t took me an hour and a half around Handbrake's backstreet garage to get a new window and stereo cas¬sette. I knew the window had come from a scrap yard, but it would have been bad manners to ask about the origins of the cassette. I wouldn't have been entirely surprised if my own deck had arrived in the bike pannier of one of the young lads who supply Handbrake with spare parts from scrap yards as an alternative to drug-running around Moss Side, but it clearly wasn't my lucky day and I had to settle for a less sophisticated machine. While that might increase the shelf-life of my new driver's door window, it wouldn't improve the quality of my life in Manchester's orbital motorway traffic jams, so I wasn't in the best of moods when I finally staggered through the door of the office just after ten.

I knew at once that something was seriously wrong. Shelley, our office manager, made no comment about my lateness. In all the years I've been working with her, she'd never before missed the opportunity to whip me into line like one of her two teenage kids. I'd once found her son Donovan, a six-foot-three-inch basketball player, engi¬neering student, and occasional rapper with a local band, having to give up a weekend to paint my office because he hadn't come home till four in the morning. After that, I'd always had a good excuse for being late into work. But this morning, she scarcely glanced up from her screen when I walked in. "Bill's in," was all she said.

Worrying. "Already? I thought he only flew in yester¬day afternoon?"

Shelley's lips pursed. "That's right," she said stiffly. "He said to tell you he needs a word," she added, gesturing with her head toward the closed door of my partner's office. Even more worrying. Shelley is Bill's biggest fan. Normally when he returns from one of his foreign security consultancy trips, we all sit around in the outside office and schmooze the morning away over coffee, catching up. Bill's a friendly soul; I'd never known him to hide behind a closed door unless he needed absolute peace and quiet to work out some thorny computer problem.

I tapped on the door but didn't wait for an answer before I opened it and walked in on the sort of scene that would have been more appropriate in the new Dance-house a few doors down Oxford Road. Bill Mortensen, a bearded blond giant of a man, was standing behind his desk, leaning over a small dark woman whose body was curved back under his in an arc that would have had my spine screaming for mercy. One of Bill's bunch-of-bananas hands supported the small of her back, the other her shoulders. Unlike the ballet, however, their lips were welded together. I cleared my throat.

Bill jumped, his mouth leaving the woman's with a nau¬seating smack as he straightened and half-turned, releasing his grip on her. Just as well her arms were wrapped around his neck or she'd have been on the fast track to quadriplegia. "Kate," Bill gasped. His face did a double act, the mouth smiling, the eyes panicking.

"Welcome back, Bill. I wasn't expecting to see you this morning," I said calmly, closing the door behind me and making for my usual perch on the table that runs along one wall.

Bill stuttered something about wanting to see me while the woman disentangled herself from him. She was a good six inches taller than my five feet and three inches. Strike one. Her hair was as dark as Bill's was blond, cut in the sort of spiky urchin cut I'd recently abandoned when even I'd noticed it was getting a bit passe. On her, it looked terrific. Strike two. Her skin was burnished bronze, an impossible dream for those of us with the skin that matches auburn hair. Strike three. I didn't have the faintest idea who Bill's latest companion was, but I hated her already. She grinned and moved toward me, hand stuck out in front of her with all the enthusiasm of an extroverted teenager who hasn't been put down yet. "Kate, it's great to meet you," she announced in an Australian accent that made Crocodile Dundee sound like a BBC news reader. "Bill's told me so much about you, I feel like I know you already." I tentatively put out a hand, which she gripped fervently and pumped up and down. "I just know we're going to be mates," she added, clapping her other hand on my shoulder.

I looked past her at Bill, my eyebrows raised. He moved toward us and the woman released my hand to slip hers into his. "Kate," he finally said. "This is Sheila." His eyes warned me not to laugh.

"Don't tell me, let me guess," I said. "You met in Australia."

Sheila roared with laughter. I could feel her excessive response thrusting me into the role of repressed English¬woman. "God, Kate, he was right about your sense of humor," she said. I forced my lips into what I seemed to remember was a smile. "Hey, Bill, you better tell her the news."

Bill stood chewing his beard for a moment, then said, "Sheila and I are getting married."

