icing on the cake.

And the fact that Luther is now trying desperately to get into the very same freezer is pretty solid evidence that this isn’t just one big misunderstanding.

‘Please enter a valid code and try again,’ says the digital lock on the freezer door. Luther slams a fist against the metal, then does as he’s told and starts hammering in another string of numbers. He’s unlikely to guess what we changed it to. Another neat trick, courtesy of Jason’s code running riot through the building’s web-enabled security system.

‘Good evening, Luther,’ says Will. We’ve made the most of his distraction to take up flanking positions: me by the door to block his escape, Will further into the kitchen towards a still-sizzling stove.

Now Luther spins around, eyes wild as he takes in the two handguns pointed at him. ‘Eh? Who are you? Why are you here?’

‘Just paying our compliments to the chef,’ I say, raising my voice to be heard over the sound of the alarm. ‘The sea bream was to die for.’

Luther looks between the two of us, gobsmacked. The smoke is already dissipating, the burnt-toast smell morphing into something both softer and more artificial. He straightens and turns to face us, sniffing the air. ‘No fire,’ he declares. ‘I’m right, aren’t I? I knew something smelled a little … phoney. All right, tell me, who have I pissed off? Inside or outside? Mikey, was it?’

Will and I glance at each other. Mikey? None of the victims or witnesses were called Mikey.

‘The game’s up, Luther,’ I tell him. ‘We’ve heard about your predilection for strange meats.’

I’m waiting to read confirmation in his features, that telltale ring of recognition that’s almost impossible to hide. This is why we talk to our targets before the kill: it gives us one last chance to back out, or to confirm our suspicions. It’s amazing what people will confess to when they’re caught off guard.

But not this time. Instead, Luther seems genuinely perplexed. ‘Strange meats?’ he asks. ‘What, like crocodile? Emu?’

Will has a go. ‘The forbidden flesh, Luther. The long pig?’

Finally, Luther catches our drift. When he does, his features soften. His eyebrows un-crease. He looks almost … relieved?

‘Wait a bloody minute, you think I’m a cannibal?’ he asks, mopping his brow with a sleeve. ‘That’s what this is all about? You’re accusing me of cannibalism?’

Will and I share another, longer, glance. Oh dear.

‘My friends,’ Luther says, beginning to relax slightly despite the guns trained on him. ‘My dear friends. I am a Michelin-star chef. I have sampled from a range of cuisines so vast that Henry VIII would have shat himself to eat so well. Food is my passion. Fine food. Quality food. Cannibalism, really! Do you really think that I would lower myself to the level of a football team stranded after a plane crash? You can’t be serious!’

‘Isn’t that how it usually goes?’ I ask, trying to hide my confusion. ‘Once you’ve tried everything you can get hold of legally, you start to develop cravings for something off menu?’

But even I’m beginning to doubt myself. The intel had seemed so solid. Multiple murders undoubtedly committed by one Luther Pizzo, with photo and video evidence. His car had shown up on Google StreetView, for Christ’s sake, with a bloody handprint on the inside window. And then there were those testimonies …

Well, they were almost a little too solid. Just once, as we were running through all the evidence on Will’s houseboat, The Narrow Escape, I’d questioned if it seemed overly convenient that one of the restaurant’s waiters had complained to the police about the chef snacking on a leg (a complaint the police had quickly binned) while two cleaners had allowed themselves to be recorded discussing what they reckoned were finger bones on a cigarette break. But we verified that the complaint and the recordings were genuinely from people who had worked here …

Even if we did have a bit of trouble tracking down them down post-facto.

‘Not at all!’ Luther declares, retching dramatically. ‘What a disgusting idea. That I would waste my skills on such a low-quality ingredient! I wouldn’t even want to try it – it cannot possibly be any good. To be honest, I hate all meat. I only serve it because the British public is so obsessed with the stuff that they’d never accept a restaurant as truly great if it didn’t offer any. My real passion …’

He looks sadly at the stove, where a pan of leeks is beginning to caramelise a little further than it ought to.

‘Is vegetarian food,’ Will concludes, turning off the gas. ‘Damn. I knew those leeks were good!’

Luther gives Will a grateful smile. Meanwhile, I’m about to lose it. ‘Then why are you still here?’ I yell over the din of the still-wailing alarm. ‘Why didn’t you run out of the building like everyone else?’

That shuts him up. Colour drains from his face and he sneaks another glance at the keypad on the freezer door.

‘Stand over there,’ Will says, nodding towards the opposite corner of the room. Luther complies. Then Will tilts his head at me to suggest I take a look in the freezer.

I swallow. Only one way to find out.

I key in the correct code for the door and there, right at the back, behind hanging pig carcasses and stack trays full of fish, is a box we saw in the evidence that came with the job listing. In that photo, it had a hand poking out of it.

There isn’t a hand there now.

I open it, and quickly see why.

Since the photo was taken, the body has been disassembled – to better fit, I suppose. My vision goes blurry. Some things you never get used to.

There’s a crash outside the freezer door, followed by the sound of heavy footsteps charging towards me.

‘Is it him?’ Will shouts. ‘Is he the murderer?’

I spin to see Luther barrelling towards me down the freezer, knife raised over his head like in a slasher film. Behind him, Will is wiping hot grease from his shirt with one hand while raising his gun with the other – but he’s not firing, not yet. He wants to be sure.

‘Felicity, is it him?’ Will shouts again, still using my codename.

It has to be him. Why else would Luther be hiding a body in a kitchen meat freezer, if not because he killed the guy? Even if he really has never wanted to eat people, this is hardly a good look for him.

But I don’t know. His confused denial has thrown me off and I don’t know.

Five months ago, my old boss sent me after a target without giving me the full story. The man in question was a sexual predator, though admittedly a repentant one, but my boss didn’t want him dead to achieve justice for his victims. She wanted him dead because he was going to blow the whistle on the company she had just sold our business to, to pay off her mounting debts. The same company that would later kidnap my best friend.

My boss made him a target because he was a danger to her.

And then she made me do it again. The last time I saw her, she forced me to kill for her one final time, just to prove she still had power over me. After that, I swore that I would never let anyone trick me into killing for them.

So I have to know. Really know.

Which is why, when the big man in the chef whites comes at me, knife in hand, I hesitate. My gun is pointed at his chest, but I don’t pull the trigger. I don’t shout to Will. I just stand there. I’ve killed people before, plenty of them. People who deserved it, sure, but many of whom posed no direct danger to me at the time I killed them. But right now …

Before I know it, he’s on me. I try to dodge, but I’m moving too slowly and the knife is arcing through the air, glowing white as it reflects the cold strip lights overhead. It’s about to connect when suddenly, Luther Pizzo’s body jerks. His arm swings wide. He loses grip of the knife, which goes skittering into the back corner. His body keels over and with a loud, soft whump falls into a harmless pile at my feet.

‘Maisie? Are you OK?’ Will asks, his pistol smoking.

Am I?

Because suddenly, this industrial-strength meat freezer has started to feel very cold indeed.

Chapter 2

One night, in the blur of last autumn, I asked Will about his childhood.

We were staying in a beautiful hotel room, one with a great big bed and a view out over the white and red rooftops of the city and the sea beyond. We’d had sex three times that day: first right after waking; second after we came back from the beach; third about two hours before I broached the subject. Well, that’s when we’d started – it had only been ten minutes since we’d finished.

His breath caught in his throat. Will didn’t – doesn’t – like to talk about his early years. Can you blame him? If I grew up like he did, I wouldn’t like to talk about it either.

‘What do you want to know?’ he asked, pulling me closer into a spoon. I traced my fingers across his bare forearm, feeling the hard lines of his muscles and his scars.

I took a breath, preparing myself. ‘How did no one realise you two were orphans?’

He laughed as he realised what I was asking. I let out an involuntary sigh of relief. It wasn’t that I’d wanted to throw him a softball, but it’s hard with Will to know which questions he’ll find easy and which will cause him to wince like I’ve prodded the skin above a fractured bone.

When I ask the wrong thing, he won’t get angry or cry. He goes quiet. That doesn’t mean he’ll never answer; he will, eventually, but it might take minutes or hours or even days. For that whole time, he’ll be distracted. He’ll spend more time alone. His eyes will lose focus mid-conversation. He’ll still smile when you’d expect him to smile, but you can tell his heart is elsewhere.

When he finally tells me, it’s like a fog lifting. He’ll apologise for shutting me out, as if it’s his fault that his life is so complicated.

So I try not to ask him too much. Not because I’m afraid of what he’ll do, but because I’m afraid to hurt him.

But even so.

I’m his partner.

There are things I should know.

‘We had a neighbour,’ he said on that balmy night in Porto, as he held me in his arms. The curtains were open and the room was lit by the moon and its reflection in the sea.

‘Ms Stoklasa. A Polish lady. She lived alone in the flat below. I don’t remember if it was me or Sarah who first got talking to her, but we’d stay in her flat sometimes. She’d cook us these massive bowls of stew, and whenever anyone needed to prove that our legal guardian really did exist, she’d be there.’

I closed my eyes, listening to his breathing as I sorted this new detail into the picture I was building of Will’s childhood. At first, all I really knew was that he and his sister had been orphaned when they were young. Their mother had died not long after his sister was born, then their father was killed on an oil rig when they were both in single digits. But even before their father died, Will had told me once, he’d be on jobs for months at a time with only minimal provisions put in place for their care. It was from him that they learned to be self-sufficient.

Once he and his sister were alone, instead of going into care, they somehow managed to eke out a living in the cracks in the system. They squatted in a high-rise flat on the edge of Manchester, saving or scrounging money for food, school uniforms, whatever else. Most people don’t think these things happen in twenty-first-century Britain. It sounds like something from a fairy tale. But if you spend long enough poking about in the underbelly of society, you learn not to be easily surprised.

‘I think Mrs Stoklasa wanted to help us more,’ he said that night, after a long silence. ‘But she had her own problems.’

It was another week of sun, sex and incredible food before I asked him what those problems were.

I wake to the hum of an engine and the feeling of being in motion. Pretty strong sensory clues, but even with them it takes me a second to figure out where I am. Car, I realise. I can look out the windscreen, but I’m not driving. So … front passenger seat. Fast. So … motorway.

I rub my eyes and the world becomes clearer. Will coalesces beside me, his hands on the steering wheel. From where I’m slumped, I can only see his profile in gleaming black shades. It’s a very handsome profile – strong and reassuring, which is exactly what I need right now.

‘Where are we?’ I croak. My question is answered by a sign instructing us on where to turn off if we want to go to Birmingham. Will doesn’t switch on his indicators, so I guess we don’t.

‘Two hours out of London,’ he replies. ‘You fell back asleep as soon as we got in the car.’

Why are we leaving London? I think. And: Wasn’t I supposed to be doing something today?

My brain is full of cold grey soup in which disconnected sensations from last night surface like soggy croutons. The taste of sea bream cooked to perfection. The flash of Luther’s knife as it swings for my neck. My fingers, frozen on the trigger, unable to shoot until I know for sure he’s our murderer.

The mission. We fucked it. I fucked it. Are we … on the run?

Will we have to abandon our lives in London to live underground in off-the-record squats, changing our address every two weeks to escape the police or the mob or whoever is coming after us?

No. I remember now.

It was a close call at the end, but actually, everything went fine. I snapped out of my trance the second Luther hit the floor. We made our exit and got rid of the body exactly as we’d planned to, leaving the guy in the freezer as a reminder to the police to take tip-offs more seriously, and got back to Beth and my flat without leaving a shred of traceable evidence. We’re pros. We know what we’re doing. Even if my wobble was … concerning.

I must have zonked out as soon as I got in, all the stress of the mission catching up with me.

Another memory resurfaces. ‘Shit!’ I gasp, jerking upright as adrenaline flushes through my system.

Will gives me a concerned look. ‘You OK?’

Not really. I am still worried about last night’s mission, but right now, I’ve got a different, more pressing concern. ‘I just remembered where we’re going.’

He laughs. ‘I did try to talk you out of it. But you were very insistent.’

I was very insistent. I remember being half-awake at 6 a.m., thinking I’d have just enough time to get dressed and over to Euston for my train – if only my bloody blouse would button up properly. Eventually I got so frustrated trying and failing to match the correct buttons to their holes that I was almost in tears. That was when Will stepped in and said I was clearly in no state to travel alone. His first suggestion was that I should call off the visit, but in the end we compromised on him driving me instead.

Which might make things a little complicated when we get there.

‘We can still turn back if you’d rather,’ Will says.

‘No.’ I give his hand a squeeze. ‘I should see her. And …’ I take a breath – there’s no turning back once I’ve admitted it. ‘It would be nice for the two of you to meet.’

Mum smiles as Will and I enter her living room. It’s a radiant, beatific beam that makes me immediately glad that we’ve come. ‘Maisie!’ She moves as if to push herself out of her chair. ‘I’m so happy you’re here!’

I rush over to her before she can exert herself, taking hold of her by the cheeks to plant a kiss on the top of her head. ‘Sorry it’s been a while.’

She’s sitting under her mandala print blanket, hair pulled back from her face with the sort of elephant-pattern headscarf they sell in every tourist market in Thailand. She looks bohemian, like a world traveller, which I guess she was until recently. She also looks gaunt. Her cheeks are sunken, her wrists and ankles concerningly thin. And though she won’t admit it, I know she is completely exhausted. That was the first sign something was really wrong, eight years ago. It wasn’t too bad, back then, it just didn’t go away. When I first saw her after she came back, I was shocked at how much worse she’d got while she was away.

‘Don’t you worry about me,’ she says. As if I can stop myself from worrying.

Then she looks at Will. ‘And how wonderful! The mysterious Will Thomas.’ She graces him with a conspiratorial wink. ‘I was starting to think Maisie was hiding you from me.’

Will smiles bashfully. ‘Not at all. It’s my fault – work has been a lot lately.’

That’s not entirely true – he could have come last time, I just wasn’t emotionally ready for it yet – but I’m grateful for the lie.

‘Well, it’s wonderful you’re both here,’ Mum says again. ‘I’m just sorry that it’s so far for you. All the way from London!’

Her words make me cringe. Carlisle isn’t too far, in the grand scheme of things – just five hours driving, or three on the train. If I was American I probably wouldn’t blink at making the journey once a week. Maybe even twice, given that I’m freelance and don’t have to explain my whereabouts to anyone. But being freelance also means that money is less of a guarantee. In the months since Mum’s been back I’ve been taking every job I can find to make sure I can pay the bills – her bills, as well as my own.

‘Well, don’t just hover there gawping, Maisie,’ Mum says. ‘Make yourself at home. Have a seat, Will.’

I move some magazines to clear a corner of the couch for Will. ‘You sit there,’ I tell him. ‘Cup of tea, Mum?’

A glowing smile passes over her face. ‘Oh, yes, Maisie. That’d be great.’

I look to Will, who nods to confirm he’d like one too, then set off on my little mission. I’m grateful for the moment to myself – even if it is less than ten minutes since I walked through the door. It’s not Mum’s fault, but I’m still not used to her being back in the country, and every time I see her it’s like pouring fifty intense emotions in a slop bucket and giving it a good old stir. At least she and Will seemed off to a good start, though you never can tell …

Anyway, tea. Focus on the tea, Maisie. After all my anxieties about last night, it’s good to be doing something unquestionably harmless.

Mum’s left the radio on in the kitchen, and I catch a snippet of an interview: ‘—which is why I’m so happy that I get to go in my own direction with songs like this.’

‘Oh yes?’ replies the presenter. I pause before filling the kettle to hear the reply, because was that just …?

‘Yes, absolutely,’ she says – and now I’m sure of it. ‘It’s amazing to have the album out there, but it felt like a mad risk when we were still in the studio. This track in particular.’

‘And yet the response has been incredible.’

‘It has. I’m so lucky that my fans are so open-minded, that they’re willing to bear with me when I shake things up a little.’

‘I couldn’t agree more – but sadly that’s all we have time for. Everyone, Skyla Dawn, whose new song “What She’d Do To You” is out now …’

Skyla Dawn! I think, finally turning the tap on. It’s like running into an old friend. The whole time she was speaking, a feeling of calm was building inside me. I mean, I’m hardly the only person who Skyla puts in a good mood: her happy, breezy pop songs can cheer up just about anyone. But Skyla is also a reminder of why I do what I do, ever since I saved her from a horribly exploitative situation involving her producer – a scumbag by the name of Vincent Messina – by faking an overdose and drowning him in his bathtub. This was years ago, back when I actually met my clients before taking on jobs, and the whole thing felt personal in a way it rarely does now.

We haven’t spoken since Vincent’s death, but just the knowledge that Skyla’s out there, free to make her happy little pop songs without that horrible man having his claws in her, always brightens my day. One of her old songs comes on as I’m adding a splash of milk to the mugs, so they must have played the new single already. It’s her biggest hit, ‘Love on a Feather’, a duet with an even more famous singer called Dayton that was everywhere a few years ago. It was so big that I know the lyrics off by heart, even though I’ve never followed Skyla’s career closely – it would feel creepy to do that, somehow, or like it would ruin the magic. Better to have her out in the world, her music randomly reassuring me whenever I happen to run into it.

It’s not quite reassuring enough to completely ease my concerns about having left Will alone in a room with my mother, but – I feel the smile playing on my lips – the fact that they’re meeting is also something to celebrate. He’s the only boyfriend of mine since I was a teenager to have met my mum, and if he can take on the Canary Wharf Cannibal I’m pretty sure he can handle Susan Baxter.

Though she hasn’t always been so easy to be around, I remind myself as I put the milk back in the fridge.

‘Is that Doi Suthep?’ I hear Will asking as I come back with three mugs of tea on a tray – Mum’s only half-full, just in case she needs to put it down quickly. Will’s pointing at a photo on the TV unit of Mum looking about two decades younger, though it can’t be more than five years, standing at the bottom of a steep staircase flanked by ornate, colourful statues of many-headed mythical beasts. My heart lurches when I realise what he’s asking. Every time the conversation has gone anywhere near Darren, her ex-boyfriend, when I’ve been visiting, she’s started falling apart. And while he’s not visible in this particular photo, that can only be because he was taking it.

To my surprise, Mum’s smile grows wider. ‘It is indeed,’ she says proudly, getting her mug stable on the arm of her chair. ‘We used to love that walk up from Chiang Mai – back when I could still do it, of course. Now I can’t even get up the stairs to my own bedroom.’

Wait, I think. ‘What do you mean you can’t get up the stairs, Mum?’

She gestures at herself weakly as if it should be self-evident. ‘I need someone to help me with them, don’t I?’

‘That’s not—’

It’s not that I don’t believe her: what she’s saying makes perfect sense. It’s just that when she first came back and we were looking for somewhere for her to live, she flat out insisted: no care homes, no bungalows, no ground-floor flats, no ‘weird set-ups’ where the bed is downstairs. She wasn’t in the best shape, she would accept that, and she eventually conceded that I could hire some carers to come around and do the bits and bobs she had trouble with, but she wasn’t going to change her entire life. She wanted a real house, like she’d always lived in, which meant stairs. She put her foot down. And who was I to say no to that? I had enough money for the rent, didn’t I?

More or less.

‘Yes, Maisie?’ she prompts. ‘I can see you have something you want to say, so get out with it.’

‘How are you managing to go up to bed?’ I ask.

‘I have Judy and Sue to help me, don’t I?’

I have to be very careful to stop my mouth from hanging open. She does, strictly speaking, have Judy and Sue. But the thing about Judy and Sue is that we pay them – I pay them – to come around between 7 and 8 a.m. each day to do some tidying, check if she needs anything, and make sure she’s taken her medicine. I know exactly when they’re here, because I take pains to ensure that our paths never cross. I’ve had enough of their judgy looks and their implicit suggestions that I should be living closer or putting her in a care home or otherwise doing more for her.

And also, because they don’t come cheap.

‘But they’re only meant to come once a day,’ I protest.

‘Well,’ Mum says. ‘They seemed perfectly happy to come round in the evenings too.’

The comment sends me reeling. Of course they’re bloody happy! They’ll be getting paid twice as much. No wonder my bank balance has been looking even more paltry than it ought to. I could’ve been paying closer attention to exactly what was going where, but there’s so much money flying out of it at the moment that I can never bring myself to look too hard. ‘Didn’t they tell you it would be more expensive?’

Mum looks thoughtful for a second. ‘Maybe they said something before I signed the paperwork. But you’ve been so busy lately and you said to do whatever I needed, so I didn’t think it would be an issue. Didn’t you notice on your bank statements? It must’ve been two months already.’

She’s renegotiated the contract. She’s renegotiated her bloody carers’ bloody contract and she didn’t think to tell me, even when it’s my bank card on the bills.

They’re both looking at me. I force my expression under control.

‘Should I not have done that?’ Mum asks.

I let out a sigh. Obviously if she needs the care, that’s fine, she needs the care. And despite everything, she is my mother, and I can, strictly speaking, afford it.

‘No, it’s …’ I begin. Then the doubts hit me. Is this all she wants me for? To stump up the cash, to sign the cheques? Is she laughing at me the moment I leave, that I can be such a rube?

But that’s paranoid and I know it. Another hangover from my old boss Gabby’s betrayal last year. More than that, it’s a horrible thing to think about my own mother.

‘Maisie?’ she asks.

‘It’s fine,’ I finish, pushing the worries away. ‘Don’t worry about it. Genuinely. I’m glad you’re getting on with Judy and Sue.’

She exhales too, looking genuinely relieved. ‘Oh, good. I was worried for a second that I’d—’

I cut her off. ‘No, no, not at all.’

That’s all there is to it. Mum is sick and she needs me, so I’ll be there for her. It’s as simple as that. As normal as that. For once, someone is relying on me for their life, not their death. It’s the least I can do to help her – even if I have to keep killing to make it work.

Chapter 3

‘Well, that was nice,’ Will says as Mum’s house disappears in the rear-view mirror. ‘I’m glad to have met the famous Susan Baxter, after hearing so much about her.’

I pull a face, and he shoots me a sympathetic smile.

‘Are you OK, though?’

‘She just can’t help herself,’ I burst out. ‘She’s always been like this, not thinking about how her actions affect other people, not including them in big decisions about her life.’

Will’s question is gentle. ‘Why don’t you tell her it upsets you, then? Instead of telling her not to worry?’

‘Because I don’t want her to worry! I just wish she’d told me at the time that she’s changed her care package. No wonder it felt like all of that money from the Liverpool job last month disappeared into the ether – which is fine, obviously – but it just pisses me off that she doesn’t think to say anything.’

Will knows all about my complicated relationship with Mum. When I was really young, I always thought she was the best mum in the world. She was barely in her twenties when she had me, and my dad … well, I never knew him, and she doesn’t talk about it. In my earliest memories, she was infinitely cooler than any other adult I knew: exciting, adventurous, never patronising in the way teachers or my friends’ mums could be. At that age I went everywhere with her, which meant mainly out into the countryside, hiking, camping, experiencing everything that the Lake District had to offer.

Then, as I got older, I stopped being so easy to drag up a hill. I didn’t find camping fun anymore, hated the wet and the cold, and she stopped asking if I wanted to go with her. She never got annoyed. In fact she celebrated my stubbornness, told me that independence was the best thing a woman could have and that I should hold on to it. So instead of joining her, I would stay home, alone. I guess in her head I was old enough to look after myself. Never mind that I was eight years old.

It was years later, when she was so consistently exhausted that it was obvious even to her that she needed help, that everything changed. I was in my final year of university, and for the whole first semester, I’d travel home each weekend to go with her to appointments, scans, check-ups, assessments, whatever else seemed necessary. It was difficult, of course it was, but I felt closer to her than I had, well, possibly ever. I felt needed. The doctors gave me instructions: make sure she kept coming back so they could figure out what was going on, make sure she took all her pills. I’d do it, I promised them. They could count on me.

‘Have I told you she didn’t even say she was moving to Thailand until she was on her way to the airport?’ I ask Will. ‘And she wouldn’t have even done that if her friend hadn’t suggested that maybe I’d like to be the one to take in our dog, instead of rehoming Maple with her.’

‘You have,’ says Will. And I know I have – probably ten times by now. But I’m feeling defensive, exposed. I want to make sure he understands exactly why I’ve suddenly regressed into a whining, prickly version of myself that he’s never seen before. How much Mum moving back has opened up old wounds.

‘I think some part of me was genuinely convinced it was all a bad joke, until I went down to collect Maple a few days later,’ I say. ‘Until I went to the house, and she just wasn’t there.’

She had phoned while I was sitting in a lecture that I barely understood, I’d been missing so many to look after her. As I stood in the lobby of the teaching building, unable to believe what I was hearing, she asked me if I really believed all that crap the doctors were trying to push on her, all the lies big pharma had told them to make a few quid. Never mind that the NHS was still basically functional back then, and we hadn’t paid a single penny for any of it – she’d decided she wasn’t buying. More than that, she’d sold our furniture, broken the lease, and was moving to Thailand – the hot climate would sort her out, Darren had said.

‘Who’s Darren?’ I asked, bewildered. I was certain she had never mentioned Darren before.

‘My boyfriend? I’ve told you about him, Maisie.’ She laughed the way she always did when I couldn’t follow one of her stories, or remember who exactly she was talking about. ‘Anyway, I’ll have to change numbers when I’m out there, so don’t worry if you don’t hear from me for a bit, OK?’

Whatever arguments I used to try to convince her to stay, she had an answer for them. She even said it might be a good thing for me, that I wouldn’t have to keep giving up so much for her or factor her into my post-university decision-making.

So she went. And I let her.

‘Then all I got for the next eight years was postcards, telling me how wonderful a time she was having, how much she wished I could come out and visit.’ I’m quiet for a second. ‘As if she couldn’t come home to see me.’

Will puts a sympathetic hand on my thigh.

‘Anyway,’ I say, casting around for a distraction, ‘we’ve got other stuff to deal with. The body we found in the freezer last night. That was definitely Luther’s victim? We didn’t make a mistake?’

Thankfully, Will follows my lead. ‘No mistake,’ he confirms, fingers drumming on the steering wheel. ‘I checked and rechecked everything after you fell asleep. Luther Pizzo committed that murder, and all the others we linked to him. All the photos and videos are real too. In fact, everything checks out, except for …’

He trails off so I finish his sentence. ‘Except for the testimonies.’

‘Right.’

That really is annoying. Why ruin a perfectly good business proposition with a bunch of lies about your murderous target also being a cannibal?

Will and I run back through our intel as we zoom south on the M6, rehashing the events of the night until it clicks. Inside or outside? Luther had asked when he saw us. That should have told us straight away: we’d unknowingly helped some gang take out one of their own.

From there we piece together a working theory. Most likely this gang operated out of the hotel that housed the Dovecote Lounge – without owning it, but with enough guys in key positions to exert some control. Luther must have been killing for them and using the kitchen to dispose of the evidence, but he was getting sloppy, so the other gang members had quit their jobs at the hotel and sent a pair of assassins in on their way out. The cannibalism story was an attempt to make sure we wouldn’t realise that we were tying up a loose end for them. A misguided attempt, but an attempt nonetheless.

It’s a satisfying breakthrough, but I want to be sure that we’re right. So as soon as we’re back on Will’s houseboat I make a beeline for my laptop.

‘Can’t it wait until morning?’ he asks, kissing the back of my neck as I sit down at the dining table.

I shake my head, booting up a secure server owned by the agency Will and I work through, Removals Inc. ‘I just want to check a few things.’

Removals provide the weapons and fake documents we use on our missions, but they also run a database that catalogues intel on the UK underworld. If our so-called witnesses really are linked to organised crime, they have to be in there somewhere.

‘Come to bed,’ Will tries again, scooping up Kipper, who’s padded out to greet us, and using his paw to beckon me into the bedroom. ‘It’s almost midnight and you’ve been up since six. It’s been a long day.’

It’s extremely cute, but I’m not swayed. I stand up to say good night to the both of them, but Kipper slips away and Will pulls me into a hug. ‘Tell you what,’ I reason between kisses. ‘How about we take tomorrow off? Maybe go out for lunch?’

He nods, accepting defeat, and I start my sleuthing.

Luther seemed to think it was a Mikey who hired us, and I’m inclined to believe him – most people know better than anyone else if somebody wants them dead. Going back to our original research, I confirm that no Mikeys or Michaels were immediately connected to last night’s job – none work at the hotel or are mentioned in our evidence. There is, however, an old-school East London gang in the Removals database listed as ‘Mikey’s Firm’ that seems to have been active since the 1990s, mostly selling drugs to A-listers, but with rumours of blackmail and darker stuff, too. It’s named after one Mikey Harris who, according to Companies House, owns a vintage shop on Brick Lane, just as imaginatively named Harris Vintage.

Not far out of our way if Will and I want to take a look, but what are the chances it’s the same Mikey?

I zoom in on a photo in their file. It’s a scanned Polaroid of five floppy-haired men in a dingy flat, dated 1997 in felt-tip pen. They could have been a rock band to rival Oasis, except they’re pulling aside their leather jackets to show the tattooed initials ‘MF’ on various parts of their bodies. I don’t recognise any of them … until I see the man on the far left.

If Will was awake I’d be punching his arm in excitement, because I’ve seen this man. He was a waiter in the hotel, the one who complained about Luther to the police then apparently went into hiding. We found CCTV footage of him entering the station, which convinced us the complaint had really been made and stopped us from picking at the cannibalism story as much as we should have.

I pull that image up now. He might have got thirty years older and 60 per cent balder, but it is unmistakably the same guy. I get a flash of anger, at him for tricking us and at myself for being tricked.

Then I notice the time. 3.17 a.m. I’ve been at this for hours, and Will’s right, it has been a long day. Time for bed.

When I emerge from the bedroom at eleven the next morning, Will reminds me of my promise to go for lunch.

‘It’d be really nice to do something together that’s not work related,’ he says, handing me a mug of tea and planting a kiss on the top of my head. ‘But only if you feel up to it.’

His innocent smile makes my heart ache. I want to, I really do, but I also want to keep going with my research from last night. I hate the idea that we’ve inadvertently cleaned up after some horrible murderers – but then, if they really are that bad, maybe it’s still possible to salvage things. Surely someone has a good reason for wanting them dead, and with a little more research …

I get an idea. ‘How about we try somewhere new?’

Which is how we find ourselves in the Universe Café, a small independent coffee shop just off Brick Lane – and just opposite Harris Vintage, not that Will knows that’s why I chose it. Winter sunlight is streaming onto our table by the window, which just so happens to have a perfect view of the shop across the road – not that you can see much of what’s happening in there, it’s so dimly lit. I expected a midday rush, but it’s actually just us and the bored lady serving us toasties who keeps popping out for a smoke.

‘I’m really glad we could do this,’ Will says. His tone is serious and I get the horrible feeling we’re about to have a Talk. ‘There’s something I’ve been meaning to say to you.’

Shit. The words tumble out of my mouth before I realise I’m saying them. ‘Are you breaking up with me?’

Will blinks in astonishment. ‘What? Of course not. Maisie …’ He breaks off and reaches for my hand across the table. ‘I love you. But that almost proves my point. Don’t you think you’ve been getting more and more anxious lately? Even the fact that you’d assume that – why would you think I’m breaking up with you? Have I done something to make you feel that way?’

I shake my head. He sits back, studies me. ‘Well then. Be honest. I’m a little worried about you. Are you … doing OK?’

No. I’m taken aback at how forcefully the thought springs into my mind. Not since Gabby’s betrayal. Not since Beth found out who I really am. Not since Mum came back. For the last few months, everything except you has been wrong in my life and I’m not even sure I understand why.

But admitting that will turn it into an actual, real problem that needs to be solved, and I don’t want to do that. I don’t want him thinking that he has to look after me; that I can’t look after myself.

‘I’m fine,’ I tell him.

‘You are?’

‘Well …’ I should have known he wouldn’t drop it that easily. ‘It’s been quite a lot lately. But I think I’m getting back into the swing of things now, after, you know … Everything. I’m dealing with it.’

He pauses, looks thoughtfully out at the street. Then he looks at me, his eyes wide with genuine concern. ‘Maisie, if what happened the other night happens again … It could be bad. Really bad. For both of us.’

His words hang in the air. Suddenly it’s like a pit has opened beneath me.

‘It won’t,’ I tell him. ‘Don’t worry.’

He raises an eyebrow, and I realise that he is breaking up with me. Not romantically, but as a partner. Because he can’t trust me. Because he’s been thinking, what if it had been the other way around? What if someone had come at him with a knife, and I had to make the shot and I couldn’t? He doesn’t trust that I would have been able to save him.

I wouldn’t trust me either.

‘Will, I have to keep working,’ I say. ‘My mum …’

‘Your mum is lovely, and I’m really glad I’ve met her. But Maisie, you have to think about your own life too. About what’s good for you. If you keep going like this, you’re going to burn out. It might not be this week or the next, but it’s going to happen. And if that happens on a job …’

It’ll mean both of our necks, he doesn’t add. He doesn’t need to.

‘So what, I just forget about her?’

‘No. We can find something for her – maybe assisted living closer to London?’

Good luck convincing her of that one. ‘With what money? I can barely afford things as it is.’

He reaches out and takes my hand above the table. ‘I have some savings.’

I pull my hand away. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

He looks a little hurt. ‘How am I being ridiculous?’

‘Will, it’s only been five months and you’ve already done so much for me. You have no obligation to help me with this.’

‘It didn’t take five months for me to realise that you are the best person I’ve ever met, Maisie. You’re brave, principled, smart as anything. And I’m in a position to help you at least to slow down a little bit.’

Possible responses rush though my head. I want to tell him that I don’t want that – that I’ve always been independent and I don’t plan on changing that now. That I don’t want to be some kept woman, like the 1960s never ended. That I don’t even know if Mum can be trusted, that she won’t just run off on me again – illness or no illness – with all of our money, somehow. That it’s my job to look after her now she’s back, not his.

‘I don’t need to,’ I say eventually, reaching out for his hand to show that I appreciate the offer, even if there’s no way I’m going to accept it. ‘Thank you, but I’m fine. I’m managing. It’ll be fine.’

‘Maisie,’ he says, eyes earnest. ‘You need some help, and I can help you. That’s what you do for the people you love.’

‘Will …’ I start, then trail off. Because over Will’s shoulder, walking up the street towards us, is a balding man in his fifties wearing a black leather jacket. He’s got sunglasses on and a great black slab of a phone obscuring part of his face, but even without seeing all of him, I’m sure it’s the man from the photo. Our lying waiter.

‘Will,’ I say again, nodding ever so slightly out the window.

Will gives the man one covert look then spins back to face me, eyebrows creasing with annoyance. He must have figured out why I was so keen on this café, but there’s no time to argue. Our phoney witness is here and he’s heading right past us into Harris Vintage.

Without even needing to discuss it, we get up to pay the bill. Then we’re crossing the street, faking a conversation as we push open the door the man just walked through.

Immediately I’m hit with the familiar musty smell of a vintage shop – unsurprising, given that clothes are bursting from every nook and cranny. Costume pieces hang down from the ceiling and gig posters line the walls, the gaps between them filled with decades’ worth of photos of an ageing Mikey Harris alongside an impressive assortment of celebrity customers. In a couple of glances I’ve spotted Hollywood favourites and indie darlings, popstars, rock stars and grime MCs.

Mikey isn’t actually present right now. The guy behind the counter could have been in the database’s group photo, he’s the right age and has the right vibe, but if he was, I can’t place him. He and our witness are deep in conversation, too quiet to make out without going closer.

‘Ooh, wow!’ I say, heading for a cabinet of cuffs and brooches to the right of the till – because if you can’t succeed at being inconspicuous, it’s better not to try. Will hangs back and pretends to look at a jacket by the entrance, to keep eyes on the whole shop. The shop has eyes on us too – it’s a relatively small room, but I’ve counted three security cameras so far, placed in such a way that we can’t hide from them. Not that I’m worried about that. We’re not here to cause a scene.

As I get closer, I become able to distinguish individual words from the low Cockney growls the men are making. ‘I just need to talk to him,’ our guy is saying. ‘Five minutes. That’s all.’

‘Keith, mate, you know I can’t let you. You know he still blames you for—’

‘That was years ago!’

‘And you know how long his memory is. It was your fuckup then, which means you get the job of …’

The shop attendant trails off, and I can feel eyes boring into me. Will must see it too, because he picks that moment to place a hand on my back. ‘See anything you like?’ he asks, his tone soft as can be. I point out a necklace and murmur a reply, still listening to the conversation behind us.

‘Come on, let’s go in the back, yeah?’ our witness – Keith, I suppose – suggests hopefully.

The answer is a whisper, only audible because I’m straining to hear it: ‘No chance. You know what you have to do, and you said you have someone to do it, so there’s nothing to talk about. Unless …?’

In the glass of the cabinet, I see Keith throw up his hands and back away from the counter. ‘All right, fuck it, then,’ he says, apparently too pissed off to bother with subtlety. ‘But it’s not just us who saw it, remember? So don’t blame me when Hangjaw comes down from Sweden and—’ But whatever this ‘Hangjaw’ might do is cut off by his phone ringing. ‘Yes?’ he snaps as he storms out of the shop.

I turn around to find the man behind the counter smiling apologetically. ‘Bit of competition with another buyer,’ he explains, before disappearing behind a curtain. As if.

Then I see Will’s expression. ‘Everything all right?’ I murmur.

He shakes his head no without turning to look at me. ‘Sorry, but I need to go,’ he says. Then he strides out of the shop as well.

It’s so unexpected that I stay rooted to my spot for a full five seconds. Will hadn’t blinked once at the man when we were researching him as a witness, but now that we’ve spent thirty seconds hearing him bicker with his buddy about some low-grade scheme, he’s decided to walk out on our date. And I’m the one who needs a break from work!

Indignant, I dart out after him. I’d shout his name, but I can’t risk drawing the kind of attention that Keith might catch on to, no matter how annoyed I am. All I can do is hang back and follow him as he follows his target.

It’s strange to see Will like this, from the outside rather than being there with him. He turns a corner, completely focused on the man ten metres in front, and I’m reminded of how he was when we first met: gorgeous, obviously, but also dangerous. The mysterious Agent Perseus. I have no idea what’s going through his mind.

But I have to trust that it’s important.

I let them get further ahead as they cut through an estate, not wanting to risk being spotted in the car park. Will is trailing Keith pretty closely now – the man is still on his phone and clearly distracted. It’s only when we pass by Spitalfields Market that he finally puts his phone away, and quickens his walk ever so slightly. Will ups his pace, and so do I.

Then, turning onto Bishopsgate towards Liverpool Street Station, I lose sight of them both. I’m not sure if it’s because Keith’s caught on to the fact that he’s being followed, or if there’s just far more people here, but as I weave through the crowds, scanning for the back of their heads, I worry that I’ve lost them for good. But all of a sudden the traffic stops and I see them cross the road, the two of them pretty much level.

As he makes it to the other side of the road, Keith breaks into a run. Will’s in hot pursuit but as I go to cross after them I’m a second too late: the lights have changed and the cars are moving. I run out anyway, waving an apology at a bus driver who slams on the horn, and sprint down the stairs to the station. Not seeing them in the relatively empty hall, I swipe through the first ticket barrier to my right, scanning each of the platforms as I pass by.

And it’s the right call, because there on Platform 2 is Will. Except he’s on his own – literally the only person on the platform as an Overground train disappears into the tunnel.

I step behind the pillar so that I can watch him, out of sight. He stays there, fists clenching and unclenching for a good thirty seconds, until eventually, he rakes his hand through his hair and turns on his heel.

Chapter 4

‘Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,’ Beth interrupts as I relay the story to her the following evening. ‘You’re telling me that after all that, after offering to pay for your mum’s care and everything, after saying that you’re too obsessed with work, he just walked out?’

Beth and I are in her bedroom in our shared flat, sitting on her unmade bed as we get ready for drinks with Liv and Michelle later. I’ve been filling her in on everything that’s happened since we last properly spoke – or at least, a slightly censored version.

‘He apologised,’ I explain, feeling the need to jump to Will’s defence. ‘And I did kind of spring the whole thing on him.’

She eyes me through the mirror in her makeup compact, eyes wide, eyebrows raised. She is in the process of applying mascara, so it’s not like she could do much else with her face even if she wanted to, but I can’t help feeling a little bit under the spotlight. ‘Sure, but still. Isn’t it strange for him to leave you like that? What if things got dangerous?’

I bristle at her implication. ‘If things got dangerous, I’d handle it.’

Possibly by killing someone.

The thought makes me squirm. After so long spent keeping my job a secret, being open about it with Beth still feels really, really weird. They’re two worlds that shouldn’t collide. It’s like having to explain the reasoning behind your last one-night stand at a family reunion. But ever since I showed her my real, capable-of-shooting-people self in the process of saving her life last summer, I’ve had no excuse not to answer her questions about it. Most of them, at least.

At first I was so sure she’d hate me. Beth has always had an unwavering moral compass: it’s why she was a journalist, and why she stopped being one, too. But a month after learning the truth, she told me she not only understood, but that she wanted in. She’d tried making change via the proper channels and realised they didn’t work. Now she was ready for a more direct approach.

I agreed to let her. In theory, anyway.

In practice, it’s a subject I’ve been avoiding. I’ve told her about some jobs, when it’s felt right, but I’ve not mentioned her being involved and she hasn’t brought it up again.

‘I’m not saying you couldn’t handle it,’ she says pointedly. ‘But you said it yourself: he seems a bit off.’

I’m starting to wish I’d kept that to myself, but she’s right, Will has been acting weird. He’s still sweet and loving: he woke me up with a tea and a kiss this morning, but I can tell he’s preoccupied.

Plus he’s suddenly got way more into the research side of the job than he has been for a while. For all his telling me to stop working too hard, I came back to the boat after our visit to Harris Vintage to find him in full-blown investigative mode – pulling up hacked CCTV feeds and files from deep in the Removals archive.

I tried to press him on what exactly he was looking for, but all I got was that he’s ‘just checking something’. Then he changed the subject to how I should be taking it easy right now, that we don’t need to be worrying about money – as if we’ve been married for ten years and didn’t get together five months ago during an intensely stressful sequence of events.

‘If we really don’t need the money,’ I challenged him before I went to bed last night and he was still sitting hunched over his laptop at the kitchen table, ‘then why are you still working at ten o’clock in the evening?’

‘This is different,’ he said. Those three words were the closest he’d come to admitting he’d been acting weird all day. ‘That name Keith mentioned in the shop – Hangjaw – I’ve heard it before. He works for an organisation called the Circle. If they’ve resurfaced, it could be bad news. Really bad news.’

‘OK. So what’s that got to do with Mikey’s Firm?’

‘I’m not sure. That’s why I’m just checking …’

Then it was like he forgot I was in the room. He went back to poring over a list of cities on his laptop – Stockholm, Turin, Zurich, Marseille – and it was the same again this morning.

So this afternoon I decided to give him some space to ‘just check’ in peace, and came back to mine and Beth’s flat. Which makes sense, anyway: our flat’s closer to the bar where we’re meeting Liv and Michelle, so the plan is we can go out and come home together. Then I can catch up with Will again tomorrow and hopefully get back on the same page.

‘I’m sure it’ll be fine,’ I tell Beth. Suddenly I’m not sure I want our relationship problems analysed under a microscope.

‘Uh huh,’ she says. Then she puts her makeup down on the bed and turns to face me. ‘But don’t you think it’s all a bit weird? He distracts you with a huge gesture like paying for your mum’s care – a massive offer that he probably knows you’ll turn down – and then immediately gets obsessed with something he won’t talk to you about. The timing’s a little convenient, isn’t it?’

Well, that doesn’t make sense, I think, because I was the one who insisted we go to Brick Lane to stalk Keith, and it was only after that that he got all weird.

I’d skipped over that detail in my version of events. Oops. That’s the problem with talking to your friends about your relationship problems: you gloss over the parts that make you look bad, and suddenly they think you’re a perfect angel while your boyfriend is an unreasonable weirdo.

‘He wouldn’t do that. I trust him. He’s just … I’m not sure.’

Her pitying smile tells me she isn’t convinced.

I should have expected this, to be honest. Five months in, she and Will still haven’t quite … clicked. It’s not that they haven’t had opportunities: we’ve had dinner together, watched her choice of romcoms and his choice of arty French dramas, and gone on a bunch of trips with Beth and my friends, especially before we got quite so busy. Will always puts in the effort, involving her in whatever he’s talking about, making small talk or asking about her day. In response, Beth is civil – but that’s about it. Even though he was as much a part of saving her life as I was, I’m starting to think she doesn’t like him.

‘But why do you think he’s so obsessed?’ she asks. ‘Has he said anything to explain why?’

He did, to be fair. To be less fair, it was only when he crawled into bed at 2 a.m. last night, after I said he was really starting to bother me. ‘He had a mission involving this Circle organisation that went wrong, years ago,’ I say, paraphrasing what he told me. ‘Hangjaw, one of their agents, was the target. That’s who Keith mentioned, so Will is worried they’re … back in business, or something.’

Will had been hazy on the specifics, but it had clearly deeply affected him. Apparently Hangjaw was someone who delighted in torturing his victims – regardless of whether they were completely powerless against him or posed an active threat.

‘But someone on the Removals side ratted Will out and it all went to shit. He’s lucky to have got out alive.’

Beth raises an eyebrow. ‘Do you think Will was betrayed by his partner?’

Was he? I hadn’t thought about it like that. ‘Maybe. Or, like, someone in a support role.’

But I’ve never known him to work with someone like Jason. Everything he’s said makes it sound like, until I came along, he was always a lone gunman …

‘That’s just a different kind of partner,’ Beth says. Then she changes the subject. ‘But this is what I mean. You should know this sort of thing about his past. And not just work, either – have you even had the ex chat yet?’

