Manda, I realised quickly, had no doubts that Parker might be bluffing.

The combination of that and the shock of a smack in the mouth brought the words tumbling out of her. I wasn’t especially proud of what we’d just done, but it was certainly effective in the time we had available.

She told us how she’d met Hunt the previous spring and been both frustrated and intrigued by the fact that he seemed so unimpressed by her wealth.

Listening to her, it was painfully obvious that Hunt had played her like a cheap violin. He was a charmer, as all good conmen are, and he’d used Manda to carefully insinuate himself into the social circle in which she moved.

The fact that he’d specifically asked her to introduce him to Orlando, rather than presenting himself as being involved with Manda, had been a masterly touch. It allowed him to influence the other girl, while Manda got her claws into Benedict. And the hands-off approach had kept Manda well and truly hooked in a way he couldn’t have done if they’d been having an open relationship.

‘After Benedict’s kidnapping didn’t go according to plan – when his parents nearly refused to pay – Hunt said it would be better if he was the one who made contact with Lennon and Ross,’ she explained, her voice a mumble, staring at her clenched hands. ‘He said it would keep us one step removed from any of it.’

‘But?’ I said, hearing the hesitation in her voice.

‘He wanted to take things a lot further. Actively look for other people – people with money – who wanted to be kidnapped for the thrill of it, too. Make a business out of it, almost.’

‘And you went along with that?’ Parker left me to ask the questions, while he hovered in the background, projecting just the right level of intimidation.

‘He made it sound like … fun,’ she admitted. ‘Like a game, where everybody wins and nobody gets hurt.’

‘And where did Torquil fit into that theory?’

She coloured at that. It was nice to see even someone as amoral as Manda was not immune to shame.

‘That was … different,’ she said, stumbling over the words. ‘Tor found out what we were doing and was threatening to expose us – all of us – unless we let him join in. But he wanted it all to be perfect, like a movie or something. He was so furious when the snatch on Dina went all wrong. He said it was pathetic, that he’d give us all away.’

I remembered Torquil’s expression as he’d watched the two men I now knew to be Lennon and Ross escaping from the botched attempt at the riding club. His anger and disappointment now seemed understandable. At the time I’d worried it was because he might be behind the kidnaps, not that he was waiting impatiently for his turn.

‘So he was killed to keep him quiet.’

‘Yes. No!’ Manda said, head hanging. ‘Look, they don’t tell me the details. As far as I know, all that was supposed to happen was Tor was to be kidnapped and held for a couple days for a decent ransom – he talked about making his parents pay with something that would hurt them. I guess now he was talking about the Eisenberg Rainbow.’

‘So, where is it?’

She looked disbelieving. ‘Why the hell would you want it? It’s a fake.’

‘Ah, so you haven’t quite severed all ties with the kidnappers, have you, Manda?’ I said. ‘How else could you know about that?’

She flushed. ‘Hunt told me,’ she said in a low voice. ‘He said that Lennon was furious, and who knew what he might do to get even.’

‘And you believed that?’ I demanded. ‘Did Hunt also tell you that Torquil was dead before I ever left the Eisenbergs’ place with the necklace? That they’d no intention of letting him go, regardless of whether the jewels were real or not?’

‘No,’ she murmured, shaking her head. ‘No, that can’t be right. Hunt said that if we went ahead and kidnapped Tor, like he wanted, he wouldn’t be able to do anything against us, because then he’d be a part of it. But I never thought for a second that they’d kill him. You have to believe me …’

 

‘Would you have done it?’ I asked twenty minutes later, as Parker pulled the Navigator out from the kerb. His eyes switched from the rear-view mirror across to mine, with a flicker that could have signified just about anything.

‘Would you?’ he countered dryly.

I smiled. ‘It might have been a difficult one to explain away in court as justifiable force.’

He nodded, as if that was his answer, also. ‘The trick is not what you’re prepared to do, Charlie. It’s what they believe you’re prepared to do.’

