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It was really starting to rile her that despite each deep-seated fault she located, she still fancied him. Maybe it was a case of any port in a storm. She hated the idea that she couldn't live her life perfectly adequately without a bloke in tow, but it was begi

'Anything good on the box?' he asked her.

'A documentary about how men are becoming women.' He looked at her, trying to work out whether she was lying. 'It's true,' she insisted. 'All that oestrogen in the tap water. You lot gulp it down and then start growing breasts.'

He concentrated for a moment. 'How does oestrogen get into the tap water?'

'Do I have to spell it out?' She mimed the action of flushing a toilet. 'Then there's all the additives in meat. It's changing your chemical balance.'

'I don't want my chemical balance changed.'

She had to laugh at that. 'Might explain something, though,' she teased him.

'What?'

'Why you've started fancying Derek Starr.' He scowled, and she laughed again. 'Way you were watching him give that speech… Might've been Russell Crowe in Gladiator or Mel Gibson in Braveheart.'

'I saw Braveheart in the cinema,' Tibbet told her. 'The audience were on their feet, cheering and punching the air. Never seen anything like it.'

'That's because Scots don't often get to feel good about themselves.'

Tou think we need independence?'

'Maybe,' she conceded. 'Just so long as people like First Alba

'What was their profit last year?'

'Eight billion, something like that.'

Tou mean eight million?'

'Eight billion,' she repeated.

'That can't be right.'

You calling me a liar?' She was wondering how he'd managed to turn the conversation around without her noticing.

'Makes you wonder, doesn't it?' he asked now.

'Wonder what?'

'Where the real power is.' He took his eyes off the road long enough to glance at her. 'Want to do something later?'

'With you, you mean?'

He offered a shrug. 'Christmas fair opens tonight. We could go take a look.'

'We could.'

'And a bite of supper after.'

'I'll think about it.'

They were signalling to turn in at the gates of First Alba

'Parking bay six-oh-eight,' he told them. And though there were plenty of spaces closer to their destination, Hawes watched her colleague head obediently towards 608.

'Don't worry,' she told him as he pulled on the handbrake, 'I can walk from here.'

And walk they did, passing serried ranks of sports cars, family saloons and 4x4s. The grounds were still being landscaped, and just behind one corner of the main complex could be glimpsed gorse bushes and one of the golf course's fairways. When the doors slid open, they were in a triple-height atrium. There was an arcade of shops behind the reception desk: pharmacy, supermarket, cafe, newsagent. A noticeboard provided information about the creche, gym and swimming pool. Escalators led to the next level up, with glass-fronted lifts serving the floors above that. The receptionist beamed a smile at them.

'Welcome to FAB,' she said. 'If you'll just sign in and show me some photo ID…'

They did so, and she a

'Third floor. She'll meet you at the lift.' They were handed laminated passes and another smile. A security guard processed them through a metal-detector, after which they scooped up keys, phones and loose change.

'Expecting trouble?' Hawes asked the man.

'Code green,' he intoned solemnly.

'A relief to us all.'

The lift took them to the third floor, where a young woman in a black trousersuit was waiting. The A4-sized manila envelope was held out in front of her. As Hawes took it, the woman nodded once, then turned and marched back down a seemingly endless corridor.

Tibbet hadn't even had a chance to exit the lift, and as Hawes stepped back into it the doors slid shut and they were on their way back down again. No more than three minutes after entering the building, they were out in the cold and wondering what had just happened.

'That's not a building,' Hawes stated. 'It's a machine.'

Tibbet signalled his agreement by whistling through his teeth, then sca

'Which bay are we in again?'

'The one at the end of the universe,' Hawes told him, starting to cross the tarmac.

Back in the passenger seat, she pulled open the envelope and xbrought out a dozen sheets: photocopied bank statements. There Was a yellow Post-it stuck to the front. The handwritten message speculated that Todorov had funds elsewhere, as indicated by the client when he opened his account. There was a single transfer involving a bank in Moscow. The note was signed 'Stuart Ja

'He was comfortable enough,' Hawes a

'Whoever took his cash card, they don't seem to be using it.'

'They could have cleaned him out,' Tibbet acknowledged. 'Twenty four K… so much for the starving artist.'

'Garrets mustn't be as fashionable these days,' Hawes agreed.

She was punching a number into her phone. Clarke picked up and Hawes relayed the highlights to her. 'Took out a hundred the day he was killed.'

'Where from?'

'Machine at Waverley Station.' Hawes frowned suddenly. 'Why did he leave Edinburgh from one station but come back to the other?'

'He was meeting Charles Riordan. I think Riordan frequented some curry house nearby.'

'Can't really check with him, though, can we?'

'Not really,' Clarke admitted. Hawes could hear voices in the background; all the same, it sounded a lot calmer than Gayfield Square.

'Where are you, Shiv?' she asked.

'City Chambers, asking about CCTV.'

'How long till you're back at base?'

'An hour maybe.'

'You sound inconsolable. Any word from our favourite DI?'

'Assuming you mean Rebus rather than Starr, the answer's no.'

'Tell her,' Tibbet said, 'about the bank.'

'Colin says to tell you we enjoyed our visit to First Alba

'Plush, was it?'

'I've stayed at worse resorts; they had everything in there but flumes.'

'Did you see Stuart Ja

'He was in a meeting. To tell the truth, it was a real production line number. In and out and thank you very much.'

'They've got shareholders to protect. When your profits are hitting ten billion, you don't want any bad publicity.'

Hawes turned to Colin Tibbet. 'Siobhan,' she told him, 'says the profit last year was ten billion.'

'Give or take,' Clarke added.

'Give or take,' Hawes repeated for Tibbet's benefit.

'Makes you wonder,' Tibbet repeated quietly, with a slow shake of the head.

Hawes stared at him. Kissable lips, she was thinking. Younger than her and less experienced. There was material there she could work with, maybe starting tonight.

'Talk to you later,' she told Clarke, ending the call.