‘We … have not,’ I admit. Not that there’s much to say, on my side. A university relationship that was fine until it wasn’t and several years of bad dates that led nowhere. Standard. Unthreatening. As far as his romantic life before me is concerned … I’ve been a little hesitant to ask.

Beth lays a comforting hand on my knee. ‘Maisie, it’s been five months. You’ve got to talk to him about stuff like this, to know what his deal is. How can you expect to really know him if you don’t know his past?’

Point taken.

‘I just really thought he was the one, you know?’ wails Liv an hour later.

It’s a bit of a non-sequitur, interrupting the conversation we’d been having about the new episode of Love is Blind and bringing it to a juddering halt. There’s a moment of silence from the rest of us – by which I mean me, Beth and Michelle, all sitting on stools around a high table in Hoxton’s Princess Royal – before we adjust to the abrupt change in direction and rally with a sympathetic chorus of ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘I know’ and ‘you just need to give it time’.

I’ve not been able to see my friends as much as I’d like to recently, but when one of them’s going through a breakup, you find ways to make it work.

Liv and Sam weren’t going out super long in the grand scheme of things: just under two years. But their relationship was serious. They met while working at the same ad agency and, feeling the pressure of the London rental market, moved in together after six months. Before long, they were living, working and socialising as a unit, and Sam was coming along to most of our friend group’s activities. If it was anyone else, it would have seemed too fast, but Liv has her life together and Sam was easy to get along with. He slotted into our routines so naturally that before long you’d think they’d always been together.

Until last week, when they broke up.

‘I had it all mapped out,’ Liv says. ‘He was going to propose to me next spring – in Italy, in the town where we went for our first holiday together. We’d get married twelve months later. You’d all be bridesmaids. We’d have a baby the year after, and then another one two years after that. A girl then a boy. It’s what we both wanted.’ She breaks off and all three of us reach out hands to put on hers. ‘It’s what we both wanted,’ she repeats bitterly, tears starting to spill down her face.

The irony is obvious – and cruel. As it turned out, it wasn’t what Sam wanted. If it was, he wouldn’t have brought his ex back to their flat while Liv was away on a business trip. Liv came home a day earlier than planned and walked in on them going at it in the shower. They didn’t even hear her come in, only noticing when she launched the toothbrush holder at them.

What’s worse is that Liv recognised the woman, but not as Sam’s ex – that only came out later. Liv knew her as a brand manager for one of her regular clients. They’d been having weekly Zoom meetings.

‘He even cleaned the bathroom before she came round,’ Liv wails, the final twist of the knife. ‘I always had to remind him to do that.’

Michelle starts rubbing Liv’s back as she sinks tearfully into her cocktail. ‘It’s horrific, but you weren’t to know,’ she says. ‘You never do with people like that.’

‘You are so much better off without him,’ adds Beth. ‘You’ve got so much ahead of you.’

There’s a pause to indicate that it’s my turn to say something reassuring, except my mind has wandered. I’m thinking about what Beth said earlier. I know nothing about Will’s past. What’s to stop the same thing happening to me? Especially when, just like Liv and Sam, Will and I also got together in a high-pressure work environment.

‘It’ll be OK,’ I add, a moment too late.

‘Thanks, guys,’ Liv says with a tragic smile.

‘But also,’ Michelle declares, her tone suggesting an attempt to steer the conversation in a happier direction, ‘Maisie, Beth: Liv and I have a proposition for the two of you …’

Thankfully, Liv bites. ‘Yes.’ She nods, wiping her tears away. ‘We do! So, me and Michelle were meant to be going to a music festival with Sam and his mates in a couple of weeks. Obviously, that’s not happening anymore—’ she wobbles for a second, then rallies, ‘—but we still want to go. Soooo … how would you two like to come along instead?’

‘Ooh, fun!’ Beth grins. ‘Yeah, maybe! Where is it? I didn’t know there were music festivals at this time of year.’

‘Not in England, maybe,’ Liv laughs. ‘But in the French Alps there are! It’s a winter festival, with skiing and everything. You guys will love it.’

‘Absolutely no pressure, obviously,’ Michelle adds, presumably noticing that Beth’s smile has become a little tighter. ‘We get that things are still a little difficult money-wise, what with the job situation.’

As far as Michelle and Liv know, Beth and I losing our jobs at the same time last summer was a freak coincidence: just two strokes of awful but unrelated bad luck, same with the fact neither of us has managed to find permanent work since. I’ve just said I’m temping in industries so boring no one asks follow-up questions, while Beth has gone back to copywriting in a freelance, online, working-from-home capacity – inasmuch as that industry still exists, given AI and everything.

‘But it’d be so fun,’ rushes out Liv. ‘We’ve booked a four-room chalet and Sam and his friend already paid for their tickets, so they’re yours if you want them! Pleasepleaseplease say you’ll think about it.’

‘Of course we will,’ I say, and Beth nods in agreement – but with money being how it is for the both of us, anything more than to think about it is difficult to promise. ‘Send us the deets and we’ll let you know.’

Before Liv can push it any further, Michelle claps a hand on her shoulder. ‘You guys can decide later. Right now, let’s dance.’

The Princess Royal is, for better and worse, the sort of pub you might book for a hen do, with tiled walls, cursive neon signs declaring it ‘mojito o’clock’, and a contemporary pop soundtrack accented by TVs high on the walls playing synced music videos, like we still live in the MTV generation. Michelle’s idea was that bringing Liv somewhere Sam wouldn’t be seen dead would take her mind off him.

The dance floor isn’t massive, but by the time we get there the entirety of the bar seems to have found their way to it. There’s a real DJ and everything, who’s offering commentary between tracks to get the room hyped. Beth joins us as we cram ourselves in between a group of girls with tiaras and another in matching T-shirts, whooping as Liv’s smile becomes more fixed with each song.

‘Next up,’ shouts the DJ over the closing bars of something by Sabrina Carpenter, ‘I’m sure you’ve heard this one before – it’s Skyla Dawn!’

But the aggressive, grimy bassline that starts playing sounds nothing like Skyla Dawn: it’s about as far from the sugary sweet piano pop of ‘Love on a Feather’ as you can get while still being pop music. Even the lyrics are violent:

Yeah she’s that bitch,

Knife him in the back bitch,

Split the vein, watch the blood draining all out bitch.

It’s a classic,

Bodies in acid,

Fake a heart attack, never prove it, run it back bitch.

Well, that’s definitely an – alarming – change in direction.

‘This is Skyla Dawn?’ I shout in Michelle’s ear.

She opens her mouth in exaggerated shock. ‘Of course! Where have you been?’

I notice one of the TVs showing the music video past Michelle’s head, and I stop dancing altogether.

‘You all right?’ Michelle shouts back. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

‘Sorry, I …’ I trail off, still entranced by the screen.

Michelle catches where I’m looking and laughs. ‘Bit different, huh?’

Different is one word for it. Worrying would be another. I’m not the sort of person to get unduly scandalised when a previously PG-friendly starlet starts the ‘good girl gone bad’ routine. Miley did it, Taylor did it, it’s nothing new. Every pop girlie does this phase sooner or later.

But when the pop girlie in question puts out a music video that features her, dressed in an Annie Lennox-style suit and a glitzy gold watch, apparently drugging a man and drowning him in a bathtub, it’s going to raise a few eyebrows. Specifically, my eyebrows. As the woman who drugged her producer and drowned him in a bathtub.

‘It’s such a good song,’ says Michelle. ‘Playing the haters at their own game.’

‘Haters?’ I squeak out. I feel like the air is being sucked out of the room.

‘Conspiracy theorists,’ Michelle shouts into my ear. There are conspiracy theorists?! ‘But, you know what some fans are like …’ She twirls her finger in a loop by her left ear with a knowing grin, then tosses her head back and starts dancing in earnest.

My knees have gone shaky. Someone bumps into me and I stumble forward, letting the press of bodies swallow me so that Michelle can’t read the expressions I’m struggling to keep in check. Conspiracy theorists imply a conspiracy, which would imply that some people think Skyla has secrets. Which she does. Secrets I’d really rather no one looks into.

The crowds shift and I’m beside Michelle again. ‘And as a fan of Skyla,’ I ask her, ‘do you think these theories have any weight to them?’

But Michelle doesn’t play along with my straw poll. ‘Oh my God, Maisie, I didn’t know you were a fan! You know she’s playing the festival we were talking about? If that wasn’t a sign you have to come … especially with how much she’s blown up recently, it’s literally the only stop on her tour there are still tickets to.’

I’m about to ask her for more details but I’ve already implicated myself enough tonight – best to avoid the subject entirely until I’m sure I can do it without losing my head.

‘Last song of the night, everyone,’ shouts the DJ over the opening bars of ‘Mr Brightside’. Thank God. Not a moment too soon. I need to get home and—

‘Chips,’ shouts a gleeful Beth, throwing her arms around me. ‘Come on, we’re gonna get chips.’

Chapter 5

I was planning on staying at mine tonight, but I’m so freaked out by the new Skyla Dawn song that I need to be with someone who really understands. A year ago, that person would have been Gabby. Right now, it can only be Will.

So while everyone else is in the queue for the chip shop, I send him a message: OK if I come round? Need to talk.

When he hasn’t replied a few minutes later, I try to phone him – but his phone is off. That means he’s either asleep and has forgotten to charge it (unlikely) or he’s in a situation where even having it on silent would be too much of a risk. Where it could be life or death.

But if he was, he’d have told me about it … wouldn’t he? Then again, he knew I was out tonight. Maybe something came up, and he didn’t want me cancelling my night out to join him.

‘You OK, Maisie?’ Beth asks, emerging from Sergio’s Pizza and Kebab with a steaming polystyrene container.

‘I’m gonna go back to Will’s,’ I tell her. Even if he’s out, I’d rather see him sooner than later – even if that means five in the morning or whenever he gets back.

‘Oh. OK,’ she replies. I can tell she’s a little hurt. We’d talked about having a hangover day like we used to: takeaway for lunch, shit Netflix romcoms, and waiting until at least 3 p.m. before we venture outside, which at this time of year means it will already be almost dark. We haven’t had a day like that in forever and I don’t want to bail – but this is urgent. ‘Did something happen?’

Did it? I think. And then: I could just tell her. The bar we were in is just across the road from the chippy, but Liv and Michelle managed to get so waylaid during the two-minute walk from one to the other that they ended up way behind Beth in the queue. And Beth knows. I don’t have to run around hiding things anymore.

But it’s still way too weird to go into it in any detail, especially standing on a random kerbside in a crowd of drunk people.

‘I don’t know,’ I admit. ‘Maybe. I’ll tell you soon. Promise.’

She holds out an arm and we hug goodbye.

‘Look after yourself,’ she whispers.

Will isn’t aboard The Narrow Escape by the time I get to Limehouse Basin, and he hasn’t called or texted either. So instead of falling into his arms like I’d hoped, I sink alone into his cold, empty bed – and into a pit of anxious thoughts.

I’ve already started spiralling though the possible scenarios that would lead to Skyla putting out a video like this – whether she’s having a crisis of conscience and has decided to air her secrets through the medium of music, or if she’s just reckless and doesn’t get how bad this looks. As I pull the duvet up to my chin and stare at the gently rocking ceiling above Will’s empty bed, an even worse option occurs to me. Could there be people who’ve become suspicious of the circumstances surrounding her producer’s death, and she feels the need to get out ahead of them? Or maybe someone actually has evidence that Skyla paid for Vincent Messina’s murder, and they’re blackmailing her to do all this … for some unknown reason?

No one has questioned the job until now, but it was a long time ago. Could I have made some fatal blunder that’s only just come to light?

The more I think about it, the more the possibilities multiply, and the more frustration builds inside me. Splitting from Gabby and Novum and striking out alone with Will was supposed to make things simpler! So why is it all getting so bloody complicated?

I pull up the music video on my phone. As it turns out, the bathtub scene is only a very small part of it. In context it’s presented as a dream: Skyla is dressed in the same suit and tacky gold watch as the man she’s drowning, and they swap positions back and forth in a series of quick, confusing cuts. He drowns her, she drowns him – though she’s the only one to emerge from the bathroom alive. Could that lend credence to the guilt theory?

The rest of the video is the story of a bad breakup. Skyla and a guy her age; innocent love that quickly turns sour; the guy yelling at her and throwing plates across the kitchen until she tells him she’s done. Then we see him standing outside her house, waiting for her – stalking her – until it ends on a final shot of a woman’s hand reaching for a knife. So is the whole video some kind of coded threat, targeting a stalker or a toxic ex? I’ve had someone killed before and I’ll do it again if you don’t stop hassling me?

Except, according to the creepy AI-generated results that come up when I google ‘Skyla Dawn boyfriend,’ she’s been in a relationship with a popstar called Dayton (no last name) for the past few years – the same Dayton she performs with on ‘Love on a Feather’. And according to an interview she gave just a few weeks ago to promote the album, they’re still together and he was ‘incredibly supportive’ throughout the songwriting process.

When I’m certain the video has nothing else to offer, I turn to Skyla’s social media, trying to get a sense of her state of mind. There’s nothing too revealing – just some atmospheric glamour shots of her in the suit from the video. Before that it’s just your standard popstar content: pictures from her gigs, photoshoots, the occasional brand deal.

At some point while I’m scrolling back further and further down her Instagram feed, past all the photos of her and Dayton looking happy and photogenic at last year’s BRIT Awards, I realise that it’s gone 4.30, I’m exhausted, still drunk, and no closer to figuring out Skyla’s intentions. So, with those questions spiralling uselessly through my mind, I set my phone down and fall asleep.

I wake up even more tired than I was the night before. It’s fully light outside, but the bed is still empty and I can’t hear Will in the next room. He must have been out the whole night. I do have a text from him, though – apparently he sent it at five minutes past five.

Maisie, I’m so sorry. Something came up last night and I had to rush out. I know I was a crap boyfriend yesterday and the day before, I don’t think I realised how fixated I was getting until I saw your text. I’ll be back this evening and I’ll explain everything, I promise. See you later xxx

I think about phoning him to ask him to explain now, but then I remind myself: you trust him. How many times has he had your life in his hands over the past few months, and always come through? If he says he has a good reason for not talking sooner, he probably does.

If he doesn’t, that’s a problem for later. I’ve got enough problems for now as it is. Or one gigantic problem, to be exact.

Skyla Dawn.

When I first woke up it felt like a bad dream, but it didn’t dissipate once I was properly awake. No, the longer I’m up, the more real it feels, like a splinter worming its way deeper into my skin.

I pull myself together and get out of bed, then climb out of the boat into the crisp morning air. I don’t need to get dressed – I fell asleep in my clothes – and it’s not like I’m planning to go far. But I still need to talk this through with someone.

I open Beth’s bedroom door to find her wrapped up in her covers like a human burrito. Her clothes from last night are strewn on the floor and she’s not opened the curtains yet, but her lamp is casting a soft, warm glow around the room – soft enough to calm the headache that has been building behind my temples on the walk over.

She looks happy to see me. ‘Maisie!’ she calls as I step into the room. Then her expression clouds. ‘What happened with Will?’

That’s not what I came here to talk about. ‘He’s just doing something for work,’ I lie, hanging my coat on the end of her bed then flopping down on the mattress.

I’m hoping that’ll be enough to placate her but her look, if anything, turns darker. ‘I see,’ she says sarcastically. ‘Nothing to be worried about there, then.’

I break her gaze and stare at the ceiling instead, wondering if it was the wrong choice to try to talk to her about this. It was admittedly months ago that she’d said she wanted in – has she changed her mind?

‘I thought you understood what we do for a living?’ I ask, wincing as I hear my voice crack a little.

She sighs, putting down her phone and settling in to face me. ‘I understand what you do for a living, Maisie. I’ve known you for ten years, and I know you’re a good person and I trust you to make good choices. All that stuff about the proper channels being useless because of who has the real power – I’ve seen that for myself. But …’ She trails off.

‘But you don’t trust Will.’

She pauses for a second, holding me in her unflinching gaze. ‘I don’t know him, Maisie. Like, if he was just a normal guy I’d get why you like him: he’s funny, he’s interesting, and he’s always been super nice and polite and considerate whenever I’ve been around him. But he’s a hitman!’

‘But I’m a—’ despite everything, I still can’t say it in front of her, ‘what you just said.’

‘It’s different when it’s you. Like I get that maybe, in this messed-up world we live in, taking things in your … direct sort of way isn’t always the worst option. One powerful dickhead to save however many more innocent people, I get that. But don’t you see how weird it is when your best friend wants you to watch a romcom with her new beau and you literally know that he’s killed people?’

‘But we’re the same,’ I protest. ‘He thinks about it in the same way I do.’

She sighs. ‘Does he? Are you a hundred per cent certain about that?’

‘Yes!’ I breathe, feeling increasingly hungover. I might not know every little detail about his past, or what he’s doing right this second, but that was one of the things we did talk about, in depth, as we were properly getting to know each other. How to determine if a target was ethically legitimate: when they are a danger to society and aren’t likely to be stopped in some other way, such as by the legal system.

I’d always had a commonsense approach to figuring this out, but Will has done the reading. ‘You should see all the philosophy books he has,’ I explain to Beth. ‘He’s thought about this stuff. A lot.’

Honestly, while I’d gone into those conversations wanting to make sure Will was as serious about this as I was, I came out of them thinking that I was the one who needed to do some deeper thinking. I’m pretty sure I’m a good person – 99.9 per cent of the time, anyway – but I can’t quote dead guys with Wikipedia pages to decide if something’s the right course of action. Usually, if something’s off, I just feel it. Will has citations.

Beth purses her lips, still unconvinced. ‘And you’re sure he’s always acted on his principles? Even before the two of you were together?’

Now that is an unfair question. How am I supposed to know every little detail of his past? And even if he did make a mistake years ago, when he and his sister were desperate, who’s to say he hasn’t made amends and turned to this kind of philosophy to ensure that it never happens again?

But you don’t know for sure – because you haven’t asked him. Why not?

Is it really just not wanting to open old wounds?

Beth must notice my concern, because when she speaks again her tone is reassuring. ‘Look, Maisie, I’m not saying you’re wrong about him. But just for me personally, I don’t know he’s safe. Especially since you’re keeping me at arm’s length from everything you’re working on. And after everything that happened over the summer … I need to know it, you know?’

I do know. It’s sounding an awful lot like my reasons for hesitating in front of Luther Pizzo. Suddenly I’m feeling terrible about all the times I tried to make her and Will get along, while simultaneously actively redirecting any serious conversation about our work. All this time I’ve been walking on eggshells, scared that things will get even weirder between us, without truly acknowledging why things were weird in the first place.

‘I’m sorry, Beth. I should have realised how new all of this is for you.’

‘Apology accepted,’ she says quietly. And then, after what feels like a couple of minutes’ silence: ‘But that isn’t what you wanted to talk to me about, is it?’

It isn’t. I take a deep breath as I shift gears, deciding whether I still want to go through with implicating her in this. But she did say she wanted in, so … ‘Beth, can I talk to you about a … work thing?’

She doesn’t blink. ‘You can.’

‘I think I might be in trouble.’

I’m half-expecting her to throw back the covers and demand an explanation. Instead there’s another long pause before she asks: ‘Trouble how?’

‘A former client of mine is … at risk of going public.’ And when she doesn’t say anything else, I follow up with: ‘You know the new Skyla Dawn song, right?’

As I speak, her expression goes from concerned to a bewildered sort of smile. ‘Of … course?’ she prompts. ‘Liv has been playing it non-stop since the breakup. How could I not?’

‘Right,’ I say, feeling guilty I haven’t spent enough time with Liv for that to register. ‘Well, this might sound like the sort of thing a crazy person would say, but I promise I have my reasons …’ I’m not sure how best to proceed, but she’s still looking at me expectantly. Time to get it over with. ‘Well, I think that song is about me.’

Now she does throw back the covers, sitting bolt upright, her eyes wide. ‘Holy shit,’ she breathes. ‘Wait, that song – isn’t the chorus something like “knife him in the back, split the vein …”’

‘And then the stuff about the blood, yes. The one that sounds nothing like anything she’s ever released before, with absurdly gory lyrics to be playing on, like, normal radio. That song.’ I pause. ‘So you see my problem.’

Beth stares at me for a second as she puts all the pieces together. ‘Wait, wait, wait. So you’re telling me, Skyla actual Dawn was your client?’

I nod.

‘When?’ she demands. ‘Why? How?’

So I tell her. Skyla was trapped in a contract with a vindictive producer, one who took advantage of her being new and isolated in the industry to physically and emotionally abuse her. Skyla asked for help from her label, from the few peers she thought she could trust, but nobody helped her. Instead she was shut out, isolated, and left to deal with the producer’s repeated advances on her own. Until she employed my services, that is, and he had an unfortunate, unexpected heart attack while in the bath.

‘You don’t think I’m overreacting?’ I ask her once it’s all out. She’s watching the music video on my phone, chewing on a finger as she does so in a combination of horror and rapt attention.

‘No,’ she says slowly. I lean over to see her phone screen, just in time to see Skyla pushing the sleazy-looking gentleman beneath the water of his glamorous bathtub. Beth’s brow creases once as his body goes limp, and twice as the image cuts to Skyla bursting from the water, gasping for air.

‘No, I think you’re reacting … appropriately, based on what you’ve told me,’ she says as the video finishes. ‘Not over, not under. Get your laptop,’ she adds, and I can tell from her expression that she’s switched into problem-solver mode, totally alert despite the hangover I’m sure she’s feeling. Suddenly I feel a lot more relaxed about my decision to bring her in on this. I get up to fetch my computer from my room, but she interrupts me before I’m halfway to the door.

‘Actually,’ she says, picking up her phone, ‘when you came in I was just about to order some food. I’m thinking rice, so sushi or bibimbap maybe – tell me what you want. Then we’ll get to work.’

Chapter 6

The conversation Beth and I have over our laptops and rice bowls amounts to three key points.

Point one: Skyla’s fans are suspicious, in more ways than one. After I run Beth through the scraps I uncovered during my late night of phone research, she suggests a deeper dive of Skyla’s fan subreddits, which I’d given only a cursory glance. At the time, the posts on there had just struck me as everyday fan stuff, like pictures of her coming out of nightclubs with captions like ‘omg her dress literally pulled my heart from my ribcage and ate it in front of me’. Another user is convinced that despite her relationship with Dayton and her being openly bisexual, she’s actually a secret lesbian and there are coded references to this in all her lyrics. Just normal, well-adjusted, internet nonsense.

But scratch just beneath the surface and something is off in the Skyla-verse. You needn’t scroll far to find clusters of deleted comments, threads locked by moderators with explanations like: ‘For the last time, we are not having this conversation. Speculation like this is potentially libellous under UK law and could get the community shut down.’

My heart beats faster the more of these I notice, remembering Michelle’s comment about ‘conspiracy theorists’.

‘It could be a lot of things,’ Beth reassures me. ‘They might not really know anything.’

But …

Point two: Where there’s smoke, there’s fire. Not every post wildly theorising about Skyla’s big hit has been scrubbed from the internet. Some people think the song is fiction – more of this, please – but a few have made the connection to her producer’s death. Some fans (or possibly haters) have even compiled side-by-side comparison images to show how much she resembles her old producer when she’s in costume for the video. And, yeah, she does – there’s no denying it. Even their clothes are eerily similar: as one post (which thankfully only has three likes on Tumblr) convincingly argues, even their watches are just about identical.

‘She’s an idiot,’ Beth says when I show her that one. ‘That is the only explanation.’

Fortunately, these posts are not popular among the Skyla stans, who’d prefer to imagine their fave would never be so tasteless about a real man’s death. Of course, the music industry being as it is, there are a few who reckon (correctly) that he deserved it – and a very, very small minority who speculate that she might have had something to do with it. Not many, but more than I’d like.

The most popular theory is that the song is about Dayton. It’s a little confusing since officially they’re together but, while she still talks about him in interviews, they haven’t been papped going on dates in a while, which has some people speculating that they might have secretly broken up. And if he really is as dangerous as she suggests he is in the video, they claim, she might have a reason for pretending everything’s fine.

I have to say, I’m fairly convinced – and a deeper look into Dayton himself only makes me more so. Five years ago, when he and Skyla started dating, they were both fresh-faced and squeaky-clean young stars. Unlike her, he’s maintained that image … more or less. But the floppy-haired ‘boy next door’ headshots feel less wholesome once you’ve seen the videos – now only available in the depths of online archives after they very briefly appeared on celeb gossip sites last year – of him getting into a fist fight with a hotel bellhop who may or may not have accidentally dinged his suitcase.

‘You know how they say you should watch out for how a guy treats staff when you’re on a date?’ Beth asks drily, watching the video over my shoulder.

She has a point. With violent men there’s always a pattern.

Eventually, we get to point three: there’s only one way to know for sure.

‘I’m going to have to talk to her,’ I groan, slumping back on Beth’s bed. I feel like I’ve read every single post on the internet and I’m still no closer to finding something that’ll stop me spiralling.

‘Is that a problem?’ she asks.

It is, though I’m not quite sure why. ‘It just feels wrong somehow. It’s like how her music always reminds me why I do what I do, but I never seek it out or listen to her albums. It seems … crass. It’s like when people say to never meet your heroes.’

‘Even though you’ve already met her.’

‘Yeah, but …’ I trail off. But she wasn’t my hero then.

Beth closes her laptop, fixing me with one of her infuriatingly perceptive looks. ‘I see the problem. You’ve built her up a certain way in your head, haven’t you? Skyla Dawn as the perfect victim – the one who reminds you of your honourable crusade against the bad men of the world.’

I groan again and put my wrist over my eyes. I’m too hungover to be seen like this.

‘But she might not be that person, not really,’ Beth continues. ‘Can you deal with that? If she’s actually more complicated than you thought she was?’

‘Of course I can,’ I say quickly. Though of course, there’s always the possibility that she’s in danger again. Maybe she needs me. I let my wrist fall from my eyes. ‘But all of our correspondence went through the company. I don’t have her number, I haven’t been able to find her address, and it’s not like I can go through her agent or something.’

I realise halfway through the sentence that Beth is smiling at me.

‘What?’ I ask. ‘Do you know where she lives?’

Now she is positively beaming. ‘Not off the top of my head, no. But I know some people who will.’

As it turns out, Skyla Dawn lives more or less exactly where you’d expect her to, in a posh Chelsea townhouse. However nice the neighbourhood, though, it’s bloody freezing on her roof. Usually I’d be decked out in thermals for a job like this, but I was so anxious to do something that I ran out the door as soon as Beth confirmed the address, so here I am: crouched against a chimney stack in joggers and a fleece, my back about to seize up from the cold, sending a quick text to Will to say something has come up and our big chat will have to wait. See, Will – two can play at that game.

Other than that, it’s been a refreshingly simple infiltration so far. I spotted the blind spots in Skyla’s security system a mile off and decided to come in from the street over, tiptoeing through a much less security-conscious neighbour’s garden and scaling the back wall that separates them from Skyla’s property. From there it was light work skulking through the bushes of her back garden then shimmying up a drainpipe to the roof of the single-storey extension projecting from the back of her three-floor Georgian terrace.

Now I’m watching Skyla – or, more accurately, the top of her head – through her kitchen skylight. She has company, which complicates things slightly. Two other women and a man, all of whom I think I recognise, are sat around the table picking through the remains of a Sunday roast. They’re a couple of drinks deep, judging by the empty bottles on the worktop, so provided they stick to the kitchen they shouldn’t pose too much of a problem. The group are locked onto a seemingly hilarious story that the influencer – Popstar? Film director? God, I hate going into a job unprepared – sitting opposite Skyla is regaling them with while Skyla plays dutiful host, topping up their wine glasses and offering second or third helpings. Not quite the picture of the tortured artist on the brink that I’d been stressing about, then.

Still, she is less effusive than the rest of them. She joins their bouts of laughter a split-second too late, and every few minutes her head does the same little dance, tilting ever so slightly as she glances between her phone, the windows, and the patio doors whenever the conversation isn’t focused on her. Even the way she’s holding herself – tight, controlled, shoulders up – suggests she’s nervous about something. Or waiting for something to happen. The knot in my stomach reties itself. It’s a good thing I’m here.

There’s a dessert in the oven and I figure the best time to infiltrate will be just after it is served: hopefully everyone will mind their manners and give it some time before getting up to go to the bathroom, giving me the run of the house for at least ten minutes.

Plan A, I’ve decided, is to figure out what’s going on with Skyla without having to talk to her – at least for now. It’s just simpler that way. Fortunately, almost every profile we read mentioned she’s a prolific journaller: she even told Vanity Fair that there was stuff in there that would ‘definitely get me locked up’, which sounds promising. Concerning, but promising.

If she has her diaries in the house, I’m most likely to find them in her bedroom or office, which, according to a careful study of her Architectural Digest tour, are next to each other on the top floor. Helpfully, there’s a bathroom on the same level with a window that opens right above the rooftop I’m crouching on. Eight feet above, to be exact, but there’s a vine trellis against the wall that’ll help close the distance.

I tread lightly across the roof to get into position. I’m almost at the wall when my heart catches in my throat. There, hidden in the leaves, something just glinted at me. I flatten myself against the wall in case there’s any chance it hasn’t got me already, then extend an arm behind the trellis to where I saw it. Sure enough, my fingers brush against the plastic chassis of a hidden security camera.

Sneaky.

And strange.

Because, these days, cameras like this invariably double as motion detectors. They don’t just record footage, they wake up when an intruder arrives on the scene and send pictures of whatever alerted them to the homeowner’s phone. Considering Skyla’s jumpiness, she’d surely have reacted if she got a push notification with a picture of me on her roof – and yet nothing about her manner suggests she has.

Then I feel it. On the back of the camera, where its battery casing should be, is an empty hollow. I pull it out to double-check. The thing is dead plastic, its battery nowhere to be seen.

No, I realise. The battery is in the trellis too: gently placed into a crook of the wooden slats, somewhere it could never have fallen by accident.

A different kind of anxiety begins to claw at my stomach. It’s a classic move, one I’ve done many times before. Case the house in the days before an infiltration and minimise the security you need to deal with. I’d bet whoever took that battery also tilted the security cameras ever so slightly to create those convenient blind spots I clocked so easily on the way in.

Could it be Dayton? Or someone working for him?

Just how sadistic is he?

I peer out through the forest of rooftops – completely dark, though it’s barely 5 p.m. Whoever did this was planning to come back, but when? Tonight?

Right now?

Could there be someone out there, watching me take their spot?

Back down through the skylight, Skyla is getting up to go to the oven. There’s no time like the present.

Swallowing my anxiety, I climb up the trellis until I can reach the bathroom window, then mantel up to the ledge. In winter you can count on all windows being locked except those connected to a toilet, and sure enough, it jerks open. I slither through the crack, landing in a crouch on the tiled floor. Her bathroom is gorgeous, but I knew that already. After a quick listen for anyone upstairs, I head straight out the door and dart towards what I think is her study – and which turns out to be a bedroom. Sloppy, Maisie, I chastise myself. But lucky, too, because at the far side of the room, just past a dressing table piled high with makeup and supplement bottles, stands a glass-fronted cabinet. Inside, just visible in the light of the streetlamp outside the window, I can make out the regimented spines of what must be a hundred or more black-covered Moleskines: shelf upon shelf of the things, a veritable library of Skyla Dawn diaries. There are people on the internet who would chop their arm off for the chance to read these.

It’s locked, of course – but not that locked, if you know what you’re doing. A bigger issue is figuring out which of the diaries is most recent. Either top left or bottom right seems most likely, assuming they’re in any kind of order. I go for the top-left one first.

Is it bad that I’m jealous? Becca and Rachael are in English AND Maths together, so it makes sense that they’ve become closer. But I miss hanging out just the two of us.

It’s dated 1 February 2010, so she must have been, what, sixteen when she wrote this? I shove the book back into its place, beginning to question coming here. Should I really be doing this? Sure, I’ve done much worse to targets before in pursuit of a mission, but they were targets. Skyla Dawn is …

I’m not quite sure what she is, but she’s not a target.

The bottom-right volume is wedged in tight. I’ve only just managed to yank it free when I hear a voice from behind me. Skyla.

‘Honestly, I don’t understand why you’re even asking me,’ she’s saying, ‘since you’ve apparently gone and agreed to everything already.’

She’s on the final flight of stairs, by the sound of things, coming perilously close to the door of the bedroom. Crap. I try to jam the diary back onto the too-full shelf, but its spot has been claimed by its neighbours, their squidgy covers expanding to fill its space in the absence of pressure. I can’t put it back without serious wrangling.

The doorknob turns.

‘I mean, it’s hardly Glastonbury, is it?’ she says with an exasperated laugh as she enters the room. I swallow a relieved sigh when she chooses not to turn the light on. ‘Will any of my audience even be there?’

I watch from a pool of shadow behind her bed as she goes over to the window, where she stands silhouetted in the streetlight. ‘All right, you’ve done the numbers, I believe you,’ she says after a minute. ‘And if there’s nothing you can do about it then fine. But don’t talk like I should be happy about it! I’m not!’

Another silence as the person on the phone presumably tries to say something pacifying, but it doesn’t seem to be working. Then finally: ‘OK, OK, fine, whatever, but Ian – I have guests round. Can we please have this conversation tomorrow?’

They can, apparently. After just a few more seconds, Skyla gives a curt ‘goodbye’, hangs up, and lets out a loud string of expletives. After that, she stays at the window for almost a minute, wine in one hand, phone hanging slack in the other, staring out into the darkness. Then something catches her eye.

‘Oh no,’ she breathes, pushing back her professionally tousled fringe. ‘No. No, no, no, no, no.’

I follow her gaze to the glass-fronted cabinet – with its door hanging open.

‘Skyla!’ I whisper from behind her.

She spins around to look at me, hand flying to her mouth to suppress a scream. Thankfully, she’s pretty much successful. I’m not too worried about most kinds of noise – I imagine she came all the way up here because it’s far enough away to avoid anyone overhearing her phone call – but full-throated screams have a way of carrying.

‘Oh my God,’ she whispers. ‘It’s you.’ She flutters a hand to her chest, the way people do when they’re about to say, You almost gave me a heart attack. ‘Ever hear of a doorbell? You almost gave me a heart attack.’ Then she spots the diary, which I’m still clutching to me. I let her snatch it. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

‘I could ask you the same thing,’ I hiss back. ‘That song – that video. What were you thinking?’

She eyes me for a second before bursting out laughing, but it’s not the shrill, dismissive laugh she gave whoever she was talking to on the phone. Instead, she seems relieved. Strangely relieved to find a woman who she knows is paid to kill people lurking in her bedroom.

‘So that’s why you’ve been prowling around here for days, is it?’ she asks. ‘I have to say, I thought you’d be a little more direct.’

For days?

‘Erm, no,’ I say, caught off guard. ‘That wasn’t me.’

Her eyes go wide. ‘You’re lying.’

‘I’m not.’

She looks out the window again. ‘But I saw someone,’ she whispers. ‘Last night …’

‘I know,’ I say, taking a step towards her. I reach out a hand to put on her arm. She flinches when I touch her, but doesn’t pull away. I still need answers about her music video – but right now, this is more important.

‘Skyla,’ I explain, ‘I think you’re in danger. I had to bypass your security system on the way in but it was easy. Too easy. If you saw someone out there, they were probably tampering with your cameras so they could come back more easily. Maybe tonight. Do you know anyone who might want to hurt you? Anyone who might know our secret?’

She doesn’t say anything, just stares out of the window, her lip trembling.

And then, because I can’t get the video of him punching a bellhop out of my head, I have to ask: ‘Is it Dayton?’

Chapter 7

It doesn’t take long for Skyla to clear her friends out of the house. From what I can hear she is tremendously sweet and apologetic as she does so, feigning a migraine after a difficult call with her tour manager – presumably this Ian character she was arguing with on the phone.

She returns with two glasses of wine. ‘I figured you’d be a red girl,’ she says, gesturing for me to sit on the plush velvet sofa she has in one corner of her bedroom. Now that the light is on, Skyla’s room looks like something out of a teen sitcom, complete with fairy lights and white fluffy throws on every surface. It’s exactly the sort of bedroom the Skyla Dawn I thought I knew would write her songs in. The one who performed light-hearted songs like ‘Love on a Feather’. Not the Skyla Dawn who would write songs about actual murders she was implicated in.

Skyla herself seems far more composed than she did when she left the room, with barely a trace of her earlier trepidation. She sits down on the sofa beside me.

‘It could be Dayton,’ she says solemnly. ‘That would make a lot of sense, sadly.’

I raise an eyebrow. ‘How so?’

She pulls a face. ‘Same reason that he’s finding it so hard to see his ex-girlfriend succeed. Same reason that me getting the first number one either of us have had since our duet has sent him into a tailspin … He’s a washed-up loser. I mean, look at this:’ She pulls out her phone, taps a few times, then shows me her call history. Missed call upon missed call, sometimes several a day, all the way back to 4 January – her new track’s release date. Before that, there isn’t much at all. I catch an answered call on 12 December before she turns the screen away.

‘And then there are his messages,’ she says, tapping a few more times. ‘“Answer the phone you cow.” “I hope you fuck off to Antarctica and die.” “Please I’m sorry Skyla please talk to me” – oh, and here’s a good one: “I bet you think you’re so fucking clever for this but remember at the end of the day you’ll always be a stupid ho.” A “stupid ho”, really! Is he American now?’

‘Can I see them?’ I ask, when she doesn’t volunteer the phone screen.

‘There’s nothing to see really, it’s just more of the same …’ She slips her phone into her pocket. ‘Anyway, ever since I released that song he’s been a bit of a problem. It’s worrying. And after what you said about my security system …’

I’m still struggling to rationalise the change that’s come over Skyla since she came back in the room. When I first saw her tonight, she seemed panicked, vulnerable. That panic disappeared when she started to think I was the only one who’d been following her, then came back when she realised that wasn’t the case. But ever since she’s come back in the bedroom, it’s like she’s a different person. She seems totally in control.

‘Skyla – is there any chance he knows something? About what happened with Vincent? He was Dayton’s producer too, right?’

She looks me dead in the eye. ‘I never told him, if that’s what you’re suggesting.’

‘Not even a hint? Something that might have only made sense to him now, after he saw that video?’

She laughs again – just like she did last time I mentioned the music video. ‘Maisie, do you know how many people are involved in making a video like that? Very little of it was my idea. The way I saw it, the images were … symbolic, mostly. Death and rebirth. Redefining myself as an artist. That sort of thing.’

‘But people online …’

She waves a hand. ‘People will think what they think. The only person with any real reason to see that video the way you see it, is you.’

I hold her gaze. On the positive side, it really doesn’t seem like she’s being blackmailed into a public confession, nor does it seem like guilt is about to make her break down and spill the beans. On the other hand …

‘Don’t worry about it,’ she says with an air of finality. ‘OK? I know what I’m doing. And besides …’ She swirls her wine and gazes into the red liquid. ‘I think it could be a good thing that it brought you here. Doesn’t it feel like a sign?’

My blood chills. ‘If you want me to kill Dayton …’

Her eyes snap back to mine. ‘No!’ The idea seems genuinely unsettling, though it doesn’t take her long to regain her composure. ‘No, not at all. Dayton is a problem, but he’s not that kind of problem. At least I don’t think he is. But Maisie … I’m in a difficult position here. I really, honestly, hundred per cent don’t think Dayton knows anything about our past – but I’m still scared of him. He’s never been violent with me before, but … he’s going down a dark path. Drugs. Gambling. Debt.’

She lets that hang in the air for a second before continuing.

‘I don’t know him anymore. I don’t know what he’s capable of. And what’s worse … the label provides me with security at gigs, but they’re to keep me from crazy fans, you know, “the public”. Not people like him. He’s still in close with the managers – much closer than I am. So if someone’s on the label’s payroll, I can’t trust them to take my side over his.’

I start to catch on. ‘You’re saying you need your own security.’

She gives me a sweet smile. ‘I’m saying I need someone I can trust to watch my back. And who could be better for that than you?’

Four days ago, after my freeze-up on the Luther Pizzo mission, I swore I’d never again take on a job where I wasn’t 100 per cent certain about every little detail. With Skyla, the only thing I’m sure of is that there are things she’s not telling me. She’s been avoidant about the music video, weirdly vague about her relationship with Dayton, and she never did show me those messages when I asked – though I didn’t get the sense she was making them up.

But even so, her job offer was far too tempting. For now, I’ve agreed to a test run: I’m to remain on call in case anything else happens at her house, then keep an eye on things at a gig in London in a few days. But if everything goes smoothly, and Skyla still feels there’s a need for it, it could go on longer. She mentioned another gig in Manchester the week after, immediately followed by Snow Glow – that French festival Liv and Michelle mentioned.

Something she conspicuously doesn’t mention in the half-hour we spent chatting on her outrageously comfy sofa, or during the additional hour I spent resetting and upgrading her security system to keep her safe in her home, is her costume in the bathtub scenes of the music video: how similar she looks to photographs of Vincent before he died, right down to the matching suit, shoes and watch. In fact, anytime we so much as skirt the subject of the video, she says something noncommittal and changes the direction of the conversation.

I can see a world where she convinces me that parts of the video really were unfortunate coincidences: artsy, provocative imagery that just so happened to resemble something I did to her old producer. But when it comes to the costume, the similarity is just too strange to laugh off – even if that’s exactly what she does when I ask her about it.

She doesn’t want to explain herself, so I don’t press her. Her job offer is too useful to jeopardise with pointed questions. It’s a chance to stick close to her and scope out what else she isn’t telling me, and it’s the first job I’ve been offered in ages where I’m not being asked to kill someone. Given my financial obligations and what happened in the restaurant, that might be what I need right now – especially if I want to keep avoiding Will’s overly generous offers of financial support. And speaking of Will …

I arrive back to The Narrow Escape to find the table in the living room set out for a meal, with plates, cutlery, candles, a bottle of wine, and even a bouquet of flowers still in their plastic wrapping, all on the table. But the man himself is nowhere to be seen.

‘Hello?’ I call out. In reply, I get nothing except for the steady lapping of water against the boat’s hull. Then, when I’m halfway down the length of the boat, I see him – lying on the couch in the next part of the living area, past the table but in front of the door to our berth. He’s completely motionless, with a rustic throw blanket pulled up to his chin, seemingly fast asleep.

‘Hey, sleepy,’ I whisper, leaning down to kiss his forehead.

His eyes flutter awake and he begins to smile as he registers my presence. Then his expression goes serious. ‘Maisie,’ he murmurs, groggily pushing himself into a sitting position. ‘I am so sorry about last night. And this week. I’ll make it up to you.’

I kiss him again, just above his hairline. ‘You don’t need to make it up to me.’ My fingers brush against the sharp edge of his jaw as I pull him into a proper kiss. I missed him last night … but when we agreed to talk this evening, I was the one who ditched him with just as little explanation. ‘We’re even, more or less.’

I still need him to tell me where he was, but when he kisses me again, more deeply this time, I can’t think of anything else. His hands go to my hips and it feels like electricity is arcing between them through my body. Is this his way of making it up to me? If so, I don’t mind it. With everything that’s been going on lately, we haven’t had nearly enough time just the two of us. It would be so easy to simply forget everything …

But he’s the one to pull away. ‘What time is it?’ he asks, his voice still gravelly from sleep.

‘About ten thirty.’

His eyes go wide. ‘Shit.’ Pulling himself to his feet, he gently pushes past me on his way to the oven. When he opens it, a giant plume of steam billows out, filling the living area with the smell of cooking.

It smells delicious. ‘Oh, thank God. I remembered to set the cook timer,’ he says. ‘You hungry? I thought we could have mushroom and ale pie. Looks like it’s kept warm.’

There’s a twinge of disappointment in the very base of my stomach – but another part of it rumbles in anticipation. I’ve not eaten anything since the bibimbap I had for lunch, and Will’s cooking is always phenomenal. Besides, we do have things we should be talking about.

‘So,’ he says once we’ve made a good start on the meal. ‘I know you said we’re even, but I do have to apologise. Are you going to make me apologise for apologising, or will you just let me do it?’

He waits with an eyebrow raised to see if I’m going to stop him. ‘I’ll let you,’ I say with a smile.

‘Good,’ he says. ‘So: I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have run off last night without letting you know, and I shouldn’t have shut you out this week. I know I’m not good at talking about things from my past, but … it’s something I want to do better.’

I take his hand across the table and give it a squeeze. ‘You’re talking now. So – where were you last night?’

He sighs and puts down his fork, though he’s barely touched his food. ‘I was … following a Lithuanian boat captain around Southend-on-Sea. A source I trust said this guy sometimes works for the Circle and that he seemed to be waiting for something to take over the Channel – it could be whatever it is we heard Keith getting harangued about. Not much of a lead, and whether it was true or not, nothing showed up. I basically just spent the night in a fisherman’s pub and missed the last train home.’

‘I didn’t miss much, then.’

He smiles. ‘Nothing worth cancelling your plans over, that’s for sure. But still …’

‘You should have told me.’

‘I should have,’ he agrees.

I appreciate the apology, but he still hasn’t given me a full enough picture. ‘But Will … what’s the deal with the Circle, anyway? What makes them worth dropping everything for? And what makes it so hard for you to talk about them?’

He takes a sharp breath, the way he does when I’ve asked him a too-painful question. ‘The Circle is … not a nice group of people,’ he says, powering through. ‘They’re a trans-European criminal syndicate. Think black turtlenecks and poisoned martinis, always with an extract of purified belladonna – their signature toxin. They ensure total loyalty by pairing up their agents and forcing them to report on each other, to the point where if one of them is killed, the partner is assumed to be responsible for their murder. And they’ve done everything. Corruption. Extortion. Sex trafficking. You name it. They make Keith and Mikey’s gang of middle-aged punks look like teens outside a supermarket.’

That’s worrying in its own way, but it’s still not my main concern. ‘But why drop everything now?’

