Predator: A Crossbow Novel (Hector Cross Book 3)
Predator: Chapter 2

“Yes, sir. That too.”

“OK then, what do you need?”

“Just a few words about your role as Director of Security, in relation to the Magna Grande field. We don’t need anything too specific, just something about how excited you are by the potential of Bannock’s Angolan operations and how you’re determined to ensure that our employees and our corporate assets are kept completely secure. If you’d rather, I can draft a statement for your approval.”

“No, if I’m going to have words against my name, I’d rather say them myself. So, can I start talking?”

“Go ahead, sir.”

Cross took a second to collect his thoughts, then began dictating: “‘The development of the Magna Grande field offers Bannock Oil a fantastic’ . . . no, ‘a unique opportunity to, ah, establish our presence in the increasingly significant West African oil industry. As Director of Security it’s my responsibility to ensure that all our installations and, most importantly, all our employees and contractors are properly protected from any possible threats against them. As I speak, I’m about to go into a meeting with my most senior staff to discuss the various challenges we’re likely to face, and how best to prepare for every eventuality. We’ve had many years of experience working on Bannock’s operations in Abu Zara . . .’” Cross paused. “Hang on, make that ‘working together on Bannock’s operations,’ et cetera. OK, new sentence: ‘With the full support of the Abu Zaran authorities, we’ve maintained a security cordon that has kept people safe and oil flowing at all times. Now we’re moving into an offshore environment, so it’s going to be tough. It’s going to be very hard work. But our commitment to doing the best job to the highest standards will be just as great as ever.’”

It all sounded like undiluted bullshit to Cross’s ears. But then, was it really so different to all the stirring, inspirational pep talks he’d given to his men before they’d gone out on missions, in war and peace alike? Sometimes you just had to tell people what they wanted and needed to hear.

“How was that?” he asked.

“Great, Mr. Cross, just great,” Nocerino enthused.

This was why Cross hated to work with yes-men. There were times when any leader needed subordinates who had the guts to point out where he might be about to go wrong. He said nothing, running his words back in his mind, looking for any possible hostages to fortune.

Nocerino must have sensed Cross’s uncertainty. “Don’t worry, sir. That was exactly what I needed,” he said. “Have a nice day.”

No sooner had Cross put the phone down than it rang again. “Yes?” he asked.

“I have another call from America,” Agatha said. “It’s a Lieutenant Hernandez from the Texas Rangers, investigating Johnny Congo’s escape.”

“You’d better put him through, then.”

“Actually, Lieutenant Hernandez is a woman.”

“A female Texas Ranger?” Cross smiled. “That sounds interesting.”

“Unusual, that’s for sure,” Agatha noted. “And everyone’s here for the meeting.”

“Tell them to come through to my office.”

“Certainly. I have Lieutenant Hernandez for you now.”

The line was switched. “This is Hector Cross, how can I help you, Lieutenant?” he asked.

“Well, anything you could tell me about Johnny Congo would be a help.”

“Can you be a little more specific?”

“Sure. I’m curious about the time Congo spent in Africa, prior to his being reapprehended a few weeks ago. We have reason to believe that he originally hired his attorney here in Houston using an alias, and we think he might have used the same identity to get out of the country.”

“Sounds to me like the simplest thing would be to ask the attorney,” Cross observed.

“That could be difficult. You ever tried asking a lawyer something he doesn’t want to tell you?”

Cross laughed. He was warming to this call a lot more than the last. “So, what can I do for you that the lawyer can’t?” he asked, waving Dave, Paddy and Nastiya into the room and pointing in the direction of the table at which he liked to hold team meetings.

“Just tell us anything you know about Congo’s activities during his years outside the U.S.,” Hernandez replied. “I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but very little’s been said here in the States about exactly how Congo came to be arrested in Abu Zara—like, for example, how he came to be there in the first place. But I have been able to establish that you had Congo in your custody and then handed him over to the U.S. Marshals. So is there anything you can tell me, anything at all that would help us figure out how he escaped and where the hell he is now?”

“Hmm . . .” Cross hesitated. “This is where I’m going to have to sound like a lawyer. You see, I very much want to help you in any way I can. Believe me, no one wants Johnny Congo despatched from the surface of the earth more than me. And no one is more pissed off that he escaped the punishment he so richly deserved.”

“But . . . ?” Hernandez interjected.

“But there were certain, ah, unconventional aspects to his capture which could, if described in detail, lead to possible allegations of—how should I put it?—less than fully law-abiding activity.”

Cross could see smirks spreading across the faces of his friends. Even Nastiya had abandoned her normally fearsome expression and was trying hard to suppress a giggle.

