X marks the spot - and when that spot is a corpses naked back and the x is carved in blood, DI Tom Thorne is in no doubt that the dead man is the latest victim of a particularly vicious contract killer. Its morbid and mess -- but its a mystery with plenty of clues. This is a turf warfare between North London gangs. Organised crime boss Billy Ryan is moving into someone elses patch, and that someone is not best pleased. Thornes already got plenty on his plate when he agrees to help out ex-DCI Carol Chamberlain, frantically raking through the askes of an old case that has come back to haunt her. When schoolgirl Jessica Clarke was turned into a human torch twenty years ago, it made horrivic headlines. But now theres something worrying in the small print: Gordon Rooker, the man Carol put away for the crime, is up for possible release, and it seems theres a copycat at large. Or perhaps its someone trying to right a few wrongs. For Jessica Clarke was the victim of mistaken identity. The intended target was the daughter of a gangland boss, a woman who would later grow up and marry a man named Billy Ryan...