When the Dempseys entered the office, several officers stopped what they were doing and gaped at them a second or two before pretending to be buried in their work again. Dempsey shot Harry a 'did we miss something' look, but she barely shrugged; she was too nervous to spare any thought for something else than what Chas intended to tell them.

Chief superintendant Jarvis was giving instructions to a nervous-looking light brown haired man. When he turned round, Dempsey did a double-take. "Fry! Is that you?"

The sergeant stopped in his tracks. He didn't seem at ease.

"Morning Dempsey, Harry." he stammered before slipping past them and disappearing in the corridor.

"I can't believe he's still working here." Dempsey said, jabbing his thumb towards the door closing behind them.

"He's a very capable officer as long as he doesn't go on the field" Chas commented. Dempsey didn't seem convinced. "Let's say he improved a lot lately." Chas conceded. Then he took a deep breath, his expression was serious, worn-out. "But that's not why I called you."

"Do you know something about Maggie?" Harry wanted it to be over. No matter what the truth was, she wanted it over.

"Let's go in private." he opened the door to the office that had once belonged to Gordon Spikings and was now his and they all entered in.

The room hadn't changed much. The chairs, the desk were all in the same place; in fact, you could have expected to see Spikings enter the room at any second claiming his chair if it hadn't been for the picture of Chas and his wife and the laptop sitting on the desk.

"Unfortunately, I have only bad news to tell you." Chas had been happy and proud to take on the post of superintendant of SI10, the job had always brought him great satisfaction, but there were times, like today, when he would have given anything not to be sitting at this desk.

"Maggie Duncan is dead." He said flatly. Intake of breath from Harry; clenching of fists from Dempsey. "We received this in the middle of the morning."

He handed them a file. Harry grabbed it and opened the folder. Inside was a picture of the young girl, gagged and tied to a chair. There was no doubt that she had had a hard time before dying. She had a dishevelled appearance, her clothes, her hair were a mess and her face was covered in bruises. Her head was lolling to one side and on the side of her neck, you could see a thin red line. Her clothes below were soaked in blood. Harry couldn't bear the view and gave the file to Dempsey.

"So you found the bastards who did that?" he asked with a shaking voice.

"Not exactly." Chas didn't feel comfortable. He cleared his throat. "Like I said, they sent the photo. I'm sorry to say that if they hadn't, we still wouldn't have anything." he admitted.

"So that's all you've got? A picture?" Harry couldn't believe it.

Chas nodded. "We don't even know where the body is."

"What about Lucy? Maggie's mother. Did you tell her?" Harry asked concerned.

"Yes, I did. Not long before you arrived. She didn't feel well so the doc sent her to the hospital, I guess they're going to give her tranquillizers."

"I should go and visit her." Harry said immediately.

"No, you're not going to do that, sorry." Chas seemed even more exhausted. "There's more" he sighed.

"What do you mean more?" Dempsey felt lost. "You just told us you didn't know anything else."

Chas sighed. "Not about Maggie, no. But they sent this with the photo. This is the reason why I called you."

He handed them a piece of paper which had been protected by a see-through plastic, to protect the fingerprints or other clues from being altered. It was a white sheet on which letters cut from newspaper had been pasted to form sentences. They both read the message together.

Payback time has come Dempsey

1 down, 2 to go

The worst is yet to come

The truth took a few seconds to sink in. Harry seemed not to be able to breathe anymore. She looked to her right; Dempsey was sat in his chair, miles away. The news had hit him hard.

"What does this mean?" she managed to articulate. She looked at Chas. "You think it's all related to James? But then… why Maggie?"

"Don't know. That's really odd." Chas sighed. "It looks like revenge if you ask me. I've already asked Fry to fetch some files from the records; criminals that threatened you, or who were released from jail lately, things like that. Of course, it would be easier to know what we're looking for; we need to understand the meaning of this." He showed the file containing Maggie's pictures and the note.

"I don't understand anything." Harry said honestly. She really felt lost. "I mean, why Maggie? Why kidnap her and kill her? And what does '1 down, 2 to go' means?"

"Well that's what I wondered too, it doesn't make any sense" Jarvis confirmed "For one thing, Maggie's not your daughter, and two, if they want to eliminate all the person close to Dempsey, there are still 3 people left: you, Jessica and Thomas."

Harry gasped. "Oh my god! We left Jess and Tommy alone!"

Dempsey seemed to jerk awake at this, he was about to stand when Chas raise a hand to stop him. "Don't worry, I already sent two teams to check on your house. Your children are safe. Anyway, I don't think they would strike again right now. They've just killed Maggie, they want you to have time to fear what's coming next, anticipate their next action." He paused. "It's a good thing, it's going to give us time to react."

"Right." Dempsey agreed, sitting back. "So what do you know? You found fingerprints on this?"

"Not a single one." Chas shook his head. "In fact the only thing new is that it's related to you. Any idea on who it might be?"

"No!" Harry said earnestly, but Dempsey swallowed hard. The two others turned to look at him.

"Coltrane." He croaked. The mere fact of saying the name made him sick. Coltrane had already tried to destroy his life twice, wasn't it enough?

"Coltrane?" Harry repeated disbelievingly. "But he died years ago."

"But he still had friends." Dempsey shook his head in disgust. "I must call New York. They have to send us Davis' files." He stood up, grabbed Chas' phone and dialled a number. Soon he was talking with a NYPD officer.

"Who's Davis?" Chas enquired in a low voice.

Harry shook her face, her eyes gazing in blank air. She didn't know who Davis was, or what files James was talking about. She didn't know how Coltrane could be related to this, and why James thought he might be. The only thing she knew was that her children, and probably herself were in danger, and that James had had information about this but did not bother to warn her. She crossed her arms around her body as if it could act like some shield that would protect her from any further harm or deception.