“Listen,” said Hernandez bluntly. “I couldn’t give a damn what you had to do to get that scumbag to Abu Zara. My jurisdiction doesn’t extend outside the state of Texas, and what happens in Africa stays in Africa. All I want to know is, what do you know that could help me?”

“Here’s what I can tell you. Johnny Congo had set himself up as the ruler of a place called Kazundu. It’s the smallest, poorest, most godforsaken spot on the entire African continent and he and his partner Carl Bannock turned it into their own private kingdom.”

“That’s Bannock, as in Bannock Oil?”

“Yes, the adopted son of Henry Bannock.”

“And by ‘partner’ do you mean business or personal?”

“Both. And before you ask, no, I don’t know where Carl Bannock is right now. He’s dropped right off the map.”

“Actually he dropped right out of a crocodile’s arse, more like,” quipped Paddy O’Quinn, under his breath.

“Do you know of any aliases Congo used when he was in Kazundu?” Hernandez asked, oblivious to the childish amusement her conversation was causing.

“No. But I can tell you this. Kazundu is a sovereign state that issues its own passports. Congo and Bannock almost certainly acquired Kazundan passports for themselves, diplomatic ones probably. And I doubt that too many other citizens of Kazundu left Texas en route to an overseas destination in the immediate aftermath of the escape. So if you can replace a Kazundu passport on any passenger manifest, anywhere, chances are that’s Johnny Congo.”

“Thank you, Mr. Cross, that’s a very great help,” said Hernandez. “Just one other thing. We get the impression Congo had access to significant amounts of money. Did you get that impression, too?”

“Significant is way too small a word, Lieutenant. Johnny Congo has access to huge amounts of money. He can buy anything, bribe anyone, go anywhere.”

“You have any idea where he might have gone?”

“Not a clue. But I aim to replace out. And when I do, I—”

“Don’t tell me,” said Hernandez. “There’s a limit to the amount of less-than-law-abiding activity I can ignore in one day.”

The moment her conversation with Cross was over, Hernandez contacted the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Houston field office at 2323 South Shepherd Drive. “Do me a favor. I’m working on the Johnny Congo investigation. We think he may have tried to leave the country in the immediate aftermath of his escape, using an alias. So I need a check on all persons leaving any of the ports of entry covered by your office, for any overseas destination between sixteen hundred hours and twenty-one hundred hours on the fifteenth of November. Look for anyone carrying a passport from Kazundu.”

“Ka-where?” asked the official on the other end of the line.

“Kazundu. It’s the smallest nation in Africa, spelled Kilo-Alpha-Zulu-Uniform-November-Delta-Uniform. It’s possible Congo was travelling on a diplomatic passport. Also the guy is loaded, so chances are he didn’t go scheduled. Look for private planes and yachts.”

“If he went by boat, he could have gone aboard anywhere, sailed out to sea and we wouldn’t have known about it.”

“Yeah, but the sea option is a long shot. I mean, boats are slow. And wherever Congo was going, he’d have wanted to get there as fast as he possibly could. So try airports, and specifically private aviation first.”

An hour later Hernandez had her answer. She called Bobby Malinga: “I’ve got good news and bad news.”

“Well, I guess that’s better than all bad, which is all I’ve got so far.”

“The good news is that I know Johnny Congo’s alias. He called himself, get this: His Excellency King John Kikuu Tembo.”

“You’re kidding me!”

“Nope.”

“And CPB fell for it?”

“The man’s passport said ‘King,’ what are you going to do?”

“OK, so we’ve got a name. How about the flight?”

“He left Jack Brooks Regional Airport, south of Beaumont, on a Citation business jet. The plane was chartered from an outfit called Lonestar Jetcharters by a Panamanian corporation, and here’s the first piece of bad news: there’s no legal requirement in Panama to register the identities of shareholders in offshore companies.”

“So we have no way of knowing who hired that jet?”

“Not unless they were real careless when they communicated with Lonestar, no. And my second piece of bad news is, I know where the jet was going. Trust me, you’re not going to like it.”

Hector Cross had been thinking about Johnny Congo’s movements, too, talking it over with Imbiss and the O’Quinns. “You’re a wanted man. You know that if you ever get caught and taken back to the States you’re going to be executed. But the good news is, you’ve got almost limitless resources. What are you going to do?”

“Me, I would prepare,” said Nastiya. “I would have Plan A, Plan B, Plan C. Money, passports, identities—all safely hidden, all ready for when they are needed.”

“Me too,” Cross agreed. “Carl Bannock was a sick, psychopathic, murdering bastard and Johnny Congo still is. The way the two of them lived in Kazundu was so decadent and depraved it made the Emperor Caligula look like a Mormon Boy Scout. But they weren’t stupid. You’re right, Nastiya, they must have had a plan, or plans, for breaking out of custody then getting away from the States. Next question: where would Congo want to go next?”