To say I was speechless would be like saying Tom Hanks can act a bit. It's not that Bill doesn't like women. He does. Lots of them. He also likes variety. As a serial monogamist, he makes Casanova and Don Juan look like absolute beginners. But he'd always been choosy about who he hung out with. While he preferred his girlfriends good-looking, brains and ambition had always been just as high on his agenda. So while Sheila might appear more of a bimbo than anyone I'd ever seen Bill with, I wasn't about to make a snap judgment on the basis of what I'd witnessed so far. "Congratulations," I managed, without tripping over too many of the syllables.

"Thanks, Kate," Sheila said warmly. "It's big of you to be generous about losing your partner."

I looked at Bill. He looked as if he'd swallowed an ice cube. "I thought that in these situations one said some¬thing like, 'Not so much losing a partner as gaining a sec¬retary,' " I said ominously. "I have this feeling that there's something you haven't got around to telling me yet, William."

"Sheila, Kate and I need to have boring business talks. Why don't you get Shelley to point you in the direction of all the best clothes shops? You can come back at lunchtime and we'll all go to the Brasserie?" Bill said des¬perately, one eye on the toe I was tapping on the floor.

"No problem, Billy boy," Sheila said, planting a kiss smack on his lips. On her way past me, she sketched a wave. "Can't wait to get to know you better, Kate."

When the door closed behind her, there was a long silence. " 'Why don't you get Shelley to point you in the direction of all the best clothes shops?' " I mimicked as cruelly as I could manage.

"She owns three dress shops in Sydney," Bill said mildly. I might have known. That explained the tailored black dress she'd almost been wearing.

"This is not a good way to start the day, Bill," I said. "What does she mean, I'll be losing a partner? Is she the pathologically jealous type who doesn't want her man working alongside another woman? Is Shelley getting the bum's rush from Waltzing Matilda too?"

Bill threw himself into his chair and sighed. "Sheila knows I was dreading this conversation, and she said what she did to force me into having it," he explained. "Kate, this is it. Sheila's the one I want."

"Let's face it, Bill, you've run enough consumer tests to make an informed decision," I said bitterly. I wanted to be happy for him. I would have been happy for him if it hadn't been for the stab of fear that Sheila's words had triggered in me.

He looked me in the eye and smiled. "True. Which means that now I've found her, I don't want to let her go. Marriage seems like the sensible option." He looked away. "And that means either Sheila moves over here or I move to Australia."

Silence. I knew what was coming but I didn't see why I should let him off the hook. I leaned back against the wall and folded my arms across my chest. Bill the Bear was turning from teddy to grizzly before my eyes, and I didn't like the transformation. Finally, a few sighs later, Bill said, "Me moving is the logical step. My work's more portable than hers. The jobs I've already been doing in Australia have given me some good contacts, while she has none in the rag trade over here. Besides, the weather's nicer. And the wine." He tried a pleading, little-boy-lost smile on me.

It didn't play. "So what happens to Mortensen and Brannigan?" I demanded, my voice surprising even me with its harshness.

Bill picked up the curly Sherlock Holmes pipe he occa¬sionally smokes when he's stuck on a problem, and started fiddling with it. "I'm sorry, Kate, but I'm going to have to sell my share of the partnership. The problem I've got is that I need to realize the capital I've got tied up in the business so I can start again in Sydney."

"I don't believe I'm hearing this," I said. "You think you can just sell us to the highest bidder? Your parents own half the farmland in Cheshire. Can't you get them to stake you?"

Bill scowled. "Of course I bloody can't," he growled. "You didn't go cap in hand to your father when you wanted to become a partner. You funded it yourself. Besides, life's not exactly a bed of roses in cattle farming right now. I doubt they've got the cash to throw around."

"Fine," I said angrily. "So who have you sold out to?"

Bill looked shocked. "I haven't sold to anyone," he protested. "How could you think I'd go behind your back like that?"

I shrugged. "Everything else seems to have been cut and dried without consulting me. Why should that be any different?"

"Didn't you bother reading the partnership agreement when we drew it up? Paragraph 16. If either of us wants to sell our share of the business, we have to offer first refusal to the other partner. And if the remaining partner doesn't want to buy, they have the power of veto over the sale to any third party on any reasonable ground."

