“I got held up,” he said.

Matt said nothing.

“You haven’t had second thoughts, have you?”

“No.”

“You’ve got nothing to worry about, Matt, mate. It’s going to be easy. Charlie told me…”

Charlie was Kelvin’s older brother. Matt had never met him, which wasn’t surprising. Charlie was in prison, in a young offenders’ institution just outside Manchester. Kelvin didn’t often talk about him. But it was Charlie who had first heard about the warehouse.

It was fifteen minutes from the station, in an industrial zone. A warehouse stacked with CDs, video games and DVDs. Amazingly, it had no alarm systems and only one security guard, a retired policeman who was half-asleep most of the time, with his feet up and his head buried in a newspaper. Charlie knew all this because a friend of his had been in to do some electrical work. According to Charlie, you could break in with a bent paper clip and you could probably walk out with a couple of hundred quid’s worth of equipment. It was easy, just waiting to be taken.

That was why the two of them had arranged to meet here. Matt had agreed to the idea when they were talking about it, but half of him had thought Kelvin wasn’t being serious. The two of them had done plenty of things together. Under Kelvin’s guidance, they’d stolen stuff from supermarkets, and once they’d driven off in someone’s car. But Matt knew this was much worse. This was serious. It was breaking and entering. Burglary. Real crime.

“Are you sure about this?” Matt asked.

“Sure I’m sure. What’s the problem?”

“If we get caught…”

“We won’t. Charlie says they don’t even have CCTV.” Kelvin rested a foot on the wall. Matt noticed he was wearing a pair of brand new Nikes. He had often wondered how Kelvin could afford his clothes. Now, he supposed, he knew. “Come on, Matt,” Kelvin went on. “If you’re going to be such a wuss, I’m not sure I want to hang out with you. What’s the big deal?”