“The death sentence had been imposed in Texas, so that’s where Congo was going to be taken and that’s the starting point of any escape,” said Dave Imbiss. “No way he’d want to get on a regular scheduled flight: too risky, too little control and there’s no need because he can afford to go private. I don’t think he wants to have to refuel, because if the plane’s on the ground, stationary, it’s too easy a target, so you’re looking at a radius of around three thousand miles, max, from take-off point. So that’s all of Mexico and Central America, the Caribbean and the northern half of South America. I’m guessing, but the furthest major city he could reach would probably be Lima, Peru.”

“Unless he flew north,” Paddy O’Quinn pointed out. “The Canadian border’s only a couple of hours’ flight time from Houston. And that’s a very big country for a man to get lost in.”

“It’s also a country that’s on good terms with the United States,” said Cross. “If I were Johnny I would want to go somewhere that isn’t going to cut a deal with Washington to send me right back to the execution chamber.”

“Or somewhere that has a powerful enough criminal network to make the government illegal. There are plenty of people in Mexico who could shelter Congo for a price,” Imbiss said.

Cross nodded thoughtfully. “Fair point. But does one criminal ever trust another? And would you want to be in a Mexican drug baron’s debt? Congo needs to feel secure. And that means having a government watching his back.”

“Cuba,” said Imbiss decisively. “Gotta be.”

“No, too many Americans,” Nastiya objected.

“In Guantánamo, maybe. But the base is cut off from the rest of the island. And you won’t replace any Americans there.”

“Sure you will.” Nastiya grinned triumphantly. “When I was in the FSB we went to Cuba for training in tropical conditions—and also so the senior officers instructing us could have good time lying by pool, drinking rum, screwing Cuban girls. In Havana we were shown the Swiss embassy. It’s a big building, almost the biggest embassy in Havana, and all this for little Switzerland? No. One-quarter of the building, or maybe less, is for the Swiss. The rest is what they call the ‘American Interests Section’ of the Swiss Embassy. In other words, unofficial American Embassy. And you know how everyone knows that? Because there is company of U.S. Marines in Havana, guarding Swiss Embassy. They have their own residence, the Marine House. Best steaks, best beer, best big-screen TV in all Havana.”

“And you know that because . . . ?” Paddy asked.

“Because I am a girl who loves a man in uniform, darling,” Nastiya teased, pouting at her husband. “Seriously, Hector, Congo would be crazy to go to Cuba. The whole island is under constant surveillance: satellites, spy planes, signal intercepts. Congo could not last a day there without being found, even if Fidel Castro himself hides him under his own sickbed.”

“So it’s not Canada, it’s not Mexico, it’s not Cuba,” said Cross, getting up from his desk and walking over to a table that was easily big enough to seat six for dinner, half of whose surface was taken up with a single, enormous hardback book that was actually slightly longer than the table was wide. “The Times Comprehensive Atlas of the World,” said Cross as the others got up to join him. “Forget all that internet nonsense, this is still the best way of replaceing places on our planet.” He opened the book and started turning poster-sized pages until he came to an image of Central America. “Right. This is southern Mexico and here’s the border with Guatemala and Belize. I’m going to keep turning pages until we’ve been through every country or Caribbean island, one by one, and worked out a shortlist of possible refuges for a killer on the run. And once we’ve got a shortlist, we’ll start thinking about how to replace and catch the bastard.”

They’d been talking for an hour, and had come up with four possible destinations when Cross received another call. “Lieutenant Hernandez,” Agatha told him.

“Just wanted to say thanks for your help,” Hernandez said. “Turned out you were right. And since you’ve already apprehended Johnny Congo once and shown your desire to hand him over to the appropriate federal authorities, I’ve decided, upon due reflection, to change my mind and share the information we’ve ascertained with you.”

“Because you have faith in the fact that I’m a law-abiding individual who knows how to do the right thing?”

“Exactly,” said Hernandez. “That’s what I’m counting on.”

“So what have you got?”

Hernandez gave Cross the details of Congo’s alias and means of transport. Then she said, “You want to know where the Citation was headed?”

“Very much.”

“Caracas, Venezuela.”

“And it could get there on one tank of fuel?”

“With a thousand miles to spare. Get there fast, too, the Citation cruises at over six hundred mph. You know how folks like to eat late in Latin America?” Hernandez asked.

“I’d heard that, yes.”

“Well, King John Kikuu Tembo made it into downtown Caracas in time for dinner.”