‘Because they’re impossible to get a lead on. When Keith mentioned Hangjaw being in Stockholm, that was the first time in years I’ve had any information on his whereabouts. Not since I was actively tracking him for a job years ago.’

‘The job where your partner sold you out …?’ I prompt. Why is he being so cagey?

‘Yes,’ is all he says.

Something twinges in my stomach. ‘And by partner you mean …’

He holds my gaze. ‘I mean my professional partner at the time …’

‘Just professional?’ I say before he can finish.

He sits back in his chair. ‘No. She was also my girlfriend.’

Is it bad that my stomach churns more at the word ‘girlfriend’ than at the thought of all the horrible things Will says the Circle has been up to? ‘Well, then.’ I cross my arms. ‘Were you planning on telling me that I’m not the first person you’ve … done this with? Or was I supposed to figure it out for myself?’

My hangover has returned with a vengeance, like two hammers are pounding on my temples, one on each side, just slightly out of sync.

His eyes flick to the window. It’s a gesture I’ve seen on targets before, when I’ve got them cornered and they’re hoping for an exit. ‘I never meant it to be a secret.’

‘You just never got around to telling me.’

‘You didn’t ask.’

We stare each other down, neither of us wanting to be the one who breaks.

Then he seems to shake himself. He lays his palms flat on the table. ‘I’m sorry,’ he says. ‘I can tell you now. Anything you want to know. But I promise you, it’s different—’

‘What’s her name?’ I ask, cutting him off.

‘Phoebe.’

‘And when was the last time you spoke to her?’

He breathes in and then out. ‘Five years ago. Right before she betrayed me.’

‘You haven’t had any contact since?’

‘No. She switched sides to the Circle—’

I drop my fork, which lands with a whump in my mashed potatoes.

‘Will,’ I say quietly, barely able to think over the pounding in my head. ‘Is she still working for them?’

The colour drains from his face. ‘Maisie, I’ve not been researching the Circle because my ex-girlfriend works for them. They’re an awful organisation—’

I stand up from the table. I know, on some level, that I’m being irrational. Will is thirty years old, he’s going to have a history. It’s not even surprising he has an ex-girlfriend – I mean, look at the man. And with the pressure our jobs put on our social lives, is it any wonder she’s from our world, too?

It’s just that I am genuinely surprised by this. I don’t know why, because there is so much we haven’t talked about – so much that we haven’t asked each other. But I thought that it was all stuff that would make sense in its own way, that wouldn’t have me questioning who he really is. Can I really believe that him immediately getting obsessed with this syndicate is totally unrelated to his ex-girlfriend leaving him for them? And even if that’s true, why was he in a relationship with someone who’d want to join a group like that in the first place?

The floor of the boat shifts beneath me, causing something to push up into my throat before I swallow it back down. I usually don’t mind the rocking of The Narrow Escape. When Will and I are in bed, when he’s holding me safe and secure in his arms, it feels soothing. But right now, I’m going to be sick.

‘I need to go home.’

‘Maisie …’ Will says, reaching out for me as I start to walk past him. ‘It’s not … she’s not the reason why …’

But I’m already at the door. ‘Don’t follow me,’ I say, looking back at him. ‘I need some time to think. Alone.’

Chapter 8

Sometimes things really do make more sense in the morning. A little more sense, anyway. At least I can think properly without my head pounding.

Will and I meet up on a deserted stretch of canal halfway between my flat and Limehouse Basin. It’s a spot we’ve always known as somewhere we can sit without having to worry about being overheard – somewhere we can plot together when we’re working on a mission and need a break from The Narrow Escape or my bedroom, our usual spots when working from home. Fresh air brings fresh ideas: we bounce plans for kills off each other, surrounded by the ruins of east London’s industrial past. There’s still a shadow of that here today … but it feels a little different.

‘There’s something else I wanted to tell you last night,’ Will says, as we watch a heron hop from the far bank to land on a rusted iron beam that sticks out of the water through a clingfilm-thin layer of ice.

I laugh drily. ‘Same.’ With everything else that came up, I didn’t manage to tell him anything about what’s been going on with Skyla. ‘But you first.’

He raises an eyebrow but doesn’t press. ‘So,’ he begins. ‘There’s a massive bounty being offered on Hangjaw through the Removal’s job board, and I think we should take it.’ He pauses, but I don’t say anything. Eventually he sighs. ‘And it’s not because of Phoebe.’

I look at him, feeling an ironic smile force its way onto my face. ‘Never said it was.’

He chuckles awkwardly and shifts in his seat. ‘I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you about her before. But surely you know that’s not why … I wouldn’t …’

I turn to face him, staring him right in his beautiful eyes. Eyes that have always made me feel calm and safe and secure, whatever he’s capable of. Sometimes even because of those capabilities, given I know he’d never use them on me.

‘I know,’ I say.

‘I admit that I’m still … angry about how things ended with her.’ His tone is reassuring, his voice level. ‘But not because I have any unresolved feelings for her, and I’m not going after the Circle in the hopes of seeing her again. If I ever run into her – and I have no real reason to think that I will, because they’re a big organisation, though as far as I know she does still work for them – you’d know because I’d tell you about it.’

‘Immediately,’ I add.

He nods. ‘Straight away. And you should too, if that ever happens. She’s a dangerous person. Not evil as such … but just sort of morally empty.’

I sigh and lean into him, feeling his firm arm weight on my arm. I can trust him. I have to trust him. But sometimes, trust isn’t easy.

‘But,’ he says, breaking the silence, ‘I got so close to getting Hangjaw once. I’m sure I could get him this time. And now that I’ve got a lead on where he is …’

I can see where this is going. ‘Business trip,’ I say. ‘Where are you going?’

He takes my hand and gives it a squeeze. ‘I thought we could go to Stockholm for a week or so. Everyone tells me Sweden is lovely this time of year.’

I laugh. The thought of going somewhere even colder and darker in January than England isn’t exactly high on my agenda.

‘Why can’t the sinister international criminal cabal lead us on a trail to Tenerife or Lanzarote?’ I say drily, turning to take in his handsome, serious, concerned face. I feel a pang of regret for the other ways last night could have gone, followed by another pang for what I’m about to say next. Ever since we got together last summer, neither of us have done missions alone, our last two evening jaunts excluded. I don’t like the thought of him going into danger without me, but …

‘I can’t,’ I say, holding his gaze.

He doesn’t ask why, just nods ever so slightly. But I can tell he wants a reason.

‘I think …’ I close my eyes and tilt my head backwards. This next part, I’m admitting to myself as much as I am to him. ‘I think you were right, what you said at lunch on Friday. I’m not sure what’s happened, but I don’t think I’m in a state to be … to have your life in my hands, potentially. If I freeze up again …’

He squeezes my hand again, but stays silent as I trail off.

I continue. ‘And also because … I’ve got another job. At least for now. You remember I worked with Skyla Dawn, years ago?’

He raises an eyebrow, and I tell him everything that’s been happening with her. He nods patiently as I run through it all, though it’s hard to tell as I’m talking how he feels about it. ‘She needs someone to keep an eye on her,’ I finish. ‘In more ways than one.’

‘OK,’ he says, nodding his head slowly. ‘Yeah, I think that sounds … good. I think that makes sense for you.’

Is that it? I’d expected a little bit more, a question about how long I might want to step away from our usual work, or at the very least some concern at this new job given my history with Skyla.

I can’t help but feel something twinge at his muted reaction. I realised on the way home last night, once the night air had cooled me off enough to think it through more logically, that one of the most upsetting things about the Phoebe conversation was the idea that Will might have a type.

If his last relationship was with another hitwoman, what does that say about his reasons for wanting to be with me? Am I just the newest in a line, the most recent person to fill a hitwoman-shaped hole in his heart? Or, worse, a hole that Phoebe left when she betrayed him? And if we’re only together because of our jobs, what will it mean if I can’t be that to him anymore?

I don’t voice these concerns. Instead, although I can already guess the answer, I ask him: ‘When do you leave?’

‘Today.’ It’s what I expected. If Hangjaw is in Stockholm now, a quick reaction is crucial. ‘I booked two tickets on the three fifteen from Stansted, but … I’m sure I can get a refund.’

Unlikely, I think as I flop back into the bench. Then I lean sideways to rest my head silently on his shoulder. It’s hardly the goodbye either of us would have wanted when he’s going up against one of the most dangerous criminal organisations in this part of the world – but it’s better than the note we ended last night on, at least.

‘Stay safe,’ I say, when he finally has to leave.

‘I will.’ He kisses me, just once, gently. ‘You too.’

And then he’s gone.

For the next couple of days, Will’s only presence in my life is as a short series of texts to tell me he made his flight, where he’s staying, and that he misses me.

Before I know it, it’s already Wednesday and I’m reporting for work at the Pillbox music venue in Brixton, pushing to get to the staff entrance through one of the most noisy and excitable queues I’ve seen.

I can’t quite match their level of exuberance. Without Will, things have been feeling a little muted. I don’t think I noticed how lonely I was before he came into my life. I guess it means a lot to have someone you can actually fully share yourself with – who knew?

‘WOOOOOOO!!!!’ shouts the queue – in response to what, I don’t know – as I push through the first layer to find that it has doubled back on itself at least three times over.

To say this show is sold out is putting it mildly. As Skyla explained it, Pillbox is what’s called a ‘mid-sized venue,’ and while Skyla Dawn may have been a ‘mid-sized artist’ before her newest single exploded in popularity, she is such no longer. Once she’s finished this run of gigs her label booked last year, she’s expecting to be back on much, much bigger stages. That makes this among the last chances to see her somewhere intimate before she bounces off to the big leagues. No wonder the fans who got tickets are thrilled to be here.

My phone buzzes just before I step inside. I check it, thinking it might be an update from Will or a message from Skyla, seeing where I’m up to. As it turns out, it’s neither of those things. The image I am confronted with reminds me of that famous photo of Bigfoot: a figure out of focus, from a distance, and striding with purpose. Except, it’s not Bigfoot – it’s me, wearing exactly what I’m wearing now, just a couple of metres behind my current location.

Concerning.

Or, it would be, if it wasn’t from Michelle to the group chat: Boss bitch Maisie Baxter spotted entering her place of work … for SKYLA FREAKING DAWN!!

She’s already followed it up with a selfie of her, Beth and Liv in the queue I just pushed through. Liv and Michelle are beaming from ear to ear, dressed to the nines in black blazers and white shirts, a trend inspired by the music video, which I’m not entirely comfortable with. Beth has gone for a more restrained look; her smile is more restrained, too. Not surprising, considering she knows a lot more about why I’m here than the others do.

Without looking up, I stop just inside the door to text back. Omg I didn’t see you guys!! Enjoy the gig! Hopefully catch you after.

I didn’t exactly intend for my entire friend group to come along with me for my first day on the job as Skyla’s ‘security consultant’, but, well, one thing led to another. Skyla mentioned yesterday when we met at her house to plan that she still had space on the guest list despite how horrendously sold out her gig was, and I didn’t control my expression quickly enough to play it cool.

‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘If we’re going to work together, you can’t lie to me.’

She looked horrified when I told her that Liv and Michelle have tickets to Snow Glow to see her. ‘I told Ian we should have more dates in the UK,’ she muttered. ‘Not finish on some godforsaken ski festival. How many do you need?’

And how could I say no to that?

On the other hand, having spent so long being cagey with them about what I do for a living, it’s nice to be able to let my friends in on what I do with my life, at least a little bit. Michelle was particularly effusive when I told her I was working for Skyla – though I let her assume I was a PA, rather than private security.

This is the beginning of the great bounce back, she messaged me privately after I told everyone. I am SO proud of you. Remember us all when you’re famous, yeah?

My phone buzzes as she sends another one to the group chat: See you at the afterparty Maisie Winking face emoji Winking face emoji

‘Oh God,’ I groan aloud. I don’t even know if there will be an afterparty, but Michelle is convinced there will be – and that it’ll be no trouble at all for me to get them into it.

‘Everything OK, Maisie?’

I look up with a start to find that I’m being watched by someone I’ve never seen before: a smartly dressed woman who can’t be older than twenty-five, drumming a pen against a clipboard in the classic pose of someone who doesn’t like to be kept waiting. My face flushes red as I slip my phone into my pocket. ‘Yep, all good.’

‘Great,’ she says. ‘This way.’

Without waiting to check if I’m following, she sets off walking through the darkly lit corridors of the venue, fast enough that I have to jog to keep up. ‘I’m Emma, by the way, Miss Dawn’s assistant. I’m sure you know already that she will be unreachable during any scheduled rehearsals and soundchecks – as well as the performance itself, obviously.’

Obviously, I mentally echo as we round a corner so fast that I have to make a split-second dodge to avoid a lighting engineer coming the other way with a tray of coffees – forcing me to run to catch up with Emma’s striding pace.

She comes to an abrupt halt outside a door labelled PRODUCTION OFFICE. ‘So whenever Skyla is indisposed, you answer directly to me, OK?’ Then she looks me up and down, and for a second I almost think she’s going to find that I’m somehow not up to her standards, never mind what Skyla thinks. But instead, she smiles and leans in. ‘Anyway, I’m glad she got a woman for this job,’ she whispers. ‘All things considered.’

I’m so taken aback by the sudden change that it takes me longer than it should to register what she’s saying – but I get there. How much does she know? I wonder. But I don’t have time to ask questions – before I know it, Emma is back to her hyper-efficient self and has bundled me into the room.

‘Lanyard,’ she says, handing me a lanyard. ‘That’s for backstage. Hand.’ I proffer one, which she stamps with a stamp I didn’t realise she was holding. ‘That’s for front of house. And this sticker …’ I present the front of my shirt but she rejects it, instead choosing to press it onto my thigh, ‘is for the artist area, but—’

‘But not before the show today because Skyla has a meeting,’ I say. We discussed Skyla’s schedule at her house yesterday, when I signed my contract and we went over general plans for the gig. We also discussed Emma, who Skyla says is the only other person employed by her directly and not her label: in other words, she’s the only other person I can trust.

‘Perfect. If you need anything, come find me. I’ll be outside Skyla’s dressing room when she’s in there for her meeting, and in the wing on stage left when she’s performing.’

‘Got it.’

Then she takes a step back, gesturing to the two other people in the room. One is a middle-aged man in all black with circles under his eyes and a few days of salt-and-pepper stubble, the other a guy in his twenties with a shock of ginger hair and a T-shirt for what I presume is a metal band, judging by the illegible scribble it has for a logo.

‘Meet Ian, Skyla’s tour manager.’ Emma gestures to the older guy. Ian from the phone, I think. He gives me a brief once-over, and then with a gruff nod goes back to his texting. ‘And Benji, who is the venue security manager.’

‘So … not employed by the label?’

Emma gives me a significant nod.

Benji stands up and proffers a hand. ‘Great to meet you! Ready to see mission control?’

Mission control turns out to be a room on the first floor with screens showing live camera footage from every nook and cranny of the venue, plus an interior window that looks out over the main room, towards the stage.

‘Not a bad view,’ I say, watching a roadie unwind a spool of cabling to plug in an electric keyboard. The doors have just opened, and I can spot some of the people I passed in the queue beginning to fill the empty space.

‘Best view in the house!’ Benji beams proudly. ‘You won’t believe the bands I’ve seen from up here. Drowning Pool, Biohazard, Blood Incantation …’

I can, in fact, believe him, but I put on an impressed face all the same.

‘I’m not into Skyla’s kind of pop,’ he continues. ‘But hey – that last track she released was pretty fucked up, wasn’t it?’

‘Erm.’ That’s one way of putting it. ‘Yeah, I guess.’

‘That’s a compliment, by the way,’ he adds, seeing my subdued reaction. ‘Anyway, the hard part is remembering to watch the cameras, not the band. It could be life or death, you know. Thrown bottles, people who don’t know when to stop moshing, terrorists …’

It could indeed. So thank you, Benji, for the reminder to get my head in the game. I’ve been sloppy so far: distracted by my friends being here, and without the adrenaline that comes from the certainty that blood will be spilled. At Novum, I got so used to having crystal-clear boundaries. There was work when it felt like a day job, my home life with friends, and the relatively rare periods where I had to be 100 per cent switched on because someone was almost certainly going to die and I had to make sure it wasn’t me.

What would I do if I had a target here? I ask myself, glancing one by one into each of the monitors. Ian is still in the production office, Emma is demolishing a sandwich outside Skyla’s dressing room, and I even catch Beth, Liv and Michelle ordering drinks at the bar, though they’re too far away to make them out clearly. Is there anything in all that I should be looking out for?

I do a few circuits of the building while the support act is playing, though they teach me precious little, as it turns out. I’m cutting back across the main floor when they leave the stage. They were pretty good from what I heard, but once the lights are dark, every person in the room takes a simultaneous breath in anticipation – myself included. I stop walking and let my gaze fall into the empty space the Skyla Dawn will soon be walking into.

I can use this opportunity to scan the crowd for anyone looking suspicious – is what I tell myself. But who am I kidding? It’s not the thought of danger that’s making my heartbeat quicken and the hairs on my arms stand on end. It doesn’t matter that I’ve sat on her couch as she’s talked about her ex, that I’ve killed for her, or that I’m still not convinced I can trust her. Right now, the idea of Skyla Dawn has wholly replaced the flesh-and-blood woman I’ve been speaking with. She is an icon, a star, invincible.

The illusion shatters the moment she makes her entrance. For everyone else, based on how they’re screaming, the sight of her in costume is apparently rapturous, but all I can think is that she is very exposed up there. I get a sudden image of a man named Archie Henderson, a corporate executive Will dropped a light on last year while he was speaking at a farm show. Skyla’s team have checked and double-checked for all such hazards following my guidance, and have kept access to the rigging strictly controlled – but there are a lot of ways to kill someone when they’re up there all alone.

Not that we have any reason to think anyone wants her dead, I remind myself, taking another pass of the crowd all the same. My heart skips a beat when I catch Liv, Michelle and Beth in among the press of bodies. Having them here when I’m thinking like this is too weird, I’m not going to lie.

‘Anything on the cameras?’ I ask Benji as I return to the control room.

‘Nuh uh. All quiet, and no one in the backstage area at all.’

No one? I think. That doesn’t sound right.

But it’s true. The areas adjoining the stage are completely empty – including the door at stage left, where Emma made it very clear she’d be for the set’s duration. Where is she? With my heartbeat quickening, I scan the corridors until I find her – on the upper floor, outside Skyla’s dressing room, still rapidly eating a sandwich that she surely should have finished by now.

‘Fuck,’ I breathe, as adrenaline flushes through my system. Someone is here. Someone who knows what they’re doing.

‘What’s wrong?’ asks Benji, getting to his feet.

To go back to my question: What would I do if I had a target here?

Well, I’d start with the oldest trick in the book.

‘Stay here,’ I tell Benji, as I start to run towards the door. ‘Someone’s looped the backstage cameras.’

Chapter 9

I race through the corridors of the venue like a woman possessed, flashing my sticker and lanyard and stamp more or less at random whenever anyone tries to block my way. The quickest way to the backstage area is, frustratingly, downstairs, through the main floor, and back up again – but the main floor is unsurprisingly absolutely mobbed right now. I can hear the bass of ‘What She’d Do To You’ from the corridor, and I get the sense that no one wants to be out of the room when that song is playing.

But it’s the only reasonable way, so I just have to push through the crowd, my every action soundtracked by a song that I was 99 per cent sure was about me killing people the first time I heard it – and which I still kind of think might be, despite Skyla’s protestations to the contrary.

Yeah she’s that bitch …

Skyla sings as I accidentally step on a woman’s foot, getting a ‘Watch it!’ in my ear for my troubles.

Knife him in the back, bitch …

as I lock eyes with a big man with a girl on his shoulders – not someone I can push out of the way without risking injury for the three of us. I have to make a decision: right or left? I choose left; he chooses right.

Split the vein—

His right: my left. ‘Sorry, sorry,’ the man mumbles, looking flustered and a little unsteady on his feet.

‘What’s the hurry?’ shouts the girl, some Coke-based mixture sloshing from a plastic cup in each hand.

—watch the blood—

‘Security,’ I shout, flashing my lanyard. ‘Just stay still,’ I add, ducking past the man towards my right this time.

—draining all out, bitch.

And I make it. I catch a momentary glimpse of the door on the right-hand side of the stage, only for a group of teenagers to choose that moment to rush forward, bowling into me in a tangle of gangly arms and legs as a girl’s foot catches on my ankle. I manage to stay upright; she goes crashing to the ground.

She’s a savage—

‘Shouldn’t you check on her?’ a man asks me, gesturing towards my lanyard but doing nothing to help her himself.

‘Emergency,’ I snap in response. ‘Let me through.’

—bodies in acid—

He holds up his hands and backs away. ‘LET ME THROUGH!’ I yell as I force my way to the very front of the crowd. I get another clear view of the door, only to find my path blocked by a group of four girls dancing in a line with their arms linked. Then, when I look for another route, my eyes settle on a familiar face.

Fake a heart attack—

is pretty much how I’m feeling right now, but it’s just Beth: the other two are nowhere to be seen. She says something in the ear of someone in the group next to her and suddenly, like Moses parting the Red Sea, a channel in the crowd springs open for me. They practically usher me to the door.

—never prove it, run it back bitch.

With gratitude in my heart and the chorus still echoing in my head, I finally burst through the door to find Emma right where the camera said she wouldn’t be, just offstage, her apparently infinite sandwich nowhere to be seen. From where she’s standing, she has a good view of the performance and she’s watching Skyla with an open admiration completely at odds with the business, business, business persona she showed to me earlier. The expression drops when she hears the heavy slap of my trainers on the vinyl flooring.

‘See anything?’ I ask, glancing around for intruders.

She blinks at me. ‘Like what?’

There’s no one here, but it wasn’t just this camera feed that was tampered with.

‘Stay here,’ I tell her. The stairs up to the dressing rooms are behind her, past one final doorway. I dash in its direction, flashing my lanyard to the security guy guarding it. He looks down at my sticker and lets me through. By the time I make it to the top of the stairs, I’m almost out of breath, but I push through the doorway into the corridor, and round yet another corner … to find someone dressed in a black leather jacket and dark jeans – standard concert-going uniform, if it weren’t for the unusual flourish of a balaclava and gloves – fiddling with the keypad on Skyla’s dressing-room door.

‘Security!’ I yell. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

They glance in my direction. ‘Ah, shit,’ she says, since judging by her voice, this person’s a woman. Definitely not Dayton, then. She jumps to her feet, scanning the hallway for the best escape route.

I take my moment and lunge towards her, but she dodges faster than I expected and I almost whack my hip on the door handle, only managing to stop myself at the cost of painfully wrenching my ankle. Then when I try to convert my momentum into a punch aimed at her dark brown eye, she deflects it with a practised block. ‘Now, now,’ she says. Which is a very irritating thing to do, if I’m being honest.

‘Who are you?’ I reply, my voice breathy from all the running I’ve been doing.

‘Me?’ she replies. ‘A ghost.’ Then, out of nowhere, her knee is suddenly up where my organs should be, collapsing my diaphragm with enough force to knock two lungfuls of air out through my throat in one sickening burst. My vision goes blurry and I stagger forward. She could kill me if she wanted to.

But apparently she doesn’t. ‘See ya,’ she says instead, in a high-pitched voice like it’s something she’s heard in a video game. Then she takes off, running down the corridor. I draw in a ragged gulp of air and set off after her, but even having refilled my lungs, my whole body is in oxygen deficit.

I push through the pain, driving my arms and legs as hard as they will possibly go. I manage to build speed as we fly down the stairs, and by the time we’ve made it into the corridor with the ticket office – which is deserted except for a few teenage girls crowding their distinctly green-looking friend – I’m starting to feel like I’ve gained ground.

But only just.

‘Stop her!’ I yell to the bouncers by the front door.

One of them spreads his arms out like a rugby player and makes to grab her, but she feints left, dodges right, and sticks a leg out to trip him in one smooth motion, sending him tumbling face-first into his comrade. Then she’s past them and into the night.

‘Which way?’ I pant as I reach the door, looking left and right into the empty street.

‘I don’t …’ says the first bouncer, rubbing his cheekbone where it collided with the other guy’s nose.

‘I didn’t …’ agrees the other, whose nose is bleeding profusely.

‘ARGH!’ I scream into the night. The street is completely silent, which seems impossible – I was right behind her and she couldn’t have run that far. But even when I pull out a torch and start poking it behind bins and into doorways, our mysterious intruder is nowhere to be seen.

After a few moments, Emma materialises beside me. ‘No police,’ she says quietly. ‘I’ll talk to the venue manager and get things smoothed over. You go check in with Benji.’

Doubled over, panting, and utterly embarrassed for getting played so easily, I stare after Emma as she strides back inside, clipboard in hand, perfectly composed despite everything.

Chapter 10

‘This is the coolest thing I have ever seen,’ Benji informs me ten minutes later. I’m back in the security room, where he and I are replaying my brief encounter with whoever that was on one of the monitors. ‘Wait, I need to see that again.’

He taps some keys, and the masked woman expertly sidestepping my clumsy grab attempt plays backwards and then forwards, this time in slow motion – causing my ankle to twinge in memory of how I wrenched it to avoid hitting that door.

The good news, Benji told me when I asked him how he allowed such a flagrant breach at their biggest show of the year, was that our intruder’s camera trick only overrode the live feed being transmitted to the monitors. Accurate footage was still getting saved to the hard drives exactly as it should have been.

The less good news, as I quickly worked out for myself, is that there’s not much to learn from said footage. So far, I’ve only gleaned that our mystery woman entered the building via an upstairs window only accessible after scaling a drainpipe. If I was casing the venue for a job myself, it’s an entry point I’d consider – and then discard, given the 1.5 metre sideways leap from drainpipe to window ledge. Also, anyone who came in that way would still have to get past additional security to get to Skyla onstage … but then she didn’t seem to be going after Skyla, did she? She wanted to get into Skyla’s dressing room.

The really bad news is that I have to watch the footage with Benji. ‘Oof!’ he shouts as the masked woman’s knee whips out to crunch me in the stomach. ‘That must have hurt. Look at her go! She’s like Catwoman or a ninja or …’

He trails off when he sees how I’m looking at him. ‘I mean, you were impressive too,’ he stutters. ‘You handled it better than I could’ve.’

‘Is that meant to be consoling?’ I ask icily.

He turns a little pale.

Still, she is impressive. Infuriatingly so. It was clear from the way Skyla’s home security had been tampered with that we weren’t dealing with an idiot, though in my experience even fuckups like Dayton are capable of real cunning when their pride is wounded. But this woman’s expertise is on a whole other level. Could she be a professional contractor? Dayton would have the money to hire one. Maybe he paid her to scrawl a horrible poem across her dressing-room mirror, to beg Skyla to speak to him, or ask for forgiveness, or to admit their breakup was all her fault, or whatever it is he wants from her.

Or maybe not. Because I can’t help thinking there’s something else I’m not seeing. Where could a man like Dayton have found a woman like this? I’m reminded of the photos of rock stars in Harris Vintage, where we followed Keith, our dodgy witness. Connections between showbiz and organised crime are hardly unheard of – but what kind of connection are we talking here?

‘Ahem,’ says Emma, appearing in the doorway. ‘Skyla is ready for you.’

I grit my teeth and prepare for a bollocking as we wait outside Skyla’s dressing room. But once we’re inside, it’s clear she has other priorities.

‘That was good, wasn’t it?’ Skyla says as Emma closes the door behind us. ‘The sound, the lights, the crowd! Oh, perfect, perfect, perfect.’

‘I loved it,’ says Emma. ‘The emotion you carried in your voice …’

‘It was great,’ I agree. ‘But Skyla—’

She cuts me off. ‘Yes, Emma’s told me already. Concerning. Odd. But! I’m feeling very good right now and I don’t want to talk about anything that might bring me down, so let’s worry about it later, shall we?’

I swallow my words. I’d think that just the knowledge of a skilled maybe-professional trying to break into someone’s dressing room while they were performing would be enough to harsh anyone’s vibe, whether or not the matter was discussed. But what do I know?

Skyla places a hand on Emma’s and my shoulders. ‘Ladies, we have places to be. Maisie, I will have to retain your services for a little longer, though hopefully now you’ve scared away our interloper you can relax for the evening.’ Then, in a darker tone: ‘Ian tells me I need to be networking. Personally, I’d rather do literally anything else, but you know how it is.’

I do know how it is. Popstar, hitwoman, or marketing specialist like Liv and Michelle – there are some horrors all jobs have in common.

We leave the venue through a backdoor that opens directly onto the secluded alley used for deliveries and talent parking. When I checked the alley earlier it was silent. Right now, it is anything but.

‘Skyla!’ fifteen or so women scream as the door opens – their excitement fizzling into disappointed silence when it’s my head that appears through the crack. No one suspicious looking, no one I recognise … except for three women at the back, who are very familiar indeed.

‘We love you!’ the group screams again as Skyla herself follows me out. Well, almost the whole group. ‘Maisie!!!’ shouts Michelle, so loud that it cuts through the other noise. Skyla must hear it too, because she gives me a nudge. ‘You’ve got fans of your own,’ she jokes, before cutting ahead of me to press hands and sign merch like a politician on the campaign trail.

I laugh, catching my friends’ eyes again. Tonight was … not ideal, but it is nice to see them excited for me – not to mention just plain excited to be here. Beth and Michelle are playing it fairly cool, but Liv is literally vibrating. I don’t think I’ve seen her this happy in months – since well before she and Sam broke up, actually. Since they split, she’s been sad, sure, but also noticeably less highly strung. It’s good to see, but it does make me wonder what else was going wrong in their relationship.

‘Hello, hello, hello!’ Skyla says as she moves down the front row of the crowd – which Liv is suddenly in the middle of. ‘Ohmygosh I’m so excited to meet you,’ she says once Skyla gets to her. ‘Maisie has been telling us all about you.’ Skyla and I glance at each other, prompting Liv to add: ‘Oh no, I don’t mean all about you. She’s been absolutely professional, you know, I just mean that she’s so excited to work for you. I’m sorry, I don’t know why I said that.’

‘I’m sure she has,’ Skyla says sweetly, causing Liv to flush with a visible wave of relief. Then Skyla leans in and whispers something in Liv’s ear, which makes Liv turns bright pink. They trade significant glances – Skyla’s enquiring, Liv’s excited but uncertain. Then, with a smile, Skyla drops it and turns back to the crowd. ‘Look at you all!’ she proclaims. ‘Everyone: thank you so much for all your support. You guys are the absolute best. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be able to wake up every morning knowing I have the best job in the entire world. It isn’t always easy – but you make it worth it.’

More cheers, more screaming, and then we’re off, cutting through the crowd in the direction of Skyla’s car.

‘What was that all about?’ I whisper to Skyla as I slip into the seat behind hers. Emma’s sitting across from me, behind the driver who has apparently been waiting for us across the street – a middle-aged woman named Paula I’ve been told about but never met.

‘An invite for the three of them to the afterparty,’ Skyla says. Then turns back in her seat to meet my gaze. ‘Assuming that, as my head of security, you don’t think they pose a threat?’

Not to you, maybe, I think as the car pulls away.

My phone buzzes as Paula confidently drives us towards the West End. It might be a Wednesday, but that won’t stop the good people of London from braving the cold in search of a good time: women in tiny dresses and massive coats; men either enjoying the luxury of society’s more practical expectations for their gender’s clothing, or squandering that privilege by going out in a T-shirt to look hard.

Michelle has messaged our group chat with a somewhat loaded question:

Maisie, settle an argument for us. Based on what you know about her, do you think THE Skyla Dawn, whose current boyfriend is motherflipping DAYTON, was hitting on our Liv just there? Or was she simply inviting us ALL to the afterparty as friends of her great new employee Maisie Baxter to make her feel like a valued part of the team?

My cheeks go warm as I read it, and I tilt my phone screen away from the rest of the car as I think of a reply. Could there be any truth in what Liv’s presumably told everyone? Of course, she and Michelle don’t know that Skyla and Dayton are no longer an item, and Skyla is bisexual (that one Reddit user’s off-beat suspicions aside), but surely she wouldn’t try to seduce one of my friends literally right in front of me? While both of us are at work? That feels incredibly unprofessional.

Just polite, surely, I send back. But then, she is a popstar … So, you guys are coming?

YES!!!!!!! replies Liv almost immediately.

The car stops outside the Rococo Club, a private venue not far from Leicester Square in London’s West End. Skyla’s face gets us through security, and I can already hear the obnoxious bass from below. Was I naive to expect a music-industry party to have decent music?

‘Keep your wits about you,’ Skyla says as we head down the stairs. ‘This industry is a nest of vipers.’

‘I’ve met producers before,’ I say. As she well knows.

She pauses at the bottom of the stairs outside the door to the main bar area and looks back at me. ‘When your friends get here we’ll have enough people to fill up a booth. But until then … stick close.’

I nod. She takes a breath, settles her face into a mask of amiability, and opens the door.

Some people might say pop music has cleaned up its act lately. Gone are the days of wanton excess: of labels plying their talent with drugs and booze until they’re in too much of a daze to ask where the money’s going; of creepy male stars sleeping with underage groupies and creepy male producers sleeping with underage stars.

That is true … to an extent. That behaviour is rarer now, if not exactly rare. But given what the industry looked like before it cleaned up its act, its act remains, by normal standards, pretty damn messy.

‘The woman of the hour!’ says an older man as we enter the bar, who makes no effort to hide the thorough once-over he gives all three of us. My jaw clenches at the sight of him: there have been rumours about this one. Someone even put out a hit on him recently, which led to Will and me spending a few days going over his files, trying to sift fact from fiction. We weren’t able to – not enough to be sure. But off the record, he’s lucky that my approach is more ‘absolute certainty’ than ‘reasonable suspicion’.

Skyla talks politely to him for a few minutes, then manages to disentangle herself. ‘Cretin,’ she mutters once we’re out of earshot. Then she draws the attention of a gangly, bearded guy in a paisley-print shirt and a lanyard reading SOUNDBOX MEDIA.

‘Here she is!’ he shouts, going in for a side-hug. ‘Skyla Dawn. Haven’t seen you since – what, Glasto’ twenty-three? How have you been?’

They chat amiably for a few minutes, before Skyla manufactures another excuse. She leaves him with a smile on his face, but dusts off her jacket where he touched her as we walk away.

‘Who was he?’ Emma asks.

‘No idea. But he’s reviewing the show, so got to be nice.’

This pattern repeats itself a few times as Skyla slowly drifts back and forth, dropping in and out of conversations with journalists, executives, and other industry professionals. Every time it’s a few minutes of chitchat, an elegant excuse, and a muttered comment only Emma and I can hear. Not all of them are creepy men – and, if anything, her interactions with the women present are even more tense. We run into Avery Guo, a singer on Skyla’s label I came across during my research, whose style runs darker than Skyla’s used to. Their words are friendly enough … but between them there’s an electricity I’m more used to seeing in paramilitary headquarters before someone gets dropped in the piranha tank.

Emma must notice my noticing. ‘They used to be close,’ she explains in a whisper, ‘but Avery thinks Skyla stole her sound for her newest single. Not strictly true – but all the same …’

Interesting, I think. Enough motive to dress up in a balaclava and try to break into her dressing room? Her eyes are the right colour, for all that’s worth, and I even remember her talking in interviews about a childhood spent learning gymnastics. She might be able to make the jump to the window … but could I imagine her kneeing me in the gut so hard I nearly vomit?

‘That table,’ Skyla says when she’s had enough, nodding to an empty booth in the back of the room. By now, the post-performance high that had her walking on air has almost entirely faded. Instead she’s tetchy and anxious. She takes the seat furthest from the dancefloor and instructs me to sit beside her while Emma goes off to get us drinks.

‘Talk to me,’ she says, sounding exhausted. ‘If we look deep enough in conversation, maybe we’ll survive without anyone bothering us.’

The question comes out without thinking: ‘Skyla, are you OK?’

She rolls her eyes. ‘I’m fine. This just isn’t my scene. And like I said, it’s a nest of vipers in here.’ She glances at the empty seats in the booth. ‘Are your friends still coming?’

‘I think so.’

Though I’m starting to regret not pushing back on the idea. It didn’t take me long to figure out Skyla’s purpose in inviting them: it’s not that she fancies Liv, and it’s not that she wanted to make me feel welcome. She just wants bodies in seats, positioned between her and the world so that she can be seen in attendance without having to talk to anyone. No one can say she isn’t strategic … but is being a popstar really so lonely?

‘What about those people at your house last week?’ I ask, aware that I’m being nosy. ‘Are any of them coming?’

She shuts me down immediately. ‘New topic of conversation. That man in the purple silk shirt – don’t look at him. How much?’

The room suddenly feels colder. The only man I’ve seen in a purple silk shirt is one of the most famous radio DJs in the country.

‘And I don’t mean to sleep with him,’ Skyla adds.

‘It depends what he’s done.’

‘What hasn’t he done?’

Goosebumps track up my arm. ‘Let’s not talk about this.’

Skyla rolls her eyes. Fortunately, before either of us can make things even more difficult for the other, Emma appears with a tray of three identical drinks.

‘Whiskey sours,’ she says for my benefit, not Skyla’s. We clink glasses, then Skyla broods in the corner while Emma and I maintain stilted small talk about where we’re each from, how long we’ve been living in London, and any vagaries around our respective jobs that we’re comfortable sharing. My vagaries are particularly vague, since I don’t know how much Emma knows already and, as nice as she seems, I don’t want her learning any more.

Eventually, my phone buzzes with a text from Beth. ‘They’ve just arrived,’ I relay to Skyla. ‘Sounds like they had some trouble getting an Uber.’

But Skyla’s not listening. She’s looking past my shoulder, her face white beneath her makeup. But she isn’t afraid – she’s angry. Her fist slams on the table, making her untouched cocktail slosh over the lip of her glass. ‘I give one request for this stupid event,’ she hisses to Emma. ‘And those absolute arseholes …’

It doesn’t take long for me to spot him. At the far side of the bar, red-faced, swaying slightly, with an arm around the waist of one Avery Guo, is Dayton – Skyla’s ex-boyfriend.

Chapter 11

‘Come with me,’ Skyla says as she gets up to leave the table. The words are directed at me alone. To Emma she doesn’t say anything – they exchange a subtle nod, then Emma sets off towards Dayton.

‘Are you sure you don’t want me to …’ Talk to him instead, is how I would have finished that sentence, if Skyla’s glare didn’t strangle the words in my throat.

‘No.’ She doesn’t sound angry now, just exhausted. ‘Emma’s met him before. She can handle him. Just get me home. I’ve done my time.’

I shoot one last glance after Emma. Avery has pushed Dayton away – she doesn’t seem much happier to see him than Skyla is – so he’s now between us and the entrance, which makes things difficult. He’s looking a little sheepish. Sheepish and strung out. Even from across the room, his eyes are almost entirely pupil.

I spot Beth across the room, craning her neck to see over the crowd that’s forming around Dayton.

‘Let’s take the fire escape,’ I say, leading Skyla to a door with a push-bar latch and a big sign reading DOOR IS ALARMED. EMERGENCY USE ONLY. Fortunately, there’s a keyhole to override the alarm, and, also fortunately, the lock only takes a bit of finessing to open it without needing the key.

Skyla thanks me as I let her into the harshly lit staircase. The door shuts with an echoing metallic crunch, and I send a quick message to my friends, apologising for rushing off and warning them about the creeps in attendance. Then we climb. The only sounds are our shuffling footsteps on the concrete, our ragged breathing, and the steadily fading music from below.

It’s an uncomfortable silence. I should be reassured that Skyla was telling the truth about Dayton, given he showed up here in the state he was in, but I’m not at all. Because why hire me as security, then send your PA to deal with a man who could be dangerous? And then there’s the masked woman from the gig venue, who Skyla still hasn’t asked me about. It doesn’t add up.

‘Skyla …’ I ask. ‘Is there something you’re not telling me?’

She stops walking. ‘I’m paying you to keep me safe,’ she says without turning to face me. It’s cold in the stairwell, and her breath mists as she speaks, hanging in a green luminescent cloud beneath an emergency light fixture. ‘Not to talk about my problems.’

What else did I expect?

‘Look …’ I begin. ‘If you want me to keep you safe, I have to know what I’m up against. Who do you think that woman could have been, who was trying to get into your dressing room? Do you have any idea?’

‘Dayton has connections. It could be someone he hired. Or …’ She sighs in frustration. ‘I don’t know. As you’ve seen, it’s not easy to keep friends in this industry.’

Let’s stick with Dayton for now. ‘What kind of connections?’

Her eyes flick towards the door at the bottom of the stairs. I catch a flash of regret, more apparently genuine than most of the emotions I’ve seen her express tonight.

‘You saw his eyes just now, didn’t you?’ Her words push out past gritted teeth, but she gets faster and louder as she keeps talking. ‘The kind of connections that weaselled their way into his life when he was too young to say no. The kind that got him hooked on what they had to sell and then hiked up the prices, and keep on selling even though he’s practically bankrupt. The kind that worm their way through this entire rotten industry that takes talented people and chews them up and hollows them out into shells that it hurts to be around, never mind have people think you’re dating. But it’s what the label wants, so …’

‘Skyla,’ I say, taking a step towards her.

She glares at me. ‘Back off.’

I back off.

She sighs, her shoulders sagging. ‘All right, fine. You want to know what’s going on here, Maisie?’

‘I do.’

‘Well then. You know our big duet?’

‘Of course.’

‘Of course,’ she echoes. ‘Who doesn’t know “Love on a Feather”? It was only number one for, what, three months? Not that it matters to me.’

‘What?’ I ask. ‘Why not?’

She looks me in the eye. ‘How much research have you done about me? Did you find who has songwriter credit for that song?’

Who indeed? The credit was never listed online, oddly. ‘I don’t—’

‘It’s Dayton. But they won’t let it be known, because it’s bad optics. Who owns the master?’ This time she doesn’t let me reply. ‘Dayton. Who gets the money every time it’s sampled, or remixed, or played on the radio, or streamed, or sold, or performed live?’

‘Day—’ I begin.

‘Wrong. Not Dayton, because he’s so hopelessly in debt to the dickhead gangsters who sell him his heroin that all that money goes directly to them. So they can keep drip-feeding him fucking smack in direct view of the entire fucking industry. And do you want to know who wrote that stupid song?’

I open my mouth to speak, but stop myself. Her tone has spelled out the answer clearly enough.

‘Exactly,’ she says, voice bitter. ‘But let’s not stop there. What about the rest of the album that song is on?’

Surely not.

‘Eighteen months I spent writing those songs. Every word, every note, I’m all over the entire thing. It was mine. Except, at the last minute, Dayton gets assigned by the label to make “Love on a Feather” a duet, and someone decides that actually maybe he’s better suited to the entire record, and then somehow it’s his name that ends up all over the paperwork. Funny, isn’t it? I could complain – but, oh yeah, I’d just escaped from my last rotten contract and, given the circumstances, I wasn’t exactly in the mood to draw attention to myself. So I rolled over and took it. And besides, everyone knows Dayton is a nice boy, don’t they? Surely I can trust my partner when he says we should play the long game and he’ll split everything fairly.’ She laughs darkly. ‘That went well.’

She stops talking, taking sharp breaths that make her shoulders jerk up and down. This was all stuff that I could’ve done with knowing sooner, but somehow now is not the time to point that out.

‘So now …’ I prompt.

She looks at me. ‘So now, I’ve threatened to go public about our breakup unless he signs over what’s rightfully mine. Naturally, he can’t handle it. Which is why I hired you.’ And then, before I can reply: ‘You’re still coming to Manchester, aren’t you?’

Still?

‘Sure. I mean, if you want me to.’

She breathes out and smiles, finally relaxing a little. ‘You did well today, Maisie. I’ll be honest, when you showed up in my bedroom the other night, it was … terrifying. It’s been years, and I didn’t know if I could trust you. But, well, even considering your job …’ she gives me a sly look out of the corner of her eye, ‘you don’t seem too bad.’

All of a sudden, I feel very seen. How is it that I’ve spent so much brainpower appraising her, trying to sort out her strange combination of confident and insecure, gregarious and lonely, approachable and guarded, without stopping to consider that she’d be doing the same thing to me?

I think of the comments she made about that DJ, down in the bar. How much? And I don’t mean to sleep with him. She was trying to provoke me – but why? To test my limits?

How does she really feel about having a killer on staff? About being alone with one in a disused stairway? When I try to see it objectively, it’s obvious that not everyone would be comfortable in her position. Would feel comfortable being with me, knowing what I’ve done.

But then, not everyone in the position Skyla was in seven years ago would have hired a hitwoman to get them out of it.

‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘It’s been nice getting to know you again.’

She laughs and sets off walking. There’s a different kind of silence between us as we climb the rest of the stairs. Still not quite companionable – there’s too much we don’t know about each other, too much thinking to be doing. But maybe it’s starting to get there.

Chelsea and Mile End are in pretty much opposite directions, so I’ve no chance of getting a lift home with Skyla and Paula. No big deal – it’s only a five-minute walk to Leicester Square Tube station. And who should I find waiting for me on the platform?

‘Maisie!’ shout Beth, Liv and Michelle in unison as they see me.

‘That was wild,’ says Michelle. ‘Not quite what I expected from a Skyla Dawn afterparty, but I asked and you delivered – go, Maisie!’

‘I still cannot believe we saw Dayton in real life,’ Liv sighs. ‘He’s even more good-looking than I thought!’

I catch Beth’s eye, as she gives me a quizzical look. From what I saw, she was the only one of them to have a clear view of Dayton, at least while I was still in the bar. I wonder if she picked up more of his generally unwholesome vibe than the others did.

‘Ugh, I know,’ groans Michelle. ‘But good news! Arman has agreed, I can have Dayton as my hall pass. So if Maisie keeps getting us invites …’ She winks at me.

