Jake Haggar has been kidnapped by his father who is threatening to sell the boy to a paedophile ring. Carlyle is struggling to get him back. It's not his case but it is his problem - it was his fault Jake was taken in the first place. But Carlyle's own caseload includes the murder of Agatha Mills.

Awakening the sleeping dragon...

Smooth expat Michael Nicholson is a fixer, getting on by doing favours for the rich and powerful in booming China. When he makes the mistake of getting too close to one of his clients, the wife of a leading Communist Party official, the ageing Lothario fears for his life as a vengeful husband decides to put his house in order.

So when a domestic dispute from the other side of the world leads to a shoot-out in a luxury penthouse apartment in Chelsea, an ex-cop called Marvin Taylor is one of the casualties. Inspector John Carlyle is little more...