“Then I hope he choked on his food,” said Cross. He put down the phone and turned his attention back to his team. “We have two priorities now. The first is to track down exactly where in Venezuela Johnny Congo, or whatever he’s calling himself now, is hiding before the U.S. authorities grab hold of him. He’s got away from them twice. I’m not willing to risk him doing it a third time. I’ll take charge of this myself. It’s personal business and I’ll pay for any costs that are incurred.”

“So you are planning on going out to Caracas?” Dave Imbiss asked.

“Not immediately. You remember when Hazel was murdered how Agatha drew up a list of the top private detectives in every country where there was anyone who had ever threatened her, or had reason to want her dead? We’ll do the same this time, replace the best man—”

“Or woman,” Nastiya interjected.

“Or woman in Venezuela and get them on the case. They’ll have local knowledge and contacts we can’t match. Just to be on the safe side, get people working in the border areas of Colombia, Brazil and Guyana. I don’t want him slipping into a neighboring country without us knowing about it. As and when someone replaces Congo I’ll go out and deal with him.”

No one asked what Cross meant by that. There was no need.

“If you want a hand, when the time comes, you can count on me for anything you need,” Paddy O’Quinn said, “and I’m sure that goes for all of us. It’s time that bastard paid for what he did to Hazel.”

“Thanks,” said Cross as the other two murmured their agreement with Paddy. “Now, back to company business. Bannock Oil has a multi-billion-dollar investment a hundred miles off the Angolan coastline and it needs protecting. I’ve had an unofficial briefing from someone at the State Department in Washington and it seems that we may be heading into stormy water.”

Cross gave a brief outline of the information Bobbi Franklin had given him. “What it amounts to,” he concluded, “is that we need to be thinking about this on two levels. The first is the development of a basic defensive strategy that will enable us to deal with any threat that we’re likely to face against the rig, or Bannock A, or both. And the second is an intelligence operation, looking at anyone who might carry out an attack, starting with Mateus da Cunha. Paddy, you’ve got Special Forces experience, so I’m putting you in charge of defensive planning. Talk to some of our old chums down in Poole. They’ve been training on North Sea rigs for donkey’s years.”

“You mean you’re making me talk to the bubble-heads? Jaysus, Heck, that’s a lot to ask of a Hereford man.”

“Now, now, Paddy, don’t insult the SBS,” Hector cautioned him, barely suppressing a grin as he pretended to be stern. “I’ve heard they’ve got one or two half-decent fighting men. Even if they are only tarted-up bootnecks.”

“Excuse me,” said Nastiya, “but what are you talking about?”

“Have I not told you, darling, about the fierce rivalry between the two main elements of the United Kingdom Special Forces? You see, Major Cross and I were, as you know, proud to serve in the SAS, the first and still greatest of all the world’s Special Forces, and that’s an Army unit, based in Hereford. But the Royal Navy, feeling left out, decided it wanted a force of its own. So it took a slice off the Royal Marines and called that the Special Boat Service and packed them off to Poole, where they could play all day at the seaside. We call them bubble-heads on account of the bubbles coming from their diving suits. And we call Marines bootnecks because . . . do you know, I have absolutely no idea why we do that, but we do. And each unit despises the other, until threatened by an outsider, like a Septic, for example . . .”

“For Septic tank read Yank,” Dave Imbiss explained wearily.

“In which case,” O’Quinn concluded, “we join forces and become the Lads, and you’d better not mess with us or you’ll live to regret it.”

“You say this to a woman trained by the Spetsnaz, who can chew you up and spit you out like they eat for breakfast?” Nastiya asked contemptuously.

“That’s enough!” Cross commanded. “I spend too much time with an actual infant to have any interest in dealing with you three acting like two-year-olds. Stop pissing off your co-workers, Paddy, and give me your first thoughts about defending the Bannock Oil installations in Angolan waters.”

Paddy spoke for nearly an hour from the notes he had worked up. As he listened Hector congratulated himself—not for the first time—that he had grabbed Paddy before he had been snapped up by any other company. When he finished speaking Hector nodded. “All of that makes good sense. Let me have your notes to forward on to the Bannock Board. They are going to have to make provision for all that extra equipment. Once we’ve got that in motion, Paddy, you and I need to start planning precisely how many extra men we’re going to need down in Angola, what our protocols are going to be in terms of crisis response, and how we’re going to get them all trained up. Next item on the agenda: intelligence-planning. I am giving that job to Dave, as usual, because he’s the man we need to plant a bug or hack a system, and Nastiya, because she’s the only person in this room who’s actually been a spy for a living. So, Mrs. O’Quinn, where do you think we should start?”

“With da Cunha, since he is the only person we know who is a potential threat. And it is wise of you to ask the advice of a woman, Hector, because this job requires the feminine touch.”

“Such as . . .”