Liv looks appalled. ‘What?! That is massively unfair. You can’t be in a happy relationship and get to sleep with celebs – what about us single people?’

I’m pleased to hear, her voice doesn’t even wobble on the word ‘single’.

‘Did either of you … you know, talk to him?’ I ask gently. If they did, I should probably warn them that my boss’s erratic ex-boyfriend is not worth the effort, however hot he might be. It wouldn’t be the first time – both of them had a knack for bringing real weirdos home when we were at uni together.

‘No!’ Liv and Michelle shout in unison, followed by a grumbled ‘I wish’ from Liv.

‘They caught one glimpse of him,’ says Beth. ‘Before some guys came over and started asking us questions like “who do you know?” and “why are you here?” and “you don’t even work in music, do you?” And since our only contacts had apparently just left the building, we started to feel a little unwelcome.’

‘I could’ve stayed,’ says Liv, kicking her feet on the platform.

Probably best you didn’t, I think. Then the train arrives, and we move onto different topics.

‘What is going on between Skyla and Dayton?’ Beth asks me as we hang up our coats on the back of our flat’s front door. It started snowing as we walked from the station, just enough to leave dust on our jackets. Inside, it’s warmer – but only just.

‘It’s complicated.’ Which is another way of saying I still don’t quite have a grasp on it. For all Skyla said about him as we left the club, her tone was a bit odd for a woman talking about an ex. I still can’t visualise how their relationship worked.

‘He’s in debt to some gang, she wants the masters and royalties to their big duet … and the rest of the album it’s on,’ I explain as I follow Beth through to the kitchen and she turns the kettle on. It’s our normal routine when we come home together after a night out: a bit of a chat while we make our sleepytime teas, then off to bed. ‘It’s a mess, basically.’

Beth watches me as I place our usual mugs on the counter. ‘I overheard something, but it wasn’t that. That girl you and Skyla were with …’

‘Emma. She’s Skyla’s assistant.’

‘Right. I only caught a bit what they said to each other, but it was something like, “If you want it that badly, you know what you have to do.” After that, he just sort of groaned and stomped off.’

I raise an eyebrow. ‘Huh.’ I can fit together parts of what that might mean, but none of them quite give the full picture. It’s clear enough what Skyla wants from Dayton – but what could Dayton want from Skyla?

‘He looked … worried,’ says Beth. ‘Well, that’s putting it lightly. He looked out of his nut.’

‘Skyla thinks he was on something.’

Beth nods. ‘Something bad, surely. Liv and Michelle were getting drinks at the time so, as far as they’re concerned, he’s still floppy-haired Prince Charming.’

I roll my eyes. ‘He’s not,’ is all I have to say about that. ‘If either of them look like they’re in with a chance, we’ll need to have a word.’

Chapter 12

The next morning I wake to a text from Will saying that he’s going off grid and won’t be in touch until Sunday at the earliest. Don’t worry, he’s written, so of course I do. How could I not, after everything he’s told me about Hangjaw and the Circle? Only for a few minutes, though, then I push it to the back of my mind. Will is good at his job. He’ll be OK.

I spend the next four days at home, successfully not worrying. At first it’s fun: Beth and I cook elaborate breakfasts, catch up on our series, and have Liv and Michelle over for dinner. They gush about how amazing it is I’ll be with Skyla at Snow Glow, which finally convinces Beth to come along, too.

Even when Sunday comes and goes without any word I’m still feeling OK. He’ll be in touch soon, I tell myself. He said Sunday at the earliest.

But when Monday evening hits and there’s still no message, the hum of anxiety that’s been building all day gets harder to ignore. Especially when Beth has plans of her own, and I’m alone for the night.

At 8 p.m. I start to get ready for bed. I’ll be off to Manchester in the morning – Skyla wants me to travel with her on the tour bus – and then we fly to France for the festival the day after. An early night will do me good. By 8.30 p.m. I’m under the covers, mind still racing. And at 8.49 p.m. I’m back up, pacing my bedroom floor, contemplating rearranging the furniture so long as it provides a distraction.

I’ve not decided if it’s a good or a bad thing that my window opens directly onto the roof of the chicken shop downstairs. For most people, I imagine, it’d be a bad thing – especially since there’s a vent on their roof with a nasty habit of spewing fried-chicken stink almost directly into my bedroom.

On the other hand, it is great for coming and going without being seen: especially before Beth knew what I did for a living, when I’d occasionally need to come straight home after a mission wearing a ballgown, nurse’s scrubs, or full-on hippie rave gear without her getting the wrong impression. Or, worse, the right one.

But I have been known to worry, if someone ever managed to rumble my real identity, whether it could provide a disturbingly easy way for them to get to me.

Right now, that worry has just resurfaced, big time. Why? Because I’ve just heard a noise. The sort of noise that could have just been a bird hitting glass, if I’d only heard it once. But birds don’t usually hit the same window three times in a row.

Bom-bom-bom. There it is again.

I’m only wearing my pyjamas, but there’s a 9mm pistol in my sock drawer, which is all the protection I need. I click off the safety and pull back the curtain, to find a huge dark shape squatting on my window ledge. I look into its eyes … and feel an incredible surge of relief.

‘Oh my God, Will, you scared me,’ I say as I open the window, letting in a gust of wind that sends papers flying from my desk.

‘Sorry, sorry.’ Snowflakes fall from his clothes onto the scented candles on my windowsill as he climbs into the warmth. From his clothes, not his coat – as it turns out he’s not wearing one.

‘Be careful of my—’ I say as he almost kicks a candle to the floor, but my words freeze when I get a proper look at him. ‘What happened to you?’

He smiles, which makes the dried blood around his eye crack and flake. His blood, by the look of it. He’s got a big gash on the forehead, not to mention the obvious effects of having been out in the cold too long. Hs teeth are chattering, his lips an uncomfortable bluish colour. ‘You should see the other guy,’ he says as he closes the window behind him. ‘Sorry for not calling. Lost my coat in a warehouse in Esbjerg, made it to Amsterdam and had to stow away on board a – well, I’m not sure what it was, actually, but it was going to Newcastle, thankfully.’

He wobbles a little as he’s speaking, so I guide him to the bed and start untying his shoes. ‘Let me get these off you,’ I say, worry rising cold in my throat.

‘Thank you,’ he breathes, shuffling under my duvet as soon as his feet are free. I’d rather he didn’t get blood on my sheets, but he obviously needs the heat.

I pass him the still-warm mug of tea from my bedside table.

He takes it gratefully, his fingers trembling as they wrap around the ceramic. ‘Thank you,’ he whispers again, his voice weaker. I look at him, knees pulled to his chest under the blanket, and an intense protective need surges inside me. I root around in my cupboards, pulling out the most man-friendly warm clothing I can find: baggy gym sweatpants and an oversized Christmas jumper.

‘You’re shivering, which is a good sign,’ I say, joining him in bed. ‘But you still might have hypothermia. So you can’t fall asleep on me, OK?’

He nods. ‘Not my f-f-first rodeo,’ he says with a trembling smile.

I hand him the clothes. ‘Are you OK to change into these? Or do you want me to strip you?’

‘I’m always happy for you to strip me.’ He winks, but the wobble in his voice undercuts the effect. ‘I should be OK to do it myself, though.’

Except, when he starts trying to pull his fleece off, his fingers struggle to bend how they’re supposed to. He tries once and then again, staring in confusion as his hands fumble clumsily.

‘Come here,’ I whisper and do it for him. Despite his lack of coat, he’s still wearing a thick fleece, an insulated shirt, and a tight thermal, which probably explains why he managed to make it back to London instead of literally freezing solid on the way. And despite the snow, nothing he’s wearing is either wet or looks like it has been, which is incredibly lucky … except for the innermost thermal, which is streaked with copper-brown stains. The skin beneath it is mottled with cuts and bruises: the sort of bruises you get from being kicked while you’re down, literally. ‘Christ,’ I say, lightly brushing his chest with my fingers, careful to keep the blankets tight enough around us both to retain heat. ‘Who did this to you? Hangjaw?’

‘No,’ he says as I pull the clean wool jumper over his head. Rudolf has to stretch slightly to cover his chest and shoulders, but Will looks cosier now, at the very least. ‘Hangjaw wouldn’t have had the courtesy to leave the room once he thought I was unconscious. By the time I got there he was already gone – and no sign of his partner either, whoever they are. But they’d left some guys behind to finish off the deal.’

This isn’t exactly the sexiest conversation to be having as I unbutton his trousers. But … ‘What deal?’

‘Some kind of sale to a big Swedish AI company,’ he says as he helps me shuck him out of them. Fortunately, there are no signs of frostbite on his legs or feet when I uncover them. They are merely pale – no discoloration. ‘Under the table, of course.’

‘And they’re selling …?’

A dark chuckle. ‘No idea. Could be stolen code, trade secrets, smuggled hardware … the Circle has their fingers in so many pies, and even the guys they left to do the deal probably didn’t know the full story. Each pair is on a strict need-to-know basis. That’s why tracking them down is so impossible.’

I look at him, relieved that his speech is getting more coherent and that colour is steadily returning to his face. He probably isn’t hypothermic – which is a miracle, considering what he’s been through.

‘Honestly, this mission was largely a bust,’ he says, taking another sip of tea. ‘The only thing I discovered is where Hangjaw went next.’

‘Which is?’

‘Turin. I was thinking of going straight there, but …’

‘I’m glad you didn’t.’

He smiles. ‘Me too.’ Then it dims. ‘I’ll have to go tomorrow, though.’

I feel guilty about the next words that come out of my mouth – but I have to ask them. ‘What about Phoebe?’

‘No sign at all.’

Another wave of relief, and I pull him into a hug. He’s still shivering – just the slightest tremor. He wriggles in the hug until he can look right at me and pushes a strand of hair from my face. ‘Thank you,’ he whispers. ‘And … sorry.’

‘Sorry?’

‘For making you worry.’

I kiss his forehead, just left of his scabbed cut. ‘Who says I was worried?’

His smile says he sees through my lie, but he’ll let it slide. ‘And for … how things went before I left. You know how it is, don’t you? When you’re really in something, you don’t have time to think. Either it works or it doesn’t. But when you’re hiding in a shipping container, and can’t eat, and it’s cold … thinking is all you can do.’

I shudder in sympathy. It’s one thing to be in a life-or-death situation when it’s fast. The adrenaline kicks in and it’s like you’re living in an action film. But being in a life-or-death situation that’s slow is another thing altogether. You end up asking yourself certain questions.

His ice-blue eyes bore into mine. ‘There are things that I … shouldn’t have held back for so long. Things I need to explain … that I owe it to you to …’

I kiss him again by his ear and pull him in closer, his face into my collarbone. ‘Will, the most important thing now is making sure it’s safe for you to sleep. I agree we need to have this conversation … but it can wait until the morning.’

He looks as if he’s going to protest – but he doesn’t. I feel him relax against me, and we stay like that, holding each other in silence, for the rest of the night.

As it turns out, we don’t get a chance to have that conversation in the morning. At 6 a.m., my phone rings. It’s a Carlisle number. A woman’s voice. Local accent, tone level and professional. You could say it’s the voice of someone trained to have a good bedside manner.

‘Good morning, is that Miss Maisie Baxter speaking? I’m calling to speak to you about a Ms Susan Baxter, I believe she’s your mother.’

‘That’s right,’ I confirm in a whisper, not wanting to disturb Will.

‘I’m phoning from Cumberland Infirmary, I’m one of the nurses here. Your mum was brought in for observation overnight. I just wanted to let you know that we’re going to have to keep her in a bit longer, OK?’

My stomach tightens. I’d spent the last few days avoiding my phone, trying to take my mind off Will, but as a result I hadn’t been checking in with Mum as much either. I can’t believe she’s been in hospital for hours and I’m only finding out now.

‘Miss Baxter, are you there?’

‘Yep, yep, still here, sorry,’ I say, scrambling out of bed. ‘Is she OK, though? I mean, why was she brought in?’

The cold of the hardwood floors stings my feet as I step out into the hall, but I stand there, feeling it. What kind of daughter doesn’t know that her mum is going into hospital?

‘Look, pet …’ Her tone softens. ‘Your mum tells us you’re down in London. I know it’s difficult, but if there’s any way you’d be able to visit her …’

Chapter 13

When I phone Skyla to explain that I won’t be able travel up to Manchester with her as planned, she pauses for so long before replying that I start to think we’ve lost connection.

‘Fine,’ she says eventually. ‘But you can make it back before the actual show, right?’

I have a feeling that that might depend on just how serious this situation actually is … but I wouldn’t be much of a bodyguard if I ditched her on the second real gig I was hired for.

‘Yes,’ I promise. Positive thinking, Maisie. ‘I’m like, ninety-nine per cent sure she’s OK. I just need to know.’

Another pause. I’m not being unreasonable, am I?

Lots of people have important jobs, and they’d all have to find a way to work around it if they got a call like that about their mum. Or does it not work like that? Has every other adult in the world just got used to worrying about their parents – until eventually, they’re not around anymore, and you’re the one being worried about?

‘OK,’ she says. ‘But don’t forget, our flight to Snow Glow is early tomorrow morning, so make sure you take everything you need along with you.’ Another pause. ‘Oh. And also,’ she adds in a way that makes it obvious that this is not something she has just thought of now, ‘I’ll need you to do something for me before you go.’

I start to splutter that it’s really quite important for me to be getting a move on, but she cuts me off before I can get it out.

‘Don’t worry, it won’t take long. And Maisie – I’m sorry to hear that about your mum. I hope she’s OK.’

I let out a breath. ‘Thank you, Skyla. Sorry for the hassle.’

She laughs. ‘If this is what gets me killed, at least I’ll have died doing a good deed.’

I chuckle politely. Hopefully it won’t come to that.

Skyla’s ‘something’ turns out to mean driving to a car park near Wanstead Tube station to await further instructions. As I sit there watching the weak sun rise over the sharp iron fence that separates a squat brown housing estate from the tatty concrete station, and the coming morning turns the sky from featureless dark grey to featureless mid grey, I wonder why anyone even bothers hiring a hitwoman in England. It’s a miracle we survive the winters without topping ourselves.

It’s a far cry from the hot European autumn I shared with Will. Swimming out from a Cretan beach in early October, the sea warm and blue …

But then, if Will and I had been a bit more careful about our spending in the autumn, perhaps the winter wouldn’t have turned out like this.

I spot Emma as she comes out of the station.

‘She wants you to hold on to this,’ she says, passing a small parcel through my rolled-down window.

‘What is it?’

‘Just some jewellery she’s worried might get stolen, with everything that’s going on.’ She glances around the dingy car park. I get the sense she’s enjoying the view about as much as I’ve been. ‘Can’t be too careful.’

I flip it over, testing the weight in my palm. It’s fairly small, about the size of a boxed smartphone, but heavier than I’d have expected, and sellotaped up so thoroughly that there’s barely an inch of cardboard left exposed.

‘Sure. Could you tell her again how sorry I am?’

‘Just bring it to Manchester, OK?’ Then she leans back, dropping the eye contact. ‘She told me about your mum, by the way. She’s not annoyed, if you were worried about that. She’s just got a lot going on.’

I chuck the package onto the seat beside me. ‘Thanks, Emma. See you in Manchester.’

‘See you tonight,’ she says with a smile.

Christ. It’s going to be a long day.

When was the last time I was in a hospital?

The thought comes to me as I pull into the car park of the Cumberland Infirmary. I suppose it was about two years ago. A politically useful war criminal was due to speak to parliament, just as soon as he recovered from a taxpayer-funded appendectomy. He never did, naturally. Not one of my … fairer kills, given he was already anaesthetised, but he wouldn’t have suffered.

I shudder. I’ll think about anything to stop worrying about Mum.

‘Second floor, Willow Ward A,’ says the girl at the desk when I tell her who I’m looking for.

I’m stopped by an orderly at the entrance to the ward, who waves me to a plastic chair next to a coffee machine and tells me that Mum is in with one of the doctors. ‘How long will they be?’ I ask.

‘Couldn’t tell you, sorry.’

Great.

My phone buzzes. Will has texted a few times, saying he hopes everything goes well and to phone him if I need to talk. He’s already at the airport, heading to Italy on Hangjaw’s trail. I feel a stab of worry: he was in such bad shape last night that I don’t want to think about him on another job alone.

But the message is from Beth, and her tone is more my speed right now. I messaged the group chat first thing to tell them what had happened with Mum, and they responded with a heartfelt barrage of stickers and emojis. But this last one was private: Want to hear something that might take your mind off it?

Go on … I reply.

OK, Beth replies. That’s the entire message. Beth is one of those people who texts in complete stream of consciousness. Each text corresponds to one thought, whether that’s a single word or a paragraph-long sentence – which means when you’re texting her, you spend a lot of time watching those three little dots while you wait for her to finish what she’s actually saying.

Well, OK, maybe this is a bit weird but it’s just been so long since I’ve properly researched something and I couldn’t help myself

My phone buzzes again.

But

Remember that Reddit user we found who was EXCEPTIONALLY convinced about Skyla being a secret lesbian and NOT bi like she says she is?

I do remember that. A strange thing to be so hung up on, but then there are a lot of strange people online.

I was curious

Did they know something?

Well, only one way to find out, right?

So

I messaged them

She was a bit hesitant to talk at first but I could tell there was something there so I kept pushing

And guess what

I reply: What?

The next message takes longer to arrive.

She said she KNEW Skyla was a lesbian because, get this, she was SKYLA’S GIRLFRIEND UNTIL LIKE LAST YEAR

??????? I reply.

They broke up because (she says) Skyla refused to go public about them being together, Beth continues as if I hadn’t interrupted.

And now she’s REALLY pissed off

Kind of an intense person tbh though Skyla did fuck her about, it sounds like.

But yeah! Drama.

Wow. That is drama, given, as I understand it, Skyla and Dayton’s relationship began around the time they recorded ‘Love on a Feather’, and continued until just a few months ago.

Could this be a polyamory thing? I message. Like, she was dating this girl and Dayton at the same time? That could explain why they were keeping it on the DL.

No, Beth replies. Another one-word message, leaving me staring at the bouncing dots as she composes the next one.

Not WHILE she was dating Dayton.

INSTEAD of dating Dayton.

I feel my fingers tense around the plastic case of my phone.

That was all fake, apparently. A publicity stunt for the label.

Then she starts sending me screenshots – a photograph of Skyla canoodling with a woman, along with some messages:

Ugh, they’re making me get papped with the “BF” again tomorrow … wish it was you babe.

Of course, it would be incredibly easy to fake this, but who would go to the trouble?

Well, that’s a bad question – loads of weird people would go to the trouble. But is that what this woman is doing?

I groan and slump down in my horrible plastic chair. It looked promising, but this has not succeeded in distracting me from my troubles – except, maybe, by giving me new ones.

I think of the matter-of-fact way Skyla explained her worries about Dayton, and the texts from him she read aloud but never showed me. Then there’s the disparity between what Skyla said Dayton wanted to talk to her about at the afterparty – some response to her threatening to go public about who really wrote ‘Love on a Feather’ – and what Beth overheard Emma actually say to him: If you want it that badly, you know what you have to.

Finally, there was the way she didn’t say anything concrete the first time I saw her again, until after she’d ushered her friends from the house – and how much more self-assured she seemed once she had done so. Almost as if she was giving herself time to think of an angle.

All of which I’d clocked already. I knew Skyla was hiding something from me, and it’s not like she’s asked me to kill for her or anything like that … but seriously, why does every client have to be a liar? Why can’t anyone just deal with me honestly? It’s frustrating, more than anything.

A thought comes to me. Leaning forward in my chair, I rummage around in my bag until I find the sellotaped cardboard box. Because if Skyla can’t be trusted – what is this thing?

Strictly speaking, neither she nor Emma told me not to open it, but it’s obvious from all the tape that I’m not supposed to. And if I do, there’s no way on earth Skyla won’t find out.

I raise the box to my ear, giving it the gentle shake a kid would give a present on Christmas morning. It clunks heavily. From the way the weight moves inside, I get the impression of a single object, dense enough that it can only be made of metal, like a knife, or …

It can’t be a gun, can it?

I realise the orderly is looking at me, his expression quizzical. Deciding it’s best to avoid prying eyes, I shove the box back in my bag then go find a toilet. Once I’m safely locked in a cubicle, I take a breath, fish out my housekey, and press it to one of the sellotaped seams. The resistance is considerable – enough to make me wish I had a proper knife – but I eventually manage to press the metal through the plastic and pull it downwards. It proceeds to tear an ugly rip in the cardboard and plastic along one side of the package. If I wanted to hide my transgression from Skyla, I certainly can’t now.

Whatever. I stick my hand in. My fingers close around something cold and smooth, made of glass and metal, but articulated in a way no weapon would be. I pull it out … to find myself holding a gaudy old wristwatch.

What?

It’s quite distinctive, I’ll give it that. Familiar, somehow. It’s chunky and gold and covered in strange embossed filigree: intersecting spirals that coalesce into real working cogs on the watch face. It hardly seems like Skyla’s style, and while I don’t doubt it’s expensive … it can’t be that expensive, can it?

There are additional dials on the watch’s back and sides. I fiddle with one and the cogs on the watch face catch and turn, revealing and obscuring different numbers as they go. It’s not exactly practical: only a few numbers are visible at any one time, so you’d have to spend the whole day twisting various dials if you wanted to read the time. More like a weird little puzzle, then, than something you’d actually get use out of.

But I have seen it before. With a mounting sense of unease, I realise it’s the watch Skyla was wearing in her music video – when she was dressed as the man I killed, right down to a watch eerily similar to one he was photographed wearing towards the end of his life.

So … was it his?

It would explain why she wants me to protect it. But why does she have it? And why keep it at all? Why go as far as to feature it in the video if it could potentially link her to a suspicious death?

Skyla tried to tell me that I was imagining things, that any resemblance to persons living or dead was purely coincidental. Now that I know she’s been lying to me, all bets are off.

I hear the door to the toilets open. ‘Maisie Baxter?’ comes a woman’s voice. ‘Your mother is ready to see you.’

Wow, I think. Who says the NHS can’t still offer a personalised service?

It is a little frustrating to have come all this way and waited so long, only to discover that Mum is absolutely fine. Mostly, though, it’s a massive, incredible, jaw-dropping relief.

‘Oh yes, they’re treating me wonderfully,’ she says, sitting up in her bed with a mug of tea. ‘Judy was just a little worried last night, and then they wanted me to do all sorts of … tests, they called them. It’s like I’m sitting my A-levels again.’

The weird thing is, she looks healthier. When I saw her at home a couple of weeks ago, I was worried about how thin she was getting, how weak she was. Now there’s colour in her cheeks and she seems to be gripping her mug a little more steadily.

‘Where’s your William, then?’ she asks. ‘When I heard you’d visit I was hoping he might come too. It was awfully nice to meet him last week.’

‘Two weeks ago,’ I instinctively correct her. I still haven’t quite recovered from that visit. But from the point of view of Will making a good first impression, it seems like that day was a resounding success.

‘We’re going to keep her in for one more night,’ says the nurse who’s been waiting behind me. ‘Will you be back tomorrow to go home with her?’

‘I—’ I stutter when I see my mother looking at me expectantly. ‘No, I can’t. I have to go away with work.’ Mum and the nurse exchange glances. ‘Sorry, Mum.’

Mum holds up her hands, looking frailer again already. ‘You don’t need to apologise,’ she says. ‘Should I call Judy and Sue, then, or would you rather?’

I wince, thinking about the almost-argument we had last time I saw her. ‘You go ahead,’ I say. ‘And don’t worry about extra costs for them coming here, whatever you need.’

She nods and pulls out her phone. I turn to the nurse, hoping to thank her, but she’s moved on to the next patient, so I wait in silence as Mum organises someone else to do the job that I ought to be doing.

‘I suppose you’ll be leaving soon, then?’ she asks once she’s finished.

I check the time, then sigh and adjust my coat. ‘Mum, I’m really sorry – but yes. I have work tonight in Manchester, so I really have to.’

She links her fingers together and brings them to rest over her torso, giving me a soft smile. ‘Don’t apologise,’ she says calmly. ‘I’m glad you came. You didn’t need to, but I’m glad you did.’

That catches me off guard. ‘What? I could hardly just … not come. You’re my mother.’

She holds me in her piercing gaze. ‘No, you didn’t need to. And if you’re just here to fulfil some sense of obligation, then Maisie—’

‘That’s not it,’ I interrupt.

Mum raises an eyebrow. ‘Well then, what is it?’

What is it? I don’t know, and I don’t know how to begin explaining that.

‘Why do you think I moved to Thailand?’ she asks me, when it’s clear I don’t have an answer for her first question.

‘Because Darren—’

‘No.’ She cuts me off. ‘Darren was a bonus, but he wasn’t the reason.’

I try another tack. ‘Because you were … distrustful of what the doctors were saying, and thought something more spiritual would be better.’ I’m picking my words diplomatically, but Mum knows how I really feel. When she was away, we hardly ever spoke on the phone. Just birthdays and Christmases, and even then, it wasn’t rare for calls to descend into shouting matches about whether she was throwing her life away.

‘That was part of it,’ she concedes. ‘But more than that, I wanted to live. Make the most of the time I still had. Until then I’d spent my whole life in a little box about the size of Carlisle, maybe a little larger. I always wanted to really do something, but then you came along, and I loved you, of course I did, but it was hard, you know? I was barely twenty when I had you.’ There are tears in her eyes as she talks. I’ve never seen her like this. ‘I always wanted … something more.’ She scrunches the duvet in her fingers. ‘And I thought when you were living your life as an adult I could get it.’

She lets out a long, uneven breath.

‘And then when I finally felt like I’d fulfilled my duties as a parent, this happened.’ She waves her hands in the direction of her body. ‘I was just past forty. I should have been in my prime.’

I feel sick. I lean forward, eyes closed, fingers steepled against my forehead. I feel something brush against my knee. It’s her hand. I take it. She traces a thumb over the back of my hand as she keeps talking.

‘I couldn’t let a silly little illness stop me,’ she says. ‘But I wish I’d been more patient in helping you understand.’

‘I was only twenty-one myself,’ I whisper. ‘I still felt like a child. And with you gone …’

She gives my hand a squeeze. ‘When I was that age, twenty-one felt a lot older.’

I reach out for her. My arms find their way around her shoulders and I pull her into me. She feels like a bundle of sticks. She feels like Mum.

‘I’m glad you’re back,’ I tell her, my voice wobbling as I realise this is the first time I’m saying it.

Chapter 14

I decide to leave my car at Mum’s so that I’ll be forced to come and visit her again before long. After all, better to leave it here than some random car park in Manchester.

But as I shove the watch into my backpack and set off for the train station, I can’t stop anger from bubbling up inside me – anger at everything that’s been happening over the last few weeks. It’s not fair that Mum has to deal with being ill. It’s not fair that I didn’t get to see her for the past eight years of my life. It’s not fair that Will got beaten up on a job that I should have been on, except that I can’t trust myself not to get us both killed.

It’s not fair that I’m being dragged into some stupid, life-threatening situation yet again by a boss who is refusing to tell me what’s going on.

Then, as my train cruises through the majestic Lake District, snow gleaming on the peaks, I find some inner calm. Looking at it rationally, Skyla hired me as private security, and that’s all she’s really asked of me. Maybe to ask no questions and to protect from harm is just the life of a bodyguard, and I need to get with it. I accepted the job, didn’t I?

But what does looking after an object that is potentially evidence for a murder I committed, at her request, actually do to protect Skyla? Surely all it does is bring unnecessary and dangerous risk for the both of us. By the time I arrive at the venue and make my way backstage, I’m once again shaking with frustration.

The keypad on the door to the dressing room dashes any hopes I have of a dramatic entrance. I try one, two, three times before giving up and shouting for Skyla to open up. Any other day I’d be glad Emma and Ian heeded my advice to change the PIN from the venue’s default setting, but right now it’s just another reminder of how much I’m being kept out of the loop.

It’s Emma who answers the door. She shoots me a questioning look – understandable, given how contrite and apologetic I’d been when she saw me this morning – but ushers me inside and then goes back to working on her laptop. Always the professional, is Emma.

I can’t say the same for myself right now.

‘Skyla, we need to talk,’ I demand, stomping over to the window where Skyla is gazing out at the skyline while blowing bubbles in a bottle of water. ‘Alone.’

‘Maisie, you’re late! Support is already on!’ She turns to face me and I’m struck once again by the absolute absurdity of the situation. She’s wearing suit trousers and a blazer over a sparkling bra, her hair is slicked back, and she even has a replica of the watch I’ve been carting about strapped to her wrist. She’s dressed up as the producer we conspired to kill, just like the fans outside. ‘Do you like it?’ she asks. ‘Thought I’d wear something special for the last UK show. Oh, and leave the parcel on the table, please.’

Then she goes back to her vocal exercises as if this has been the most normal conversation in the world, and now it’s over. No acknowledgement of my request or my obviously putrid mood.

‘Skyla …’ I growl, catching Emma’s eye in the mirror of Skyla’s dressing table.

Skyla’s jaw twitches. ‘Fine. Emma, guest list should be arriving any minute now. Could you wait outside?’

Cool as a cucumber, Emma stands up and exits the room, clicking the door shut behind her.

I flourish the ripped box from my backpack. ‘Why didn’t you tell me you have Vincent’s old wristwatch?’

Skyla grabs it from me, her eyes flashing with anger. ‘Who do you think you are, opening this?’

‘Someone who deserves to know what they’re being dragged into?’

Skyla scoffs. ‘You’re not being dragged into anything. You signed up to be my security guard, knowing full well that I was being threatened. Given that you couldn’t look after me today – on your second proper day of the job, mind you – I gave you a valuable possession that I didn’t want to leave unattended. I don’t see the problem.’

‘You don’t see the problem?’ I repeat.

‘No, I don’t. Your job was to keep it safe for me – it ends there.’

Except that’s not quite true and we both know it. If it was, she could have hired a security team to follow her around 24/7. She could have locked the watch away in an impenetrable bank vault. She could have done a lot of things that weren’t requesting the woman who murdered its original owner to carry it around all day.

She’s taking the piss.

‘You know full well that’s not my only job,’ I say. ‘This watch is evidence of that.’

She crosses her arms defensively. ‘I’m not forcing you to do any of this. I offered you the job, but you were the one who decided to take it.’

I take a few steps back and sink into the sofa, letting out a long, tired breath. It was my decision – but maybe it was the wrong one.

Skyla softens slightly. ‘And I asked you to help me because, in my entire career, you’re just about the only person I’ve worked with who hasn’t tried to fuck me over. Who I know can’t be bought. Well, except for Emma, but … different skillsets.’ She shoots me a smile – a peace offering.

I give a bitter laugh. ‘You trust me.’

‘I do.’

Yesterday I’d have appreciated the compliment. Today it’s just irritating. I sit up in my seat. ‘OK. You trust me. But Skyla, how am I supposed to trust you? Dayton, the video, the watch – you’ve been lying to me about all of it.’

Skyla huffs in exasperation. ‘When you broke into my house, I had no idea why you were there. You could have been coming to kill me, for all I knew. Did you really expect me to sit you down and tell you every single thing that’s happened since we last saw each other?’

‘Once you’d decided to hire me, yes. Or at least not outright lie when I’m suddenly responsible for your life.’

There’s a flicker of regret at that and she throws herself down on the sofa beside me. As she mulls over what to say next, I glance up at the camera propped on the wardrobe – one separate from the venue’s system, which I’d asked Emma to set up in my absence. She must be watching us now – I would be if I were her. What does she make of all this? How much does she know?

‘Let’s start with Dayton,’ I prompt. ‘Why did you let me think you two had dated?’

She shifts uneasily. ‘You assumed, and it was just too convenient not to go along with. It’s what I’d been telling everyone else, anyway.’

‘But why fake it at all if the guy was taking credit for your work? Why associate with him?’ I give her a sideways look. ‘Unless that was a lie as well …’

‘No,’ she flares up, ‘that part was all true.’ She sinks into the sofa cushions, the fight leaving her as quickly as it came. ‘The label thought that “Love on a Feather” would be even more of a success if the public believed we were in a relationship. And I didn’t make a fuss, because I thought if I went along with it they might rethink giving me the song credits. I wanted to play ball, keep my head down after everything that happened with Vincent.’

I grimace. It’s another reminder that Skyla’s problems didn’t magically end when I took out her producer.

She looks up at the ceiling, quiet for a few seconds before continuing. ‘Dayton and I were friendly enough, and so when it became clear the label wouldn’t listen to me, I tried to get him on board. At first he said that he’d speak to the label for me, but it never seemed to be the right time and eventually he stopped making excuses. When he told me I’d never get the money he’d promised, the same week the album hit 10x Platinum … well, that’s when I stopped being so sympathetic.’

‘So what did you do?’

‘What could I do? I’ve tried everything I can not to get fucked over in this industry, and it’s still happening. So I channelled my anger into my music, into my art. I wrote “What She’d Do To You” in a day, then pitched the idea for the video in fury after watching Dayton wax lyrical about his inspiration for “Love on a Feather”. By the time I realised what I’d set in motion, the label had already got on board and assigned budget. And I never get budget.’

She has the grace to look sheepish, even while defending herself.

‘It’s a great concept, you know, I’m really proud of it. The opportunity to make art from something so personal to me, it’s not something I take lightly. Sure, Dayton didn’t know what I did to Vincent, but it’s all there on a karmic level: take advantage of me and you’ll get what’s coming to you. Even he should understand that.’

‘And then what? He’d come to his senses and sign the paperwork?’

‘That was the plan.’ Her smile drops. ‘I promise that’s all there was to it. I definitely didn’t mean for the video to be some sort of giant bat signal to you.’

To me and every whacko conspiracy stan with internet access, but I don’t say that. I’m sure she’s realised it by now.

‘And the watch?’

Skyla shrugs. ‘Honestly, I can’t figure that out. I knew Dayton would lose his shit when he saw the music video, but that watch was all he could talk about. That it was his, that Vincent was just looking after it for him, that I needed to give it back.’

I’m suddenly hyper aware of the tension in my jaw. ‘So you stole it?’

She pats her hair nervously. ‘I mean – yeah? I went to Vincent’s office the week after he died. Made some excuse about needing closure, when all I wanted to do was revel in what had happened. Rub it in his cold, dead face that he could never touch me again. And then I saw the watch on his desk, boxed up like a gift, well … it felt like the cherry on top of a beautiful cake.’

Horror pools in my stomach. Not from how candid she’s being, or how callously she’s talking about the man she paid to have killed – I more than anyone can understand that particular coping mechanism when I see it. But that she’s so reckless.

‘And then,’ she continues, oblivious, ‘when I was deciding on wardrobe for the music video, I remembered it and thought, Why not wear it? Might as well commit to the bit, keep things authentic.’

No, I think with dread. This can’t be happening. How have I joined forces with someone so impulsive?

Skyla sees my face fall. ‘Don’t worry, nobody’s joined the dots, not even Dayton. I thought for sure when he started asking for the watch that I’d pushed my luck, that it was his coded way of threatening me. But days passed and he was still stuck on the watch, saying that I needed to give it back and that I didn’t know what I was getting myself into.’ She grins. ‘So I’ve finally got some leverage.’

‘You want to trade him the watch for the song credits? And he’s agreed to it?’

‘Yep,’ she says. ‘He should be here any moment, actually. That’s why I wanted you to come back before the show.’

And then, as if he can hear us talking about him, there’s a knock on the door.

Chapter 15

For all her bravado, Skyla looks a little unsure now that Dayton’s actually outside. ‘Look, I don’t want you saying anything to change his mind,’ she says, flapping a nervous hand at me. ‘I can handle the trade, even if he gets difficult, so just … stand over there and look menacing. I’ll tell you if I need you.’

There’s another sharp rap at the door. With a final warning glance in my direction, Skyla crosses the room, snatching up the parcel as she goes – bad idea, honestly – and flings open the door.

Dayton strides in as if he owns the place, dressed in clothes so baggy he’s swimming in them. I can’t tell if he’s still got that wild look in his eyes behind his sunglasses, but he seems calmer than before – fewer jerky movements, his shoulders resolutely set. Like he knows what he’s doing. Like he’s got a plan.

Familiar warning bells ring in my ears.

He looks in my direction and sniffs with distaste. ‘I thought it would just be the two of us. What’s she doing here?’

Skyla grimaces. ‘Well, I don’t exactly feel comfortable being alone in a room with you right now, no offence. This is Maisie, my security detail. Don’t worry about her. All I need is proof that you’ve squared everything with the label, and then we can be done.’

Dayton huffs but doesn’t complain. He extracts a brown envelope from the front pocket of his hoody, its sides curling where it’s been rolled to fit. The moment Skyla sees it, she snatches it from him. Dayton does a double-take when he sees the watch on her wrist. ‘If you think I’m gonna let you wear that out on stage …’ he sneers.

‘It’s a fake, idiot.’ She brandishes the parcel with the actual watch in it.

‘Hand it over, then.’

She secures the parcel under her armpit – I really feel like I should be holding it – and tips a sheaf of papers out of the envelope. ‘You realise I’ll actually need to check these to know you’re not lying to me? You can wait here while I read.’

Dayton sighs dramatically and sits down on the sofa. ‘Well, don’t take too long. I’ve got places to be.’

‘And I’ve got a show to do,’ Skyla snaps. ‘So let me get on with it.’

A good five minutes pass in silence, except for the sound of Skyla flicking between pages as she reads. I watch Dayton, who still hasn’t taken off his sunglasses despite the sun having set over an hour ago. He’s getting steadily more irritated: twitching as he scowls back at me, drumming his fingers on the arm of the sofa.

After another minute he turns to Skyla. ‘You dumb or something? The signatures are all there, what’s the problem?’

He’s pressuring her to rush, a classic tactic of a bad-faith negotiator. She might be due on stage in – I check my watch – less than fifteen minutes, but Skyla clearly needs me to buy her some time.

‘Have you had those notarised?’ I ask Dayton innocently.

It’s a stab in the dark. I don’t know the first thing about the legal complexities of the music industry and I’ve no idea if contracts need to be notarised in a situation like this, but I’d bet anything that Dayton doesn’t either.

‘Have I what?’ Dayton snaps, but Skyla cottons on to what I’m doing and joins in.

‘Had them notarised?’ she repeats. ‘If you haven’t, these signatures mean nothing, you know.’

‘Course I have,’ he says, standing up and adjusting his trousers. ‘Can you not see it? It’s on the back page. You not got there yet? Careful, you should get a move on or you’ll miss your own show.’

His tone confirms it: Dayton has no idea what should be in these papers, which means the chances of them being genuine are very, very slim indeed.

Judging by her expression, Skyla’s just figured that out, too. She steps away from him, extracting the parcel from under her arm and moving it behind her back. ‘I’ll need time to give these a proper look,’ she says, voice wavering slightly. ‘Why don’t you come back tonight, pick up the watch then?’

‘Well, the thing is,’ Dayton says, advancing on her, ‘I don’t think that suits me very well at all.’

‘Dayton …’ I warn, moving towards them.

Skyla looks at me, panicked. And then everything goes to shit.

First, Dayton pepper-sprays us both. I was expecting him to do something idiotic, so I’m able to dive in front of Skyla in the time it takes him to pull the can from his pocket. I shield her from most of the spray, but she’s taken by surprise and staggers backwards. We go crashing to the ground, coughing and retching as we land in an awkward heap on the floor.

Dayton leans over us and tears the watch from Skyla’s grip. He kicks me in the gut as I go to grab his leg, whatever was left of his cool demeanour now absolutely gone. He dodges out of my reach and runs for the door, shouting something about how Skyla’s brought this on herself and it didn’t have to be this way.

Except, before he can get there, a wardrobe between him and his exit bursts open. Its door crashes against the wall, a sharp crack that stops Dayton in his tracks. And out steps …

You have got to be kidding me.

There’s no way of being absolutely sure, because her face is covered and I’m still on the ground squinting up at them through streaming, pepper-sprayed eyes, but I’d bet anything on it being the masked intruder from the London show. Same cocky stance, same boots, same balaclava. Only this time she’s learned from her mistakes and managed to make it inside the dressing room before anyone else arrived. Is she here to help Dayton? Did they know that Skyla would have a bodyguard?

I scramble to my feet. Two on one: not the best odds, but I’m not exhausted like I was in London … I just need to get to them before they manage to open the door.

Except Dayton doesn’t look happy to see her either. In fact, he looks just as shocked as we are as he glances between the three of us. He seems to glitch for a second, unsure of what to do – then he decides to run into the room, pepper-spraying wildly as he goes.

I put up my arms to shield myself, but there are too many chemicals in the air for it to have much of an effect. My throat tightens as he crashes past me, my eyes streaming so badly that I misjudge the distance between us when I go to grab him. I gulp desperately for air but it only makes things worse.

Skyla’s not any luckier. ‘What – the fuck – Dayton!’ she gasps from the floor as he reaches the window and wrenches it open. ‘And who – the fuck – are you?’

But whoever the woman is, she only has eyes for Dayton. She leaps over Skyla and grabs onto his hood, catching him just as he’s managed to clamber onto the windowsill. He lets out a gargled choke, fighting her off with one arm while keeping the other firmly on his parcel – but his blows glance off and she only tugs harder.

Moving slowly, my eyes and nose still streaming, I take advantage of their distraction to sneak up behind the woman – then whip out a hand to tear the balaclava from her head. I must take fistful of hair with it, judging by her gasp of pain, but the mask comes away … to reveal someone I’ve never seen before.

‘Stay out of this!’ she shouts as I pull on her shoulders, hoping to get her clearly on camera so I can ID her later. She resists, but she’s got Dayton and me both to deal with – she won’t last long.

Right as I twist and slam her back against the wall, Dayton manages to wriggle out of his hoodie and scramble onto the flat roof beyond. He glances back and I feel a jolt of shock: at some point in the scuffle his sunglasses have slipped from his face, revealing a purplish-blue black eye and a split eyebrow.

But the woman is still in my grip, spitting and snarling at me. For a second I get a clear view of her face in all its blazing fury: she’s about my age with dark hair and dark eyes, but beyond that could be anyone.

‘Congratulations,’ she hisses as we lock eyes. Then she wrenches herself from my grip and dives out the window after Dayton.

‘Do you have any idea who that was?’ I shout to Skyla. She’s back on her feet now, apparently rooted to the spot.

‘I … I don’t know,’ she says.

I’m torn between going after them and staying to keep her safe. The repercussions of the last few minutes are swirling round my brain: all this time we thought the intruder might be connected to Dayton, but in fact they were just after the same thing.

‘You’re sure?’ I ask again.

‘Y-yes,’ Skyla answers. ‘I’ve never seen her.’ Then something flits across her face and I get a glimpse of the defiant, vengeful, determined Skyla that I met all those years ago. ‘Maisie, you need to get that watch. I’ll double your pay, triple it, whatever. I’ll never lie to you again. Without it …’

Her face is desperate. Whatever value that watch has to Dayton and this other woman, its worth to Skyla is obvious – her only bargaining chip to secure the money she’s owed and a huge part of her legacy.

I climb out the window.

They haven’t got very far. At the edge of the next roof over, Dayton and the woman are silhouetted against the lights of an office block, locked in a standoff. She has him cornered painfully close to the ledge, where a gap of about a metre separates the building we’re on from the next one over. It’s a scary jump, so I can understand why he’s stopped. If he was jumping that on the ground he’d clear it, easy, but twenty feet up and your mind starts to play tricks on you.

Meanwhile, he’s still brandishing his pepper spray, which seems to be putting her off coming any closer. They’re laser-focused on each other, evidently not expecting me to follow them out into the night – but on an empty rooftop, it’s hard to stay hidden for long.

Dayton yells out when he sees me. Surprised, the intruder looks in my direction before turning back to make a grab for him, but she’s a split-second too late as Dayton has already turned and flung himself over the gap towards the next building. His knees buckle as his feet hit the rooftop, then he’s away again. But he’s only gained a couple of seconds. The woman clears the jump effortlessly, then she’s right behind him, keeping pace.

I do a quick scan of the rooftops. This block stretches out for a few hundred metres, but so does the one running parallel to it, which is slightly higher and has fewer obstructions. If I could somehow overtake them and come at Dayton from another angle …

I hoist myself up onto it and take off at a sprint. In ten seconds I’m level with Dayton, and in fifteen I’ve overtaken him, so I cut back to the left and launch myself into the void.

I’ve timed it well: my body slams into his and we collapse onto the asphalt tiling. As he struggles I sneak my hand into his pocket and pull out the watch, stuffing it into my own pocket as I let him break away from me and stagger to his feet. He clearly doesn’t notice my sleight of hand, because he takes off again immediately, the intruder hot on his heels.

He must realise he’s not going to get away from her, though, because instead of jumping to the next roof he scales a chimney stack in the corner, wobbling as he goes but resolutely kicking out to stop her from getting up.

I can’t be sure in this darkness, but I’d almost swear that the moon is glinting off the woman’s grin. In fact, she seems to be finding this whole thing amusing. It’s like watching a cat chasing a mouse. Dayton isn’t exactly dressed for agility – she could have caught up with him if she wanted, but she’s been toying with him, and now she’s finally got him trapped.

I approach the chimney stack from the other side, shouting to be heard above the wind. ‘We can’t stay here all night, Dayton. Come back to the venue, you and Skyla can figure things out.’

Or more like, he can tell us why everyone is losing their mind over this goddamn watch.

‘You don’t understand,’ he says. ‘They’re going to kill me.’

I get a flash of worry that he means Skyla, but it wasn’t Skyla who gave him that black eye. So this woman, then? Or more likely, whoever’s pressuring him to get this watch – I can’t see why he’d want it for himself.

‘They won’t,’ I reassure him. ‘I promise I won’t let them.’

