'So Billy can record what's on TV the night we're away, ideally a live sporting event. You can watch it as soon as you get back. The one worry is the Almighty.' Shepherd gestured at the metal satellite phone case by the door. 'If it rings, we've got one h.e.l.l of a problem. There's only half a dozen people who have that number and they all know the boss personally. There'll be h.e.l.l to pay if it rings and isn't answered.'

The Major raised a hand. 'The chances of it ringing are slim at best,' he said. 'If the s.h.i.t is going to hit the fan, I usually have wind that it's coming.'

'And if there's even a chance of something brewing that requires the Increment, we call this off,' said Shepherd. 'But there's always the possibility that something might kick off while we're over the water. If it does ring, Billy's going to have to call the boss immediately, on a throwaway mobile. The boss can then call back and claim that the sat phone is kaput.'

'They'll buy that?' asked Billy.

'If you call us in, then everything gets put on hold and we come straight back,' said Shepherd. 'If nothing happens, there'll be nothing to investigate. The worst possible scenario would be that we do what we have to do over there and then the Almighty rings. But the chances of that are so slim that we might as well all be buying lottery tickets.'

Shepherd hefted his backpack onto the coffee-table and unzipped it. 'I've got new Nokias for us all and put pay-as-you-go Sim cards in, each with fifty quid's worth of credit. I've pre-programmed with our numbers and used One to Five instead of our names.' He began handing the boxes out. 'So, One is the boss, I'm Two, Jack's Three, Billy's Four and Martin's Five. As soon as it's all done, destroy the Sim cards and the phones. Sim cards to be snapped, singed and flushed, the phones to be crushed. Any questions?'

'Why's he Three?' asked Billy, nodding at his brother. 'Why's he Three and I'm Four?'

Shepherd frowned. 'What?'

Billy grinned. 'Joke,' he said. 'Trying to lighten the moment.'

'Just don't screw up on the day,' said Shepherd. 'If the s.h.i.t hits the fan down the line, the boss's alibi has to be watertight. The first thing they do is check his phone records so you have to make those calls and you have to make sure that the neighbours don't see you. As soon as we get back to Hereford, Jack can drive the boss to London. I'll follow first thing in the morning.'

'I wish you'd rethink the number of bodies,' said Jack. 'They're hard as nails, those Newry boys.'

Shepherd chuckled. 'We're no pushovers ourselves, Jack.'

Victor Mironescu flicked through the channels on his ma.s.sive LCD TV but couldn't find anything to watch. On the roof of his detached house in St John's Wood he had a satellite dish the size of a small car and had access to more than a thousand channels but there was rarely anything that held his attention. He tossed the remote to the blonde girl who was sitting on the black leather sofa. 'Watch what you want,' he said. 'I'm going to shower.' The girl was sixteen and had just arrived from Romania. She was gorgeous with waist-length blonde hair and big blue eyes, and Mironescu was breaking her in before setting her to work for one of his escort agencies. Sarah had been trafficked into the country, but she had come willingly and knew exactly what she would be expected to do. She had arrived as a virgin, and Mironescu had been the first man to enter her. Over the next twelve months she would be entered by a thousand men, give or take, but first she had to be taught how to handle her customers. The first night in the house she'd had a list of things that she wouldn't do. She wouldn't do a.n.a.l, she wouldn't do oral without a condom, she wouldn't swallow. It had taken half a bottle of vodka, a few slaps and a lit cigarette applied to her thigh but now she did everything that was asked of her.

The doorbell rang and the girl got up, but Mironescu waved her back. 'I'll get it,' he said. He walked down the hallway and opened the front door. Two men stood there, both holding up small black wallets.

'Police, Mr Mironescu,' said the man on the right.

Mironescu leaned forward and peered at the card he was holding. He was wearing a bright yellow fluorescent jacket over his uniform. 'What do you want?'

The two men put their warrant cards away. A third uniformed officer was standing behind them, a large black man with muscular forearms.

'We need to talk to you,' said the policeman in the fluorescent jacket. 'We can do it here or we can arrest you and take you to the station.'

'Arrest me for what?' sneered the Romanian.

The policeman pushed past him and walked along the hallway. 'You can't come in without a warrant,' said Mironescu. 'I know my rights.'

'You don't have any rights,' said the officer on the doorstep. He shoved Mironescu in the chest and the Romanian staggered back into the hall. 'That's a.s.sault!' he shouted.

The policeman kicked Mironescu between the legs, hard. The Romanian howled and bent double as pain seared his groin.