“Such as seducing Mateus da Cunha. He is a man who wants to conquer and rule a country, so he is, by definition, even more of an egotist than any other, normal man. He has also been brought up in France, so he will have a French attitude to infidelity.”

“And what a fine attitude that is,” said O’Quinn cheerfully. “I sincerely hope that you are not proposing yourself for the role of seductress.”

“I hadn’t thought about it, darling. But now you mention it . . . it might help me pass a rainy afternoon,” deadpanned Nastiya.

“What’s good for the goose is just as good for the gander,” Paddy suggested, and his wife winked slyly at him.

“Don’t fuss yourself. Home cooking is good enough for me.”

“Mostly because I’m the best cook in the house!” Paddy laughed.

Nastiya ignored him, and went on smoothly: “Da Cunha’s record tells us that he is highly intelligent, sophisticated and also disciplined enough to succeed at a very high academic level. But I suspect that he is also a vain, arrogant, privileged young man who cannot resist boasting to people, and to women in particular, just how brilliant he is and how great he is going to be in the future.”

“I am following you.” Hector nodded. “But we’ll need covert surveillance on da Cunha and a properly worked-up cover for Nastiya, Dave. If da Cunha meets a woman who promises him sex and money, the first thing he’ll do is thank his lucky stars. The second will be to hit Google and check her out. So make sure Nastiya’s cover has online back-up.”

“Got it,” Imbiss assured him.

“Then unless anyone else has anything they need to say, our meeting is temporarily adjourned. You all know what you have to do. Give me an hour to get things moving in Houston, and then we can go and get something to eat. I’m paying.”

Yevgenia Vitalyevna Voronova, known as “Zhenia” by the multitudes of her male friends who admired and adored her, and even by her few female friends (who were more cautious in their approval), kissed Sergei Burlayev, her partner of the evening, goodnight and clambered out of the Ferrari 458 Italia that Sergei’s father had given him to replace the one he’d written off in a crash six months previously. She set off across the concrete floor of the private underground car park, teetering just a little unsteadily in her 10.5-cm-high heeled Chanel pumps. With the self-satisfaction of one who is just slightly tiddly, Zhenia congratulated herself on the skill with which she had matched her shoes so perfectly to the color of Sergei’s car, which was now roaring back up the ramp and out into the streets of the Moscow International Business Center.

She reached the express lift and slid her personalized key card into the slot at the second attempt. The doors opened, Zhenia tottered in and gratefully leaned against the wall of the lift, snuggling into her coat of jet-black, wild-caught Barguzin sable as she was whisked more than seventy floors up the bizarre, apparently random structure which was the Moscow Tower.

Zhenia giggled when she recalled how proud her papa had been when he managed to get a penthouse right at the top of what was, for a short while, the tallest building in Europe, and how his pride turned to fury when it was promptly overtaken in height by the Mercury City Tower, right here in the Moscow IBC. Papa had stood at the five meter-high windows that wrapped around his living room, watching the Mercury Tower go up, raging at the fact that he had been beaten to the penthouse there by one of Vladimir Putin’s favored henchmen. One word from the President’s office had been all it took to ensure that no other offers for the property were considered.

The lift pinged, the doors opened and Zhenia stepped out into the Voronov family’s entrance lobby. Its design had always displeased her. The wall directly opposite the lift was mirrored from floor to ceiling, an admirable idea in her view, except that the important business of examining her own reflection was made extremely difficult by the huge stone fireplace that stood right in the middle of the wall.

Still, this was no night for complaining. Sergei had taken her to Siberia, a restaurant-cum-club on Bolshaya Nikitskaya where it cost 25,000 roubles just to book a table. Lots of their friends had been there and they’d all eaten gloriously, drunk extravagantly, danced wildly and generally laughed, flirted and delighted in the joy of being young, beautiful and rich. The only disappointment had been that she had not been able to bring Sergei back to the apartment. Zhenia had harbored steamy fantasies of dragging him back home and exploring every position in the Kama Sutra and all fifty shades of gray with him.

That was always possible when Papa was away and Mama was too drunk to take any interest in her surroundings. However, tonight she had had to be satisfied with a quickie in the cramped back seat of the Ferrari, trying frantically to keep pace with Sergei’s mercurial libido rather than be left dangling high and dry at the end. She had managed to reach the summit with just seconds to spare and was feeling so satisfied with her achievement that she decided to have one last nightcap.

Zhenia had first tasted Bailey’s Irish Cream during her years studying History of Art in London and been utterly seduced. There was bound to be a bottle in one of the fridges behind the splendid marble-topped bar in the living room. Zhenia dropped her coat and her clutch bag on the lobby floor and stepped out of her heels, knowing that the servants would pick up all her belongings and put them neatly away. Then she made her way to the living room wearing nothing but her little red party dress.