Across from me the intruder doesn’t say anything, but I swear her eyes roll just a little bit as she again tries to climb up to his level, a knife glittering in her hand. Dayton sees her coming towards him and kicks out wildly – so wildly that his arms windmill for balance. Somehow he finds it, but he’s going to end up dead unless I do something drastic.

‘Let’s all calm down before someone gets hurt,’ I yell to the two of them. ‘I’ve got the watch.’

That gets their attention. Their heads swivel in tandem and they stare at me, frozen, while Dayton’s hand drifts to his empty pocket. Then they lunge.

I’m prepared, though, neatly sidestepping as the woman barrels towards me. I clip her ankle with my foot and she goes sprawling off to the side. I turn my attention to Dayton. He’s picked up a loose tile from the chimney stack, which he hurls in the direction of my head. When it misses, he picks up another, stepping back to get better aim.

‘Stop—’ I shout, but it’s too late.

His foot finds empty air. His arms fly out but it’s no use: the weight of his body has tipped him backwards and there’s nothing for him to grab hold of. He falls off the roof, out of sight.

I run towards where he was, just moments ago, and the intruder runs with me. Three storeys below, the white glow of a streetlight illuminates Dayton lying spreadeagled on the pavement. We watch as a car screeches to a halt and a woman runs out, leaving her door wide open in her haste to get to him. But even from up here it’s clear there’s nothing she can do. His head is tilted at a sickening angle, and there’s a pool of blood starting to form by his left ear.

Dayton is well and truly dead.

‘Now look what you’ve done,’ the intruder says, then dashes into the night.

Chapter 16

I watch the crowd roar as the opening chords of ‘Love on a Feather’ resonate through the venue. None of them have any idea what just happened less than five hundred metres away – that the man whose voice is being pumped through the speaker system is dead.

‘Everything OK?’ Emma asks when she notices me loitering.

‘Something’s come up,’ I say. ‘I need to talk to Skyla.’

‘OK,’ she replies, not pushing to know more. ‘You can speak to her as soon as she’s done.’

Skyla dances closer to us in an interlude, raising an eyebrow when she clocks me in the wings. I tap my wrist and nod, which gets a grin in response. I feel guilty, but there’s no point stressing her out mid-show – and I don’t mind a reprieve before I need to tell her about the death of a man she explicitly told me not to kill.

It’s complete luck the news hasn’t broken already. After Dayton’s fall, I climbed down to a side street to check whether the woman who found him had spotted us on the roof. She hadn’t, and somehow neither she nor the ambulance crew had recognised the body. But it’s only a matter of time before word gets out.

Until then, I can’t stop thinking about how scared he was – about his bruised face and the desperation in his eyes. About his conviction that he was going to be killed. Who was threatening him? And what about the knife-wielding maniac in the balaclava?

Then it clicks.

Here we have a celebrity deep in drugs, debt and ten other kinds of trouble, under the thumb of some dangerous people. And there – in London’s East End, to be precise – we have Mikey’s Firm, an organisation that sells drugs to celebrities, blackmails them, and does business through a shop that would easily stock the watch that Dayton was so desperate to get his hands on.

What are the chances these two are connected?

I remember the conversation Will and I overheard in Harris Vintage:

‘You know what you have to do, and you said you have someone to do it, so there’s nothing to talk about.’

‘But it’s not just us who saw it, remember? So don’t blame me when Hangjaw comes down from Sweden …’

Two organisations, both after something. A stolen watch resurfacing in a music video. Two people determined to get it: a woman who, English accent aside, wouldn’t look too out of place in a trans-European criminal cabal, and a man who could be easily coerced into doing Mikey’s Firm’s dirty work, if they were acquainted.

By the time Skyla is closing out her encore, I’ve found a photo deep in the Harris Vintage Instagram of Dayton posing with an expensive pair of 90s Air Jordans, captioned: Our main man Big D! I take it to mean they know each other.

‘Skyla,’ Ian shouts from behind me as she clatters down from the stage, sweaty and beaming from her post-show high. ‘I need to talk to you.’

From one look at his face, it’s clear he knows about Dayton. Moments later, he’s elbowed his way past me and has his arm around Skyla’s shoulders as he ushers her towards a staircase.

I try to listen in, but their conversation is drowned out by the buzz of the crowd waiting to filter out of the auditorium, and I get blocked by roadies bustling about with equipment. By the time I catch up, they’re in the production office with the door firmly shut. Emma has followed me, so I stand aside to give her the honours of intruding. Instead, she puts a finger to her lips and shows me her phone screen.

It’s a BBC article: Pop singer Dayton dies in rooftop accident. News has officially broken.

Neither of us move to open the door.

‘I didn’t even know he was in Manchester,’ Ian is saying inside. ‘Did you see him today? Was he meant to be at the show?’

Skyla’s reply is quiet, shaky. ‘I want to go back to London. I want to go home.’

There’s a long pause. ‘I’m really sorry,’ Ian says.

‘But?’

‘But you can’t. We leave for Snow Glow tomorrow. It’s too late to drop out.’

‘Why?’ Skyla sounds like she’s on the verge of tears. ‘I don’t understand. Isn’t there something in the contract that covers situations like this when someone fucking dies?’

‘No, there’s just a massive fine if you cancel for any reason. We’ll all be liable. It’s—’

Now she does start crying. ‘Why did you let me sign that?!’

‘I know, I know, I’m sorry,’ Ian says. ‘It’s my fault. Please stop crying. I’ll try to get you out of it. The festival might agree to pull you once they hear the news. But until then, you need to plan on showing face.’

I glance at Emma, who is nervously chewing a finger. I know how she feels.

‘But look, Skyla,’ Ian’s tone is softer now, ‘I know your experience with the label hasn’t always been smoothest sailing. I know you’ve been … passed over for certain aspects of recognition that you may otherwise have been due.’

That’s quite the euphemism, I think. But it’s stopped Skyla from sobbing.

‘And I know it might not be the nicest thing to say right now, considering the circumstances – but I’ve been talking to management and, depending on how things shake out, they’ve said they might want to reassess certain historical arrangements. If you’re happy to play ball.’

I lock eyes with Emma. She looks furious.

‘Fine,’ says Skyla. ‘France it is. But you’d better not be lying to me.’

A half-hour later, Emma and I are in Skyla’s hotel room, trying to talk some sense into her.

‘Don’t you think you deserve some time off?’ Emma argues as I nod along vigorously.

‘And then there’s the security risks to consider,’ I add.

The biggest one being that even if we ditch the watch now, just the fact Skyla and I have been seen with it makes us targets. Getting out of the UK might not be the worst idea for shaking off Mikey’s Firm – but the Circle are a bigger threat, and we’d be going deeper into their territory.

‘It’s just the way these things go,’ Skyla rationalises. ‘Ian’s obviously fucked up by booking this show to begin with, so if I help him out, he’ll owe me one. Plus, he’s made the financial repercussions if I don’t very clear.’

All traces of her distress about Dayton and the festival have been utterly buried. There’s no convincing her.

Once Emma leaves, I run Skyla through everything that happened on the rooftops and my suspicions about who Dayton and balaclava-lady were working for. ‘These are dangerous people,’ I say. ‘If you want to keep that watch, we’ll have to find somewhere safe for it while we’re out of the country. If not, we’re better off destroying it.’ It’s not like you can trade it to Dayton anymore, is my unspoken implication.

She turns it over in her palm. ‘Do you know it’s not even real gold?’ she asks. ‘Just gold-plated. But it must be pretty valuable, for them to want it so much.’

Oh no. I don’t like where this is going.

She closes it in a fist. ‘We’re taking it with us. First, the label wants it for a photoshoot once we’re out there – the costume is resonating, as you’ve seen, and we’ll use it to promote the new album. After that, we can figure out why this thing is worth so much. If we can sell it without the money going to a bunch of drug dealers, what do you think about splitting the proceeds fifty/fifty? Call it a late bonus on the first job you did for me.’

I swallow. I could do with the money …

‘And it’s surely safer with you than in some draughty old lockbox in Manchester,’ Skyla adds. Her expression says she trusts me completely.

‘Fine,’ I say. ‘But let me keep hold of it.’

By the time I find my own room, I’m already wondering how she convinced me.

As I flop onto my bed, my phone buzzes with a text from Emma: Just sending you the stills from our security camera.

I lie on my back and swipe through the closeups of the intruder’s unmasked face. I’m glad we managed to get them, but I still have no idea who she is. If Jason wasn’t on holiday, I’d send it to him – he’s a whizz at identifying faces. Instead, I just try a standard reverse image search, then forward the photos to Will – and to Beth for good measure. She wanted to be involved and her research skills could prove invaluable.

She texts me back immediately: This your ninja?

I’d recounted the Pillbox debacle to her the other night and, unfortunately, she’d found Benji’s reaction hilarious.

As I’m typing a message back to her, Will’s reply pops up on my screen: Fucking hell. That’s Phoebe.

Oh.

His message is immediately obscured by another notification from Beth: I see what that guy meant, she does look like Catwoman. Are you OK?

Oh no, no, no.

Before I have time to process anything, Will is phoning me.

‘Maisie are you OK?’ he asks the second I pick up. This is the most worried I’ve ever heard him, and he’s seen me held at gunpoint. Multiple times.

‘Yes, I’m fine,’ I say, and then before I can stop myself: ‘No thanks to your ex-girlfriend.’

A pit opens in my stomach as I say it out loud. Is this really happening? The woman who’s been showing me up at work is my boyfriend’s ex? I might have guessed when I figured out she worked for the Circle – but they’re a massive organisation, aren’t they? Out of all the agents they could have sent after Skyla’s watch, why did it have to be her?

‘What happened?’ he asks. ‘What did she do to you?’

What did she do to me?

‘Nothing,’ I snap, then run through the events of the evening: how Phoebe camped out in Skyla’s dressing room and fought me and Dayton for the watch, leading to Dayton’s death.

‘You need to be really careful with her,’ he warns, when I stop to draw breath. ‘I mean, someone is already dead.’

‘She didn’t actually kill him,’ I say, hating the competitive edge that’s crept into my voice.

He laughs bitterly. ‘That’s just how she operates. She always finds a way without getting her hands dirty. Maisie, Phoebe was dangerous when I knew her. After four years with the Circle, who knows what she’s capable of?’

‘But why would they want the watch, though?’ I ask. ‘Mikey’s Firm makes sense, but doesn’t this seem like small fry for the Circle? Have you heard anything to explain it?’

‘Nothing about the watch, no. But you’re still flying to Snow Glow tomorrow, aren’t you? Hangjaw has already left Turin – and there’s no sign at all of his partner, whoever they are – but the Circle agents still here are preparing to head for the French border, possibly to meet them. It could just be a coincidence, but …’

But it might not be. I feel a chill. ‘We are, and the watch is coming with us. They need it for a photoshoot, apparently.’

‘That might not be the worst thing. Maybe it’ll pull the Circle out into the open, give us our best chance to take them down.’

I push my palm into my forehead. ‘I know,’ I groan. It makes perfect sense – would make perfect sense, if not for one inconvenient wrinkle. ‘But Will – all my friends will be there.’

‘Ah,’ he replies. ‘That might complicate things.’

Chapter 17

I still can’t get over how devastated she must be, reads the message from Michelle the next day.

I’m sitting across from Skyla when I receive it, in the car the festival sent to pick us up from Grenoble airport. I wouldn’t say she looks happy, but she’s a long way from devastated. Determined, more like.

Liv chimes in too: Everything I’ve read says Dayton was literally the perfect boyfriend. And so damn hot as well!!! What a loss.

Ever since news of his death broke last night, the internet – my group chat included – has been alight with eulogies for Dayton and concern for Skyla’s well-being. I’ve seen a hundred theories about how she’ll cope without the supposed love of her life and countless videos dissecting her performance in Manchester for how much she knew. Thankfully, all of them are far from the truth.

Instead of playing along, I’ve been giving my friends every reason I can think of not to go to Snow Glow short of outing myself as a criminal. I share rumours of bad weather; my worries that Skyla might still drop out despite her social media posts to the contrary; and warnings that I’ll be so busy with work that I’ll never get to see them anyway.

Dayton’s death makes it an even harder sell than it would have been. If she’s doing the show, we HAVE to support her, replies Liv. She told us herself: her fans make it worth it. She needs us.

Anyway, we’re already at the airport, adds Michelle, ever the practical one. No turning back now!

There’s no convincing them. I’ll just have to make the best of it, and prepare for the worst. The 9mm pistol and several clips of ammunition I pick up from a Removals contact in a service station toilet should help with that.

Finally, our bus jolts to a stop in the artists’ car park. I allow myself a few seconds to appreciate the impressive scenery of vast white mountains and dark forests surrounding the festival grounds, then get to work.

Skyla’s photoshoot and performance are both tomorrow, so my top priority for this afternoon is to secure the watch somewhere safe. I start at the Portakabin of one Madame Roux, head of security – a gruff but efficient woman who is nonplussed by my request for their highest-grade safe to be moved into Skyla’s chalet.

‘There is no mention of this in her rider,’ she says. ‘Which was due in weeks ago. We do not have any spare.’

‘It was a last-minute addition,’ I say apologetically, hoping to appeal to her decades of experience dealing with mercurial popstars. ‘I didn’t even know she needed it until yesterday, you know how it can be …’

She pulls a sympathetic face. ‘How big do you need? There’s a small safe back here. It’s empty, but screwed in place. You can set the code however you like.’

‘Who knows the reset key?’ I ask.

She laughs and gestures to herself. ‘Juste moi.’

I meet her gaze. She’s asking me to trust her, that even though she could snatch Skyla’s valuables whenever she felt like it, she’s too much of a professional to even think about doing so. And you know what? I think I will. Plus, even if someone does pay her off to bloodlessly grab the watch … well, Skyla wouldn’t be happy, but as far as I’m concerned there are worse outcomes. At least my friends won’t get caught in the crossfire.

‘Perfect,’ I say.

Skyla’s in rehearsal all afternoon, and we’ve decided that with the additional safety net of a tracker on her phone, the practice space is secure enough for me to leave her to it. That gives me time to do a thorough inspection of the whole site, casing it out like I would for a mission.

Reassuringly, security seems to be tight. I spot guards in distinctive blue jackets almost everywhere, including at the roads in and out, monitoring who’s coming and going. The perimeter bordering the forest is less well guarded, with only a chain-link fence and intermittent patrols. I guess they’re thinking nobody will hike up a mountain and through twenty miles of forest just to sneak into a festival without a ticket – but paid-up members of a top European crime syndicate might be a bit more persevering.

I find a raised section of pathway that gives me a good view of the fence and look out, studying it for breaks. It doesn’t take long to find one – behind a burger van, easily wide enough for someone to climb through. Not a good sign.

Then I hear a voice from behind me. ‘Maisie!’

I turn around to see Michelle and Liv beaming as they stride in my direction. Beth, hanging back, looks understandably apprehensive. Oh no. I really don’t want to be seen with them – for their own safety.

For some reason, Liv is brandishing a key. ‘For the chalet,’ she says, pressing it into my hand. ‘It’s so gorgeous, you’re going to love it.’

What? I’m taken aback. ‘Oh, didn’t I tell you? Skyla’s team have organised my accommodation. I can’t …’

As I speak, Liv’s and Michelle’s brows simultaneously crease in disappointment. ‘Guys, I’m sorry,’ I begin.

At once they both start laughing. ‘We’re kidding, we’re kidding!’ says Liv.

Michelle punches my arm. ‘God, Maisie, you are so easy to wind up. But just so you know, we do have an empty room – if you can spare a minute in your busy schedule of gazing wistfully out over the mountains, that is.’

I feel myself redden, wondering how long they were watching me for without my realising.

Liv looks concerned. ‘You doing all right?’

‘Well, you know how it is,’ I say, not needing to fake my discomfort. ‘Difficult situation all round.’

Liv and Michelle nod knowingly. As if they know the half of it.

I glance back towards the hole in the fence, which gives me an idea. ‘Actually,’ I say, ‘Skyla’s just sent me out for some food so I was trying to spot a burger van. I’ve just seen one over there, so if you don’t mind—’

‘Great!’ Liv interrupts before I can say that I need to go, ideally alone. ‘We’re all starving, we can come with you.’

In the end, she and Michelle rush on ahead, chatting excitedly about tonight’s headliner – none other than Skyla’s old rival, Avery Guo. For a brief moment, I wonder whether she and Skyla will cross paths, and how Skyla will react if they do. As if we don’t have bigger things to be worrying about.

Beth sidles up to me once they’re out of earshot. ‘I really tried,’ she murmurs apologetically, ‘but they’re unstoppable.’

I told Beth about Will’s and my worries about the festival this morning – to enlist her help in dissuading Liv and Michelle, and to give her the chance to drop out if she wanted to. She’d insisted on coming with them, and offered to help me in any way she could. ‘It’s not your responsibility,’ I say. ‘Though it is nice to see you.’

Beth slows down a fraction and leans in as if she doesn’t want to be overheard. ‘I’m glad we ran into you, too,’ she says. ‘I’ve found something.’

I’m not sure what I was expecting to see when she hands me her phone, but a picture of a brightly coloured magazine cover was certainly not it – especially not one with a cartoon castle surrounded by levitating crossword puzzles and Sudokus, titled Le Manoir des énigmes d’Alphonse Baudelaire.

‘Alphonse Baudelaire’s puzzle mansion,’ translates Beth, as we huddle to the side of the path. ‘It’s a puzzle book sponsored by some crazy old millionaire. This guy, presumably.’ She zooms in on the elderly man photoshopped to be standing in front of the castle. He’s holding what looks like a rolled-up map in one hand, while gesturing towards the front door of the castle with the other.

‘He was so obsessed with puzzles that he came up with a whole series of them to decide who got his inheritance. This magazine was the first step – just a simple puzzle book anyone could buy in an airport. And then …’ She zooms in further, focusing on the millionaire’s wrist. On it, clear as can be …

‘Skyla’s watch?’ I ask, looking at its familiar cogs and dials.

Beth nods in confirmation. ‘This is a just a mock-up, but the design is exactly the same.’

I did think it looked like a puzzle.

‘I think it’s probably a later stage in whatever series of trials this guy came up with,’ Beth continues. ‘Maybe to be given out as prizes to whoever solved the earlier ones. But the weird thing is, the competition never actually ran. Nobody in the forum where this was posted could find any copies of the magazine, let alone of the watch. In fact, loads of people were claiming the whole thing was a fake.’

Except the watch isn’t a fake, because I’ve held it in my own hands, but why would no one except Mikey’s Firm and the Circle have heard of it? And why would they go to such extreme lengths on its behalf?

But before I can ask either of those questions out loud, Michelle and Liv turn around and beckon for us to catch up with them.

‘You guys need to back me up on this,’ Liv says, ‘Michelle is out of her mind …’

Whatever they’re saying, I stop listening almost instantly. Because past Michelle’s head, beyond the burger van, and out through the hole in the fence, I catch a glimpse of something that makes my blood run cold. It’s far enough from the path that no one else seems to have noticed it, and only visible from a very select angle, but it’s unmistakable.

A dead body, half-covered in leaves, dressed in a familiar shade of blue.

Chapter 18

By the time I’ve concocted an excuse to ditch Beth, Liv and Michelle and get back to the woods behind the burger stand, the body is gone. And not gone as in having been roughly dragged away, with a convenient trail leading to whoever did the murder. No, it’s vanished entirely, to the point I almost doubt that I even saw it. After all, it was fairly indistinct, just that familiar blue jacket and the outline of a hand in the leaf litter, and it wasn’t like I could look at it long without Liv and Michelle seeing and freaking out. Could my eyes have been playing tricks on me?

But I’m definitely in the right place: fifteen metres back from the path, slightly to the left of an electrical box labelled DANGER DE MORT in bold black-on-yellow. There should be a corpse here. Instead, all I find is an unbroken covering of dead, frosty, resolutely intact leaves – leaves that would definitely have been crushed to smithereens if they’d been made to bear the weight of a human body.

I crouch down for a closer look, sifting the top layer aside and peering through the haze of my own breath frosting in the mountain air. Beneath them, I find fresh scuff marks on the packed, dark earth. Here’s my trail, then. I guess those leaves were planted.

Will would have liked that joke, I think sadly. It’s been ages since I’ve done a job like this without him – I miss the camaraderie. I miss him.

I catch a glint of something in the weak sunlight, just off to one side. A tiny glass bottle, broken into two pieces but clean, its label unpeeled and unfaded. Not something that has been sitting out here for weeks – or even a single night.

Will picks up on the second ring. ‘What was it you said the Circle always used to kill his victims?’ I ask him. ‘Was it belladonna extract?’

‘That’s the stuff,’ he confirms over the roar of an engine. I get the image of him tearing along a winding Italian road in a borrowed or stolen sports car, top down, wind tousling his hair. That last part is unlikely given the season, even in Italy, but hey, a girl can dream.

‘I just found an empty bottle of it next to a missing body,’ I tell him. ‘I’d say that confirms they’re here.’

The surge of noise as Will’s car kicks up a gear sounds powerful. I guess my mental image wasn’t too far off. ‘Got it,’ he shouts over the din. ‘I’m on my way. Hit a bit of traffic coming out of the city but—’ He’s interrupted by two gunshots, then the screech of metal grinding into metal. My heart jolts with worry, but when he speaks again his tone has hardly changed. ‘I think I’ve lost it. Should be smooth sailing from here.’

Then he’s gone.

Don’t worry about him, I remind myself. Whatever he’s doing, he can handle it. Probably.

It’s like a punch in the gut how much I miss him right now, but I can’t let it distract me. My thoughts need to be on Skyla, on the body that was here until recently, and on the empty bottle of poison.

There are two things I can learn from the bottle itself. First, this person really was killed by the Circle, which is a scary enough thought on its own. It’s been a long time since I went up against opponents who are both properly trained and likely to have no reservations about actually killing me. Last summer, Will was a complication – but he never quite felt like a threat.

The second is that whoever moved the body didn’t do a great job of sweeping the crime scene for evidence. Wilderness tracking was never my favourite part of Gabby’s training regimen back at Novum – too Duke of Edinburgh, and I get a crick in my neck whenever I spend so long staring at the ground – but there’s an undeniable sense of satisfaction when it all comes together. Figuring out what direction someone headed is like researching a case in miniature, only instead of putting together a story from bank invoices and hacked security cameras, your evidence arrives in broken twigs and churned-up soil.

The further I go from the road, the more the artificial noises of the ski resort – the hum of electricity, the crunch of tyres on snow from the main road, and the tinny music of the burger stand – fall away, replaced by the whistle of the wind in the trees and the sound of rushing water from somewhere ahead of me. It’s a reminder of how remote we are, at 4,000 feet and over 50 miles from any civilisation except the resort itself.

Out here, would anyone respond to a gunshot? Would anyone hear a scream? Usually, for a girl in my line of work, that would be liberating. Right now it’s a concern.

A twig snaps underfoot. Not my foot. I must be gaining on them.

I glance about to make sure I’m not being followed, then deviate from the trail to climb a rocky outcrop, hoping I’ll be able to see the Circle agent through the trees. As it turns out, I can. Up ahead, a black-clad man is just visible in the dwindling sunlight, a body in blue and grey slung over his shoulders. Seen in full, the victim’s outfit is immediately recognisable as the festival security uniform. A couple of metres further on, another man in black is leading the way. He’s presumably the other agent’s partner – Will had said that the Circle move in pairs, even if Phoebe and Hangjaw haven’t been, as far as we know.

Now there’s a thought …

They’re almost at the stream I could hear before, which cuts down the mountainside in a sharp-rocked ravine. Not a bad place to throw a body and make it look like an accident, at least until forensics arrive from the police station in the nearest town. But they’re too far away to have broken that twig.

‘Let’s just leave them to it, shall we?’ says a familiar voice from behind me. ‘I’d hate to see your body in the river too.’

My rocky outcrop didn’t feel precarious when I was climbing it – but it does now. Slowly, carefully, I turn around to see another all-black silhouette peel out from behind a pine tree. Only her brown eyes, accented with flawless pink eyeshadow, are visible through the hole of her ski mask.

Shit. I was so sure I wasn’t being followed.

‘I’ll need that watch,’ Phoebe tells me, stepping forward onto the slope of my uneven rocky pedestal. She’s still holding the knife she had back in Manchester, which gleams sickly gold where it catches the light of the sunset. I mentally calculate how long getting my gun from under my jacket would take versus her closing the rest of the distance – and decide not to risk it. They say not to bring a knife to a gun fight, but a knife in your hand is worth a lot more than a gun in your coat.

‘I don’t have it,’ I say. Which is true, given it’s hopefully still in Madame Roux’s safe.

Phoebe narrows her eyes, squinting at me like she’s reading the tea leaves in the bottom of a mug.

I bristle. ‘What, you think I’d just carry it around with me? I’m not an idiot. I know how obsessed you all are with it.’

She softens her stance, apparently at least somewhat convinced. Her eyes flicker in the direction of her colleagues and their victim as if she’s weighing up her options. Waiting for them to finish dumping the body so they can come back and flank me? Or something else?

Whatever it is, it’s the best chance I’ll get. Shifting my weight forward, I feint as if I’m about to jump on her blade – a terrible idea, given my likelihood of ending up as a human kebab, but one she’d have to react to if she doesn’t want to lose her own footing. Then, at the last second, I swerve and jump in the opposite direction, off the far side of the rock. My thinking is that while the landing might hurt, putting the rock between us should at least give me time to draw my pistol.

And it does! But the landing knocks the wind out of me and something twinges in my ankle – the same ankle I wrenched in my first fight with Phoebe. I push myself to my feet, jump away from where I guess she’ll be coming from, and pull out my weapon … but before I can figure out which way it ought to be pointing, there’s a hand clamped on my wrist.

‘Now, now,’ Phoebe admonishes, her tone infuriatingly smug. I yank myself from her grip – it’s not like she’s stronger than me – but I have to admit she’s got the better position, especially after she pushes her fingertips into my median nerve. Even through her gloves and my sleeves, the pain is enough to make me momentarily stop struggling, giving her the chance to eject the clip from my pistol. It falls uselessly to the ground. Then she raises her knife to my neck.

‘I’m asking nicely,’ she says. As if. ‘Where is the watch?’

‘Hello, Phoebe,’ I reply, forcing my tone to match her steely calm. I’m trying to wig her out by showing I’ve done my research, but honestly, knowing who she is is only wigging me out more. Is it helpful to know that the woman out-hitwomanning me is my boyfriend’s ex? That she can appear and disappear like a ghost, look stylish as hell in a bodysuit and a ski mask, and hold a knife to my jugular?

No. Thanks for asking, but no. None of that helps at all.

‘That’s Agent Medusa to you, Maisie,’ she says.

What?! I’m going to be sick. Agent bloody Medusa? As in, Agent Perseus and Agent Medusa? They had matching Greek mythology-themed codenames and he didn’t think to warn me?

‘More like Agent …’ I say, trying to wrestle my hands free. But she has me solidly pinned, and I can’t even think of a good way to finish my sentence. ‘Bitch,’ I conclude lamely.

She laughs, a horrible, staccato ha ha ha that makes a cold weight settle in my stomach. What was it Will called her again? ‘Just sort of morally empty’? ‘Wow, nice one,’ she gloats. ‘Did your friends at the BBC help you come up with that?’

I manage not to rise to it – as much as any reminder of my former boss is enough to make the blood rush in my ears. ‘What do you want, Phoebe?’ I ask. ‘Did your new boyfriend send you to kill me or are you just wasting time?’

It’s a shot in the dark – I don’t even know if she is Hangjaw’s partner, just that they’re each unaccounted for. But her whole body seems to recoil at my remark. ‘And make little William cry?’ she sneers. ‘I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.’

‘You don’t know anything about him.’

‘Don’t I?’ She laughs again. ‘When he and I met, he was a poor little Manchester orphan stealing scrap copper to buy food for him and his sister. Within six months, we had a four-bedroom flat in the Northern Quarter, with a view of Piccadilly Gardens. I don’t know him? I made him.’

‘And yet you threw it all away to run interference for a psycho.’

I wish I could have seen her face as I say the word ‘psycho’, but the way her muscles tense as I say the word tells me I’m onto something.

‘What’s your game here?’ I press on, ignoring the way talking makes her knife brush against the skin of my throat. ‘Surely the watch isn’t that important if Hangjaw can’t even be bothered to help you steal it. Trouble in paradise, is it? Is that why you had to third-wheel your little colleagues over there?’

‘Fuck you,’ she says. The venom in her voice confirms it: not only am I right about Hangjaw and Phoebe being partners, but she hates him. Which I can’t imagine is a great situation when, according to Will, partnerships in the Circle are made for life and each partner is fully responsible for the other – including being their assumed murderer if they wind up dead.

‘Phoebe, why is the Circle killing event staff?’

‘Come on, Maisie. Why do you think? You and Will are in the business – you must understand the value of a good disguise in a place like this. And sometimes the best disguises are, let’s say, currently in use.’

I feel a chill, and it’s not just from the increasingly sub-zero temperatures. ‘We don’t do that,’ I say quickly.

Phoebe laughs again, and I get a horrible lurching feeling in my stomach. ‘You don’t, do you?’ she asks. ‘And Will would never, I suppose?’

I’m going to be sick.

When Will and I first started seeing each other, we laid out our boundaries in detail – our ground rules for the kinds of jobs we’d accept. We were hitmen, sure, but we both wanted to do it right. No innocent lives – that was something we agreed on. Definitely nobody who just happened to be in the way. That’s what I’d always said. Will agreed wholeheartedly. He showed me his collection of ethical philosophy. I trusted him.

Surely I’ve not been wrong to?

Phoebe laughs again, but it’s a different laugh this time. It’s almost good natured. Her grip loosens slightly. ‘No, I suppose you don’t, do you? God, you two really are made for each other. He always was so bloody ethical about things.’

She might have a knife to my throat, but her words make me gasp in relief.

At least until she tightens her grip again. ‘So, as I said, I don’t want to kill you – even if you have made a mess for me that we’re now in the process of cleaning up. What I want is for you to tell me where the watch is.’

Again with this bloody watch! What can possibly make it worth the effort? Nothing I’d want the Circle getting hold of, that’s for sure. ‘No.’

The knife presses into my throat. ‘Pretty please?’

I tense. But she has just said she doesn’t want to kill me. ‘I said, no.’

And just like that, she lets me go – though not before snatching up the clip that she took from my pistol. ‘Worth a try,’ she says, wisely backing up a few paces to get out of my easy reach.

‘You’re letting me go?’ I spin to face her, flexing my arms and neck in their newfound freedom. I could rush her, probably … but then what?

‘If you promise to be good,’ Phoebe says. ‘Hangjaw and I want the watch, but you’ve not got it, do you? You should consider yourself lucky, really.’

‘I guess?’ I agree tentatively. Was that really all this was?

She holds my gaze with cold intensity. ‘But I’m serious. This is the only warning you’ll get. Hangjaw is a dangerous man. You and Will play nice – he doesn’t. Go back to London, leave the watch somewhere we can find it. If Will’s thinking of coming here too, tell him to stay away. If you don’t—’

She stops suddenly.

I realise why when I hear the murmur of voices and rustle of approaching footsteps. For a second I worry that it’s Hangjaw, but they’re coming from the direction of the road, and Phoebe seems nervous too. Instinctively, though I don’t quite know why, we step towards each other, turning outwards to cover each other’s backs. It’s exactly what Will and I would do in this situation.

Let’s not read too much into that.

It’s nearly fully dark in the forest now, but I count three figures on my side, two on Phoebe’s. They move in to surround us. Finally, one of them comes close enough that I can see his face, his leather jacket squeaking as he walks.

‘All right, ladies,’ says Keith – our dodgy witness from Harris Vintage. ‘You can tell the Circle: it’s over.’

Chapter 19

So. I’m on the side of an alp, with my boyfriend’s ex, surrounded by middle-aged Cockney gangsters who appear to think we’re both working for the same international European criminal cabal … And it’s only January. What can the rest of the year possibly have in store?

‘What do you mean, “it’s over”?’ Phoebe asks. I’m glad she’s here to ask that sort of question. If nothing else, it buys me some time to figure out how to play this situation so I don’t get killed.

Keith raises a hand to his chin in a leering approximation of The Thinker and glances theatrically to his cronies. ‘Hmm, what do I mean by “it’s over”?’

He might be giving it lip, but the men with him seem to lack the same confidence. They’re all pushing sixty and therefore should be at least somewhat experienced in showdowns like this, but their gazes constantly shift between him, each other, and us with a surprising mixture of nerves and excitement. It’s clear he’s putting on a show for his men, but where did he even find them? Went down the pub and offered them a bucket-list once-in-a-lifetime violent winter break? Or, judging by the trenchcoats and battered leather jackets they’re decked out in, at the gig of some indie has-been?

‘You tell ’em, boss,’ a man pipes up, then turns a little sheepish under Phoebe’s and my glares.

‘Oh, I’ll tell them, all right,’ Keith says, taking a step towards Phoebe. He hasn’t spent much time looking at me, which suggests he sees Phoebe as the main attraction. He must have come across her in his research and dismissed me as her sidekick. I can use that to my advantage.

‘By “it’s over”,’ he gloats, ‘I mean it’s over. You lot had your chance back in London. You blew it. We didn’t. So now, we’ve got the watch and you don’t. How’s that for “it’s over”?’

What? OK, now I’m really glad Phoebe asked what he meant by that, because that isn’t what I expected at all. They’ve got the watch?

‘How?’ I can’t help but breathe.

His eyes shift to me, like he’s properly taking me in for the first time. I’d really rather he wouldn’t. But instead of leering triumphantly, he just squints like he can’t quite place where he’s seen me before. For a second, I’m worried he’ll remember me from Harris Vintage and realise I’m not with the Circle … but then it passes.

Maybe he’s just too busy peacocking for the memory to register. ‘You ever hear the phrase “it’s not what you know, it’s who”?’ he asks, turning back to Phoebe. ‘It turns out we didn’t even need to steal the watch back in London – we could just have someone close to Miss Skyla Dawn convince her to bring it here for us herself. Helpful little minx, isn’t she?’

I try my absolute hardest not to look puzzled by this. In my experience, ‘puzzled’ is not the reaction men like Keith are looking for when they boast in your face. Often, looking puzzled just makes them angry.

But what he’s saying makes no sense at all.

Not the fact that they’ve paid off someone on her team – I’m not too surprised about that, and have a pretty strong guess of who it might be. But why would Mikey’s Firm want Skyla to bring the watch here of all places?

‘So what happens now?’ Phoebe prompts.

Keith’s smile blooms wickedly. ‘Good question. Now I’m going to give you a choice. Maybe it’s one you’ve heard before. It’s called the easy way …’

‘Or the hard way,’ Phoebe finishes. ‘Yes, that does sound familiar.’

Keith looks triumphant. ‘Right! But whichever you choose—’

He’s interrupted by a blast of static from the walkie-talkie he has clipped to his coat. ‘Got a problem, boss,’ says whoever’s on the other end. Keith’s smile falters. ‘It’s a fake. The bloody slag’s fobbed us off with a fake.’

Ah. I get it now.

The prop version of the watch Skyla uses in her live shows – the one she says no one would possibly mistake for the real thing if they saw it up close. She must have left it in her chalet, and I guess someone did mistake it for the real thing – at least for long enough to convince one of the gang to tell Keith they’d found it.

Keith glances to his men, then looks back at us with a horribly self-effacing smile. He doesn’t seem to have noticed that Phoebe’s used his momentary distraction to take a step closer to me. ‘Well, never mind that,’ he says. ‘It won’t matter to you soon, anyway.’

‘You said there’s an easy way,’ I remind him hopefully. ‘Does that mean we can just go home and leave you all to it?’

Something brushes my hand, and I open my fingers slightly for Phoebe to pass me the magazine she unloaded from my pistol. I force my eyes not to widen in surprise. That’s quite the expression of trust, all things considered.

‘Not quite.’ Keith doesn’t seem to notice me slipping the clip into the long sleeve of my coat. Reloading one-handed is bad enough, but doing it in gloves, while keeping the pistol hidden from view is another. Even just manoeuvring the clip towards the slot is difficult – I’m terrified I’ll drop something, or else the movement of my hand in my sleeve will give me away. I glance between Keith and his men as I work. With their hands burrowed in their pockets from the cold, I can’t tell if any of them are carrying firearms. They’d be pretty stupid not to, given how much easier it is to get guns in France than it is back in England.

But I really hope they’re not.

Keith nods at the man to his right, who meets his eye and jerkily nods back. ‘The easy way is you let Alfie here stab you,’ he says, leering wickedly. ‘But it might be more fun if you try to fight back.’

Alfie steps forward, rolls his shoulders menacingly and produces a knife from his coat pocket. Even unarmed, he would have been the toughest-looking of the men – taller than Keith, with a shaved head and a nose that looks like it’s been broken a few times. But his threatening aura is undercut slightly by the look of hesitation in his eyes. He might have had his fair share of brawls, but I can tell he hasn’t killed before.

And that’s before I raise my gun to his chest.

‘Uh, boss?’ Alfie asks, glancing at Keith as his bravado evaporates. ‘She’s pointing a bloody gun at me.’

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ Keith says, glancing around his little group in annoyance. ‘Which of you lot told me these two never used guns?’

Really? I think.

‘I said, that one never used guns,’ says a weedier-looking man, sheepishly nodding towards Phoebe. He’s skinny enough to fit into his trenchcoat twice over, and his wireframe glasses have fogged up in the cold.

They didn’t think they might at least need a pistol? To take down the bloody Circle?

‘But I never seen that other one,’ he continues, looking nervously in my direction.

‘Back off,’ I tell the rest of the group, who have been inching ever so slightly forward. ‘Or Alfie gets it.’ Alfie’s eyes almost pop out of his head.

‘Right, then,’ says Keith, raising his hand to reveal a glint of gunmetal in the sleeve of his coat. OK, so they do have at least one gun between them. I swing my aim from Alfie to his boss, but before either of us can get our shots off, a blur in black Lycra has whipped out from beside me and kicked the gun from Keith’s hand.

After that, a lot of things happen very quickly. Keith’s gun goes off when it hits the ground, the bullet blasting a trail through the leaf-litter then exploding into wood chippings where it hits the base of a tree. My gun goes off, intentionally – but I’m not trying to hit anyone, just scare them. Another plume of wood chippings from the same tree – unlucky for the tree – and snow tumbles from a branch overhead. Then Phoebe rushes Keith, kicking him hard in the gut so that he stumbles backwards. Not wanting to be completely outshone, I dash in and punch him in the stomach with my left hand, which sends him crumpling like a sack of potatoes.

The men’s jaws go slack as I place a foot lightly on Keith’s neck and point my gun down at his head. I give them each a significant glance in turn, daring them to move. Phoebe’s doing the same, only she’s unarmed, having adopted the threatening martial arts pose she used on me to great effect back in London. Except that’s not quite true, I realise – she is armed. She must have grabbed Keith’s pistol while I wasn’t looking, but rather than threatening anyone with it she’s just jammed it into the waistband of her leggings. Curious.

Meanwhile, Keith’s men are looking less like threatening gangsters, more like a scared group of dads. Even the one with the knife – Alfie – is letting it hang limply at his side.

‘Drop it,’ I tell him. He obliges. Breathes out. He looks relieved.

‘What are you doing here?’ I ask the whole group. ‘Don’t you have work? Or families?’

I catch the weedy man glancing at Keith when I say the word ‘families’. Oh. I hadn’t noticed the resemblance until now, but … brothers? ‘Don’t shoot him,’ he mumbles, catching my eye.

‘This is stupid,’ groans a guy who hasn’t spoken yet. He turns away from us and faces the weedy man. ‘She’s right – what are we doing here? Jack, your brother is a fucking nutter. I only came because he said it would be a guaranteed money-maker, and he could hook us up with free tickets.’

‘As if,’ Jack snaps back, holding his own despite the fact the other man is a good few inches taller than him and twice as wide in the shoulders. ‘You knew what this was and you said you could handle it.’

Impressive – and probably unwise. ‘And you’re saying I can’t?’ says the bigger man, looming over Keith’s brother and grabbing his coat by the zipper. ‘Not my fault this was a stupid idea.’

‘Oi, lay off him,’ says Alfie, coming to Jack’s aid. Then the fourth man chips in with something, but I don’t hear what it is because suddenly they’re all yelling over each other about which part of this was whose fault and what they’d even hoped to gain by coming here in the first place.

BANG!

The sound of my pistol putting a third bullet in the same tree (sorry, tree) brings their squabble to an end. They turn to face me, cartoonishly lowering the fists they were about to use to clobber each other. Then all of them – except Jack – make a break for it.

My two options are either to let them go or to shoot them, and I’m not feeling in a particularly murderous mood right now. There are far too many unanswered questions for me to have any idea what sort of mess this watch is getting us into, and I’m not about to start killing for it.

‘Now, you,’ I say, turning to Keith’s brother. I can’t help but feel bad for him. He’s oddly sensitive beneath the skin-deep bravado in a way that makes me think he’s really just trying to be there for Keith, despite his brother being a grade-one prick.

‘I’m going to need you to go back to the festival. Find the security office, and ask for a Madame Celeste Roux. She speaks English. Tell her your brother has taken a bad pill and got sick in the forest, OK? Bring her back here ASAP.’

He nods and scurries off without a backwards glance, reassuring me that he’s grateful enough for the out that he’ll do exactly as I’ve asked.

‘And as for you,’ I say as I turn towards Phoebe … only to find she isn’t where I thought she’d be. Or anywhere, in fact. I try to remember when I last saw her and realise I can’t quite place it.

‘See you around, I guess,’ I tell the darkness. It doesn’t reply.

It takes less than five minutes to deal with Keith. He grumbles as I drag him to his feet and handcuff him to the tree with our three bullets in it (another indignity for the majestic ash). Then I fire Madame Roux de la sécurité a quick text, in which I just happen to mention a notorious British gangster with an Interpol warrant for his arrest who I’ve spotted lurking around the festival on my rounds. I’m hoping that when she finds Keith here, she’ll put two and two together and keep him out of harm’s way – at least until my warrant turns out to be a little bit completely made up.

I also text Emma, checking if Skyla is still in rehearsal.

She is, comes Emma’s two-word answer.

I reply: Good. Her chalet isn’t safe. I’m going to check it out and look for alternatives, will let you know.

Chapter 20

As if Keith and his band of indie sleazebags haven’t made my life difficult enough, Skyla’s chalet is well and truly trashed. Worse, it’s all but confirmed someone in her entourage is feeding Mikey’s Firm information. Given he all but forced Skyla to play Snow Glow after Dayton’s death, I’m pretty sure that someone is Ian – but I still need proof.

I come to a halt outside a large white tent with a sign that reads PRODUCTION OFFICE and assess the situation through a gap in the tent flaps. Ian’s on his own in there, transfixed by a buzzing mobile phone on the trestle table in front of him. I watch his right hand twitch indecisively as he stares at it, but he doesn’t move to grab it until the phone rings out. Then, for a few seconds, everything is still. His shoulders drop ever so slightly in relief. Then the phone starts buzzing again.

This time, he answers. ‘Please,’ he says. ‘Leave me alone.’

Interesting.

After a few seconds of silence, Ian speaks. ‘No, I don’t know anything about that.’ His voice is raised but there’s a nervousness to it as well, as if he knows he’s pushing it. ‘I did what we agreed, didn’t I? So we’re done here.’

The person he’s talking to must disagree, because Ian shakes his head. ‘No, no. If you got it wrong that’s on you.’ His nervousness is tipping into desperation. ‘But you can’t go back in. The deal was that I get her to the festival and create some time for you to search her chalet. You’ve done that. That’s it.’

Well, there’s the proof I was looking for. But Ian doesn’t seem too happy about his role in all this. ‘Please don’t go near her,’ he begs. ‘If what happened to Dayton—’

But he doesn’t get to finish what he’s saying before he’s interrupted by whoever he’s speaking to. His face loses what little colour it had left and after about thirty seconds of weak protests, he’s hung up on.

‘Fuck,’ he breathes, beginning to pace. ‘Fuck, fuck, FUCK.’

That last expletive is punctuated by a clanging kick to the nearby wastepaper basket. I take it as my cue to enter.

‘Everything all right?’ I ask, pushing into the tent.

‘Yeah,’ is Ian’s hoarse reply before he resumes his distracted pacing. He’s barely glanced at me and his hands are now shaking so violently that he’s unable to smooth down his hair. ‘Just another client wanting something unreasonable, you know how it is.’

‘Mikey’s Firm, is it?’ I ask, not bothering to hide the edge in my voice. Our eyes lock. ‘You’re in bed with dangerous men, Ian.’

For a second I think he’s going to deny it. Then his face falls and he staggers back into a chair. ‘Things have got out of hand,’ he says, voice shaky, head in his hands. ‘I don’t know what to do. I’ve fucked it.’

Before I can grill him on precisely how he’s fucked it, he starts a rambling confession. It’s as if, now the seal is broken, he’s intent on unburdening himself completely.

‘I didn’t know they were going to wreck her place, I swear,’ he says. ‘All I knew was that they wanted her to play the festival, and they were obsessed with that watch. The festival made sense for her anyway, so why not make a little money on the side? They said the watch had always been theirs, they’d paid good money for it years ago but something went wrong, God knows what.’

I’m starting to figure it out. I can’t tell if Vincent, Skyla’s producer, was meant to be part of the relay getting the watch to the gang, or if something else went awry and he just ended up with it. Whichever it was, his death seems to be the point at which it dropped off the map – until it showed up in Skyla’s video, that is, and the entire criminal underworld went crazy for it.

‘So why not just tell them what chalet she was in and they could grab it themselves?’ Ian continues. ‘But then Dayton must have figured out they wanted it, or maybe someone was pressuring him to get it for them, and—’ He breaks off, gulping for air.

‘And?’ I ask. ‘What happens now?’