‘I know.’

But Sean would have done it, I realised, for real, without hesitation. Maybe that was the difference between them.

Stop making comparisons!

‘The important thing is, did you believe her?’ Parker asked now, as if reading my thoughts.

I twisted slightly in my seat, watching him drive through the lightening streets, heading east for the Queensboro Bridge.

There had always been an easy competence about Parker, but where previously he’d seemed relaxed and confident, now he showed an uncertainty around me that I didn’t like. That kiss had changed things, not necessarily for the better, but there was no calling it back, I realised. Sooner or later, we’d have to deal with it and move on.

‘Some of it,’ I replied. ‘I think the bit about her becoming a little obsessed with Hunt is true. It made her angry to be under his thrall like that. From what I know of Manda, she hates having to admit to any kind of weakness.’

‘Particularly to you,’ Parker judged. ‘You must have left quite a lasting impression on her.’

‘Well, I stopped her from killing her father,’ I said. ‘That would tend to stick in anyone’s mind.’ I shook my head sadly. ‘They should have got some serious help for her back then. Who knows how differently she might have turned out?’

‘Some people just don’t want to be helped.’

Parker’s cellphone buzzed and he slotted his Bluetooth headset in place before he took the call. I realised he’d been waiting for it, hence taking the bridge rather than the Queens-Midtown Tunnel, where the signal would have been non-existent.

‘Bill,’ he said shortly. ‘Go ahead.’

He seemed to spend the next few miles listening more than talking, his face growing darker all the while. When he finally ended the call, he took the headset off and chucked it onto the dash in frustration.

I raised an eyebrow. ‘I’m assuming that wasn’t good news.’

‘Bill can’t find anything on Trevanion,’ he said. ‘And I mean anything. Fake name, fake addresses, fake references. No record of him with Immigration. Zip. Looks like he’d created a legend for himself that would stand up to initial scrutiny, but as soon as we dug down a layer, it all collapsed.’

‘Shit.’

‘Yeah, that’s about the size of it,’ he agreed with a little sideways glance. ‘That’s not all. This guy’s good – good enough to hack into a secure comms network and traffic light control programs. Bill said by digging around he’s triggered some kind of alert in the system.’

‘Shit,’ I said again, with a touch more feeling this time. ‘So he knows we’re onto him.’

He might kill Dina and run, just to cut his losses …

‘There’s ten million at stake,’ Parker said tightly. ‘He won’t cut and run now. This is what he’s been working toward.’

I wished I shared his confidence.

We headed east out of the city, against the traffic and into a fresh sun rising weakly from the ocean as if waterlogged by last night’s storm.

Dina had now been kidnapped for forty-four hours.

The deadline was ten hours away.

I cursed again the chance meeting that had caused me to open up to Hunt. ‘But how did he know where to find me?’ I wondered aloud into the quiet interior of the vehicle, and caught the twitch of Parker’s head in my direction. ‘The more I think about it, the more I can’t believe it was coincidence, him just happening to turn up as I was leaving Orlando’s parents’.’

‘You think he might have slipped a tracker on you?’

‘It wouldn’t be the first time,’ I said. ‘Mind you, he didn’t have to bother doing that with Torquil’s ransom, did he? Gleason had two trackers on me then – one on me and one on the money. If Hunt’s so clever he can interfere with traffic lights, I’m sure he could have hacked into the GPS system and followed me that way.’

Parker’s face was grave. ‘All the company vehicles have on-board trackers in case of theft,’ he said. ‘If he’s activated this one, he knows exactly where you’ve been over the past twenty-four hours, and who you’ve talked to.’

‘There’s one person I didn’t meet at a known location,’ I said. ‘One person Hunt couldn’t know for certain I’ve been in contact with.’ Parker merely raised an eyebrow in my direction. ‘Ross. At least, I bloody well hope he doesn’t know – for all our sakes.’