“Where have you been, you little slut?”

The words were slurred and spiced with malice. The man who spoke them was sitting at the bar in a shiny gray suit. His shirt, which swelled around the mound of his monumental paunch, was so tight at the collar that the layers of fat drooped over it. Despite an expensive series of transplants and the application of a wide range of gels and sprays, there was more pink bald scalp in evidence on the top of his head than thin gingery-gray hair.

“Good evening, Papa.” Zhenia studiously ignored the question.

“I said, ‘Where have you been?’” Vitaly Voronov was the man known throughout Russia as the Woodpulp Tsar for the fortune he had made chopping down trees and turning them into paper. “But I know the answer: you have been rutting like a bitch in heat with that bone-idle wastrel Sergei Burlayev. Don’t deny it. You smell like a whorehouse on Saturday night.”

“And you, my darling Papa, smell like a pathetic old drunk who’s just had a bellyful of the cheapest potato vodka he can replace,” Zhenia snapped back at him. She had drunk just enough that night to have abandoned her usual caution. “You are sitting at a bar stocked with every fancy brand there is, and yet you drink that peasant urine. Look, you even kept it in a paper bag just like a true moujik! Didn’t Mama teach you how to use a glass?”

“You want to know why I drink this?” Voronov said, getting up from the cream leather bar stool and advancing toward his daughter, his hand still around the bottle in its brown paper overcoat. “I drink it because it reminds me of the old days, that’s why. When I was poor, and I grew up in an apartment that wasn’t half . . . no, not even a quarter the size of this room. Six of us, squeezed in there, my daddy coughing his lungs out after twenty years down the coal mine. My mum cleaning the blood and God knows what off the sheets in the hospital laundry, then standing in line for hours, just to buy a loaf of bread and a couple of cabbages, if she was lucky.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it, Daddy. Life was tough. You had to work and fight for everything you ever had. Blah-blah-blah . . .”

“Don’t you talk to me like that, you spoiled little bitch,” he shouted, making her recoil from his flying spittle and the stench of his alcohol-drenched breath. “And you still haven’t answered my question.”

Zhenia faced her father. “If you really want to know, I’ve been at a club with Sergei and some friends, and then Sergei brought me back here like a gentleman. I gave him a little goodnight kiss and then I came up here.”

“You’re lying! You have been screwing him—”

“No!” she protested. And then she stopped, as if struck by a revelation. She stared at her father’s face, really peering at it, and then she burst out laughing. “Oh my God! I’ve only just got it! Now I know why you’ve been up all night drinking, why you want to know about my sex life and why you’re always telling me that I’m a whore. I know what you want from me, my darling Daddy. I know exactly what you want, you filthy old peasant.”

Voronov stepped forward, his face contorted with fury, squaring up to her, just as he would to a man he was about to fight. “All right then, slut,” he snarled, “if you’re so clever, if you know so much with your fancy education, go ahead, tell me . . . what am I thinking?”

There was a devil in Zhenia, an aggressive, fighting spirit that came straight from her father she hated so much and it seized her now. She stared right back at her father, provoking him, taunting him, matching his brute, male presence with the womanly power of her youth, her beauty, her body and her scent and purred, “Here’s what I think, darling Papa,” Zhenia paused again, just to add to the tension, and then she said the words that would change her life, and many others forever. “I think you’re jealous of Sergei. You want to screw me yourself.”

Her father hit her across the face with the flat of his hand, putting all his great strength into the blow. Zhenia’s vision exploded with pain and the force of the impact wrenched her head to one side, taking her body with it and tearing at her neck muscles as she was sent spinning to the floor. Voronov stood over where she lay, moaning in agony on the floor. He was aiming wild, drunken kicks at her stomach, shouting filthy abuse at her. She was curled up into a foetal position trying to protect herself.

She had no idea how much time had passed when, through the fog of semi-conciousness that had fallen over her like a dark cloak, she heard a woman’s voice somewhere far away screeching, “Stop it! Stop kicking her, you bastard! Leave her alone!”

She realized dimly that it was her mother, Marina Voronova. She almost laughed through her pain as she thought, Mama has come to watch someone else get beaten up for a change.

Voronov stopped kicking her as he turned to face his wife, shouting, “Shut up! Shut your stupid mouth. One more word and you’ll get a taste of my boot also!”

Her mother was screaming back at him, “I hate you, you bastard, I hate you!”

Some tattered shreds of her own survival instinct warned Zhenia that this was her opportunity to escape. She stumbled to her feet and desperately tried to break into a run.

Her father yelled, “Come back here, you little slut! You are going to suffer for the things you said about me,” but before he could chase after her, he was crying out in alarm as Marina launched herself at him, raking his face with her long, manicured nails, knowing that she could not hope to overcome her powerful husband, but desperately trying to buy Zhenia time to escape from him.

