Detective Nick Belsey is trying to behave this summer. Which means no more boozing, no more thieving, no more abuse of the badge. It's hell. Then somebody sets him a riddle. It goes like this. How does a man walk into one of London's million dead-end alleys and never come out? How does he disappear? And then reappear - in another part of town not long after - to cave in a homeless man's skull, or to kidnap an eminent shrink's daughter. Belsey dives headlong into London's darkest terrain and tastes the evil of the secrets degenerating beneath the city's sickly glitter.