Curtis was glad for Monday’s beach trip and the outing to some of Sintra’s historical sites the next day. It meant he didn’t have to make something up when his parents asked him what he’d been up to when they called on Wednesday. He could hardly tell them that he, the twins, Autumn and Anna had been busy every night – the twins working up at Wolf HQ and the rest of them checking on Claudia and making plans for their trip to Berlin. His parents would be worried sick and besides, hopefully it would all be over by the weekend and then things could go on as normal.

This past Monday morning, Claudia had woken to find fresh bread and pastries in the kitchen as well as milk in the fridge. Curtis imagined it was unnerving for her to know that someone had been in the flat, presumably while she was asleep. Autumn had hooked up a tiny camera to face the door. They’d all berated themselves for not having thought of it earlier. It was a rookie mistake and one they shouldn’t have made. The men hadn’t returned since, but hopefully they would soon. The success of the plan to rescue Claudia and bait the saboteurs relied on it.

Interestingly, no one in the Spencer party had seemed remotely phased about the idea of Anna and Irene taking the children to Seville. If anything, Ed and Fitz had been overly enthusiastic, though they clearly had no intentions of tagging along. Cordelia hadn’t batted an eyelid and neither had Song, Sidney or Fletcher. Hector and Marisol had already planned to go to Paris for a long weekend and Mim said that she was happy to stay put.

Curtis placed the last of his clothes into the overnight bag. Max had already finished packing and had gone to check on Kensy and Autumn.

They were leaving first thing in the morning in a car Anna had hired for the trip.

Aurelia and Tom had flown to Berlin with the team the day before to start race preparations. James hadn’t told them his plans, letting them assume he had a transport company taking the cars to Germany and that he’d fly out on Friday. Aurelia still had no idea about Claudia, and Curtis knew James was keen to keep it that way. Her job was to win the championship and secure Wolf Racing’s place in history.

Curtis sat his bag down near the door. He’d add the last of his toiletries in the morning. He heard footsteps in the hall and looked up to see Kensy, Autumn and Max coming through the door, which Max closed behind him.

‘Time to send that story to the Beacon,’ Kensy said. ‘Mum said we should do it now.’

Anna had made some discreet enquiries to find out that Peter Petrovska hadn’t yet returned to work. That was good. Anna had been worried that if he was still investigating Zig Buzbee and Wolf Motors, he might not run their story. But the fact that she’d overheard Peter mention to Ed and Fitz that two of his reporters had shown interest in the case was perfect. Anna had said that Peter’s deputy, Madeline, was hungry to make a name for herself too. She’d had several exchanges with the woman in recent months about some stories on the NHS. Madeline would run it for sure.

Curtis pulled out his laptop and opened the lid. He’d already set up a burner email account so that the recipient would have no idea where the story came from, but he’d included enough detail and some photographs to pique their interest.

James had initially been horrified and completely against the idea when Kensy and Max had explained the plan. When they pointed out it was probably the only way to lure his would-be saboteurs to Berlin the man relented. The article would certainly ruin some of the surprise, but the children had promised not to send any full pictures of the Electra to the press. If releasing the information helped catch the culprits, then James agreed they should do whatever was necessary. Curtis thought that if the kidnappers were as keen to destroy Wolf Motors as it seemed, then they would be doing their best to make sure that the launch was a complete disaster. The children just had to make sure they were ready for them.

Curtis opened the file again. Max read it over his shoulder.

‘Looks good to me,’ the boy said.

Curtis nodded. He entered the email addresses of the reporters Anna had overheard Peter saying were on the case.

Kensy reached across and hit send.

‘Let’s just hope this works,’ Autumn said.

‘It has to,’ Max replied with a nod. ‘Or Wolf Motors – and James – will be ruined.’