style getting in the way of doing the job. The salaries she’d been offered by companies had gradually diminished as she bounced from one hedge fund or financial institution to the next. As she’d become more and more embedded in London’s high-society party scene, it was very likely that Sophie’s expenditure had been outstripping her income. She wouldn’t be the first smart girl to turn escort in the Big Smoke. She wouldn’t be the first to get greedy, either, and find ways to exploit the men who paid thousands for a night with her—and would pay anything to keep that secret.
The humanist in Knight wished it wasn’t that way, but the evidence was stacking up against the young girl. The CCTV footage had revealed Sophie leaving the Mistral hotel at eight every time she stayed. Sir Tony always left thirty minutes later. With some old-fashioned investigative backhanders to the hotel staff, Knight had discovered that there was nothing organized in the Mistral that would account for these regular timings—no backroom parties, poker games or secret clubs.
Knight rubbed at his face. He was tired. Tired physically, and tired of seeing good people turn bad. He was the rare kind of person with a clean soul, and the dishonesty that he witnessed on a daily basis weighed on him heavily. The only thing that could possibly weigh on him more would be doing nothing about it.
He would crack this case.
“You’re not gonna jump, are you?” The familiar voice came from behind him.
“Depends on what you’re here to tell me,” Knight replied. Hooligan walked over to him from the rooftop’s fire escape. “Did you finish the search of Sir Tony’s emails?” Knight had ordered the tech expert to comb through the data once Eliza Lightwood had given her permission.
The redhead smiled. “I have.”
“And?”
“Hold on to something, mate, because this one’s gonna blow your socks off.”
Chapter 27
JACK MORGAN WAS at the kitchen table with Lewis, looking over potential sites to lure out and trap his would-be assassins, when Peter Knight’s call came in. The American stepped outside to take it.
Across the room, Jane Cook looked up from her laptop, her eyes following Morgan’s every step until he was out of sight.
Sharon Lewis snorted.
Cook, frustrated by the case, couldn’t ignore it. “What’s your problem?”
“Women like you. You lot make it more difficult for those of us who aren’t willing to sleep our way around the office to further our career.”
Cook couldn’t care less about Lewis’s opinion, but the respect of her colleagues at Private mattered to her, and Lewis had touched a nerve, giving voice to what she feared others were thinking.
To avoid those thoughts she turned her attention back to the laptop in front of her, continuing her trawl through Sophie Edwards’ social media. In particular, her Facebook photo albums. Most of the photos were of hedonistic parties where Sophie seemed to be the life and soul. Men came and went, but none appeared regularly enough to suggest a boyfriend. It all painted a picture of a party life that rarely left London.
With one exception.
Between the photos of popping champagne bottles and rooftop bars, one location continued to show up throughout the years since Sophie had left Brecon—a beautiful waterfall surrounded by forest. Sophie was posed in front of the cascading white water in several pictures, each one chronicling the effect that drugs and alcohol were taking on her body, her ageing accelerated by her damaging lifestyle.
“She went downhill fast,” Lewis commented, looking over Cook’s shoulder.
“Do you know this location?” Cook asked, pointing to the waterfall. “It could be somewhere around here that she knew from her childhood.”
Lewis shook her head. “I don’t. But print me a copy and I’ll pass it around the team. A lot of the guys are into distance running and mountain bikes. Maybe they know it. If not, we can ask the farmers. You expect to find her there?”
Cook shook her head. “I doubt she’s gone missing because of a hiking accident, but what else do we have? If it’s close, it’s worth investigating.”
“You’re right. I’ll go get the printouts from the office.”
Lewis had only been gone a moment when Morgan re-entered the room. Cook was about to tell him of her small lead, but something on the American’s face told her that he had bigger news.
She wasn’t wrong.
“Peter and Hooligan found the origin of the blackmail note: Eliza Lightwood’s penthouse.”
Chapter 28
PETER KNIGHT NEEDED to clear his thoughts. His mind was in the trees, and he needed to pull back to see the forest. If there was one thing that helped him see clearly, it was the faces of his children.
Knight’s ten-year-old daughter accepted his video call. As always, the joy of seeing her was mixed with a pang of sadness and loss—she looked so like her mother.