When Harry Chance agrees repay a debt to Patrick Brogan, incarcerated for his part in the Trims Bank bullion heist, he should have known better. But, Grogan has called in the marker. Chance promises to steal an Himitsu-Bako, a Japanese puzzle box, inside which is Brogan’s security against the revenge of his former boss, uber criminal and Soho pole dancing club owner Billy Ray, known as Croucher. A big mistake on both their parts.
Brogan had entrusted the puzzle box to the safe keeping of an ambitious politician campaigning for his release. Now he wants it back. Chance cracks the safe, retrieves the box but discovers the decapitated MP shot to death. A smudgy image that could be Chance captured on a security camera puts him in the frame for murder.
Croucher’s heavies (Pit Bull, Big Girl’s Blouse and Flat Face) had got there before him. Croucher then has Brogan slaughtered inside Wandsworth Prison.
DI Alan Richards, head of Operation Phoenix, has spent five years trying to tie leading criminal faces to the Trim’s Bank heist. And, he is desperate to put the slippery Harry Chance behind bars for a string of high profile jewel thefts. He sets a honey trap in an attempt to snare him. And Chance walks right into it. He meets Annie Black, acting undercover, and the attraction is mutual. Now they can tie Harry Chance down for murder, if they can catch him.
Croucher puts two and two together and makes conspiracy. Harry Chance had to the one who stole £60 million of bullion from under his nose. He kidnaps Chance’s 16-year old daughter Amanda on her way home from school to Chance’s ex-wife and her new husband then makes Chance an offer he really ought not to refuse.
Chance deduces that the key to locating the gold must be inside the Himitsu-Bako and spends days trying to crack it. Days he can’t afford. Eventually, using sophisticated technology, he finally makes it. Inside is an old key connected to a phial of acid, a precaution against using brute force to smash open the box. Embossed into the lid is a set of coordinates. They lead him to a desolate part of the Forest of Dean. Inside a disused mine is the beaten up Ford Transit containing the gold bars.
The rendezvous with Croucher and his heavies is an old sewage works downstream on the Thames. Chance manages to secrete a tracking device underneath Croucher’s wagon as the bullion is loaded. Croucher tells Chance where Amanda is being held by ‘associates’. Chance has to go and fetch her. She will not be brought to him. Before they leave, the heavies pile into Chance, who takes two down before being hit by a crowbar.
Chance keeps a few gold bars back with one intention, to frame Croucher for the Trims Bank heist. He breaks into the Soho club, over roofs, along walls, then plants gold bars in Croucher’s private safe.
Suspecting a trap at the remote farmhouse where Amanda is being held, Chance gets help from Annie Black, who, against police regulations, and because she has the hots for Harry, agrees to provide firearms and accompany him on the rescue mission. Harry and Annie rescue Amanda after a bitter battle. Chance returns her to his ex-wife and her husband.
Alan Richards finally feels Croucher’s collar but Pit Bull and Cedric are acting on a previous order and are holding Amanda, her mother and stepfather in their Hampstead house. Chance has to break in again for a final brutal rescue. But, Amanda is safe at last.
Epilogue
Chance can’t resist one final break-in; to steal the hottest pendant diamond around from high profile celebrity – and get away with it.