"'The final decision as to the reasonableness or other¬wise of that ground to be taken by the partners in consul¬tation with any employees of the firm,' " I quoted from memory. I'd written most of the agreement; it wasn't sur¬prising I knew by heart what the key parts of it said. "It's academic, Bill. You know I can't afford to buy you out. And you also know damn well that I'm far too fond of you to stand in the way of what you want. So pick your buyer."

I jumped to my feet and wrenched the door open. "I'm out of here," I said, hoping the disgust and anger I felt were as vivid to him as they were to me. Sometimes, the only things that make you feel good are the same ones that worked when you were five. Yes, I slammed the door.

I sat staring into the froth of a cappuccino in the Cigar Store cafe. The waitress was having an animated conver¬sation with a couple of her friends drinking espressos in the corner, but apart from them, I had the place to myself. It wasn't hard to tune out their gossip and focus on the implications of what Bill had said. I couldn't believe what he planned to do to me. It undercut every¬thing I thought I knew about Bill. It made me feel that my judgment wasn't worth a bag of used cat litter. The man had been my friend before he became my business partner. I'd started my career process serving for him as a way of eking out my student grant because the hours and the cash were better than bar work. I'd toiled with him or for him ever since I'd jacked in my law degree after the second year, when I realized I could never spend my working days in the company of wolves and settled for the blond bear instead.

There was no way I could afford to buy him out. The deal we'd done when I'd become a partner had been sim¬ple enough. Bill had had the business valued, and I'd worked out I could afford to buy thirty-five percent. I'd borrowed the money on a short-term loan from the bank and paid it back over four years. I'd managed that by pay¬ing the bank every penny I earned over and above my previous salary, including my annual profit shares. I'd only finished paying the loan off three months previously, thanks in part to a windfall that couldn't be explained either to another living soul or to the tax man without risking the knowledge getting back to the organized criminals who had inadvertently made me the gift. It had been a struggle to meet the payments on the loan, and I had no intention of standing under the kind of trees that deliver such dangerous windfalls ever again.

I had to face it. There was no way I could raise the cash to buy out Bill's sixty-five percent at the prices of four years ago, never mind what the agency would now be worth, given the new clients we'd both brought in since then. I was going to be the victim of anyone who decided a two-thirds share in a profitable detective agency was a good investment.

A second cup clattered onto the table in front of me. Startled, I looked up and found myself staring into Shel¬ley's amber eyes. "I thought I'd find you here," she said, tossing her mac over a chair and sitting down opposite me. Her face looked like one of those carved African cer¬emonial masks, all polished planes and immobility, especially now she'd abandoned the beads she used to wear plaited in her hair and moved on to neat cornrows. I couldn't tell from looking at her if she'd come to sympa¬thize or to tell me off for my tantrum and plead Bill's case.

"And we thought Lincoln freed the slaves," I said bit¬terly. "How do you feel about being bought and sold?"

"It's not as bad for me as it is for you," Shelley said. "I don't like the new boss, I just walk out the door and get me another job. But you're tied to whoever Bill sells his share to, am I right?"

"As usual. Back on the chain gang, Shell, that's what I am. Like the song says, circumstance beyond our control."

Shelley's eyebrows flickered. "Doesn't have to be that way, does it?"

"I'm not with you."

"This behavior from Bill is not what we're used to."

"Of course it's bloody not," I interrupted petulantly. "It's this Sheila, isn't it? Like the man said, when you've got them by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow. And there's no doubting which part of Bill's anatomy Sheila's got a grip on."

"Doesn't matter who's behind it, the end result is the same," Shelley pointed out. "Bottom line is, Bill is not behaving like your friend, and in my book that absolves you of behaving like his friend."

"And?"

"You own thirty-five percent of the business, don't you?"

I nodded. "Free and clear."

"So you put your share on the market. Either as an independent entity, or as part of the whole package."

I frowned. "But that would devalue the business quite a lot. It's a different kettle of fish buying into an established agency where one of the partners is staying on to main¬tain the existing clients and another thing altogether to go for something that's nothing more really than a name and a bunch of office equipment."

