We tried to watch the movie, but I couldn’t concentrate. Something didn’t feel right. Oliver never disappeared without telling me where he was going, and he always responded to my messages. After thirty minutes, he still hadn’t replied, but my phone told me that the message had been read at his end.

“Okay,” Maisie said, pausing the film. “You’re obviously worried about him. You always bite your nails when you’re nervous.”

I took my nails out of my mouth. It was a nasty habit. “It’s not like him to disappear.”

“He’s probably just hanging out with the team,” Shaun said. “They had a training session earlier today. I reckon they’re spending a few extra hours going over tactics.”

“But he would have let us know where he was,” I said. “Okay, I’m going to do something very bad, but I’m only doing it because it’s an emergency. Never tell Oliver I did this.”

“Uh, Michelle, you have me a little worried now,” Maisie said, coming over and sitting next to me in the space that had been intended for Oliver. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m going to track his phone and find out where he is,” I replied.

“You bugged him?” Maisie asked. “I never took you for the possessive type.”

“No, it’s not like that. He used my phone to track his one day when he lost it, and I don’t think he wiped it.”

I opened up the app on my phone, and quickly found out how to pinpoint the location of his phone.

“Oh,” I said, looking at the location on the map. “That’s good, I guess. He’s in a bar, by the looks of it.”

“Maybe he forgot about tonight,” Shaun said. “Although he shouldn’t really be drinking anyway, this close to the big game.”

“I doubt he’s drinking,” I said, as I opened up a map app on my phone. “He’s in an American bar. There’s no way he’d drink any of the beer in there.”

“An American bar?” Maisie asked, then glanced over at Shaun. The two of them shared a knowing look, and I thought I detected a note of concern on their faces. “Which American bar?”

I showed Maisie and Shaun the map, and they looked at each other again. “What is it?” I asked. “You know the bar?”

“Sort of,” Maisie replied. “Don’t be mad, but Shaun and I were going to head down there the other day to watch a game of football.”

“I figured I should learn the rules if I’m going to move there,” Shaun said.

“You’re allowed to be in pubs under eighteen,” Maisie said. “You just can’t order alcohol, which obviously we weren’t going to do.”

“Good,” I replied. “So what’s it like down there?”

“That’s the weird thing,” Maisie said. “When we were on our way out, we bumped into Oliver and he told us not to go to the bar. He said very clearly that we were not to go there.”

“He was a little scary actually,” Shaun said. “I’ve not seen him like that before.”

“So why would he be there now?” Maisie asked.

“I don’t know,” I replied. “But I don’t like it.”

Oliver wasn’t the type to overreact. If he’d told the kids not to go to that bar, then he had good reason. This entire situation felt wrong. Oliver had been in a weird mood for days, and then there had been the big confession about his past which came out-of-the-blue. Was that in some way connected to the bar?

“Maybe we should call the police?” Maisie asked. “He might be in danger.”

“No,” Shaun said quickly. “You can’t trust them. The people who killed my dad had a contact in the police force; no need to guess who it was either.”

“I can call Chief Superintendent Hodgson,” I said. “She’ll know what to do.”

I pulled Hodgson’s card out of my purse, but I didn’t dial the number. I stared at the card trying to extract a thought that was niggling away at the back of my brain.

What was it that troubled me? Obviously I was worried for Oliver’s safety, but there was something else.

I kept remembering snippets of conversations I’d had with Hodgson, and I knew there was something I should have spotted. Was she trying to tell me something?

I spotted you easily enough on my way to the bathroom.  

“Why an American bar?” I asked aloud.

“Winston’s American,” Shaun said. “He was born there. That just makes me even more certain that he’s involved and that this is something dangerous.”

“Maybe,” I said uncertainly. “That would be a bit obvious though, wouldn’t it?”

What’s this bloody thing on your head? You’re not a Chargers fan are you?

I wanted someone to hit me on the back of the head just to see if the thought would make its way to the surface, but I had to remain vaguely calm in front of Shaun and Maisie. They wouldn’t want to see me completely lose it.

I dialed the number, but only got her voice mail. When I heard the beep, I opened my mouth to leave a message, but then stopped and hung up, dropping the phone into my lap as a wave of nausea came over me.

Ah, lager and Sprite. Now there’s a refreshing drink.

“Are you alright, sis?”

I massaged my temples with my fingers. Maybe if I rubbed hard enough the pieces would come together.

“Be right back,” Shaun said, standing up. “Just nipping to the toilet.”

Just as Shaun walked out of the room, Maisie yelled out “bathroom. You’ll have to get used to calling it that once we move to the US.”

Finally, it hit me. I had the full picture in my head.

Some men matching the description you gave showed up on CCTV a few hundred yards down the road.

“Oliver’s wrong,” I said softly, barely able to speak the words. “He’s wrong. So wrong.”

“Wrong about what?” Maisie asked. “You have me a little scared right now.”

I quickly picked up my phone and dialed the main number for the police station which was also listed on Hodgson’s card.

I know you both must still have the scars from that night, but they have it worse.

We might be too late, but I had to try. Oliver was walking into a trap; one he might never walk out of.

“Hello, this is the West London Police Station,” a man’s voice answered. “How can I help?”

Please don’t be too late. “I need to speak to Superintendent Winston,” I said calmly. “Tell him it’s Michelle Portman. Hurry, please, it’s an emergency.”

A stealth approach seemed like the logical thing to do, although with my six foot five-inch frame and above average build, I looked more like a drunk staggering around than someone trying to be stealthy.

A few people inside the pub gave me a curious stare as I walked past the window, but you saw all sorts walking around London at night, so no one thought too much of it.

I pulled out my phone to triple-check that I was recording everything, but in doing so the bright screen illuminated me and everything else down the dark alley. As far as being a spy went, I was less James Bond and more Johnny English.

My hand instinctively reached out and felt the knife in my jacket pocket. I should be able to take it out quickly if need be. One hand would grab hold of the sheath through the jacket, while the other hand would take hold of the handle and pull. It had worked in front of the mirror at home, but back then my hands hadn’t been sweaty, and my heart hadn’t been pounding in my chest.

I made it to the pub’s back entrance without being spotted. The door was slightly ajar, so I took a peek through, but could only see a table and some empty chairs. The fat stacks of cash on the table made it fairly obvious that either this pub was doing a heck of a lot of business, or there was something dodgy going down.

The room was brightly lit, so the second I walked inside, all hope of taking them by surprise would disappear in an instant.

I had a good idea of what to expect in there, but that wouldn’t be much good if I walked in having literally brought a knife to a gunfight. Not to mention, a copper would know all sorts of ways to commit crimes and get away with it, whereas I’d never used a weapon before. This didn’t bode well.