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‘What do you think Detective Cunningham meant when she said she wasn’t walking away from the biggest payday she was ever going to have?’ Draper said. ‘Or when she asked Mr Koenig if he’d still have a smart mouth when her guy was peeling his skin off?’

Lieutenant Glenister, Detective Wagstaff and Detective Mallinson had watched the video in silence. It had lasted twelve minutes and none of it was open to interpretation.

When Glenister didn’t answer, the grey man said, ‘This video was taken under the umbrella of the Patriot Act. There was no entrapment. It’s legal, and copies have already been lodged with the FBI and the US attorney for the Southern District of New York. The East Coast Sweeney exists, and your guys were caught red-handed.’

‘What the hell did he say when you turned off the cameras?’ Glenister asked Wagstaff and Mallinson. He seemed to have aged in the last ten minutes.

‘Nothing that contradicts that video,’ Mallinson said. ‘He said there’s a Russian bounty on his head, and it does sound like those douchebags were trying to claim it.’

‘I’m aware things are moving extremely fast, Lieutenant Glenister,’ the grey man said. ‘I’ve arranged for the attorney general to call you in fifteen minutes. She’ll answer any questions you have. She’ll tell you how to proceed. But for the avoidance of doubt, we’re leaving right now, and Mr Koenig is coming with us. Please unfasten his handcuffs and return his possessions. If you don’t do as I ask, the FBI will arrest you.’

Koenig’s hands were stinging with pins and needles. He rubbed them together to get the blood running again. His possessions had been returned, even his sharpened credit card. After checking his Fairbairn–Sykes fighting knife was still there – the only possession he had any emotional attachment to – he followed Draper and the grey man into the precinct parking lot.

‘My photograph isn’t supposed to be on any database,’ Koenig said. ‘How the hell did the NYPD find me via facial recognition?’

‘We dropped the ball,’ the grey man admitted. ‘The woman who monitors everything has gone on maternity leave. Something must have got missed in the handover.’

‘I killed someone today,’ Koenig said. ‘I put someone else in a coma. I scarred Cunningham for life. None of that needed to happen.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Part of the team assigned to your case. I was here to make sure you didn’t spend any longer in custody than you needed to.’

‘Bullshit,’ Koenig said. ‘Jen has the biggest pair of balls in any room she’s in. She doesn’t need help, not when she has video evidence as damning as that. I’ll ask again: who are you?’

The grey man looked around the precinct parking lot. A few cops were milling around, sharing a smoke before they either went on shift or went home. They were staring at them with suspicion. ‘Not here,’ he replied.

‘Our car will be here soon,’ Draper said. ‘We’ll explain everything then.’ She took a moment. ‘That was a stroke of luck annoying Detective Cunningham so much she incriminated herself in front of the computer. It was almost as if you knew you were being recorded.’

Koenig shrugged. ‘You’ve heard the fable of the scorpion and frog?’

‘The one where the scorpion promises not to sting the frog if it carries him across the river? The scorpion says if he did, the frog would die, but he’d drown. The frog agrees. Halfway across, the scorpion stings the frog anyway. He couldn’t change his nature.’ She took a silent moment. ‘I guess in this story I’m the scorpion?’

‘Once a spook, always a spook. You lie by default.’

‘That’s enough,’ the grey man said. He held up his hand. A car drove towards them. It was big and black and looked like the Beast, the armoured Cadillac the president was transported in. The car pulled up beside them. The driver got out and took up a defensive position.

‘Ooh, scary,’ Koenig said.

‘Inside, please,’ the grey man said.

Koenig did as he was asked. The interior of the car smelled fresh and clean. Much more pleasant than the interview room. There were two bench seats. One forwards-facing, the other rear-facing. Like a diner booth. Koenig chose to face forwards. The grey man sat opposite him. There was a minifridge in the centre console. Koenig opened a bottle of sparkling mineral water and took a swig. Draper tried to get in beside him, but the grey man stopped her. ‘Sorry, Miss Draper, you don’t have the clearance for this.’

Draper didn’t seem to mind. Koenig imagined that in the intelligence game, you got used to being excluded from things that didn’t concern you. That sometimes it wasn’t your turn on the merry-go-round.

‘What’s this about?’ Koenig said. ‘Jen has higher clearance than me. And I know this because I don’t have any.’

The grey man turned to Koenig. He said, ‘I need you to tell me everything you know about the Acacia Avenue Protocol.’