'No,' said the policeman. 'That's a.s.sault.' He grabbed Mironescu by the scruff of the neck and dragged him into the sitting room while his colleague closed the front door.

The girl got off the sofa, her hands covering her face. 'It's all right, darling, we're the police,' said Fluorescent Jacket. He gestured at Mironescu. 'Do you work for him?'

The girl nodded fearfully.

'Not any more you don't.' He jerked a thumb at the policeman in the doorway. 'He'll take you to a place of safety.'

'I don't want to go. I want to stay here.'

'How old are you, darling?'

'Nineteen,' she said.

He clicked his fingers at her. 'Pa.s.sport.'

'It's upstairs.'

Fluorescent Jacket gestured at the policeman in the doorway again. 'He's going to go with you to get it, so you'd better tell me the truth. How old are you?'

'Sixteen,' said the girl, in tears now.

'And where are your parents?'

She sniffed. 'Romania. But they know I am here.'

'You're not staying with this sc.u.mbag,' said Fluorescent Jacket. 'Go upstairs, pack your bag, and that officer'll take you to a safe place where there are people who can help you.'

The girl went upstairs with the policeman. Fluorescent Jacket pointed at the sofa. 'Sit down, Victor.'

'He a.s.saulted me,' said Mironescu. 'He kicked me.'

'Don't be a baby, Victor. Sit the f.u.c.k down.'

'I want to see your warrant,' said Mironescu, still bent over and holding his groin. 'You can't come into my house without a warrant.'

The policeman seized him by the collar of his shirt and threw him onto the sofa. 'Do as you're b.l.o.o.d.y well told,' he said.

Mironescu glared at him but he stayed on the sofa, ma.s.saging his aching groin with both hands.

'What is it with you Romanians?' asked Fluorescent Jacket, lighting a cigarette.

'What do you mean?' said Mironescu.

'All we ever get over here are the bad ones,' said the policeman. He took a long drag at his cigarette and blew smoke at Mironescu. 'We get the pickpockets, the gypsy beggars, the hookers, and that's about it. Why do we never hear about Romanian doctors or Romanian engineers or even Romanian c.o.c.kle pickers?'

Mironescu grimaced. 'I don't understand.'

'What I'm saying, Victor, is it seems that we only ever get Romanian pond sc.u.m. It can't be that your whole country is pond sc.u.m, can it?'

'Why are you here?' asked Mironescu. 'What do you want?'

Fluorescent Jacket's mobile phone rang and he answered it. He listened and then walked to the far side of the room so that the Romanian couldn't hear what he was saying. As he was talking on the phone, the girl and the policeman came back downstairs and went out of the front door.

'You brought her in, did you, Victor? Told her she was going to work as a waitress in a nice little restaurant and then you let guys pay to bang her?'

'She knows what she's doing,' said the Romanian. 'Came into it with her eyes open.'

'Legs open, you mean,' said the policeman. 'Got a lot of sixteen-year-olds, have you, Victor?' The Romanian didn't reply. 'You've got what? Three Internet escort agencies? Each with thirty girls? Maybe more? Let's call it a round one hundred, shall we? And how often do they work in a day? Three times? Four?'

Mironescu shrugged. He worked his girls hard and complained if they didn't see at least five customers a day. If they did less than four they were doing something wrong and earned a beating. Nothing too severe, of course. Nothing that would mark the merchandise. But he had no intention of telling the cops how much his girls earned.

Fluorescent Jacket blew smoke up at the ceiling. 'Let's say three times a day. And they charge a hundred and fifty pounds an hour, don't they?'

Mironescu didn't answer. A hundred and fifty pounds was the cheapest price. The prettiest, youngest girls could earn much more.

'So, each girl earns four hundred and fifty pounds a day. You keep half? A third? Let's be generous and say you only take a third. That's fifteen grand a day.' He nodded enthusiastically. 'That's b.l.o.o.d.y good money, Victor. Fifteen grand a day that's more than a hundred grand a week.' He looked around the expensively decorated room. 'Pays for this, I suppose.'

Before he could say anything else the doorbell rang. The policeman went to open it. He returned a few seconds later with two more men in dark coats. With them was a figure that Mironescu recognised immediately: his friend and business partner Lucian Popescu. Popescu's right cheek was red and his eye was puffy. He was a strong man with a weightlifter's forearms but he stood meekly between the two men in dark coats.

'You know Poppy, of course.' He grinned. 'I guess you prefer Poppy to Lucy, right?'

'My name is Lucian,' said Popescu.