‘They’re – they’re still looking for that watch,’ he stammers. ‘They’re desperate for it. I don’t know why. Their boss back in London is pissed because his man here isn’t answering his phone, but as soon as they speak he’ll come sniffing around her chalet again, and this time …’

I wave a dismissive hand. ‘Don’t worry about Keith. He’s tied up with festival security. What about the others? You’re saying Mikey’s still in London?’

Apparently, I said something funny, because that gets the first smile out of Ian I’ve seen all evening. ‘Yeah, Mikey’s back in London. But you said their man’s with security? I can’t see that doing much good – they’ve got more holes than a colander. The man’ll be out in no time.’

God, you really can’t trust anyone in this industry. I’ll have to pick up the watch from Madame Roux to make sure she doesn’t give him the safe password on his way out.

‘They really didn’t say anything about why they were so keen for her to play Snow Glow?’ I ask. ‘Why not just steal the watch in London?’

‘I– I don’t know,’ stammers Ian. ‘I didn’t ask questions, I just did what I was told. I didn’t think …’

‘That anyone would die?’ I spit out. ‘A bit late for that, isn’t it?’

Ian whimpers. ‘I never wanted that! Dayton was a good lad, just a bit … troubled. And Skyla – please look after her, I couldn’t live with myself if …’

This is the issue with men like Ian. They’ll do just about anything if the price is right, and if they can tell themselves nobody will actually get hurt, but they never think about the repercussions. And there are always repercussions.

I watch him trembling on his chair and weigh up what to do with him. He’s a loose end, but not a dangerous one, I don’t think. He’s just pathetic, more than anything.

Then my phone rings. It’s Skyla, apparently out of rehearsal. ‘Maisie. I just heard from Emma. What happened to my chalet?’

I catch Ian’s gaze. He looks like he wishes he was anywhere else. ‘Hello, Skyla,’ I reply. ‘Funny you should ask me that. Perhaps you can talk to Ian about it – and then tell me what you think we should do with him.’

Skyla’s decision is softer than it could have been, which is a relief – but then again, most people don’t solve all of their problems by having someone killed. After I bring a sobbing Ian to the rehearsal space she and Emma are hiding out in and he wraps up his confession, she gives a heavy, tragic sigh.

‘I expect your resignation letter sent to the label within the next half-hour,’ she says. ‘Tell them you refuse to work with a company that gives male artists the credit for women’s work, and that you intend to go public with the real story of who wrote “Love on a Feather” and the other songs on that album. Make sure to copy in a few magazines and influencers when you do, just to make sure it’s out in the open.’

He nods and sinks to the floor, defeated.

My first thought was that this gives Skyla the perfect opportunity to cancel her show. It’s still kind of early – if we set off now, we could be back in Grenoble well before midnight.

But not only was Ian not lying about the punitive clause in Skyla’s contract, but also, the local news is now reporting a tunnel closure on the only route leading up the mountain to the resort.

At least until the morning, no one gets in or out without a helicopter.

That in mind, I have two immediate concerns. First is picking up the watch from Madame Roux’s safe, which only takes a short detour. She’s somewhere else – possibly looking for Keith in the forest – when I arrive there, and I’m half-expecting the safe to be empty. It isn’t. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

Second is finding somewhere for Skyla to stay that’s off the record, close enough to keep an eye on her, and occupied solely by people I know I can trust.

That only leaves one real option. It’s not a good one.

At least no one in the festival crowds seems to notice Skyla Dawn moving through their midst, just as no one seems to question why anyone would still be dressed in a full-face ski mask, goggles and helmet this late in the evening. By now, the daytime activities are well and truly over, and the festival site has morphed into something resembling Ibiza at 4,000 feet. Dance music blasts from marquees and wooden lodges, vendors in thick winter coats sell hotdogs and light-up deely boppers, and the general mass of people are moving in the direction of the main stage, where Avery Guo is apparently just about to start her set. The only people to even look our way are a group of drunk Germans who shout for us to join them in making topless snow angels. Thankfully, they don’t push it when we respectfully decline.

I didn’t expect anyone to be in my friends’ chalet – last I heard, everyone was out for the night’s performances – but the living room light is on when we get there. I have a sudden premonition of opening the door to find it trashed in the same way Skyla’s was, if either of the gangs have figured out my friends’ connection to Skyla through me. It’s a horrible thought. I hate to think that I might be putting them in harm’s way by bringing her here, but what other option do we have? Skyla’s team and festival security are both compromised. I have to get her somewhere no one would think to look.

I unlock the door with the key Liv gave me and call out ‘Hellooo?’ as I step into the hall. I don’t hear any sign of looters – just a sudden flurry of hacking coughs from inside the living room.

I’d know those coughs anywhere. ‘Beth? Are you sick?’ I ask, pushing open the door.

Beth is under a blanket, laptop on her knees, surrounded by scrunched-up tissues. She’s even holding a wad of tissues up to her mouth and nose, but when she sees me she drops it straight away.

‘Oh, thank God, it’s you,’ she says. Beneath the tissues, her face looks … absolutely fine. Neither her eyes or nose are any redder than usual, and her voice sounds exactly as it did when I last saw her a few hours ago – which is to say, not sick at all. ‘Sorry, Michelle almost killed me when I said I wasn’t feeling up to Avery Guo’s set, so I was pretending that I was oh my God it’s Skyla Dawn.’

‘Ta-daa,’ Skyla says, taking off her ski goggles as she comes in behind me. ‘Lovely to see you again – Beth, was it? Sorry for the hassle, Maisie found an obsessive fan lurking near my chalet and we’re not sure it’s safe.’

‘God, that’s horrible,’ says Beth sympathetically. If you didn’t know her, you wouldn’t be able to see the gears turning in her mind as she figures out what’s really going on.

‘Isn’t it?’ Skyla grimaces. ‘Big piece of advice if you ever want to get famous: don’t be a woman.’

‘So,’ I explain to Beth, ‘I think Skyla’s best option is to stay in the spare room for the night – would that be OK?’

I’m nervous as I say it, aware of what I’m asking and its implications.

‘Of course,’ says Beth, standing up to hurriedly tidy away her scrunched-up tissues – all of which seem remarkably clean and dry, now that I’m looking at them. ‘But if you want a quiet night, Skyla, we should hide you away before Liv and Michelle get back. They are going to flip.’

Skyla smiles, hoisting the sports bag she put all her clothes in over her shoulder. ‘It would be lovely to see them,’ she says, and I’m almost convinced that she’s not just being polite. ‘But maybe tomorrow morning. I need my sleep if I’m going to perform, you know.’

I offer to guide her up, but she’s closer to the stairs and has already started going up ahead of me. Beth catches my eye as I make to follow after her, detaining me on the bottom step. ‘She seems nice?’ she mouths, looking gobsmacked – and a little wary. Neither of us have had the best run when it comes to meeting people off the telly – not after she got caught up in the whole Gabby Hawthorne debacle last year.

‘I think she is,’ I mouth back, putting on an uncertain look. It’s mostly true. Maybe.

‘Oh, it’s the first on the left,’ Beth calls up to Skyla, who’s almost at the top.

She climbs the last step, turns, opens a door … and screams, ‘MAISIE!!!’ She spins around and charges back down the stairs towards the two of us with a clatter of trainers on wood. ‘There’s a man in there!’

Beth’s eyes have widened, though she isn’t looking particularly astonished. ‘Shit, sorry!’ she says. ‘We thought it’d be a fun surprise, and then with all the Skyla excitement I totally forgot to say—’

But I’m already running up the stairs. In the middle of the bedroom stands Will, wearing the awkward grimace of a child who’s wandered into the wrong toilet cubicle.

‘Sorry!’ he whispers when he sees me. ‘Isn’t this your room? I didn’t mean to scare her.’

‘You could have said something,’ I say, but I can’t stop myself from smiling at the sight of him, or from taking another step closer.

I fall into him without letting him explain himself, ignoring the sharp cold sting of his jacket’s zipper where it brushes my bare neck. I focus instead on the warmth of his face against mine, the gentle scratching of his hair and stubble on my cheek, the tickle of his breath on my ear. I hold him there, feeling his weight, pushing out all the questions we haven’t had a chance to talk about: about him and Phoebe; about what’s going on with the Circle and how we’re going to deal with them. They don’t matter – not right now. In this exact, tiny, already-slipping-away moment, all that matters is that he’s here and he’s mine.

‘I thought you couldn’t get here until later,’ I whisper as I pull away.

He smiles roguishly, holding me by the shoulders. ‘It’s those alpine roads.’ He slips into a Sean Connery impression, raising an eyebrow ironically. ‘You can really power into the turns.’

I roll my eyes, playfully squeezing his upper arm. Then I lean in for a kiss and—

‘Maisie? Will?’ Beth shouts from downstairs. ‘Everything all good?’

We come out onto the landing to find the two of them staring up at us.

‘This is Will,’ I explain to Skyla, not entirely sure what Beth will have told her. ‘He’s my … partner.’ That word covers just about everything, I guess. ‘He’s very sorry for scaring you, and he’s safe to be around, I promise. Anyway, Will, Skyla; Skyla, Will.’

I catch the realisation flash in real time across Will’s face, but it’s subtle. ‘Of course,’ he says, as if her showing up here was the most natural thing in the world. ‘Lovely to meet you. And Maisie’s right – I am very sorry to have intruded like that.’

Skyla looks like she’s about to say something, then thinks better of it. ‘Right. Well, I’m going to sleep. Big day tomorrow and everything.’

‘Night, Skyla,’ I say as she starts climbing back up the stairs. ‘We’ll try to keep it down so you can sleep.’

‘Oh, don’t worry about that,’ she says, pausing to look back at us. ‘I can only sleep with white noise playing through my headphones – I’ve spent too long on tour buses not to. It would take an avalanche coming through here to wake me up.’

Possibly not the best idea when at least two criminal organisations are coming after you, I think, but I’m not going to argue it now. If it means Will, Beth and I can chat downstairs without worrying about waking her up, or her hearing something she shouldn’t, then I’m all in favour.

‘And Maisie,’ she says, holding my gaze. ‘Thanks for everything. Really.’

I smile. ‘You’re very welcome.’

As her door clicks shut, the three of us release the breaths we’ve been holding and flop onto the couches in the living room.

‘I really hope this doesn’t end badly,’ I murmur. ‘There was nowhere else I could put her.’

Then I explain everything, from the scuffles with Keith and Phoebe in the woods and how Phoebe practically confirmed she’s Hangjaw’s partner, to the state of Skyla’s chalet, and how Mikey’s Firm paid off Ian to force Skyla to come here.

When I mention the closed tunnel, Will takes a sharp breath.

‘You think it’s suspicious?’ I ask him.

‘I think it’s convenient, and it’s something the Circle would have no trouble organising.’

Beth must see my anxiety, because she gives me a sympathetic smile from across the room. ‘Liv and Michelle probably won’t be back until the morning anyway,’ she says. ‘You know what they’re like.’

That is true. On our last girls’ trip, they had a running joke that only me and Beth should pay for the hotel room, since we were the only ones who used it. To be fair, though, we were in Mallorca, and they did most of their sleeping on the beach.

‘Right,’ I say, suppressing my worries and rounding on Beth. ‘You’ve been researching, haven’t you? That’s why you’re pretending to be sick.’

‘You know me,’ she grins, ‘I couldn’t help it.’

I can’t help but smile back. Stressful situation aside, I haven’t seen her this invested in something since she left the TV company.

We give Will a brief rundown of what Beth found earlier: that the watch was most likely a clue in a puzzle competition sponsored by French millionaire Alphonse Baudelaire, a competition that never actually ran.

‘Which might be related to,’ Beth adds, opening her laptop, ‘the little fact that the entire team working on it died in suspicious circumstances, around the same time it was quietly cancelled.’

She turns her screen to show us a newspaper article with the glaring headline PUZZLE COMPANY EMPLOYEES KILLED IN TRAGIC MINIBUS ACCIDENT.

‘Yeesh,’ breathes Will, shuffling over to take a better look at the article. ‘And no autopsy report on the driver.’

I take the watch from my pocket and turn it over in my hands. All of this for an ugly, eccentric timepiece? And yet, all signs are pointing to two of the deadliest gangs in Europe chasing after clues in a decade-old puzzle competition. It feels like some sort of absurdist nightmare.

‘I still don’t get it,’ I sigh. ‘This whole thing feels so … silly. I mean, the Circle is a serious organisation – they’re not going to drop everything to chase after a few hundred thousand euros, are they?’

‘It could easily be millions, though,’ Beth muses. ‘Baudelaire was a puzzle-obsessed multi-millionaire, and he was planning this competition as his legacy. Who’s to say he didn’t put all of his money into it?’

Will shakes his head. ‘Even so. They already have more money than they can launder without setting off alarms. It has to be something else.’ He chews his lip, lost in thought. Then his eyes suddenly sharpen. ‘What about his estate?’ he asks Beth as he pulls out his phone. ‘Is there any chance he owned something a bit more serious that could have been part of the treasure hunt?’

Leaving them to sniff out Alphonse Baudelaire’s last will and testament, I turn my attentions to the watch. If Mikey’s Firm and the Circle really are on a treasure hunt, then solving it ahead of them would be one way to get an advantage. This puzzle must be the key to it – but how?

I twist the dials aimlessly. It causes the cogs to turn, revealing and obscuring different numbers as they go, but I can’t see a pattern to it.

How could this object be used as a clue? I ask myself. Well, naturally, it would have to point whoever found it in the direction of the treasure – which means that even if it seems like a numerical puzzle, what it’s actually doing is encoding a location. And since Mikey’s Firm saw Skyla bringing the watch here as a step in the right direction, whatever location it’s hiding can’t be too far away. Which makes sense – what better place for a mad French aristocrat to hide his fortune than up in these mountains?

Then it hits me. No one in Mikey’s Firm has ever actually held the watch – or anyone in the Circle, as far as we know. And yet they both came here, after seeing it in Skyla’s video.

I pull the video up on my phone, scrubbing through until I find the split-second closeup of Skyla’s hands as she holds the suited man’s head beneath water. For the rest of the video, the watch is hardly visible – it could be any gaudy Rolex – but not here. This one shot must have started this whole thing. But what did they all see in it?

It can’t be the highlighted numbers. That can be changed with a touch of a dial, so it would be a complete fluke if it just happened to be in the right position.

So what about the cogs themselves? After all, they’re the centrepiece of the display. And while their positions might change, one thing about them is never going to: the decorative holes punched into them, of which each cog has a different number. Reading the cogs in size order …

‘Guys, does four, five, zero, six mean anything to you?’ I ask.

‘Could it be a PIN?’ Will replies.

‘Or a password to get in somewhere?’ Beth throws out. ‘Or a date? May fourth 2006?’

‘Maybe,’ I say, unconvinced. ‘I think it has something to do with why Mikey’s Firm were so keen on bringing Skyla here.’

‘Latitude and longitude coordinates, then?’ suggests Beth.

‘Yes!’ Will claps his hands and points at Beth, who’s already on her phone checking. ‘I think that’s it. London is 51 North, 0 West – we can’t be too far away from 45, 06.’

‘We’re not,’ she says triumphantly. ‘That’s where we are exactly.’

Will hops up from the sofa and pulls out an old-school map from the bookshelf, unfolding and spreading it out on the floor between the two sofas. Skimming his finger over the paper, he traces out a rectangle.

‘This is still a pretty large area, but it’s a start.’ He jabs the paper. ‘We’re here, in the north-west quadrant. There must be a second part to the puzzle, something that narrows it down even further.’

‘It must be to do with these dials,’ I say slowly, twisting them as I think out loud. ‘They’re the only part of the watch that’s not static, and they cover up different numbers as they go.’

I twist the dials until the 4, 5 and 6, and the 0 in the ten are all covered. Positioned like that, it would make the 1, 3, 7 and 9 all visible.

‘What if the numbers that are still visible when you cover up the initial coordinates are what comes after the decimal place?’ I suggest. ‘We’ve got one, three, seven and nine, but that still gives us about sixteen different options.’

‘Take a picture of it and send it over,’ Beth says. ‘I can work through the combinations.’

I hit send on the photos, feeling good about our progress: not just that we’re getting somewhere with this, but because it’s good to see her and Will start to work together.

Then there’s a rattle from the chalet door.

Chapter 21

Any worries that someone is trying to sneak into the chalet disappear when the door opens so violently that it bangs off the wall.

‘Whoops!’ says Michelle, before breaking off into giggles. It’s followed by the sounds of people traipsing into the hallway behind her, unzipping jackets and snow boots, joking and laughing and failing in any attempt to keep the noise down. Alongside Michelle and Liv, I hear two other voices – a man and a woman, speaking English with distinct but unplaceable European accents.

‘What the hell?’ hisses Beth, glowering at the closed door separating the living room from the hall. ‘They’re bringing people back for a party? While I’m in my sickbed trying to get some sleep?’

God love them, but I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what they’re doing. Michelle and Liv are among the most considerate people I know when they’re sober, but after a drink all rationality goes out the window.

‘Maybe they’re just grabbing something before they head back out,’ Will suggests hopefully – naively – as the door to the living room flings open.

‘Beth, you’re up!’ Liv shouts, a massive grin on her face, oblivious to the looks of horror on ours. ‘Are you feeling better? And oh my God, Will! What are you doing here?!’

Shit. I had planned to hide Will away before they got back: a boyfriend crashing the girls’ trip is never a good look, especially when said trip has come about because one of the girls is going through the worst breakup of her life.

I push Skyla’s watch deep into my trouser pocket. ‘He was working nearby,’ I blurt out. ‘Crazy coincidence! He’ll be gone in the morning, though, don’t worry.’

But if anything could puncture Liv’s good vibes, it certainly isn’t Will. ‘Aw, that’s so sweet!’ she says, pulling each of us in for a hug. When she gets to me, she takes hold of my shoulders and effects a serious expression, only somewhat undermined by the glazed look in her eyes. ‘Maisie, have I ever told you how happy I am that you’ve found someone like him? It’s so nice not having to worry about you!’

Before I can dwell too long on the ‘worrying’ state of my previous romantic history, my gaze lands on Michelle, in the middle of the room. She’s talking to a glam-looking woman holding a bottle of vodka and dressed in a black T-shirt printed with the words LIGHTING TECHNICIAN and an athletic-looking man in a blue security jacket.

A very familiar security jacket. Suddenly, I’m feeling a chill, because it’s exactly the kind of jacket I saw on that body in the woods – on the man who was killed, apparently so that a Circle agent could steal his identity. Not that a jacket alone means anything, given how many people are dressed in the exact same way across the festival this weekend … but I can’t help but notice his one looks more than a little bit tight around the shoulders.

Liv spots where I’m looking. ‘Oh, right! Introductions!’ she chirps, waving them over. ‘Everyone, this is Jean-Pierre, and this is Élise. They’re both working at the festival but they’re off for the night and they’re sooooo funny, you’ll love them. Guys, meet Beth, Maisie, and Maisie’s boyfriend Will. We didn’t expect him to be here, but here he is!’

The guy, who I’m assuming is Jean-Pierre, speaks first. ‘Hey.’ Or should that be hej? Because there’s something very northern European about his inflection. ‘Glad for meeting you,’ he adds, though his brusque tone sounds anything but.

‘Ciao,’ says Élise, absently tapping at her phone.

We don’t respond, but before things can get properly awkward, Michelle appears behind Élise and grabs the vodka. ‘Drinks! Drinks! Drinks!’ she starts chanting, disappearing with the bottle into the kitchen. ‘Everyone OK with vodka Cokes?’

The other three cheer in agreement and follow her through, leaving just Will, Beth and me in the living room. We huddle in like a football team.

‘So Liv’s wasted,’ begins Beth.

‘Michelle seemed to be swaying a little, too, as she came in,’ adds Will.

‘OK, sure,’ I interject. ‘But more importantly: does anyone else feel Jean-Pierre’s accent is a little off for a Jean-Pierre? And that jacket …’

Beth grimaces. ‘Now that you mention it, I’m not sure Élise is French either. They do say “ciao” in France, just … not like that. But if she was Italian, she’d be Elisa or something, right? Not Élise.’ She pauses thoughtfully. ‘Although they could just be Swiss. That might explain a lot.’

Will nods hesitantly. ‘It might … But let’s keep our friend and her watch hidden, just in case.’

I nod and pull out my phone. Hopefully, Skyla’s managing to sleep through the music that is now blaring from Michelle’s Bluetooth speaker in the kitchen, but I shoot her a text anyway:

Friends have brought people back. Trying to get them out without a fuss, but stay in the room for now!!!

Will waits until I’ve finished typing, then leans in to whisper: ‘Do you think Phoebe could have figured this out? Seen the connections from you to Liv and Michelle and relayed it to the Circle in enough time to have them followed this evening?’

‘It’s possible …’ I begin, then go quiet as Michelle reappears from the kitchen, drink in hand. She leans down and sticks her head into our little circle: ‘Everything OK?’

None of us know what to say, so after some pointed glances at Beth and me, Michelle continues: ‘Look, I know you two love a quiet night, but this is the happiest Liv’s been in forever. She needs to let loose, but all the bars were closing and those two are staying in staff dorms, so …’

Her words are slightly slurred, but the insinuation is clear: pretty please take one for the team and let Liv have this. And given the good mood she’s in, I desperately want to. But with my friends, Skyla, and the watch under one roof, even the off-chance that Jean-Pierre and Élise might be Circle agents is way too much of a risk.

Time to play the fun sponge. ‘Michelle, I’m sorry. We can’t have a party tonight. We need to get them out of here.’

‘Really, Maisie?’ Michelle replies, straightening up to look down on me. Oh no. I recognise that expression. Michelle can be a fighter when she’s drunk. ‘So you inviting your boyfriend to stay without telling us is no big deal, but bringing two people back for some quiet drinks is crossing a line? No offence, Will.’

‘I didn’t invite him,’ I say defensively, as if that’s what’s important. And they’re hardly being quiet, I can’t help but think, as the wall starts humming with the bass of Ariana Grande’s ‘Dangerous Woman’.

Fortunately, Beth is here to keep things on track. ‘Look, Maisie’s heard rumours through her work,’ she says. ‘There’s dodgy stuff going on at the festival. People have been impersonating staff members, trying to get close to the artists.’

Michelle only laughs. ‘So you think these people we met in the queue for the bar somehow know that we know someone who works for Skyla?’

And brought her back to your chalet without telling you, I want to admit. But as much as telling Michelle about Skyla is the right thing to do, there’s no way I can trust her to keep it a secret.

‘There’s a chance,’ says Will.

She throws up her hands. ‘OK, you’re all paranoid. Well, it’s a good thing Skyla Dawn’s not here then, isn’t it?’

It would take the best actors in the world to respond to that without giving the game away. If it was just Will and me here, we might have pulled it off, on a good day … but Beth hasn’t had that kind of training. Michelle’s mouth falls open. ‘You’re shitting me.’

We all shush her at once, and she must realise how serious we are because she stops talking. Not a moment too soon. With a blast of pop music, the kitchen door swings open and Liv emerges, somehow balancing a plastic wine glass, a whiskey tumbler, a chipped Mickey Mouse mug, and a measuring beaker between her hands and forearms, each filled to the brim with dark brown liquid – as our unwanted guests linger behind her.

‘Drinks!’ she says happily, distributing the assorted containers while keeping the wine glass for herself. ‘Sorry, Will,’ she says when he ends up with the beaker. ‘We seem to be low on cups.’

‘Thanks, Liv!’ we each say graciously. But the moment she and Michelle drift off with their new friends to the far side of the room, Will and I peer into our respective vessels. When we look back up, our eyes meet, and I know right away that he’s thinking the same thing as I am. The age-old rule: don’t drink anything that you haven’t seen poured yourself. Not that we can’t trust Liv, of course, and she probably mixed them all, and she probably kept an eye on all four cups the whole time she was in there …

But if she didn’t …

And if either of their so-called friends really is working for the Circle …

Well, they do have a history with poisons.

‘Better not,’ I whisper to Beth, staring at her mug so she knows what I mean. She pulls a face, then quietly gets up and goes to the kitchen, presumably to tip out her drink and replace it with a fresh one. Smart. I’m planning to wait a moment then tactfully follow her, but just as I’m starting to stand …

‘Guys, Ring of Fire! Come play!’ Liv shouts from the other side of the room. She’s sitting on the floor next to Jean-Pierre, holding a deck of cards, with a soup bowl on the coffee table apparently ready to perform as the dirty pint. Gross.

‘Liv!’ I say, laughing to mask my genuine annoyance. ‘What are we, sixteen years old?’

‘It’ll be fun!’ she informs me, still beaming. And who am I to say no to that smile? ‘Just like old times! Remember when we played it with those engineering students and …’

I jokingly exaggerate an all-too-real groan, partly in the hopes that Will won’t hear the end of that particular story, and pull myself to my feet, wrenching my boyfriend up after me. We cross the room hand-in-hand to sit down beside Liv, but just as I reach her …

‘Shit!’ I shout, tripping over nothing. My knee collides with her plastic cup, sending its sticky, dark mixture sloshing onto the floor – just as I intended.

‘Maisie!’ Liv shouts, dodging backwards so that it doesn’t stain her jeans.

‘I’m so sorry,’ I say, grabbing some kitchen roll to dab at the growing stain on the floor.

Liv just bursts out laughing. ‘Wait, were you drinking before we came back? Everyone, Maisie’s druuunk!’

‘Want another?’ Jean-Pierre asks, leaning in and touching her arm.

I place a hand on Liv’s plastic wine glass. ‘I’ll get a new one for you, Liv,’ I say, but my eyes are on Jean-Pierre alone. I want my gaze to bore into him, but he meets it and shrugs. He might not have risen to the bait, but something about him still gives me the creeps.

In the kitchen, I pour out my tumbler and what’s left in Liv’s goblet, then replace them both with Coca-Cola from cans in the fridge. I think about passing on the vodka for both of us – better safe than sorry – but find an unopened bottle in the back of a cupboard, so I use a tiny bit of that. Call me paranoid, but I still don’t trust the one Élise brought.

By the time I’ve sorted that and am re-entering the living room, the drinking game is well underway. It’s still not my preferred way to spend any evening, but I’m less worried about it now that the drinks belonging to me, Liv and Beth are all confirmed safe. That only leaves Will, who can look after himself, and Michelle, who I’m 99 per cent certain must have poured her own, given she was first both in and out of the kitchen.

More of a concern is how close Liv and Jean-Pierre seem to be. I can see from the doorway that she’s leaning against him while he touches her back, leering smugly like the cat that’s got the cream. Not that I’m a prude. It’s just another thing that hasn’t changed since our uni days: Liv and Michelle not noticing the rancid vibes of men they find on nights out, then insisting on bringing them home to become everyone’s problem. And given how drunk she is, even if I wasn’t half-sure the guy’s an international criminal, I’d still have to keep an eye on him.

Will’s sitting between where I was and the kitchen, which means I have to pass him on my way back to my seat. He reaches out for my hand as I come near, pulling me in for a quick kiss. I think he’s just being sweet; it’s only as I’m standing back up that I figure out his agenda. His hand, beneath the level of the coffee table where only I can see it, is shaped into a bit of sign language even a six-year-old could recognise. Two fingers straight, two fingers bent, thumb slightly curled.

Gun.

His eyes dart in Jean-Pierre’s direction. The chill I was feeling comes back with a vengeance.

Feigning nonchalance, I turn away from Will and flick my eyes to Jean-Pierre’s hip. It wasn’t visible when he first came in, but sure enough, now that he’s removed his jacket and has sat down, it’s undeniable if you know what you’re looking for. There, on his left hip, is the ever-so-faint print of a concealed handgun.

Fuck. Of course, he does work in security – supposedly. I’m pretty sure some French security do carry guns these days – or is it just personal bodyguards? Either way, they’re probably not meant to hide them under their clothes while they’re off the clock. So while it doesn’t absolutely confirm that he’s working for the Circle, it makes it distinctly more likely – and much more dangerous if it turns out that he is.

My heart is in my throat as I sit down beside Liv, forcing a smile as I pass over her drink.

‘Thanks, Maisie,’ she says, leaning into me. ‘I’m so glad we were all able to come here for this. I am having such a good night.’

Curdled happiness bubbles in my throat like acid reflux. I’m glad one of us is.

‘That’s good,’ I say, smiling weakly.

On the far side of the coffee table, Élise is sitting between Beth and Michelle. ‘Question master!’ she says, drawing a card from the diminishing ring on the table. ‘So, how do you all know each other?’

‘Through uni,’ says Beth, taking a sip of her Coke. Her tone is flat, and one look at her face makes my heart sink even further. While she might have been pretending to be unwell before, right now she looks sick with worry. My heart aches for her. She knew what she was signing up for, but still – the only other time she’s been in a situation like this, she was locked in a CEO’s penthouse and nearly executed for getting too close to a scandal.

‘Another three,’ Michelle mutters, taking the next card and another swig of her drink. A three means ‘me,’ meaning the person who draws it drinks, and Michelle’s had a few of them in a row. She turns to Élise. ‘It’s actually a wild coincidence that the four of us are here together.’ Then she sees me looking. ‘Isn’t it, Maisie? If you weren’t working for— ouch!’ She rubs her arm where Beth just pinched her behind Élise’s back. ‘What was that for?’

‘Oh?’ Élise asks me across the table. She’s tapping at her phone again, and am I crazy to think there’s a connection between her sending a message and the fact Michelle just let something slip? ‘You’re working here too?’

‘Um, yeah,’ I fluster, giving Michelle the mother of all evils – though she’s too far gone to notice. ‘Just in the … car park, actually. Nothing glamorous.’

Before I can register Élise’s response to my feeble excuse, I’m interrupted by a shout from my right. ‘Six! Dicks!’ shouts Jean-Pierre, brandishing the card he drew. ‘All the men.’ He takes a mighty gulp, staring at Will all the while as if challenging him to do the same. Great. As if it wasn’t enough to be playing a stupid drinking game with two criminals, one of whom has a gun and is trying to sleep with my friend, I have to listen to his macho posturing, too.

Will, in contrast, is a sea of calm. He simply raises the beaker to his lips, tilts it a little, then puts it back down. Though the downside of him drinking from a measuring beaker is that it’s all-too-clear that the level of liquid hasn’t changed even by a millilitre since the game started. Jean-Pierre watches, eagle-eyed, then lets out an exasperated snort.

‘Be nice,’ says Liv, giving him a playful push. ‘Will doesn’t have to drink if he doesn’t want to.’

Jean-Pierre declines to respond to that, which is awkward. So awkward, in fact, that it plunges the whole group into a moment of silence, which just so happens to coincide with a gap in the music as a Taylor Swift song finishes.

It’s not quiet for long.

Just long enough to hear a thump from directly above us. From Skyla’s room.

My heart leaps. Time seems to slow down. The moment stretches out, apparently forever.

Then Lady Gaga starts playing, conversation resumes, and the atmosphere is all party party. No one else seems to have noticed the noise – or if they did, they’re doing a good job at pretending they didn’t.

I check my phone, tilting it away from prying eyes. My last message from Skyla was twenty minutes ago – Don’t worry about the noise, all cool up here zzz – followed by emojis signifying sleep and headphones. But if her soundproofing is really that good, she’s extremely vulnerable if anyone gets up there. Not that she has the watch anymore, but still – the Circle don’t know that.

I visualise her window. There’s a tree outside, kind of close, but I didn’t think it was close enough for anyone to make the jump. But then, I thought that about the window Phoebe used to get into Skyla’s venue in London. Could I have miscalculated? Could someone be in there with Skyla right this second, doing who knows what to her in pursuit of a watch she doesn’t even have?

‘You OK, Maisie?’ Liv asks.

I snap out of it. ‘Yep. Sorry, just thinking about … something.’

‘Long day at the car park?’ sneers Jean-Pierre. Liv glares at him, and I notice with a little satisfaction that there’s now a few-inch gap between their knees that wasn’t there before. Funny thing, that: act like a prick to a girl’s friends and suddenly she stops wanting to sleep with you.

‘I’m getting a jumper,’ I tell Liv, and then stand. Checking on Skyla means leaving Will on his own down here, but he’s more than capable of handling things.

Especially if Élise wants to come with me. ‘Oh, are you going to the bathroom?’ she asks innocently, as she stands up alongside me. ‘Would you mind showing me the way?’

‘Sure,’ I reply. ‘No problem.’

As it happens, the toilet is just outside the living room we’ve been sitting in, under the stairs. ‘There it is,’ I tell her. ‘You go first, I need to grab something.’

She pauses, glancing up the darkened stairway. Was I wrong to even say that? But then, it’s an absolutely normal thing to do, and Jean-Pierre already overheard me. It would seem weirder to suddenly change my story.

‘Is that OK?’ I ask.

‘Why wouldn’t it be?’ She smiles and turns away.

Chapter 22

I open the door to find Skyla peacefully in bed, with an embroidered eye-mask covering her eyes and chunky headphones still firmly over her ears.

Panic over, is my first thought. But some subconscious niggling won’t let me leave it at that. Listening to make sure Élise hasn’t followed me up the helpfully creaky stairs, I pull the door softly shut and give the room a proper look-over. Standing in the centre, at the foot of Skyla’s bed, I do a full, slow, 360-degree spin, systematically peering into every nook and cranny like a little kid determined to prove that there are no monsters hiding in the dark.

I start another slow spin in the opposite direction, but after turning a short distance I snap my head back to the right, in case someone has been circling the room in my blind spot. And by someone, of course, I mean Phoebe. There is no one else in the world who I imagine could pull that off.

But there’s no sign of her.

Feeling faintly ridiculous, I crouch down to peer under the bed. Nothing. Then I open the wardrobe and a human-shaped silhouette looms out at me. I jump backwards, landing softly on my toes, knees bent and hands raised in a fighting stance. But the figure doesn’t move. It’s Skyla’s fur coat.

I breathe out, willing the tension to leave my body. It’s clear that having to worry about protecting someone twenty-four hours every day for days on end is starting to wear me down. It’s not like being a hitwoman, where the only lives I have to worry about are the target’s and my own, and if things go to shit I can leave.

Skyla shifts in her sleep, apparently still oblivious. Then I feel the chill of a draught from the direction of the window. I glance through it to see two snowmobiles parked not far off, sheltered beneath a tree. They weren’t there before, were they?

Something creaks on the stairs.

I grab a hoodie from my suitcase – may as well commit to the act, just in case – and quietly leave Skyla’s room. Per the noise from below, the party is still going strong, and I’m hoping to just see Will or Beth coming up to check on me. There’s still a faint, faint chance that this is all some paranoid misunderstanding.

It’s Élise.

‘Why are you here?’ I ask her, as she steps onto the landing. She doesn’t reply. Then I see the gun in her hand.

She raises it to fire, but I’m too fast for her – I’ve already run across the landing and barrelled shoulder-first into her chest. She falls backward into a doorway, which immediately springs open under her weight. We stumble together into a bedroom that, judging by the already unpacked suitcase and folded pyjamas on the bed, must be Liv’s.

The fall creates space between us – space a better fighter than Élise would have exploited to raise her pistol, instantly putting me at a massive disadvantage. I’m almost surprised when she doesn’t react fast enough to do so. After my last two fights against Phoebe, the difference in fighting against someone less trained is instantly noticeable.

But it’s good news for me. I knee her in the stomach, then grab her wrist, digging in my nails and forcing her weapon from her. The same technique Phoebe used on me, comes the intrusive thought as I raise the gun to her head.

‘Tell me what you’re doing here,’ I growl at her. ‘What does the Circle want with an aristocrat’s treasure? What could possibly be worth all the effort?’

That seems to catch her off guard for a second. She almost laughs. But the sight of her own pistol pointing at her seems to cause her to compose herself. ‘Too messy with your friends down there, no?’ She sounds more Italian than ever: Élise, my arse. ‘I know you haven’t told them you’re a sicario.’

I grit my teeth and step forward. ‘Tell me,’ I repeat.

Her smug smile fades. I get the impression she’s about to – then a gunshot echoes from downstairs. Somebody screams. Katy Perry sings on.

‘Though maybe you won’t have to worry about your friends for much longer,’ says Élise. I punch her in the face.

As she staggers back into the dressing table, everything in me is screaming to run downstairs, check that my friends are OK, and kill Jean-Pierre if he’s so much as scratched them. But that would mean leaving Élise up here, with Skyla.

When Élise moves to grab a decorative trinket dish, I snap back into the situation in front of me. She lobs it at my face but I dodge just in time – same with Liv’s makeup bag and her perfume bottle, which smashes against the wall. I lose my balance ever so slightly on that last one, and in the split-second it takes to right myself, she slips past me and dashes out of the room.

But instead of trying to get to Skyla, she runs to the staircase, vaults over the banister two-thirds of the way down, and kicks open the living room door.

‘What the actual fuck is happening?!’ I hear Michelle shout.

I expect to see her and Liv huddled in fear when I barrel into the room a few seconds after Élise, but I’m wrong. In fact, they’re watching Will and Jean-Pierre grappling with open-mouthed curiosity, ignoring Beth’s desperate attempts to get them out of the room.

‘This is crazy,’ Liv says, incredulous. ‘He’s like Action Man.’

Is this why they call it liquid courage? Not that I want them to be traumatised, obviously, but a little bit of self-preservation wouldn’t go amiss.

At least the gun isn’t pointing at anyone. Jean-Pierre no longer has it, which is reassuring, though it’s less reassuring when I realise that Will doesn’t have it either. Élise is scanning the room, having noticed the same thing. Within seconds we’re both lunging towards the gleam of metal in among the abandoned playing cards. She’s quick but I’m quicker, managing to give the handle a swift kick before she can get to it. It skids under the sofa, out of reach, and she lets out an infuriated shriek.

‘Get out of here,’ I shout at my friends as Beth tugs on their jumpers for what must be the fiftieth time. ‘It’s not safe.’

Something in my voice must shock some sense into them because they nod and start to shuffle towards the door, though their eyes are still glued on Will and Jean-Pierre. Michelle pauses in the doorway. ‘Aren’t you coming?’ she asks me, confused, then Beth bundles her out of sight.

Before I can freak out about the fact that my cover is hanging by a thread, there’s a grunt from Will behind me. ‘Little help, Mais?’

I whip around to see that the Circle agents have edged him towards the kitchen and are about to box him in – which means they no longer have eyes on me. ‘Big mistake,’ I mutter, swiping an empty beer bottle from the coffee table and swinging it at the back of Jean-Pierre’s head. He notices too slowly and fails to dodge, the bottle connecting with his shoulder with a satisfying crack. I swing it again, a clean backhand that slams into his side, and he staggers into the living room. Will presses the advantage with Élise, pushing her backwards with a series of kicks and jabs.

We close in together, catching our breath. Now that we have the upper hand we have to actually end this thing. But how? Will and I are the ones with guns – Will has his own concealed, and I’ve got Élise’s – but I’m reluctant to use them. More shots will only require more explanations for Liv and Michelle, and there’s no way even we could explain away dead bodies without them insisting on getting the police involved.

If it’s the cost of keeping them safe, though …

As I reach for Élise’s pistol, I notice that Jean-Pierre is reaching for something hidden under his shirt. Surely not another gun, I have time to think, before he throws whatever it was onto the ground and the room starts to fill with smoke.

Not a gun, then, but still a problem.

‘Will,’ I choke, quickly unable to see him, ‘we need to get out of here.’

I stumble forward, trying to get to the door before the Circle agents can, but I’ve lost my bearings and my leg smashes into what I thought was empty space – the coffee table, I realise, my shin smarting. I find Will’s hand and we grope together through the fog. By the time we’re out in the hallway, they’re nowhere to be seen but I can hear them – both of their voices, muffled by the front door.

So they’re retreating? But the watch is still in my pocket, and they didn’t even try to get back up to Skyla. Why are they leaving without more of an attempt to get what they came for?

Will lets go of my hand and rushes towards the door, right as there’s a banging sound from upstairs. I bolt towards the noise, taking the steps three at a time to find Skyla’s door blown open to reveal her bed – empty – and her window – open.

Through it, I can see her being forced at gunpoint onto one of the snowmobiles I saw earlier by a familiar figure.

Shit, shit, shit. So Élise and Jean-Pierre weren’t working alone.

I pull out the pistol and aim it at Phoebe, but it’s no use trying to shoot. She’s standing behind Skyla, manoeuvring her in such a way that any shot at her would risk hitting Skyla too. I can’t take that chance.

If she’s being kidnapped, I tell myself, it’s because they want her alive. Which means we can get to her before it’s too late.

As I’m watching, Élise and Jean-Pierre come hurtling around the side of the chalet with Will in hot pursuit. Again, I try to aim the pistol; again, I can’t find a good angle. They’re moving too fast, getting too close to Skyla. As they climb onto the second snowmobile and Élise revs the engine I almost have it, but a sudden movement from Phoebe catches my eye.

‘WILL!’ I bellow in warning.

He ducks behind a bin, just in time for Phoebe’s snowmobile to go careening through the space he just vacated. She whips back around then accelerates away in a cloud of snow as Jean-Pierre and Élise follow suit.

Will looks back up at the window and our eyes meet in silent agreement. Quickly, quietly, I prepare myself for a chase.

I’m pulling thermals out of my rucksack when Beth bursts into the room. ‘Maisie,’ she says breathlessly. ‘Is everything— where’s Skyla?’

‘They’ve got her,’ I say, not stopping to look at her as I root around for gloves. ‘Can you cover for us?’

‘You’re going after them right now?’ she asks. ‘Do you even know where they’re taking her?’

I have no more idea than she does, but I don’t tell her that. I don’t want her to worry any more than she already is.

‘I’ll figure it out,’ I say instead. And then, after a moment’s hesitation. ‘I’m going to send you Emma’s number – Skyla’s PA. Phone and tell her what’s happening. She knows a bit about this, too, maybe the two of you can figure out those clues on the watch?’

‘OK,’ she says snapping into action. ‘I’ll have a look back over our notes, see if we missed anything earlier.’ She’s quiet for a second as I finish what I’m doing and turn to face her. ‘But Maisie, please be careful. They’re dangerous.’

‘So am I,’ I say. Now that I’m ready, I turn around to grin at her but she doesn’t smile back. I walk over and place a hand on her shoulder. ‘Of course I’ll be careful. I always am.’

She pulls me in for a tight hug. I hug her back for three long seconds, and then I’m out the door, not allowing myself to look in on Liv and Michelle as I go.

Outside, I find Will parked in front of the chalet on a snowmobile he apparently just hotwired, exposed cables sticking out of the ignition.

‘We should be able to follow them pretty easily,’ he says, pointing to the criss-cross of tracks left by the Circle. For now, they lead up and around the side of the residential area, though God knows where they’re actually headed.

I throw Will his jacket, gloves and some spare ammunition I grabbed from my secret stash. ‘I’ll drive,’ I tell him.

If he suspects my motives he doesn’t say anything, just scooches backwards into the pillion seat and cocks his pistol. I’m still a little thrown by my freeze in the freezer, so Will should be the one to ride shotgun. Then, with a final glance back at the chalet, we’re off.

At first, the drive is almost dreamlike. The full moon reflects off the snow, drenching everything in silvers and blues. It’s enough that I almost forget about how unprepared we really are to go up against the Circle – not least because it takes a good while to actually catch up with them. I have to floor it for a good fifteen minutes before we hear them up ahead, and then it’s another five before they come into view.

The grim reality of our situation comes crashing back down when Jean-Pierre twists around in his seat, brandishing a submachine gun. Did they really have that stashed on the snowmobile while they were inside partying? The psychos! He raises it and lets off a volley, though the recoil almost knocks him backwards and the shots go high.

I jerk the handlebars to the left, then straighten out again. ‘Keep it steady,’ Will says in my ear, reaching past me to fire a few shots in return. ‘It would be very impressive if he can hit us from there.’

I press myself down behind the windshield all the same, tightening my grip on the throttle.

Something else I’m worried about is how the Circle haven’t let up once since we caught up to them. I’m managing to keep pace, but there’s been no hesitation, no sense of uncertainty about their destination. They know exactly where they’re going – but where? Not to the treasure, surely, since the so-called map is still in my pocket. But what else is there, out here in the wilderness?

I’m about to raise it with Will when the faint whine of a new motor joins the throng. ‘More company!’ Will shouts. ‘Coming from behind!’

Still gunning the engine, I glance down to see Keith’s face in my wing mirror. He’s standing upright behind one of his henchmen, gun aimed in our direction. ‘Mikey’s Firm,’ I shout back. ‘And they’re armed.’

As if to emphasise my point, Keith fixes his pistol on us and fires – but a bump in the snow sends the shot wide. It sparks from the chassis of the vehicle in front, not far from Jean-Pierre’s leg. He flinches away then replies with a volley of his own, sending up bursts of white powder horribly close to our vehicle.

‘I don’t know if I like being stuck in the middle!’ I shout as I swerve round a corner, sending a curtain of snow flying up to our left as I lean into the turn. We have a few seconds of reprieve before the shooting starts again, this time in earnest. My eyes fix on a ridge out ahead, one that looks so thin that surely no snowmobile could get across it.

I feel something jolt beneath me and, somehow, the engine revs even faster. Too fast.

I have a brief feeling of weightlessness.

Then everything goes black.

Chapter 23

When sensation returns, I’m lying on my back in a snowdrift, my head spinning like I’ve just chugged a bottle of vodka. Something reeks of smoke – a horrible burnt-plastic stench that claws at my sinuses.

But also, Will is holding my face in his hands. And for a second, that’s all that matters.

‘Maisie!’ he says as my eyes flutter open. ‘I thought I’d lost you.’

‘Will,’ I breathe, pushing myself into a sitting position as he pulls me into a hug. ‘Ow!’