Zhenia staggered back into the lobby, where a Filipina maid was just gathering up her coat, bag and shoes from the floor.

“Give me those!” Zhenia shouted.

The maid looked around in surprise that turned to shock when she saw Zhenia’s face. She stood there, dumbly, staring at the blood spurting from Zhenia’s nose.

“Give them to me!” Zhenia insisted, her voice rising in desperation as she snatched everything from the terrified servant and then raced to the door of the lift. She hammered at the button with the side of her right fist, in which she was clutching the ankle-straps of her shoes.

“Come on, come on!” Zhenia pleaded. She could hear the sound of her mother sobbing in the living room and her father shouting, “I’m coming for you, Yevgenia! You won’t get away from me!”

Not daring to turn around she heard his footsteps pounding over the marble floor. Where was that damn lift?

“I’m going to smash your lying mouth. I am going to break your jaws so they will never be able to put them back together again. I am going to mash your face so that no man will ever look at you again . . .”

Then the lift pinged, the door opened and Zhenia almost threw herself into it, pressing the “doors closed” button again and again.

She looked around and her father was only a few paces away, filling her whole field of vision.

The doors began to close. Voronov forced himself between them, pushing them apart with his bare hands.

Zhenia hit him with the heel of her shoe, bringing it down on the back of his right hand. Voronov howled in pain. He pulled his hands away. The doors closed, and the lift plummeted back down the shaft, carrying Zhenia to safety.

She didn’t have her car keys in the tiny evening bag, nor the internal passport that was essential for almost any official transaction in Russia, nor even her driving license: just her lipstick, some tissues, a packet of ten Marlboro Lights, a miniature going-out purse that contained her black Amex card and 5,000 roubles in cash, and last, but most importantly, her mobile phone.

Zhenia closed the bag, shrugged on her coat and stepped back into her shoes. It was only when she straightened up that she caught sight of her reflection in the lift wall. Her left eye looked puffy and swollen, as did her cheekbone, which was already starting to color with the beginnings of an ugly bruise. There was blood coming from one of her nostrils. She suddenly realized that her neck was aching and that even the slightest movement of her head sent shooting pains through her strained muscles and ligaments. She felt sick and disoriented and when the lift reached the ground floor and the doors opened it took Zhenia several seconds to gather her thoughts and replace the will to walk out into the reception.

The next few hours passed in a semi-conscious blur as she called Sergei again and again without ever getting an answer, leaving endless messages begging him to come and rescue her and then gazing in bewilderment when he finally texted her: “Your dad called mine. We can never talk ever again. S.”

She wandered the streets, wondering why her father hadn’t come after her, or sent his security men to grab her, only slowly understanding that he’d chosen another, crueller form of retribution as one dear friend after another turned their back on her. The Woodpulp Tsar had put the word out to his fellow oligarchs, calling in favors or making threats, as each one required, but always making sure that they got the same message: his daughter was a non-person and no one was to have anything to do with her until she crawled back home and begged for his forgiveness.

It took Zhenia till dawn to replace one contact her father couldn’t get to. Andrei Ionov had been a rebel since they were in kindergarten together. He left home for good when he was eighteen, rejecting his privileged upbringing and working, mostly unpaid, as a freelance journalist for a series of anti-government websites and magazines, somehow managing to stay out of jail as one avenue after another was closed down. When she called him he gave her an address in Kopotnya, an infamously lawless and impoverished district in the south-east corner of the city, jammed up against Moscow’s ring-road, the MKAD.

“Are you sure this is where you want to get out, miss?” the cabbie asked her as he dropped her—Chanel shoes, fur coat and all—outside an old Communist-era apartment block, on a street of cracked paving stones and patchwork tarmac. Dawn was just breaking as she walked, still dazed and only vaguely aware of her surroundings, into the courtyard at the center of the block. She saw high white walls that were filthy, peeling and pockmarked. The surface of the yard was just beaten-down earth and rubble, from which three spindly, leafless trees were trying to grow between the cars parked wherever their drivers could replace a few square meters’ space. Laundry was flapping from the railings of the balconies: cheap clothes in vile colors, and sheets so filthy it was hard to believe they’d ever been washed. She heard a voice call down from one of the balconies, “I’m up here!” and somehow managed to make her way up a stairwell that was strewn with rubbish and stank of vodka and urine to a door where Andrei was waiting to greet her.