'Sit down next to your partner in crime,' said Fluorescent Jacket. He stubbed out the remains of his cigarette in an ashtray and pocketed the b.u.t.t.

'What is this?' asked Popescu. 'What is this about? What do you want?'

Fluorescent Jacket stepped forward. As he did so he removed a small Taser from his pocket, placed it against Popescu's neck and pulled the trigger. The two p.r.o.ngs sparked against the man's skin and his body went into a spasm. He collapsed onto the sofa. Mironescu shuffled away from him, his eyes wide with fright. 'What are you doing?' he shouted. 'What the f.u.c.k are you doing?'

Fluorescent Jacket put a finger against his lips. 'Sssh,' he said. 'Or I'll give you some of the same, Mironescu.' He frowned. 'What is it with that -escu on the end of Romanian names? They almost all have it, don't they?'

'What?' said Mironescu. 'What are you talking about? I don't understand.'

'Your names, they all end in -escu, don't they? It must mean something, right?'

'It means "from the family of" it means that's who you belong to,' said Mironescu.

'So you're from the family of Miron,' said the policeman. 'And Poppy's from the family of Pop?' He laughed. 'I like that, the family of Pop. Pop goes the f.u.c.king weasel.'

Popescu was starting to recover from the 50,000-volt jolt. He was looking around, still dazed.

'So, Poppy, Victor and I were just discussing all the money that you boys have been making from prost.i.tution. Fifteen grand a day, we reckon.'

'You want money?' asked Mironescu. 'This is a shakedown, is it?'

'Where do you keep it, Victor?'

Mironescu folded his arms. 'How much do you want? How much will it cost me to get you out of here?'

'Be nice, Victor, or you'll get a taste of what Poppy there got. Where's the money?'

'f.u.c.k you!'

Fluorescent Jacket looked over Mironescu's shoulder, but before the Romanian could turn the man behind him had pressed the p.r.o.ngs of a Taser against his neck and pulled the trigger. The pain was incredible but Mironescu couldn't scream as every muscle in his body had gone into spasm. He couldn't scream, he couldn't breathe, he couldn't move, he just convulsed until the Taser was taken away.

The policemen watched as Mironescu started to breathe again. Popescu was sitting with hands on his chest as if checking that his heart was still beating.

'You... can't... do... this,' panted Mironescu.

'Yes, we can, Victor. We can, and we will. Now, where do you keep your money?'

The Romanian took several deep breaths. His legs were trembling. 'Not here... we take it... to the bank,' he said.

Fluorescent Jacket nodded at the man standing by Mironescu but the Romanian threw up his hands. 'Okay, okay!' he said. 'In the master bedroom. The cupboard. The walk-in cupboard.'

'Is there a safe?'

Mironescu shook his head.

Fluorescent Jacket looked over Mironescu's shoulder. 'Take him upstairs,' he said. 'Poppy too.'

'I told you, there's no safe,' protested Mironescu.

'Be a good host and show us around, Victor,' said Fluorescent Jacket, waving his Taser. 'Or we'll zap you again.'

Mironescu's arms were seized and they took him out of the sitting room and up the sprawling marble staircase. He nodded at the master bedroom. 'There,' he said.

They took him into the bedroom and sat him down in a green winged armchair. Fluorescent Jacket went over to the walk-in wardrobe and pulled open the doors. At the end there was a floor-to-ceiling mirror and, on either side, rows of suits on hangers. 'Very stylish, Victor,' he said. He took out one of the suits and admired it. 'Hugo Boss, very nice,' he said. 'How much would a suit like this cost?'

'Two grand, maybe.'

The policeman looked at his colleagues. 'Hear that, lads? Two grand for a suit. Are we in the wrong job or what?'

The men laughed. 'That's what my last car cost,' said one.

He put the suit back on the rack. 'I don't see any money here, Victor. You're not lying to me, are you?'

'On the floor,' said Mironescu. 'A black bag.'

The policeman knelt down and moved the suits apart. He smiled when he saw the black Adidas holdall. He pulled it out, took it over to the bed and unzipped it. It was full of banknotes that had been bundled together with elastic bands. They were mainly twenties but several of the bundles contained fifties. 'How much is there, Victor?' he asked.

'Forty thousand pounds, about.'

'Nice,' said the policeman, zipping the bag up.

'You can't take it all,' said Mironescu.

'We can do what we want,' said Fluorescent Jacket. He tossed the holdall to the uniformed policeman.

'You pigs, you're no different to me,' said Victor. 'You steal, you cheat, you lie.'

'We're nothing like you, Victor, as you're about to find out. Take off your clothes.'

'What?'