He jerks away, a concerned crease forming between his eyebrows. It’s picked out by the warm orange glow that’s illuminating his face, a little dark crater in the … firelight? It looks like firelight. I can hear something burning, though whatever it is, Will doesn’t seem concerned. ‘Are you hurt?’ he asks.

I roll my neck, feeling a twinge in my trapezius, but only a twinge. It could have been much worse. ‘Maybe I pulled something,’ I say, drawing him into me again, more carefully this time. We’ll get moving again soon, but first – I need this. My nerves are shot from worrying about Skyla and from how little good it’s done for her, now that she’s been whisked off to God knows where. I rest my chin on Will’s shoulder, feeling the soft weight of his bundled-up body press against mine, closing my eyes just to feel him.

It’s only when I open them that I see what’s on fire.

Just a few metres from where we are now, back in the direction of the ridge we’d been following, is our snowmobile. It’s half-submerged in a snowdrift with its back end pointed skywards like a duck with its head underwater, fully engulfed in flames.

‘Our ride’s seen better days,’ I say in Will’s ear.

‘Yep,’ he replies, not releasing me from his grip. Not that I want him to. ‘I think a bullet must have hit the carburettor, knocking a valve to the engine open. Massive uncontrolled acceleration … and a big fire, as you can see.’

‘Oof. How long was I out?’

‘Only a few minutes. Seems like everyone’s assumed we’re dead. It’s a good thing Keith and his friend kept going after the Circle, or one of the Circle guys would surely have come back to check.’

I exhale. So we got lucky. I don’t like getting lucky. If you have to rely on luck, it’s a sign you should have planned better. That you did something stupid, and could have got yourself killed. Though it’s not like we had much time to think through our options. That’s another disadvantage of bodyguard work: you’re always responding to situations, never creating them.

I miss being a hitwoman, I think. The clarity of the thought catches me off guard. It’s the first time I’ve properly articulated that, but it’s true. Undeniable. But there’s no time to dwell, so aloud I say: ‘I guess we’re walking, then?’

Will’s concerned dimple makes a comeback as we disentangle ourselves and he gives me a once-over. ‘If you can manage it?’

‘I can manage it,’ I tell him. For Skyla, I’m going to have to.

We help each other to our feet. Surprisingly, apart from the crick in my neck, I feel mostly OK once I’m standing – just a few dull aches in my arms and my core. Who needs an airbag when you’ve got a huge snowbank to cushion your landing?

As I take my bearings, I instinctively grasp for the pocket I’ve been keeping the watch in. It’s comforting to know that while they might have Skyla, I have something they seem to want even more.

Well, it was comforting. Because right now, the pocket is empty.

‘Wait, Will, the watch,’ I say, turning to look where I landed. My heart rate quickens. ‘I felt it when we were on the snowmobile, which means …’

Which means it must have fallen in the snow with me, only it isn’t there. I see my impression in the powder – a deep and misshapen snow angel, surrounded by unbroken white. I step forward in case it was flung from my pocket as I flew from the vehicle … but Will grabs my hand from behind, pulling me back. ‘Watch out!’

Instantly, my whole body tenses. Even if I have no idea what he’s on about, I trust him completely.

Then, I see it. Or, rather, I don’t.

‘Oh.’

Will loosens his grip. ‘Yeah. Good thing we crashed where we did, to be honest.’

More good luck. Far, far, too much. Because barely a metre from where I hit the ground, on the far side of the snow that broke my fall, is complete and utter darkness. And I don’t just mean that the ground is unlit. I mean that the ground falls away into an ink-black void, within which I can just make out the frosted tips of some snow-laden pines, reaching up from a ground level far below us, teetering vertiginously in the gentle wind.

My knees feel unsteady. If I was thrown just a little bit further, I’d have had no chance. Splattered. Or shattered, like the watch was, probably. I take a tentative step back towards the drop, on the off chance I see it caught somewhere. Then the wind picks up and I really wish I hadn’t. It scatters the snow from the ground in ghostly white trails that make it feel like I’m walking on water – metres away from my death.

I step back towards Will. ‘I’m such an idiot. If I’d kept it somewhere safer …’

I feel his hand on my back, reassuring me. His voice is calm. ‘It’s OK. We don’t need it.’

‘But …’ I protest.

‘The only thing that matters right now is getting to Skyla,’ he says. ‘And look.’ He points back at the ridge we were driving along, a dull white spine in the moonlight, furrowed along the top by the tracks of three snowmobiles. ‘Snowmobiles aren’t the best choice if you don’t want anyone knowing where you’ve gone. Wherever they’ve taken her, we can follow their trail right to their door.’

He makes it sound so easy. I’m not quite convinced. ‘And when we get there?’

‘We’ll figure it out.’

I pull my jacket a little tighter. It’s not ideal, but it’s the best we can hope for, given the circumstances. Still, there’s a nagging voice inside me – a kernel of doubt.

‘The last time I had to shoot someone …’ I begin, then hesitate. ‘If it came down to it again, under pressure …’

Will puts a hand on my shoulder. ‘I’ve been thinking about the Luther Pizzo job a lot, recently. Where we went wrong was not trusting your instincts from the start. You knew there was something fishy about those testimonies from the employees, but you were putting so much pressure on yourself because of your mum. I didn’t pick up on it – but I should’ve listened. I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise,’ I say. I turn his words over in my mind. They sound true … but life-or-death situations have a way of separating the ‘close enough’ from the real deal. A split-second of hesitation …

‘Maisie, look at me,’ Will whispers. I do. I remember thinking at the start of winter that his eyes were the blue of an icy pool, but having spent so much time around ice lately, the feeling I get when I look in them couldn’t be more different. ‘Trust yourself,’ he says. ‘Trust your intuition. I promise you’re good at this. Really, really good.’

He makes it sound so easy. I love him for it.

I take a breath. His hand is still on my shoulder – I give it a squeeze. Then I nod. ‘I can do this,’ I repeat. It feels true. Not just mostly true. Really true. It feels like the first time in a while that I’ve fully believed in myself.

‘You’re right,’ I say. And he is. There’s no point regretting what got us into this mess. The only thing we can do is fix it – together. So hand in gloved hand, we trudge off into the darkness.

Even without the snowmobile tracks, we’d still have been able to find Skyla. The tracking app on my phone is still picking up on her location – though taking my glove off to use it is so cold it’s painful. Her dot is a few miles ahead of us, out in the blank white space that the app defaults to when there are no roads or buildings.

‘Looks like they’ve stopped moving,’ says Will, peering over my shoulder at the screen. ‘That’s good. Should only take us … a bit more than an hour?’

Only. We made sure to dress for the weather, but even wrapped up in thick coats, thermals and snow boots, the ice-cold wind has a way of worming in through the layers. But for Skyla, an hour is doable.

I squint at the map on my phone again as I keep trudging forward, one step at a time. ‘Where have they even taken her?’ I ask, quiet enough for the words to be lost on the wind. Without thinking much of it, I take a screenshot and send it to Beth. The watch might be … wherever it is, but she still has the photos of the map on the back and its cryptic directions. Maybe she can do something with them.

She replies almost instantly.

Maisie. I think that confirms it.

I stop in my tracks as I wait for her next message. Will notices and slows down beside me. We huddle like penguins in the snow, protecting my phone instead of our egg.

I’ve just been looking at the map now,Beth writes. Based on the numbers, I narrowed the solution to the map puzzle down to three options. This is one of them.

I stare at the screen, not sure how to process what she’s telling me. Her next message spells it out:

They’re taking her to the treasure.

‘But that doesn’t make sense,’ says Will in my ear. ‘If they already know where it is …’

I finish his thought for him: ‘Why are they so obsessed with the watch?’

There’s only one way to find out. We start walking again.

In my line of work – my real line of work, not this bodyguard business – there are often times when extreme tension and extreme boredom co-exist simultaneously. I once sat for five hours on a hotel toilet, waiting for a hacker, who had caused hundreds of deaths by holding the health service to ransom, to finally take a break from the fantasy-themed card game he was playing on his laptop.

When it’s just me in situations like that, I find ways to keep my mind active. Boredom can be deadly: you zone out, let time slip away, maybe even fall asleep. So instead I count every tile in the room, and then every screw, and then rate each toothpaste stain on the taps aesthetically, to decide which one I’d hang in a hypothetical toothpaste museum.

But since Will and I are here together, we don’t have to resort to any of that. Instead, we can just … talk.

We’re picking our way over a frozen waterfall when the question comes spilling out of me. ‘Do you think I’m selfish for having friends?’ I ask.

It’s bothering me that Beth didn’t give any updates on Liv and Michelle in her texts, and I’m too scared to text back and ask why. I’m scared they’ve figured out who I am and no longer want anything to do with me, that Beth only hasn’t said anything because I could get myself killed if I’m distracted, and she doesn’t want the responsibility of that. But do I even deserve them as friends, when my decision to house Skyla in their chalet put them in so much danger?

Will looks at me, surprised. ‘Because of what happened in the chalet? No, of course I don’t.’

I hold his gaze, unconvinced.

‘It wasn’t your fault. You did the best you could with the situation as it played out. You didn’t invite them to the festival. You didn’t know that Skyla would have nowhere else to stay. And you kept them safe.’

It’s a generous interpretation. ‘Where are all your friends, then?’ I ask.

Will gives me a playful push. ‘Thanks for that.’

I didn’t quite mean it that way, but it’s true – and perhaps for good reason. Other than me, Will is close with his sister, who now lives in France, and he used to be best friends with her husband, who was murdered last year in a hit ordered by the same maniac who kidnapped Beth.

Will’s obviously thinking about him now too, because his face hardens the way it does when he’s preparing to tell me something.

‘I never told you,’ he says a couple of minutes later, ‘but when Sean died, I first thought it was Phoebe. I knew it was a hit, and I thought it had to be someone trying to get to me – why else would anyone want Sean dead? Phoebe was the only person from this world who knew about him. In a way, I blamed myself.’

Actually, Sean was killed for reasons completely unrelated to their friendship, which I guess is the point Will’s driving towards. But something else sticks out to me. ‘Would Phoebe do something like that?’

I don’t know why, but for some reason I feel like she wouldn’t. Is that crazy? After all, she works for the Circle, and I know all too well what that says about her. But she’s had plenty of opportunities to kill me, and she hasn’t. Apparently, she doesn’t even carry a gun.

Will looks back at me, smiling grimly. ‘Family doesn’t mean much to Phoebe. My first job for Removals was killing her uncle. She was the one who convinced me to do it.’

Phoebe’s uncle was a bad man, but he loved her, and she even sort of loved him. The way Will tells it, she just loved a paycheque more.

‘Just think about it,’ she said to Will one night. ‘We do this one thing and we’re set for life.’

That wasn’t exactly true – neither of them had any idea how much living really cost, or how much pricier it was going to get. But from where they were sitting, it looked like a lot of money.

Will didn’t want to take the job at first, but Phoebe convinced him by playing on his sense of righteousness. Killing one man who had already caused the death of many, many more – by accident, with his dodgy heroin, but also on purpose. Who would keep ruining the lives of those in his orbit.

And nobody would suspect them, she reminded him. He was her uncle, after all.

Despite his ruthlessness with other people, Phoebe’s uncle doted on her as much in private as he did in public. He had rules for her – keep her head down, help him when he needed her, don’t do anything that could possibly attract attention – but he wasn’t completely tyrannical. He gave her everything she wanted: a good phone, good clothes, all the DVDs she could ask for.

She smiled and accepted his love graciously. Then she told Will how much she resented him for denying her a normal life.

‘Looking back, that should have been my first warning,’ Will says. ‘He doted on her, and she’d smile in his face while plotting to stab him in the back. I should have known she’d do it to me too.’

‘I’ve smiled in targets’ faces before,’ I object. ‘As have you. I’ve seen you do it. Remember that guy in—’

‘That’s different,’ Will says firmly. ‘We didn’t know them. They weren’t family.’

His tone doesn’t surprise me. I know from before we started dating how important family is to him: from the lengths he’d go to protect his sister from the people who killed her husband.

‘Anyway,’ he says, ‘Removals sent us the intelligence package, told us where to be and when to get there …’

Phoebe’s uncle would be conducting some kind of deal at a farm on the edge of the Peak District, the intelligence said. It was connected to some part of his business that Phoebe hadn’t been let in on. No one would suspect them, since no one would expect them to know he was there. The police would be paid to look away. All they had to do was pull the trigger.

And that’s how it went. Her uncle arrived in his black BMW. Two men went out to meet him. They shook hands, exchanged greetings. They kept glancing, Will noticed, in the direction of a shed with a chained and padlocked door.

Phoebe wanted to be the one to do it. She’d spent days practising on bottles out on an abandoned railway line. ‘But when it came down to it, she couldn’t,’ Will explains, shaking his head at the memory. ‘Her breath was ragged, her hands were trembling. It’s not even that she changed her mind, she just physically couldn’t.’

I think back to the way that she’d handed me back my ammunition, when we were ambushed in the forest by Keith and his men.

‘But I felt … calm,’ he continues. ‘Much, much calmer than I expected.’

But something was stopping him from squeezing the trigger, so he waited. Eventually the men stood: first Phoebe’s uncle, then the two farmers. He tracked them with the scope as they left the farmhouse and walked over to the shed. One of them took out a key and unlocked the padlock. The chains fell away. The door opened. And inside …

‘It looked like a slave auction,’ Will says. ‘Which, in a sense, it was. Twenty desperate people, starved and half-naked, crammed into a tiny shed. Filthy. Human trafficking of the worst imaginable kind.’

‘So what did you do?’ I ask him. I’m not sure when we stopped walking, but we’re now standing still as he finishes his story. It must have taken him half an hour to get to this point: the longest I’ve ever heard him talk about his past in one go.

‘Well, Removals had given us three bullets,’ he says. ‘I shot all three of them.’

I’m still mulling over what Will’s told me when I see a light through the trees and hear the crunch of footsteps.

‘Drop,’ I whisper, silently lowering into a crouch. Will hunches down with me, and we wait as the lights come closer. Handheld flashlights, several of them, approaching along an angle that threatens to rejoin the snowmobile track we’ve been following. I’d estimate a group of around eight, which doesn’t add up, does it? Someone has found reinforcements. But from where?

They’re close enough now that I can hear voices. It’s a London accent doing most of the talking – a familiar one. I can just make out the stripes of his puffer jacket.

‘All right, all right, keep your wig on,’ says Keith, as he appears from the darkness. ‘I’m walking, aren’t I? No need to push.’

In his present company – in his present environment – Keith stands out. The men and women around him are dressed in thick, military-style trenchcoats embroidered with white circles, faceless in their balaclavas. Each of them, except Keith, is holding a submachine gun, at least two of which are pointed at Keith’s back. I almost feel bad for him. Never have I ever seen a man more out of his depth.

He has no sense of the danger. ‘That’s better,’ he says as they pass near us, though I didn’t hear any reply from the masked agents. ‘I knew you were nice enough lads. I’m sure we can hash something out, can’t we?’

Still no reply. He tries again, with the air of a British tourist insulted to find that not everyone in Europe speaks English. ‘Une deal?’ he offers. ‘Le bargain? Parley?’

His voice fades as they pass us, rejoining the trail left by the snowmobiles. I knead some warmth into my stiffening leg muscles, then Will and I follow at a safe distance. Before long, the tracks come to an end: the vehicles themselves have been left outside a … castle?

A theme-park version of a castle, anyway – and not an expensive theme park, or one that’s been well looked after. It’s more like a big shed built against the side of the mountain, but covered in chipped plaster that was at some point painted to look like stone.

Though not everything is quite so fake-looking. The front door might be completely two-dimensional – even the ostentatious (peeling and non-reflective) bull-head door knocker in the centre of it – but the armed guards standing on either side are 100 per cent authentic. Also real is the black helicopter sitting in a clearing to one side, surrounded by pallets of something squarish, covered by blue tarpaulins.

I hear Keith up ahead. ‘What the bloody hell is this place, then?’

Well, Keith – it is, quite clearly, Le Manoir des énigmes d’Alphonse Baudelaire.

But no one tells him that. Instead, one of the door guards radios someone to open the door, and two members of the search party grab him by the biceps and drag him inside.

Chapter 24

We act fast, before the door can close behind the last member of the search party.

With two guards left outside and two of us wanting to get in, it’s simple maths. We don’t even need to decide who’s taking who. With instant unspoken agreement, I peel right while Will goes left, sticking to the shadows of the trees to avoid being spotted. We loop back around the side of the puzzle mansion’s protruding entry passage and, in perfect sync, take a guard each in a sleeper hold, as Will sticks his foot in the door frame to prevent it from locking shut.

Our gazes find each other as the black-clad men go limp in our arms. ‘Nice one,’ I whisper.

‘Back in action,’ Will replies.

I blow him a kiss. I’m still worried about Skyla, of course … but is it wrong to say that I’ve missed this?

No one inside reacts to the door not closing properly, which suggests that it’s either unguarded, guarded poorly, or whoever’s guarding it saw us coming and is lying in wait. My instincts tell me it’s the first of those, but since you never want to assume the best in a scenario where the worst is getting riddled with bullets, I take a small mirror from my kitbag and position it at the gap in the door frame.

‘See anyone?’ Will whispers as I squat on the floor beside him.

‘Not yet,’ I say, slowly rotating the mirror to pan my view across the room. Inside, the paper-thin illusion of Alphonse Baudelaire’s puzzle mansion falls away almost entirely. The space behind the door is essentially a wide hallway, but it’s built like the inside of a barn, with cheap wooden beams and panelling, dimly lit by a single strip light. There’s a mini train track along one edge of the room, regularly obstructed by more of those pallets under blue tarpaulins. They wouldn’t provide bad cover for a firefight, assuming whatever’s inside isn’t explosive or flammable, but the floor is covered with lilac-coloured dust that gives away footprints like nobody’s business and there aren’t any tracks to suggest anyone is hiding there now.

I turn the mirror again, and almost drop it in surprise. Will must hear my breath catch, because I see him tensing in the corner of my eye, his trigger finger flexing into position.

Exhaling to calm myself, I lean in closer to make sense of what I’m seeing. There is someone inside. But if it’s an ambush, it’s a very strange one. A single man stands in the middle of the entryway, stock still, staring right at us through the mostly closed door. A man in a three-piece suit, with an ostentatious chain hanging down from the breast pocket of his jacket.

Ah, I think. ‘Clear.’

Will raises an eyebrow but doesn’t question me. He even goes in first. How’s that for a trusting relationship?

Inside, Will is miming a doff of his cap to a plastic statue of the aristocrat from the front of the puzzle book. ‘Monsieur Baudelaire, I presume?’

I meet the statue’s creepy, dead-eyed gaze. Its arms are held out in frozen greeting to the intrepid puzzlers who never made it this far, and I suddenly feel sad that this silly idea could lead to so much death.

‘Crazy place to bring people, on the basis of a clue on a watch,’ Will mutters.

‘Isn’t it?’ I agree. That’s one reason not to feel sad that Alphonse’s idea never came to fruition. It’s hard to imagine this not ending in tears, even without the Circle’s involvement. Speaking of which … ‘We should bring them inside.’

Will nods, and we set about dragging the unconscious guards into shelter. It might seem like a surplus of mercy, given who they’re working for, but Will and I have rules about killing henchmen when you don’t know their backstory. What the action movies never remind you is that every black-masked goon is somebody’s son, and there’s always a chance they’re being blackmailed or threatened by their bosses, or have somehow managed to remain oblivious to all of the really nasty stuff. Unlikely, in this instance … but we’re ethical assassins. We have to know for sure, and leaving them outside and unconscious on a night like this is killing them as much as shooting them in the head would be.

Once they’re safely inside, I hide them beneath a crumpled tarpaulin that’s apparently missing its contents. It won’t confuse anyone who’s really looking for them, but there’s always a chance more guards will come back through here, and it should at least delay them running into their unconscious comrades. Then we check out the rest of the corridor. The little train track runs all the way down the left-hand wall, stopping about a metre from a faux-medieval door made from wallpapered plywood. Based on what we saw from outside, it ought to lead pretty much straight into the cliff face, and sure enough a sign propped against the wall reads: LES ENIGMES SE POURSUIVENT DANS LA CAVERNE DES SECRETS.

‘Enigmas something something cavern of secrets,’ I mutter as we move carefully down the hallway. ‘Lovely.’

We approach the door with our guns at the ready, as if it could bang open at any moment to reveal a platoon of Circle paramilitary officers. Which, of course, it could. Fortunately, it isn’t guarded either. Someone has even left it ajar for us, apparently trusting that the remote location and the men outside the radio-locked front door would be enough to deter unwanted guests. Beyond is a tunnel straight into the rock, continuing the faux-medieval theming with concrete steps moulded to resemble stone blocks, eerily lit from overhead by anachronistic white LEDs.

Except, as we descend, something strange happens. The concrete of the tunnel gives way to real, actual masonry, like you’d find at an English Heritage site: lumpy stone bricks held together by rough cement. The ceiling, which was originally flat, now arcs over our heads, and the steps we’re walking on feel like they’ve been worn smooth by potentially generations of feet. It’s getting hotter and hotter, too. For all I know, we could be descending into Hell.

‘Listen,’ Will whispers. ‘What is that?’

As he says it, I realise that the whole space is humming with a sound so low and bassy that I’d been hearing it without registering. It becomes more distinct when I stop walking: an echoing mechanical whirr like a car left to idle inside a garage. ‘Some kind of … engine?’ I guess. ‘A generator?’

‘Not what you’d expect from a cavern of secrets beneath a fake puzzle mansion,’ Will says. I have to agree – though I’m not sure what I should expect to find here.

Then we hear something else. An accented voice, possibly Spanish, shouting as if to be heard over the din: ‘Sit. SIT! Wait. Do not move. Our boss wants to speak with you.’

Our boss. My jaw clenches. With everything else going on, I’ve been at risk of forgetting that Hangjaw is among the most cold-blooded, capable and merciless killers I’ve ever come up against. And now, apparently, he’s headed this way.

When the stairway ends, we emerge into a larger, vaulted space that looks like a wine cellar that’s been converted into a brewery against anyone’s better judgement. It’s stuffed to bursting with mismatched industrial machinery, most of which is strangely angled to fit around the sloping ceilings and curved walls. Dented metal vats, drums, and an overworked ventilation system all fight for the space. Hence the noise, I suppose – but what is it for?

I lead the way. We follow a sloping outside wall further in, making sure there’s enough equipment in the way to block the view from the centre of the room. Also tracing the wall are more of the same rail tracks from upstairs. I first think they’re connected to the machinery – transporting materials through the site or something like that – but they’re frequently obstructed by junk and have even been dismantled in places to make space for newer appliances, indicating that the tracks were here first.

Then I realise where I’ve seen tracks like these before. Only it wasn’t in a factory, but a film studio, for moving the cameras. They were making a TV show, I realise. The puzzle book and the watch were just, what – a publicity stunt?

Until people started dying.

Before I can think any further, we come to the end of the machines we’ve been using as cover. Beyond them, in an empty patch of floor, is Keith, tied to a chair. He has a submachine-gun-wielding guard at each shoulder, standing to attention like good little soldiers, but they’re all facing away from us. I inch forward to get a better look, stopping when I catch a vague flash of movement from the direction they’re looking, deeper in the shadows of the vaults.

Then, over the hum of the machines comes the regular clomping of boots against stone. They echo from the curved ceiling, clomp, clomp, clomp, seeming to come from all directions at once but steadily getting louder. I shrink back behind an aluminium barrel, flexing my gloved fingers against the handle of my pistol, as a large man in a black leather duster comes out of the darkness.

‘Well, well, well,’ Hangjaw says – because who else it could be? ‘What little creature has washed down our drain and found itself where it shouldn’t be? An English rat! How novel!’

He’s flanked on one side by a uniformed guard, and on the other by Phoebe, who is contemplating the proceedings with a scowl of disdain. It’s the first time I’ve seen her since we met in the woods, and she’s wearing a high-collared top that doesn’t wholly conceal purple bruises on her neck. It reminds me of the bruise she gave me when she kneed me in the stomach back in London. I think back over our fights. Did I give her that?

I feel Will shifting beside me. This is not the time to think about the fact it’s his first time seeing his ex-girlfriend since they broke up five years ago. No way. Not at all.

Hangjaw comes to an abrupt stop directly under one of the few lights in the room, a couple of metres from where Keith is sitting. The effect is almost theatrical, and from the way Hangjaw is dressed, I’d say theatrics are intentional. He looks like someone who is trying to look like a villain. Even his skin looks intentionally crafted to play the role: pale and scarred like a pitbull that’s never backed down from a fight, contrasting with his dark coat and greasy black hair. He’s big – like, steroids big – but his piercing expression and ironic tone make it clear that you’d be the fool to assume that made him stupid.

‘Well?’ he sneers at Keith, who is blinking back in confusion. ‘I’m told you wanted to make …’ He turns to his guard: ‘Remind me, what did he say with that typical English eloquence … uno dealio?’

The guard sneers. Keith snaps out of his daze. ‘Ahem,’ he says, pushing himself up in his chair as if he’s trying to take the upper hand, despite … everything. ‘Yeah. That’s about right. A deal. ’Scuse my French, heh.’

‘And?’ Hangjaw asks. ‘Your deal is?’

Keith blinks again. ‘Well,’ he begins, but the thought doesn’t seem to go anywhere. ‘I mean,’ he tries again, ‘the way I see it …’

Hangjaw’s left eyebrow twitches impatiently. And you know what? On this and this alone, I’m with him. There are many things I’d rather do than listen to this conversation, rescuing Skyla being the current number one. But I have no idea where they’re keeping her – or even, though I try not to think of it, if they’ve kept her alive – and Will and I have a cat in hell’s chance of getting past all these armed guards to one of the exits behind them, which are the only ones I can see out of this room.

Which means our only real option is to stay put and listen.

‘The thing is,’ Keith continues, ‘you’ve got something I want. Yeah? At least, I think you do.’

Hangjaw shifts his weight to his other foot. ‘Something you want? Yes, I believe so.’

On the other hand, listening in to this is absolutely excruciating. Keith doesn’t care about Skyla, obviously, so I can only assume that the ‘something’ Keith wants is the watch. Problem is, Hangjaw doesn’t have it and never has. What’s more, I can’t think what Hangjaw might want enough to bother keeping Keith alive … except for the watch. Which Keith doesn’t have. So the question is: how long do we have to wait until they realise they’re both trying to bargain for an object that neither of them has – that, in fact, nobody has, given that I accidentally dropped it off a cliff just over an hour ago?

‘Right,’ Keith goes on, perking up a little. ‘So you’ve got something I want, and I’ve got …’ He glances around the room, as if he might find his angle in the shadows or the stonework. ‘I’ve got …’

Hangjaw is tapping his foot. ‘Yes?’

‘And I’ve got unparalleled access to the London underworld,’ he says, apparently finding one. ‘Celebrity clients. Oodles of them, if that’s what you’re after. Top blokes that can get shit done. Mountains of gear. Hook-ups. Connections. All kinds of geezers to help you sell whatever it is you’re cooking up here. You could make far more than you’d get from that silly little watch.’

Hangjaw’s foot-tapping suddenly ceases. Oh no. Here it comes. ‘From the what?’ His tone is lower now, darker.

Even Keith seems to notice the vibe has shifted. ‘From the … rather fetching watch?’

With a creak of leather, Hangjaw’s hand disappears beneath his coat. When it re-emerges, it’s holding a sawn-off shotgun, which is pointed directly at Keith’s forehead. ‘The watch,’ he repeats, his eyebrow twitching violently. There’s no irony in his tone anymore, just barely suppressed anger.

Keith doesn’t get it. ‘What?’

‘WHERE IS THE WATCH?’ Hangjaw shouts, so loud that it echoes from the vaulted ceiling.

Keith stares back in disbelief. ‘I thought you—’

Hangjaw doesn’t let him finish. ‘Wrong answer.’ The gunshot, when it comes, is ear-splittingly loud in such a confined space. It echoes and echoes again, bouncing from each arch of the ceiling as it moves through the cellar complex. Keith and his chair tip backwards together, and what little remains of Keith’s head lands in a pool of his own blood and brain matter well before the room finally quietens.

Then Hangjaw starts yelling. ‘WORTHLESS!’ he shouts, grabbing the man who came in with him by the neck and slamming him into the nearest machine. Sparks fly from the metal, spittle from Hangjaw’s mouth, as he yells in the man’s face. ‘You wretch! You told me this was the English worm who has been following us since Stockholm. You told me he had the watch, and that he’d trade it for the popstar’s life. Is this a joke? Am I a joke to you?’

The man struggles, kicking with his feet and raising his hands to claw at the black glove on his neck, obviously unable to reply. Meanwhile, as grim as it is when a man could be dying, I find myself looking for an exit. There are three doors in the far end of the chamber, and Phoebe and the other guards are maybe distracted enough that we could make it to one of them, if we’re lucky. But they all lead in opposite directions. It’s a lot of risk for a one-in-three chance at the right answer.

Of course, we could just start shooting – but we’re deep in enemy territory, and who knows how many more of them there are hiding in the warrens?

And then there’s that little all-too-moral part of my conscience that, ever since what happened last summer, won’t let me pull the trigger unless I know, I know, I know that it’s the right thing to do. Hangjaw I could kill – at least, I think I still could. But the others? Or any more that show up?

‘ANSWER ME!’ Hangjaw screams at his henchman, who has started to turn blue.

Phoebe puts a hand on Hangjaw’s arm. ‘No one thinks you’re a joke,’ she says softly. ‘We’re all very grateful you’re here. I’m sure Valerian just made an honest mistake, but I don’t think he’s able to answer you if he can’t—’

‘Quiet!’ he snaps at her. ‘If you hadn’t failed us in London, none of this would have happened.’ But he does loosen his grip. Immediately, Valerian falls to his knees, gasping for air as Hangjaw looks on.

My skin crawls as I watch this play out. Horrors beyond comprehension, all the result of a man’s fragile ego.

Hangjaw lets out a breath and rolls his eyes. The angry red colour fades from his face. It’s as if the colour is moving to Valerian’s, which is finally losing its blue-white tinge.

‘You can be on corpse duty,’ Hangjaw says to Valerian. ‘Dump him in the usual place, the room next to our little guest’s. Then come back and get this mess cleaned up.’

I feel myself leaning in. Their ‘little guest’ could only mean Skyla, couldn’t it? Does that mean she’s alive? I hate to rely on getting lucky, but at least, so far, it’s holding.

‘And you two.’ Hangjaw turns towards the two men still standing guard beside Keith’s cooling corpse. ‘Provide backup at the entryway. We will need to be on high alert for when our British friend finally shows himself.’

Ah, I think. A little less lucky, considering the current state of the other guards at the entryway.

Turning on his heel, Hangjaw stalks back into the darkness. Phoebe lingers a moment longer, peering into the shadows of the vaults. I almost think she’s looking for Will and me … but if she is, she doesn’t find us. After a long, tense moment, she turns to follow her partner.

Chapter 25

A bucket and a mop. Dustpan and broom. Bin liners, bottles of cleaning fluids, a scrubbing sponge, scourer, and a large pink towel. As Will and I watch from the shadows, Valerian buzzes in and out of the space around Keith’s corpse, returning each time with another armload of cleaning products. He arranges them in a neat little row along the edge of a machine.

Forgetting something? I think in his direction.

By the third time he comes back without a body bag, I’m certain we’re rumbled, that Valerian’s going to ignore his boss’s direct order and start cleaning up the mess of blood and brains before dragging away the corpse – thereby giving the two guards on their way upstairs ample time to find their unconscious colleagues and raise the alarm, before Valerian can inadvertently show Will and me where Skyla’s being kept.

Either that or he’ll just take so bloody long to get started that it won’t matter what he does first. The staircase connecting here to the topside entrance was pretty long, but it wasn’t that long, and while we hid the guards reasonably well considering the circumstances, it’ll hardly be foolproof.

Valerian pauses, looking around as if he’s forgotten something. Body bag, I try to beam at him telepathically. You forgot the body bag. For moving the body. Body bag. I can feel my pulse in my ears as I stare at him, holding my breath.

There’s an audible, echoing thwack as he slaps his forehead at his own forgetfulness, then finally, he leaves the room and comes back with the body bag. He uses it to zip Keith up and drag him out of the room by the left-hand door.

I sigh with relief – first because he finally left, and second because he left through a different door to the one Hangjaw and Phoebe used. It’s a smaller, less assuming one in the right-hand wall, and the big black sack leaves a thin, faint smearing of blood behind it as it drags along the floor.

As we trace the red line through the labyrinth, the rock constituting the walls changes once again. The grouted-together stones of the wine-cellar-cum-TV-studio-cum-chemical-plant are replaced by walls carved directly into intact bedrock, like you’d see in an old coal mine. We’re kept company the whole way by a heavy metal pipe that hangs from the ceiling, clanking and gurgling as it takes some kind of liquid to or from the machines in the central chamber.

Valerian takes a few sharp turns onto connecting branches, which makes me worry we’ll loop back around and cross paths with Hangjaw and Phoebe. But that doesn’t happen, and he eventually comes to a stop by the second of two heavy metal doors in the right-hand wall. Will and I creep past him into the continuing tunnel as he bends down over the lock, fishing a ring of keys from his back pocket and muttering under his breath as he thumbs through them. I don’t know the language, but the sentiment of an aggrieved employee griping about his unfair treatment needs no translation. Fair enough, to be honest. At least my overbearing boss never strangled me.

At last the door swings open. From inside the room comes the unmistakable stink of rot, reaching even the shadowy alcove Will and I have squeezed ourselves into. Valerian retches as he drags Keith inside, swatting through a cloud of flies each bigger than my thumbnail. I can’t see whatever’s in there – and believe me when I say I don’t want to – but it’s safe to assume Keith’s body won’t be alone.

Once he’s finished inside, Valerian locks the door behind himself. Then, without even a look in our direction, he sets off back down the corridor. Will’s chest deflates against my side as he lets out the breath he’s been holding. ‘Those keys might be handy,’ he whispers in my ear.

Good point. The ring is once more in Valerian’s back pocket, with no sign of a chain to hold them in place. Picking pockets is risky, though. Any sound at all, any misplaced contact, or if he’s perceptive enough to notice the sudden lightness at his backside, and things get a whole lot messier. And while Will has many skills as a hitman, sleight of hand like this is absolutely my domain.

I tiptoe after him, still not sure if I’ll commit to the grab. First rule of being sneaky: until you get noticed, you can always back out. Part of me wants to leave it … until, all of a sudden, it just feels right. I reach out a hand, hook my index finger on the ring then use my other three to squeeze the keys gently to stop them from jingling. And then I have them. Valerian, oblivious, keeps walking away.

‘Nicely done,’ Will says, once we’re truly alone. Will is, I notice, holding his pistol. He notices me noticing and smiles. ‘Always good to have a backup plan.’

I smile grimly. As much as I’ve been trying to avoid unnecessary bloodshed after what happened in London, it’s less a matter of ‘if’ than ‘when’, given how tonight’s been going. Will nods at the other door, the one Valerian didn’t go through. ‘If you’d do the honours?’

It doesn’t take long to find the key. This room, thankfully, does not stink of decay, nor do I hear the buzzing of flies made fat by God knows how many bodies. I open the door to find perfect darkness, and almost perfect quiet. But not quite. From somewhere inside, I hear a frightened breath.

‘Skyla?’ I whisper.

‘Maisie!’

Will closes the door behind us. I turn on a torch to see Skyla in the darkness of a basic cell. Aside from her, the only things in the room are a camping mat and a bucket on the floor.

‘Oh my God,’ Skyla says, throwing her arms around me. ‘Maisie! I can’t believe you came. I was worried it would be … one of them. That woman doesn’t seem too bad, but the men …’

‘It’s me, Skyla,’ I say, rubbing her back. She’s still wearing the odd combination of fur coat and pyjamas she left in, and she seems mercifully uninjured – but she’s understandably terrified. ‘It’s me and Will. We’re here for you. We’re going to get you out of this.’

Her legs seem to collapse from beneath her and she sits down on the floor. ‘This is crazy,’ she breathes. Then she laughs at the understatement of it. ‘Really fucking crazy. First that woman throws me on the back of a snowmobile, then they bring me here. I didn’t even know places like this existed anymore. I feel like I’m in a video game. Or Game of Thrones.’

‘I know,’ I say, squatting down beside her. Even for me, this is one of the weirdest places I’ve been. I still don’t understand what it’s all here for.

Skyla sniffs and hunches in on herself. I put a hand on her back, which begins to shake as she starts sobbing. ‘But do you know what the worst part of it was?’ she says, her words muffled by the neck of her coat.

My blood goes cold. ‘What did they do?’

‘It’s not what they did,’ she sobs. ‘It’s what I thought, when they left me here alone. What kept running through my mind.’

‘I don’t—’

‘I just thought, again and again, I bet Avery’s behind this. I bet it’s all just some big trick to freak me out so that my set tomorrow flops and she can prove she’s the talented one. But it’s not, is it? And how could I think that, after everything we’ve been through?’

The pain in her voice as she wails that last word is so real and so raw that it makes my heart ache. I could explain to her that, from a psychological point of view, she shouldn’t blame herself for thinking such things. Deep down, I am sure, she is more than aware that it’s ludicrous to assume that Avery Guo, an experimental music producer from Luton, could have organised her kidnap and imprisonment in a labyrinthine underground facility in the side of a French Alp. But when faced with a reality that’s unimaginably horrible, the brain has a way of making rationalisations that are at least imaginably horrible. Being kidnapped by an artistic rival out of petty revenge might be unlikely – but it’s easier to accept than the alternative.

I could explain that, but I don’t know what good it would do. So instead I just hold her. ‘I miss her, Maisie,’ Skyla says as she cries in my arms. ‘I miss her so, so, much.’

‘It’s not Avery’s fault,’ I tell her, once the intensity of her sobbing has subsided. ‘It’s mine. I should never have let them take you.’

We wait a second for Skyla to compose herself. I am fully aware that we need to get moving, that at any moment the unconscious doormen will be discovered and our cover will be blown. But Skyla needs this.

And she doesn’t take too long about it. All things considered, she’s holding up remarkably well. ‘What even is this place?’ she asks, after taking a long, wet sniff.

‘I have a theory about that, actually—’ Will begins, but he stops short as a look of terror passes across Skyla’s face.

‘Wait, what’s that noise?’ she whispers.

Then I hear it. The wail of a distant alarm. ‘Surprised it took them that long, to be honest,’ I say, looking over at Will. He’s instantly dropped whatever he was about to say and taken position by the door, holding it slightly ajar to peer out into the corridor, his pistol ready. ‘See anyone?’ I ask him.

‘Clear for now,’ he replies. ‘But this is the first place they’ll look. What do you think of our chances of getting out past the agents we’ve seen?’

‘Bad.’ There are at least four soldiers with submachine guns, Jean-Pierre and Élise, wherever they got to, plus Phoebe and Hangjaw. We are, in other words, horrendously outgunned. And that’s assuming I can rely on myself not to freeze up. For how crazy things have got lately, I still haven’t killed anyone since I failed to shoot Luther Pizzo. ‘We should go further in,’ I say. ‘I haven’t seen any cameras, so they won’t know exactly where we are. Maybe we can find a way to loop back around, or at least get the jump on them.’

Will nods grimly. I can tell he isn’t hopeful about our chances. I’m not either, but this is the best we’ve got. ‘OK,’ he says. ‘Skyla, you ready? When we get out there, you’re going to need to run. Keep up with us, stay behind cover, and make sure to keep Maisie and I between you and anyone with a gun.’

She nods emphatically as she pulls herself to her feet. ‘Don’t worry about me.’ Her knees are knocking and her hands are trembling, but at least from the neck up she’s managing a brave face. I’m impressed. If music doesn’t work out, she might be one of the few popstars who can make the jump to Hollywood.

If we can get her out of here, that is.

There’s a noise from further down the corridor, back the way we came from. ‘We need to move,’ says Will.

I agree. ‘Let’s go.’

We burst through the door into the corridor, and set off running deeper into the facility. And ‘deeper’ is really the word for it. The tunnel we used to get here seemed almost abandoned, like it was leading us away from the important parts of the base, but as we follow it further, it becomes obvious that it isn’t at all. Things quickly feel busier and more complicated, with more crossroads, more branches, more doorways, most of them opening onto computer rooms or science labs.

I’m about to ask Will for his ‘theory’ regarding the purpose of it all when a shout comes from distressingly close behind us. We dash faster and faster down the corridor, barely having time to check corners and intersections as we pass them. I peer around one sharp turn, then duck just in time for a hail of bullets to crack into the wall where my head just was. Will steps into the space I left and fires, his pistol so directly over my head that an ejected shell casing lands in my hair.

‘Got him,’ he says.

But there’s an alcove in the rock behind Will, with a door we hadn’t even spotted. It opens while he’s looking the other way, unable to react. But I can. Still crouched on the ground, I reach my arm past Will’s legs and sink three bullets into a black-clad shape. The masked man’s finger spasms on his trigger, but his shots go wide, pinging off the walls as they ricochet down the corridor. One hits the overhead pipe and chips it, causing a stream of water to spatter down to the floor.

But he’s dead. ‘Still got it,’ I breathe, feeling far more relieved than I’d like to admit.

Will pulls me to my feet. ‘Of course you do,’ he says, smiling as if there was never any doubt that I’d have his back when it really mattered. ‘You’re Maisie Baxter.’

‘Guys,’ says Skyla, softly. She’s still looking the other way. Past the man Will killed, the corridor turns sharply. ‘I saw a shadow moving at the bottom. Someone’s coming.’

I see it too. ‘Shit, how many of them are down here?’

We’re still being followed from the other direction, so our only option is the door my guy came through – a big metal thing that looks like it belongs on a submarine. I’m expecting to find a dead end – somewhere to make our heroic last stand or die trying – but when we step over his body, we’re faced with the opposite problem.

‘And just how big is this place?’ I breathe, rotating as I count all six of the doors in the various walls. The only wall that doesn’t have two doors in it is to our left, which is wholly given over to a huge frosted window. There’s a blurred silhouette of a man at its centre, legs spread wide, long coat hanging down to his ankles. It can only be Hangjaw, waiting for us.

Will raises his gun and fires at him, but whatever the window is made of, it doesn’t chip or dent. Maybe I’m imagining it, but I get the slightest impression of the silhouette’s shoulders jerking up and down like he’s laughing.

‘We can cut him off,’ says Will, rushing for the door closest to the window. But the moment he opens it, a grenade rolls back through the gap, landing at his feet. ‘Will!’ I shout, grabbing Skyla’s arm as I pick a door at random and drag her through it. Will follows, slamming the door just in time for the explosion to turn it convex and send shockwaves through the stone at our feet.

With the door thoroughly warped in place, the only way is forward. Ahead of us, the corridor branches, plasticky signs listing the rooms in each direction: RESIDENCES, BORE HOLE, ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICE, CONTROL CENTRE, OXIDISATION, PUMP ROOM.

I’m getting sick of this. ‘Skyla,’ I ask, ‘did you ever hear the guards talking about what else was in this facility? Anything that might be useful?’

She’s glancing about wildly, but that triggers a response. ‘I did, actually,’ she says, though her tone is uncertain. ‘Two guys were talking about where they could smoke. He said if he followed the signs to the “pump room” there was a staircase that would take them somewhere.’

Will and I glance at each other. ‘Up to the surface?’ I ask.

‘I guess,’ says Skyla.

‘Can’t they just smoke inside?’ asks Will.

‘Guess not.’ Skyla creases her brow. ‘I would have said something sooner. But the whole conversation just seemed … fishy. Like they were acting, and not very well. Why would they have that conversation right outside my door? In slow English? It sounded like they were reading from a script.’

Will is nodding, apparently convinced. ‘OK, so we avoid the pump room, then,’ I say. ‘Got it.’

But it’s not like we have much control over where we’re going. There’s a scraping at the warped metal door behind us, and I spin around to see it blasted the rest of the way off its hinges. I grab Skyla’s wrist again and we fall back away from it, Will and I firing into the smoky darkness behind the door to dissuade anyone from coming through. As soon as we get to the junction, more bullets come from the left. Surrounded from all sides, we run almost at random, stumbling through doorways and around corners. Finally we come across an unlit and seemingly empty room with some sort of big grey machine in the middle of it, which at least seems like it’ll provide some cover.

It’s only once I’ve passed through the threshold that the writing above the door registers in my brain.

PUMP ROOM.

The one room in this wretched place we know we don’t want to be.

Strip LEDs blink on as we enter, bathing everything in sterile too-white light. There’s nowhere to hide except behind the pump machine, and no exit except the one we came in through. I hear a noise from behind me, and turn to see the heavy metal submarine-style door swinging closed, its bolts locking into place.

From a speaker in the corner of the room comes the voice of Hangjaw, crackly and gloating. ‘Well, well, well. Our little English rat has finally taken the cheese.’

Oh quit bragging, I want to tell him. We saw through your stupid little ploy.

But that feels a bit desperate, considering we’ve ended up just where he wanted us all the same.

Chapter 26

It’s easy to tell yourself that things can’t get any worse, but it’s not often true. In my extensive experience of terrible situations, things can almost always get worse.

Look at it this way. Will, Skyla and I being trapped together in an underground base, surrounded on all sides by the impenetrable rock of a French Alp – that’s bad.

But the mad psychopath who trapped us here being annoying enough to gloat about it, instead of just killing us with dignity? That’s worse.

And now there’s the water. Cold water. Freezing water, gushing forth from a disconnected outlet on the side of the great big pumping machine that takes up most of this room, and pooling ominously on the floor. However bad things get, there’s always a new low they can sink to.

‘This was never intended to be a torture chamber,’ Hangjaw crows through the crackling sound system.