"My point exactly," Shelley said.

"But I'd lose a lot of the money I've put in," I said.

"But Bill would stand to lose a hell of a lot more," Shel¬ley said. "And he needs the cash a lot more than you do right now. What it would do is buy you a bit of time and a lot of say-so on the deal. It gives you a bargaining chip."

Slowly, I nodded. "Shelley, you are one mean mother," I said, admiration in my voice. "And I thought Bill was your blue-eyed boy."

Shelley's lips tightened. I noticed that between her nose and mouth, a couple of creases were graduating to lines. "Listen, Kate, when I was growing up, I saw a lot of women doing the 'my kids, right or wrong' routine with teachers, with cops. And I see their kids now, running drugs, living behind bars. I've seen the funerals when another one gets shot in some stupid gang war. I don't like the end result of blind loyalty. Bill has been my friend and my boss a long time, but he's behaving like an asshole to us both, and that's how he deserves to be treated."

I admired her cold determination to get the best result for both of us. I just didn't know if I could carry it through as ruthlessly as Shelley would doubtless demand. "You're right," I said. "I'll tell him I want to sell too."

Shelley smiled. "I bet you feel better already," she said shrewdly. She wasn't wrong. "So, haven't you got any work to do?"

I told her about the previous evening's adventures, and, predictably enough, she had a good laugh at my expense. "So now I need to see Dennis," I finished up. "Richard

might know all there is to know about the music side of the rock business, but when it comes to the criminal side, he thinks seedy is something you listen to on your stereo. Whereas Dennis might not know his Ice-T from his Enya, but he could figure out where to make a bent earner in the Hallelujah Chorus." The only problem was, as I didn't have to remind Shelley, my friend and some¬time-mentor Dennis wasn't quite as accessible as normal, Her Majesty the Queen being unreasonably fussy about keeping her guests to herself.

When I met Dennis, like so many people in their late thirties, he'd just gone through a major career change. After a stretch in prison, he'd given up his previous job as a professional and highly successful burglar to the rich and famous and taken up the more demanding but less dangerous occupation of "a bit of ducking and diving" on the fringes of the law. Which included, on occasion, a spot of consultancy work for Mortensen and Brannigan. Thanks to Dennis, I'd learned how to pick locks, defeat alarm systems, and ransack filing cabinets without leaving a trace.

Unfortunately, a little enterprise of Dennis's aimed at separating criminals from their cash flow had turned sour when he'd inadvertently arranged one of his handovers in the middle of a Drugs Squad surveillance. Instead of grabbing a couple of major league traffickers and one of those cocaine hauls that gets mentioned in the news, the cops ended up with a small-time villain and the kind of nothing case that barely makes three paragraphs in the local paper. Inevitably, Dennis paid the price of their pique, seeing his scam blown sufficiently out of propor¬tion in court to land him with an eighteen-month sen¬tence. Some might say he got off lightly, given his CV and what else I happened to know he'd been up to lately, but speaking as someone who would go quietly mad serv¬ing an eighteen-day sentence, I wouldn't be one of them.

"When can you get in to see him?" Shelley asked.

Good question. I didn't have a Visiting Order nor any immediate prospect of getting one. Once upon a time, I'd have rung up and pretended to be a legal executive from his firm of solicitors and asked for an appointment the next day. But security had grown tighter recently. Too many prisoners had been going walkabout from jails that weren't supposed to be open prisons. Now, when you booked a brief's appointment at Strangeways, they took the details then rang back the firm you allegedly repre¬sented to confirm the name of the person attending and to give them a code consisting of two letters and four numbers. Without the code, you couldn't get in. "I thought about asking Ruth to let me pose as one of her legal execs," I said.

Shelley snorted. "After the last time? I don't think so!"

The last time I'd pretended to be one of Ruth Hunter's junior employees it had strained our friendship so severely it had to wear a truss for months afterward. Shelley was right. Ruth wasn't going to play.

"I don't mean to teach you to suck eggs," Shelley said without a trace of humility or apology. "And I know this goes against the grain. But had you thought about doing it the straight way?"