‘Who asked?’ I shout back at the ceiling. Part of me is praying that the water will short-circuit the intercom and at least we won’t have to hear his smarmy voice any longer, but given the speaker is over eight feet from the ground, we’ll have other problems by then. For now, the water is a fairly large puddle on the floor. Enough to worry your downstairs neighbour, but annoying and clammy more than dangerous. But the way it’s pooling at the doorway tells me the room is sealed tight. So it’s like I said: things can always get worse. Right now, it’s all too easy to visualise what ‘worse’ will look like.

It looks like drowning.

‘It’s actually just a quirk of our pumping system,’ he continues, ignoring me. ‘You’d never guess it from down here, but directly above this part of the facility is a majestic alpine lake. Not a huge lake, in the grand scheme of things: almost forgotten among the tremendous and magnificent mountains, especially when it freezes in winter. It is only, I would estimate, about a hundred million cubic metres in volume. Not much for a lake, but quite enough to fill this room, don’t you think?’

Will shouts over him: ‘What do you want, Hangjaw? Couldn’t find an audience for your geography lectures?’

Even as he shouts, he’s helping Skyla climb the metal frame of the pumping machine to take the higher ground. Always the gentleman, even in a situation as dire as this.

Hangjaw keeps on talking. Just what we want: a sadistic murderer who can’t get enough of hearing himself speak.

‘The scientist who installed this machinery said we should fit an overflow pipe, to stop this from happening. But the first time I saw it all pouring out, my imagination exploded. Wow! I thought. So much water. Whatever can we do with it? Blast away rock, of course – but what else? Perhaps we could use it to … drown the little English rat that’s been tailing me through Europe?’

With Skyla out of the water for now, Will sploshes over to me at the doorframe. I’ve been attempting to lever it open with the back of my knife, with no success. ‘If you want to punish me, just do it,’ Will shouts. ‘Let the others go!’

‘Will!’ I hiss in his ear. ‘We’ve talked about this. No noble sacrifices. We get out together.’

But the room is filling faster than I’d expect, considering the water is only coming through a single hole, albeit a rather wide one. The tops of my shoes are still dry, just about … but they won’t be for much longer. ‘You know what this facility is, right?’ Will leans in to whisper under the roar of the pipe.

I nod. I’d figured it out from the signs in the hallway, even before Hangjaw mentioned using water to ‘blast away rock’.

‘Borehole mining,’ I say. In other words, squirting pressurised jets of water into the Earth’s crust, hard enough to turn rock into slurry that can then be processed for rare metals in the vats we saw in the main chamber. Eventually you end up with some kind of powdered oxide, which is probably what’s on the pallets upstairs. This facility is designed to do all that in secret and would have been cobbled together via untraceable grey markets, which explains the slightly unconventional set-up, expanding out from a wine cellar. Not to mention the industrial pump repurposed as torture device.

Will grimaces. ‘Exactly. Neodymium, I think. Essential to modern technology, but only extracted in a few places around the world – mainly in China. It explains the purple dust we saw upstairs, and the deals they were doing with AI companies in Sweden.’

Exactly the sort of company who’d stand to benefit if a metal like that was discovered in sufficient quantities inside the EU … especially if the European government itself was none the wiser.

‘It would explain where the Circle’s getting a good chunk of their money,’ I reply quietly.

In my head, the chain of events starts linking itself together. A TV show with a puzzle gimmick stumbles upon a motherlode of rare earth minerals while adapting an old mountain cellar into a secret studio. The Circle get wind of the discovery, muscle in on the site, and start killing anyone who knows the location – but by that point, the watch would already have been made. A watch that also serves as a map, promising treasure … leading people right where the Circle doesn’t want anyone looking.

All good information – but useless if I can’t get this bloody door open! I almost think I’m getting somewhere, then the blade of my knife snaps off and goes skimming across the surface of the water like a stone. ‘Fuck!’ I hiss.

‘I assure you, that door is entirely sealed,’ Hangjaw tells me, as the water level passes my socks. ‘I have had this room tested, by the scientist who built it, no less. If you know what I mean.’

I wish I didn’t, but I do. I think of the smell from the room next to Skyla’s, and the horrible buzzing of those flies. How many people have died down here already?

‘But what do you want?’ Will repeats, shouting up at the ceiling.

Again, it’s like a switch flips in Hangjaw’s demeanour. The ironic humour drops from his voice entirely. ‘You know what I want,’ he growls in reply. So he can hear us, I think. I was beginning to wonder.

‘You know this won’t help you get it, right?’ I shout back, turning my attention to the pumping machine – maybe if I can block the tap I can at least buy us some time, force them to come in here if they want to kill us. ‘We don’t have the watch. You have no idea where it is. Without us you lose it forever, and who knows who might find it.’

Hangjaw pauses before replying again, and I can tell from that pause that he believes me. In a high-pressure situation, it’s much easier to convince someone of something when you really are telling the truth.

I take off one of my shoes.

‘Maybe not,’ he finally admits. This time his voice is icy calm. ‘But it will be much easier for us to find it once the two of you are safely out of the way. And I know who to ask. Those friends you brought with you, for example. I find that very unconventional, by the way – for a woman in your position to bring her friends along. Not when so much is at stake.’

I grit my teeth, determined not to give away how close he is to the bone, and jam my shoe in the waterflow. Even getting it halfway in takes all of my strength, and it’s too narrow – the water still rushes past it.

‘Nice try,’ says Hangjaw. ‘Or perhaps I should begin with the popstar’s secretary?’

‘No!’ Skyla gasps.

‘“No,” she squeals. Delightful. So – who wants to tell me?’

The water is approaching knee height now, greyish in colour and bone-chillingly cold. Eventual drowning aside, the cold will make it dangerous to stay in this room for much longer. Already my teeth are chattering, and Will’s complexion is starting to look how it did when he showed up at my window after hitching a ride back from Amsterdam on a cargo ship with no coat. Skyla is faring a little better, being the only one of us to have largely remained dry. She might last an extra half-hour, if she’s lucky.

‘You do know that you brought this on yourselves, don’t you?’ Hangjaw adds when none of us reply straight away. ‘You must have realised I had a reason for keeping the popstar alive. If you two hadn’t rushed in here, guns blazing, I was intending to make a deal. I am not a cruel man.’ Then he breaks off, laughing to himself.

Prick, I think, as his laughter buzzes through the speaker in distorted staccato bursts. Nothing Hangjaw has done has made me hate him as much as hearing that laugh. I think of how he slammed his subordinate into some machinery, screaming in his face: Am I a joke to you? He’s just the worst kind of person: a horrible, nasty, thin-skinned, humourless man, who half-hides it behind a skin-deep performance of ironic detachment. A man for whom every life is a joke except for his own, which must be taken deadly seriously at all times – or else.

‘Well, not unduly cruel, anyway,’ he continues, still giggling slightly. Arsehole. ‘I can honestly say that I wanted to treat you perfectly fairly. Give me the watch, and I let the popstar go free. You let us mind our business, and you can mind yours. Everyone goes home happy.’

The cold water still gushing from the pipe, creeping up our thighs, undermines his jolly beneficence. ‘How can we trust you?’ shouts Will.

‘I said I intended to make a deal,’ growls the speaker. ‘Past tense.’

‘So why—’ I begin, but he isn’t finished.

‘But I might still be persuaded to speak to one of you. On one condition.’

None of us reply.

‘Aren’t you going to ask me what the condition is?’

‘You said one of us,’ I growl. And leave the other to die. That’s all I need to know about his conditions.

‘Maisie,’ Will says softly, touching my sleeve with a cold hand. I brush him away. I know what he’s going to say. Leave me here, save yourself, go on without me, blah blah blah. I don’t have time for it. There is a way out of here together. I know there is. There has to be. I take off my other shoe.

‘Ah, so I did,’ Hangjaw says. ‘Very good. Yes, that’s the condition. I will talk to one of you, unarmed and alone. The popstar stays in here until I am sure you can be trusted. If you convince me, you may bring her with you. But whatever happens, the other stays. For good. A more than generous trade, given that you have killed several of my agents this evening.’

With both shoes jammed in the nozzle, I think for a second that I’m managing to stem the flow. Then, like I’m trapped in an arm wrestle with someone twice my strength, the pressure on my shoulders becomes unbearable. Just like in an arm wrestle, once I start losing, I lose fast. I’m thrown back by the weight of the water, forced to swing my arms to avoid landing backwards in the icy grey drink.

‘Should I give you some time to deliberate?’ asks Hangjaw.

Will catches my gaze. He’s standing near Skyla’s perch on the far side of the machine. I wade to them through the nearly waist-high water, forming a triangle around Skyla.

‘Will—’ I begin, but Skyla puts me off.

‘Guys,’ says Skyla, ‘I am so, so, sorry for dragging you into this.’

‘Thanks, Skyla,’ I say quietly. ‘But don’t worry about it. More importantly—’

This time it’s Will who interrupts me. ‘Maisie, this is your only chance. You have to take it.’

‘Will!’ I hiss. ‘We said we wouldn’t do sacrifices.’

He leans in to speak more quietly. ‘This isn’t about that. Once one of us goes out there, there’s no way we can trust him to uphold his end of the deal. He’ll kill all three of us as soon as he’s sure he can find the watch. But I seem to have got under his skin after Sweden and Italy, so if I go out, I’ll have no chance of turning the tables on him. It has to be you.’

‘But—’

‘Maisie,’ he says, putting a hand on my shoulder. This time I let him keep it there. ‘You know there’s no way out of here for any of us unless he lets us out. I’ve seen doors like that before – on battleships. We’d need explosives to get it open. And there’s no way of stopping this pumping machine without the entire lake crashing down on us through the ceiling. If he lets you out … you just need one good opportunity. And you’re a lot more dangerous than you look.’

He might underestimate me, is the implication. And as much as I hate to be underestimated, it can make a powerful difference. Just think what happened to Keith, when he underestimated the Circle.

I feel Skyla’s hand on my other shoulder. ‘You can do it, Maisie,’ she whispers.

I look between them, trying to believe the faith they have in me. I’ve spent so time recently doubting myself. Doubting that I’d be able to come through for Will the way he did for me, or protect Skyla, or keep my friends out of trouble. But when I look at them, I see no doubt at all. They’re counting on me. Trusting me.

I can’t let them down.

‘Fine,’ I say.

Then I brush off their hands and step decisively into the centre of the room. ‘Love you,’ Will whispers.

But I ignore him.

Because he’s right – and what’s more, I’ve got another card up my sleeve. Something Will hasn’t mentioned, that I’m not even sure he realises I’m holding. But the thing about this card is, I have to be very careful about what Hangjaw sees through his camera and hears through his microphone. So as much as I’d like to hear one more time from Will that everything will be OK, as much as I’d like to look into his eyes and tell him he’s the best thing in my life when we might never see each other again, I can’t.

Which hurts. It really, really hurts.

‘Hangjaw?’ I shout, directing my words at the camera in the ceiling. My shoulders are back, my head raised, defiant. Angry. But willing to talk. ‘I accept your deal. The watch and his life, for mine and the popstar’s.’

‘Very good,’ comes the reply. ‘Now listen very carefully to my instructions. I only intend to be reasonable once.’

Chapter 27

Hangjaw’s instructions are straightforward and thorough. First he insists that we wait as a foot-wide metal panel opens in the floor, draining the water faster than it continues to flood in. Then we put all of our weapons, tools and equipment – even our kitbags – into this drain, and take off our bulky jackets and dump them in a corner. Finally we twirl for him in front of the camera in our soaked T-shirts and trousers until he is satisfied that we’re sufficiently unarmed not to attempt any heroism when the door opens and his soldiers come in.

After that it’s just a matter of waiting, I assume until there’s little enough water that it won’t make a mess of the hallway when he opens the door. That would happen more quickly if he stopped the flow from the pumping machine, but he does not, perhaps as a reminder that this is all happening at precisely his whim and we shouldn’t be feeling pleased with ourselves about any of it.

Once the water level is low enough, Hangjaw instructs me to stand close to the door, and Will and Skyla to take opposite back corners. We do as we’re told.

It’s the two agents who tricked their way into the chalet who’ve come to greet us, when the door opens. They’ve changed into full paramilitary get-up complete with balaclavas and submachine guns, but I recognise their eyes.

‘I’d been wondering where you two were,’ I say. ‘I don’t suppose you have a towel, do you?’ My top half is mostly dry, but my legs are even colder, now the water is dripping off them, than they were when they were submerged. My sodden trainers – now back on my feet – rub unpleasantly.

‘Out,’ barks the man, whatever his name is. It seems ridiculous to keep calling him Jean-Pierre. I step over the threshold, while the woman pushes past me towards Will and Skyla. I’d hoped they’d be left alone while I was out of the room, but had been worried Hangjaw would renege on his deal and shoot both of them dead.

As it is, his strategy is somewhere in the middle. The Italian handcuffs them each to the heavy metal pipes that presumably connect the pump machine to the water system running through the rest of the base. Then she comes back out, closing the door behind her as I hear the grate in the floor grind shut – time for round two.

‘This way,’ grunts the man. And with the muzzle of the woman’s gun against the small of my back, what can I do except follow?

They prod and pull me until we reach the room I saw earlier through the frosted-glass window, then shove me forward, hanging back just inside the door to block my exit. In the centre of the room, Hangjaw is sitting in a high-backed chair, facing towards me. Behind him is a bank of security monitors – this is the control centre, apparently. I fix my eyes on Hangjaw’s, ignoring three different live feeds of Will and Skyla suffering at the edges of my vision. The rising water is already back up to their ankles.

‘I’m glad you’ve seen sense,’ he says, as smarmy as always when he’s not throwing a temper tantrum. ‘You’re willing to uphold your end of the deal?’

‘Of course,’ I say. Then I break eye contact and take a leisurely step towards the analogue control panels lining the wall with the window. From this side, the glass is completely transparent, giving a view of the six-way intersection we passed through before – presumably so he can track his subordinates’ comings and goings. ‘But this place you have! It’s very impressive. Did you build all this yourself?’

I’m trying to channel the tone Phoebe used to placate him earlier, though I have to say, I’m not used to playing the femme fatale. No shade to the black widows out there, as long as they’re not being evil about it, but it isn’t my speed.

Still, you’d be amazed at how often it works – even when you’d expect the effect to be undermined by the fact my sodden trousers are dripping cold water all over the polished stone floor.

Hangjaw’s chair creaks as he leans back in it, which suggests my approach is working. ‘I did, actually,’ he boasts. ‘It’s the most profitable site in the Circle’s whole portfolio. The Centre loves me.’ Then he catches himself. ‘Though I have to say, this attitude of yours is quite unexpected. Aren’t you concerned for the plight of your little friends?’

The glance I shoot towards their monitors is meticulously casual. Maybe a little too much, but still, it’s better to over-egg the pudding than not enough. ‘We’ve got time,’ I say. ‘The water is only up to their ankles, and the terms of my employment are to keep Skyla Dawn physically safe. A little mental trauma isn’t much, at the end of the day. Assuming you’re a man of your word?’

He steeples his fingers and looks me up and down, appraising me. ‘And the man?’

The pit of my stomach wavers, but I keep my expression firm. ‘He’s an ally of convenience. My contract doesn’t mention him at all.’

‘Oh?’ Hangjaw raises an eyebrow. ‘You seemed to work well together when you were shooting my men. And women, of course.’ He doesn’t quite roll his eyes when he adds that last part, but he may as well have. The Circle, as far as I can tell, is an equal opportunities kind of criminal syndicate – there appear to be women at all levels of their organisation, and from what Will said about their partnership system, Hangjaw and Phoebe ought to be considered absolute equals. But while it might work like that in theory, Hangjaw as an individual clearly has a problem with women.

I laugh. ‘Well, we’re professionals. You said he’s been tailing you through Europe, didn’t you? He came by my chalet to warn me about your agents coming after Skyla, and from there it made sense to work together. But he has his own reasons for wanting to break in to your base.’

He leans forward again, his eyes boring into me. ‘And yet he agreed to let you save yourself, even if it meant sacrificing his life. He didn’t even put up a fight.’

The cold creeping in from my dripping trousers isn’t the only chill I’m feeling. This was always a desperate ploy, and I’ve no idea if Hangjaw’s buying it. But the only thing I can do is ignore my doubts and press on.

I laugh again and turn away, back to the window. ‘Some men have an obsession with chivalry. Like a storybook hero. The knight in shining armour. It’s pathetic, really. But also, in more practical terms – he doesn’t know where I’ve hidden the watch. So what did he have to bargain with? It was either him dying, or all three of us.’

Hangjaw leans forward even further. ‘And you do know where the watch is?’

‘I do.’

I meet his gaze again to find him staring at me, intent and unwavering. I hold it. I am unbothered, I repeat to myself, hoping every muscle in my face believes me, even the tiny little ones around the eyes that are the crappiest at lying in the whole human body. I am unbothered. I am happy. I am in my lane. Focused. Flourishing. And moisturised, certainly – that goes without saying.

But I can still see Will and Skyla in the corner of my vision. Can still see the cold water covering their ankles; still remember how it felt to be trapped there myself; still imagine how it must feel for them without me, without even Hangjaw prattling over the microphone, completely cut off from any knowledge of what has happened to me, of the events that will determine their fate.

And it makes me want to smile.

So, I smile. Honestly this time. Believe me or don’t, but what I’ve seen on that screen puts a lightness in me. I feel for the first time since I gave up on opening the pump room door, that maybe everything really will be OK.

But either Hangjaw doesn’t buy it, or he does buy it and that’s how he knows something is off. His brow creases. Then he laughs, a single, abrupt: ‘Ha!’

Shit. That wasn’t a good kind of ‘ha’.

He swivels his seat away from me to face the feed from the pump room. He doesn’t seem to notice that the water level ought to be higher by now, just smiles with sick pleasure as he sees Will and Skyla strain against their handcuffs. His voice, when he speaks, is dripping with sarcasm. ‘Thank you, dear, you have so far been most helpful. You will tell me how to find that watch – but before then, you shouldn’t have any objections if I accelerate the death sentence of the little English rat?’ He spins on the chair again, and I catch a glint of gunmetal in his left hand. ‘Agents!’ he shouts, raising his right to beckon over not-Jean-Pierre and not-Élise, who have been guarding the doorway, submachine guns trained on the middle of my torso.

It’s now or never.

‘Wait!’ I say, reaching out to gently touch Hangjaw’s arm. That gets a response. He spins around to face me, grinning at me with an evil, vindictive, victorious smile.

‘Oh!’ he says, feigning surprise. ‘So you do care about him! How novel! What a shock!’ Then his voice drops to a growl. ‘Did you really think I was stupid enough to believe your lies?’

‘It’s not that,’ I say, still fully committed to the character like a standup comedian who won’t admit they’re bombing. ‘It’s just that – if you try to kill him, things might not go as you planned. Because the whole reason he’s here …’

I pause dramatically. Hangjaw’s nostrils flare. He’s fighting to restrain the angry, violent impulse that has him grabbing the necks of his subordinates and supposed equals whenever they annoy him, slamming them into the furniture until someone (preferably a woman) puts a hand on his shoulder and says something to soothe his poor, wounded ego.

‘YES?’ he barks. His two guards are getting closer, his knuckles turning white where he clutches, with one hand each, the arm of his seat and his shotgun. Any second now, if I’m lucky, the hand on the seat is going to whip forward and close around my throat. If I’m unlucky, the hand on the shotgun will close around its trigger and he’ll shoot me. Or maybe he’ll just have one of his team do it for him. That would be the sensible thing to do, all things considered, and the more I fuck him about, the more likely he is to get so pissed off that he just wants rid of me.

But still, I pause. I have to delay.

Because I’m not trying to convince him any longer.

Right now, I’m playing for time.

‘The whole reason behind why that man is here,’ I repeat, speaking slowly and firmly, ‘is because …’ I take a breath, ‘your partner has been lying to you.’

Hangjaw jumps to his feet. ‘WHAT?’ he shouts, so loud that it’s deafening.

‘Your partner,’ I say, taking a nervous step backwards. I do want to provoke him, but I know that it’s going to hurt. ‘Phoebe Pritchard, AKA Agent Medusa. Five years ago, right before she joined up with the Circle, she and that man in there were—’

Before I can finish the sentence, there’s the impact – his hand on my throat, hard enough that I can’t even think about breathing. Hard enough that, even if he lets go, I’m sure he’s crushed something vital and I’ll never breathe again. The strength in his arm launches me backwards and I get an eerie sense of déjà vu, only this time I get to feel the pain myself. The jagged edge of some electronic furniture digs into my spine as Hangjaw bellows at me: ‘WHAT? WHAT DID YOU SAY?’

I can’t reply. Of course I can’t. How could I?

But in the jealous blindness of his rage, he genuinely doesn’t seem to get that. ‘ANSWER ME, WOMAN!’ he screams, spittle flying from his mouth and dampening my cheek. I raise my two hands in the direction of his big one and try to prise my fingers into the gap between my neck and his palm. I claw at him with my nails, kick with my feet – hard enough to earn them a hard stamp from his boot. But nothing changes, except that my vision starts to fade. It disappears from the outside in like at the end of a Bugs Bunny cartoon, leaving a black-red haze. The entirety of my visible world reduces to this horrible man’s bulging eye, the red veins marbled across its white curve – that’s all, folks.

I worry, as I lose consciousness, that I’ve failed. That I’ve misread the situation, or mistimed it, or that something else has gone wrong and that this really will be the end. That I’ll die being choked out by a roided-up prick in a leather jacket, that Will and Skyla will drown in the next room if the hypothermia doesn’t see to them first.

Then, just as I’m about to lose consciousness, I hear a gunshot.

Thank fuck for that.

Though it is just one gunshot, which is a little worrying. I’d been expecting three at the very least, given the three people in the room who want to kill me, and the difficulty of shooting Hangjaw without getting past the other two first.

Still, one bullet is a good start.

It’s answered by a responding volley from one of the guard’s submachine guns and, mercifully, by the loosening of Hangjaw’s grip on my neck. I fall to my knees, my diaphragm contracts, and air is pulled in so forcefully that it feels like a solid object against the bruised passage of my throat.

My vision comes back to the sight of the male agent, lying on the floor in a pool of his own blood. The woman is standing over him, holding her gun in one hand, aiming it at the open doorway. Hangjaw has his shotgun raised, too. Thankfully, it isn’t pointed at me. Rookie mistake.

From out in the corridor, I hear the sound of someone dry heaving.

‘You’re finished!’ Hangjaw yells. ‘I know it’s you, Phoebe. Who else would be so pathetic as to retch at the sight of blood?’ He throws his head back and laughs. ‘Finally! After all these years of waiting for you to get sick enough of me to do something about it, you finally turn traitor. I can’t wait for the Centre to hear about this! Finally I will be rid of you, you worthless, pathetic woman!’

The whole time he’s speaking, he’s advancing slowly towards the doorway, leaving me to pick myself up. He’s apparently so fixated on the latest woman he feels has wronged him that thoughts of the one before have slipped his mind entirely. Well, soon he will be free of Phoebe. Free of the strange, acrimonious work marriage they were forced to endure, each the other’s partner and jailer. But not freed in the way that he’s hoping, I imagine.

Moving slowly and silently and staying carefully beyond his field of vision, I rise to my feet. Just a little longer, I tell myself. Although, given how thorough he and his goons were, I haven’t got much to work with. Just the last resort of all my last resorts: a single size-three embroidery needle that I keep wedged in place on the inside of my trousers, flush against my hipbone to mask its position.

You can’t do too much damage with just a needle …

Unless you stick it right in someone’s jugular – and tear.

Hot blood gushes out past my fingers as Hangjaw reaches, bellowing, for the wound in his neck. His legs buckle beneath him as his surviving guard spins around, ready to fire. But my body is entirely obscured behind that of her boss – I did have to sneak up behind him to reach his neck – so she shoots awkwardly wide and misses me entirely. Her bullets hit the console behind Hangjaw, which showers sparks and releases the stink of burning plastic.

I grab Hangjaw’s shotgun and fire.

‘Next time,’ I say as both of their bodies fall limply to the floor, ‘don’t fuck with my friends.’

By the time I step through the doorway, the dry-heaving sound from the corridor has turned distinctly wet.

‘Wow, you really did throw up,’ I say to Phoebe, who is kneeling over a pile of her own sick. ‘That’s quite a drawback for a career criminal, isn’t it?’

She glares up at me. ‘There’s a lot more to this life than just wanton violence, you know,’ she says, wiping her mouth. ‘At least, there should be.’ She glances into the room, and I think she’s about to throw up again. ‘Is he dead?’

‘He’s dead. Where are Will and Skyla?’

She blinks at me, as if the very question is ridiculous. Then I see my mistake. When I first saw that Phoebe had looped the footage from the pump room, I thought it meant she’d rescued Will and Skyla before coming here. But that doesn’t make sense, because Will wouldn’t have taken one shot from the doorway before bending down to chuck up his dinner. He’d at least have managed to kill both the guards, if not Hangjaw as well – saving me from having to do it myself with a sewing needle.

I drag Phoebe to her feet. ‘Well, thanks for saving my life. But are you going to show me how to get them out, or do I have to shoot you as well?’

‘No need to be rude about it.’ She holds her stomach and stares at the ceiling as she enters the room with the three dead bodies and picks her way across the blood-drenched floor. ‘We have to do it from this console.’

She’s halfway across the room by the time she looks gives the console a proper look. The expression on her face makes all other thoughts disappear from my head.

‘What?’ I hiss.

‘I can’t do it.’

‘What do you mean you can’t do it?’

‘I mean, look at the console, Maisie Baxter. It’s fucked.’

I push past her to look at it myself. She has a point. Whatshername’s bullets did much more damage than I realised: warning lights are flashing, white smoke is pouring out, and about half of the buttons and switches are so mangled that I don’t even know if you could push them, assuming you were crazy enough to brave electric shocks and cut fingers.

‘Fuck,’ I breathe. ‘Well, we need to get that door open.’

Phoebe grits her teeth, then turns and runs out of the room. I dash after her, convinced that if I let her out of my sight, she’ll be gone for good. ‘Wait!’ I shout. But whatever other faults she might have as a criminal, you can’t deny that she’s fast. By the time I make it to the six-way intersection, she isn’t there, and I have no idea which door she went through.

Desperately hoping she’s just running ahead of me, I follow the signs back to the pump room. I find the door, but the corridor is empty. There is at least a handle on this side of the door, which I yank firmly … to no effect. Whatever locking mechanism it has, it seems that it was only operable from Hangjaw’s control panel, which has now been destroyed. But there must be a way to open it. I haven’t got this far, done this much, for Will and Skyla to …

‘Step aside, please,’ comes Phoebe’s voice from behind me. She’s holding something that looks a little like a Christmas present, a narrow box wrapped in heavy brown paper, with a few strands of black wire taking the place of a bow.

‘We’d need explosives to get through this door,’ Will had said. Back then, the water was up to his waist. Is it that high now? Further? Past their heads? I’ve completely lost track of time – but regardless, Phoebe has found some C4. I stand back and let her plant it on the door.

When we come out of hiding after Phoebe’s detonated the charge, we find the door very much where we left it, just looking a bit worse for wear. It hasn’t been exploded so much as kind of caved in, like someone went at it with an impressively hard kick. The deformation seems to have broken the seal around its edge, however: water is trickling out in little currents all the way up both sides. And I do mean all the way up, which isn’t a good sign.

‘That’s a lot of water,’ I mutter. I’m worried that despite the damage done, the door will be just as stubborn about opening as it was before Phoebe put a great big dent in it, and sure enough, my attempts to simply push it open it don’t get anywhere. But I do feel it shift slightly when I put my hands to it, so I back up a few paces, lower my shoulder, and ram into it, hard.

The first impact alone doesn’t achieve much – but again I feel that budging sensation. I try again, and then again. This third time, Phoebe runs with me. Together we hit the door hard enough to bend or break whatever pesky little latches are still clinging on. It shifts against us, starts to move, just a little bit, into the room full of water … until the weight of water behind it pushes it hard backwards in the direction it came from. We fall together, the door propelling us into the corridor like an unruly, upside-down surfboard, crashing down over us as we land on our backs.

But that’s not going to stop me.

I push the door off me and pull myself to my feet, taking unsteady steps through the torrent still rushing past my feet and ankles. Beyond the doorway, I catch my first glimpse of Will and Skyla. They’re both thoroughly soaked from head to toe: Will with his fringe plastered to his forehead, Skyla with her hair scraped back across her scalp, except for a few wayward locks smeared across her cheeks.

I have no idea how long their heads were submerged, but they both look limp, hanging from the pipes they’re shackled to, which run close to the ceiling. I can only hope it wasn’t too long.

Then they both start coughing up water.

Chapter 28

Even once they’ve blinked the water out of their eyes and can breathe normally again, neither Will nor Skyla seem particularly happy to see Phoebe. This could be seen as ungrateful, considering she has saved their lives at least twice over in the last half-hour and is now in the process of undoing their handcuffs. But then again, they each have their reasons not to like her very much.

‘You,’ croaks Skyla. ‘You brought me here. You kidnapped me.’

‘I did,’ Phoebe admits, as she turns the key in the lock of Skyla’s handcuff, setting her arm free.

‘Why?’ Skyla asks, folding her newly liberated arms in around her body as if to protect herself. ‘And how? How can you just go around doing things like that, jumping in through people’s windows and kidnapping them?’

‘It could be worse,’ Phoebe says drily. ‘I could be a murderer. But we all have our uses.’

If I were paying more attention to that conversation, I might have risen to the needless barb Phoebe shot in my direction. If it wasn’t for my being a ‘murderer’, as she put it, she’d still be trapped with that arsehole Hangjaw – and I’ve been around enough women in bad situations to recognise a woman who’s bound to a man they despise. Not unlike Skyla, the first time we met.

On the other hand, I might equally have said something in Phoebe’s defence. She really did save us, after all. All of us. At least twice. But right now, I’m too busy holding Will’s face in my hands to care about all that.

‘You’re safe,’ I say, as if it’s the only thing that matters. It is the only thing that matters.

‘You did it,’ he replies, grinning at me even despite his shivering. ‘I never doubted you for a second, Maisie Baxter. You’re unstoppable.’

‘Bleugh,’ Phoebe says in my ear. ‘You never lost faith in her, even when you were literally drowning? She’s not Jesus Christ, you know.’

Then she pushes me out of the way and gets on with unlocking his handcuffs.

Will pretends not to notice her, just maintains eye contact with me as if she’s a doctor fussing over an old bandage while he’s trying to have an important conversation. It hasn’t escaped my notice that this is the first time they’ve interacted since they were in a relationship together … but I feel secure enough in what Will and I have to not feel threatened. Especially now I know for sure that she’s got nothing on me as a hitwoman.

‘Thanks,’ he says coolly, when his arm pops free. Then he leans over to me and whispers: ‘Are you sure this is a good idea? She definitely isn’t going to rat us out to Hangjaw?’

‘Hangjaw is dead,’ Phoebe interrupts. ‘And I’m not deaf. And as soon as the Circle fails to discover my body next to Hangjaw’s, they’ll assume I had a hand in his killing, so whatever bridges I had with them are well and truly burned. They’ll probably come after me with a vengeance – not that it matters to you.’

Will and I look at each other. I can tell he wants to say something that he knows is beneath him … and I see when he loses the battle not to. ‘So betraying me isn’t going well for you, then?’

‘Will!’ I protest. ‘If it wasn’t for her, none of us would be alive right now. She shot one of Hangjaw’s guards and bought me time to kill him and the other one. Even if she threw up afterwards.’

The way he blinks at me suggests he didn’t expect any of that. He throws up his hands. ‘For which I am exceedingly grateful. Genuinely. But it doesn’t change the fact that five years ago—’

‘Oh get over it,’ Phoebe says, cutting him off. ‘You should be grateful I “betrayed” you back then, as you so dramatically put it. That mission was a suicide job. If I hadn’t forced you to call it off they would have killed you, one hundred per cent. You’d have been sleeping at the bottom of the canal and you’d never have even met Little Miss Love-of-Your-Life over there.’

‘Is that what it was?’ asks Will, his voice getting louder as he speaks, years of pent-up frustration bubbling to the surface. ‘You betrayed me out of the goodness of your own heart? I can’t believe this. I thought you were dead, Phoebe. It was only when I saw that photo of you at the bloody Burj Khalifa that I—’

‘GUYS!’ I say, stepping between the two of them before the claws can come out. ‘This is not the time. There could still be Circle agents in this facility and—’

Then Skyla steps in to wave a hand in front of me. ‘Hey! Erm, does anyone else think the water’s getting deeper?’

I look down at my feet. The water level is definitely getting deeper. Which makes sense. It’s not like it’s stopped pouring out of the pumping machine the whole time we’ve been arguing, or even slowed down, and while the door to the rest of the facility might be open, the drain isn’t, so …

There’s a metallic groaning sound from directly overhead. It’s the sort of sound a giant, hastily installed, grey-market water pump might make when it’s been put through a series of unusual stresses, possibly right before it—

‘Run!’ I shout, grabbing the wrists of the two people nearest to me as the sound of shearing metal gets more unmistakable. I probably should have made sure I grabbed Skyla – instead I end up between Will and Phoebe as we run together out into the corridor. Another tremendous groan seems to come from all around us, and then, from behind us, an ear-splitting crash. It’s followed, a second or so later, by the sensation of a wave breaking on the back of my calf – like I’m running up a beach with my friends, except it’s a horrible English beach, in January, with biting-cold water, and the wave never goes back out, it just keeps coming in.

‘RUN!’ we all shout together, as the water level only gets higher. I glance anxiously around in search of Skyla and see to my relief that she’s there beside Will – he’s holding her wrist. And like that, hand in hand, the four of us make our break for it through an underground facility that is rapidly disappearing underwater. I don’t know what those bullets to the control panel did to it, but the water system is entirely messed up. That overhead pipe we saw earlier is leaking in all sorts of places, and by the time we make it to the machinery room where Hangjaw killed Keith, we’re wading through water that, once again, is up to our waists.

But we make it to the stairs that lead to the surface, into the cold, dry air.

Emphasis on the cold.

Skyla collapses as we’re halfway up them.

‘We can’t stop here,’ says Will. ‘It’s just going to keep coming, and this is the weakest part of the structure. There could be a cave-in.’

Phoebe perks up at that. ‘Good news for me.’

All of this is good news for her. Not only is Hangjaw dead, but his body is hidden at the bottom of a dangerous underwater labyrinth that, for all the Circle knows, could have killed her just as easily. It’ll take them a long time to figure out how he died and that she didn’t die with him. In other words, she seems increasingly likely to get away with it. Doubly, triply so if there is a cave-in.

But Will is right. ‘Come on, Skyla,’ I say, grabbing her arm.

‘I just need,’ she pants, ‘a little rest.’

‘No, no, no,’ I say, attempting to hoist her to her feet. ‘We have to get you out of here.’ But either her wet clothes are so heavy they’re dragging her down, or everything I’ve been through tonight has started to catch up with me, and it feels like lifting a boulder.

‘And then what?’ she asks, her breath frosting in front of her as she stays resolutely on the floor. ‘We’re on the side of an alp. It’s the middle of the night. All our clothes are soaked through. What are we going to do, just call Mountain Rescue?’

Will and I look at each other. It’s a fair point. ‘There was a helicopter,’ Will says. ‘Let’s hope that it’s fuelled and ready.’

‘And that no one else took it when they ran off,’ Phoebe mutters.

Down below, something falls apart. Dust trickles down from the ceiling. ‘We’ll have to worry about that when we get to the surface,’ I say, giving her arm another yank. This time she doesn’t fight me, just stumbles to her feet, and we run.

Nothing has quite fallen down on our heads by the time we reach the little would-be TV studio that’s the only sign of this base from the surface, but we’d definitely have been pushing our luck to stay there any longer.

Will is the first to get there. ‘OK,’ he says, turning back to face the rest of us. ‘You three stay here where you’re at least sheltered, I’ll go and check on the helicopter. Back in a sec.’

Just like I said to Hangjaw, he’s being ridiculously chivalrous given he took as much of a beating as anyone and is just as wet. But right now I’m too exhausted to argue. I know that’s a dangerous symptom when you’re this cold, but the funny thing is, I’m also too exhausted to worry about that right now. That’s probably not a good sign.

But when Will opens the door, he’s greeted immediately by the blinding white headlights of a 4x4 Land Rover.

‘AHOY THERE!’ shouts a voice – and not just any voice. I can’t make them out past the glare of the headlights, but I get the impression of someone leaning out from the driver’s side window, waving to us. I stagger forward, unable to believe what I’m seeing. Is it a mirage? A dying hallucination? Or is it really Beth, risking her own life to wait outside a cave full of dangerous criminals on the off chance we make it out alive?

It’s Beth.

‘Oh my God, you’re all soaking,’ she says. ‘Everyone, get in. I’ve been blasting the heating.’

She gets out to help Skyla into the front, while Will and I take the back. I practically push him in first, then he turns round to grab my hands, hoisting me in after.

It’s only after my left foot is on the door sill and my right has just left the ground, that I hear a voice in my ear: ‘You two are good for each other. Look after him.’

I look around to find Phoebe, but no one’s there.

Epilogue

One afternoon, in the warm unfurling of a French spring, I get another glimpse into the truth of Will’s family. After a particularly elaborate job in Marseille, we decide to stop in on our way home and see his sister. After all, he’s met my mum, and I was supposed to meet her ages ago. It’s about time.

And we do deserve a break.

Sarah is warm and generous and not at all fazed by the single day’s notice we give her. She welcomes us into her cottage, down a forested lane on the side of a river. Like her brother, she is calm and collected as she offers us tea and shows me around the ground floor. Unlike her brother, it doesn’t take a lot for her to open up.

Best of all, Will doesn’t even seem to mind. Sure, he groans at the more embarrassing stories, but he counters with ones of his own and teases her back. It’s the most relaxed I’ve ever seen him when it comes to talking about his past. It’s a whole other side of him.

‘I’m so glad he’s got you,’ Sarah says a few hours into our visit, while he’s in the bathroom. ‘You are exactly how he described.’

I smile, feeling the flush of a warm security. We’re sat in the garden, with the radio playing sugary upbeat pop, as we watch the dragonflies buzz around some white flowers at the edge of the river. I’ve only just met Sarah, but already I feel incredibly comfortable. Everything is as it should be.

Will comes back carrying a pitcher of water for the table.

‘And what about you, Maisie?’ Sarah asks as he pours her a glass. ‘Do you have any brothers or sisters?’

I shake my head. ‘It was just me and my mum growing up.’

‘Is she still in Carlisle? That’s where you’re from, right?’

Will comes round the table to stand next to me.

‘She …’ I swallow, ‘is in Chile.’

That was one final bombshell at the end of our last trip to France. Once again, she was calling me from an airport, only this time I was in an airport too, as it turned out – flying into Heathrow from Grenoble, now that everything was wrapped up with Skyla, Keith and the Circle. If her flight had been a couple of hours later, or mine a couple earlier, we might have crossed paths in the car park.

‘What do you mean you’re going to Chile?’ I demanded. ‘With what money?’

‘Oh, don’t worry about that, Darren’s taken care of everything.’

‘You’re back with him?!’ I shouted, drawing wary backwards glances from the family ahead of us in the queue. ‘Mum! What?! The man is a prick!’

‘No need to shout, Maisie! No, of course I’m not with him, and I know he’s a prick – that’s why I divorced him.’

The family in front were very lucky I wasn’t not drinking anything, because if I was I would have sprayed it all over them. ‘Divorced?!’ I yelled into the phone. ‘You never even told me you two were married!’

‘Now that really is ridiculous, Maisie,’ she said sternly. ‘Of course I told you. I’ve always said it – you never listen to anything I say. Properly listen, I mean. But, yes, the settlement has come through and it’s turned out to be rather a lot. So I thought – why am I sitting around in little old Carlisle when I could be back out seeing the world?’

Why indeed? I wondered. And I realised: who am I to tell my mum how to live her life? You can’t stop people from making their own decisions, even if you disagree with them – working with Skyla taught me that. If that’s what she wants to do with herself, who am I to stop her?

It’s not like I appreciate being told what to do.

‘But you will come out and see me this time, won’t you?’ she continued. ‘There are some gentler trails in the Andes that even I should be able to manage, on my good days, and who knows – maybe you’d like that kind of thing now you’re a little older? I already feel the idea of a change of scene is doing wonders.’

Nearly a decade ago, when she left the first time, I’d have demanded to know what the hikes involved, how she was planning on looking after herself out there, what she’d do if it didn’t turn out how she thought it would, et cetera, et cetera. But I’m past that now. It’s not my responsibility to save everyone, even if Liv and Michelle have started calling me a superhero after that business with the Circle agents in their chalet. So instead I just said: ‘Sounds great, Mum. I’d love to come see you when you’re settled in.’

‘That would be lovely, dear. And I’ll come back and visit more often too.’

I relay the gist of the story to Sarah, and conclude it by saying: ‘But I think I’ve realised something. I used to think she was uncaring. But now I just think she’s determined to do things her own way … and bad at communicating.’

Will catches my eye. He looks like he’s about to say something, then thinks better of it. ‘I know what you were about to say!’ I snap at him.

He zips his mouth shut, glancing to Sarah for support. She only grins.

I give him a playful shove. ‘You were about to say, that reminds me of someone, weren’t you? Admit it!’

‘Nope,’ he says, forcing his face to stay straight. ‘I wasn’t about to say anything.’

‘It reminds me of someone.’ Sarah raises an eyebrow and nods in Will’s direction. ‘Growing up, he always had his schemes for how to make things better. Which he’d never let me in on, by the way.’

Sarah’s tone is relaxed – why shouldn’t it be? It’s her life, after all. But I can’t help but feel my smile cool on my face, thinking about the past they shared together in that falling-apart squat in Manchester.

But that’s a ‘me’ problem, not a ‘them’ problem. In the weeks since our mission in the Alps, Will and I have talked a lot more about his past. And the more he talked, the more I realised it wasn’t only his fault that we didn’t discuss it all sooner. I was shutting it down, too, often without realising it – constantly afraid that I’d react insensitively, or ask the wrong question, or seem too sympathetic and come across as fake. As a result, I’d change the subject without realising it, shutting down conversations before they began.

‘Some things are hard to let people in on,’ I say diplomatically.

‘I still think there’s value in a good scheme,’ Will says with a wry smile. Then he looks at me. ‘But right now we tend to scheme together, don’t we?’

I give him a nudge. ‘Wouldn’t have it any other way.’

Sarah grins at us both. ‘Look at you two.’ Then she cocks an ear and bats her hand at Will. ‘Oh, turn the radio up, would you? I just love this song. It’s Skyla Dawn, have you heard of her?’

Will and I look at each other. ‘I have, in fact,’ I say slowly.

‘Maisie used to work for her,’ Will adds.

‘You did?!’ Sarah says, her face lighting up. ‘Did you get to meet Avery Guo as well? I am obsessed with the two of them as a couple.’

‘Yep.’ I grin, thinking back to their hugging reunion through the open door of Beth’s borrowed Land Rover. ‘So did Will. We were there right when they got together. Or back together. I think they had a bit of a thing way back when, but it didn’t last the first time.’

Sarah’s eyes get wider, and she looks between us. ‘Oh, how romantic! What happened?’

The truth is, of course, a little different to the public story, but we tell her the broad strokes: that Avery and Skyla had been friends for years, that in the tragedy of Dayton’s death they had sought solace in each other, and that they’d realised they were truly, deeply in love with one another. I leave out the fact that Skyla figured out her feelings while trapped in a prison cell in an illegal neodymium mine, but I get the important stuff.

‘Can you keep a secret?’ I ask when I’m done.

Sarah leans in, eyes shining. ‘Of course!’

‘Well, first – they’re founding their own label. The last company they worked for was absolutely horrible, but they managed to get out of their contracts without paying the termination fee.’

That clause was a big reason why Skyla needed money, but the way things turned out, she ended up with more than enough leverage to get her and Avery out without giving them a penny. Especially once the more crooked elements of the business started to suspect Skyla had serious protection.

‘Also,’ I add brightly, ‘they’ve got a song coming out soon. A duet they wrote together. The lyrics are incredible – you’re going to die when you hear it.’

Acknowledgements

Although this book sees Maisie and Will dashing across Europe, it was written over 5,000 miles from there in our flats and various coffee shops around Beijing, where we have been living for the last few years.

As we get ready to move back to the UK (at least for now), we want to thank everyone who welcomed us to China and made our time here so incredible. This includes colleagues past and present at the China University of Geosciences – Ben, James, Kaitlyn, Rob, Wayne, and Will – alongside Haiyuan, Tuya, Russell, Johnnie, Xuhe, Nick, Pippa, Craig, and Clare. Finally, we want to thank Yang Bowei for his friendship, and the whole Yang family for hosting us over Spring Festival, where we rewrote the alpine ending surrounded by the real mountains of Yunnan.

Thanks as well to the team at HQ: our brilliant editor Clare Gordon, Najiyah Begum, Jon Appleton, Maren Landsnes, Charlotte Atyeo, Imogen Gordon Clark, Lou Nyuar, Rhiannon Morris and Joey Yau.

And last, but not least, to our friends and families back home: especially our parents who pitched Hitwoman to every bookshop in Edinburgh; Max and Cami who helped spot errors before it went to print; and Rachael, who planned the sweetest party for its launch. No brownies have ever tasted as good as the ones with our book cover on them!

Keep Reading …

She always gets her man … but has she met her match?

Maisie Baxter is determined not to let her job as an ethical hitwoman get in the way of her social life, but it’s tough when your hours are extremely unpredictable and you can’t share any details of your day.

So she can’t tell her friends about the guy that keeps showing up on her missions. Will. He’s cute – really cute – and he’s desperate to speak to her.

Maisie is sure Will works for the competition, but they’re going to have to put aside their professional rivalry when it becomes clear a dangerous conspiracy threatens them both.

Maisie always gets her man, but has she finally met her match?

Available in audio, ebook and paperback.

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