Zhenia slept for little more than an hour and woke with a splitting headache, feeling more nauseous than ever, and when she saw her swollen, discolored face in the mirror she burst into tears of misery and despair. She was about to give up, surrender and crawl back on her knees to her cruel and twisted father and her hopelessly disfunctional mother when she remembered one last possible source of help: the half-sister, ten years her senior, whom she’d never really known, still less liked. But they had exchanged occasional birthday emails, and Zhenia’s sister had always attached her phone number to the message, each time with a different overseas dialing code.

Zhenia knew that this was her only chance. Her only hope of survival.

It was three in the morning in London and Anastasia Vitalyevna Voronova, known as “Nastiya” to her friends, was still asleep when the phone rang.

“Yevgenia?” she said, once she’d woken up, using her half-sister’s full name because she simply didn’t know her well enough for pet ones, and barely recognizing the muffled, desperate voice on the other end of the line. To her mind, Yevgenia had always been a spoiled, pampered little princess, the child of the trophy wife her father had acquired when he’d found himself seriously rich and wanted to shed any trace of his years of impoverished mediocrity, his first wife and daughter included. But as she listened to Zhenia’s story, Anastasia felt, for the very first time, as though they were truly sisters. For, though she had seldom been the victim of her father’s brutality, she had witnessed it often enough. It was the sight of her mother’s helplessness that had first fired Nastiya’s determination never to allow any man to beat or bully her; from that had come the hunger, drive and unflagging willpower that had made her the woman she was today. The discovery that her own sister had been attacked was enough to waken long-buried feelings and reopen emotional wounds that she had thought were long since healed.

“Don’t worry,” she told Zhenia. “I’ll take care of everything. First, I want you to go to my mother’s apartment. I’ll let her know you’re coming.”

“But will she let me in? I mean . . . he left her for my mother.”

“Believe me, when she hears what he did to you, she’ll be only too glad to help. We’ll get you a doctor and you’ll need a brain-scan to make sure that you’ve not got anything more serious than concussion to worry about.”

“How can I pay? He’s bound to have stopped my Amex card.”

“I said, don’t worry. I can pay for everything, and if you want, when this is all over, you can get me a little present—nothing fancy—in return.”

“I’d like that,” Yevgenia said, almost crying at the relief of being in touch with somebody who was kind to her. Then she remembered the darkness that was still out there. “But . . . but what are we going to do about Papa?”

“Nothing,” said Nastiya. “Ignore him completely. Do not acknowledge his existence. Let the bastard sweat. But if the day ever comes when he threatens you again, let me know. I will make sure that whatever we do about Papa, he will never, ever forget it.”

Somehow she knew that her big sister really meant every word said. When Nastiya broke the connection and her phone went dead Yevgenia stared at it for a while and then she whispered, “I love you, Nastiya, like I have loved nobody before you.”

Shelby Weiss did not appreciate being made to look like a fool by an overgrown gangbanger like Johnny Congo. Of course he’d understood that even in these days of wanton excess among the very rich, two million bucks was a ridiculous price to set aside for a funeral. So he would bet his two million bucks to a nickel that D’Shonn Brown was not really as squeaky-clean as he always claimed. It was also safe to say that Congo had never struck him as a man who would compliantly walk right into the Death House without a fight. But it had never for one second occurred to Weiss that Congo and Brown would turn U.S. Route 190, the goddamn Ronald Reagan Memorial Highway no less, into the East Texas answer to the Gaza Strip. And he really didn’t like having Bobby Malinga come into his office the day after and treat him like some kind of suspected gangbanger himself.

On the other hand, one message had come through loud and clear from the whole experience: Johnny Congo had money, lots and lots of money. And though, as Weiss now realized, he had made a lot of it in various unsavory business ventures in the heart of Africa, the original source of his wealth was the income his partner Carl Bannock enjoyed as a beneficiary of the Henry Bannock Family Trust. Weiss let the thought of that trust percolate through his mind for a while and his subconscious work at it, the way he did when he was planning a courtroom strategy, letting a sequence of thoughts line up like wagons behind a locomotive until he had a long train steaming down the track, heading full speed toward his destination.

The Bannock Trust, Weiss reasoned, was a gold mine, not just for its beneficiaries, but also for its legal administrators, who could charge sky-high fees that were just the merest drop in the torrent of Bannock Oil bounty. Weiss himself had never crossed the line and actually stolen from a client, but it occurred to him that a lesser man might be able to skim six- or even seven-figure sums from it every year without anyone ever needing to replace out.

At the present time, the trust was administered by the firm of Bunter and Theobald. Old Ronnie Bunter had not only been a close personal friend of Henry Bannock, he was also as fine and decent a man as had ever stood at the Texas Bar, a Southern gentleman of the old school for whom all who knew him felt nothing but affection and admiration. His wife Betty had in her time been a perfect Texas Rose and long after she ceased to practice law, she was a towering figure in the legal community, organizing charity events, supporting those members of the profession who had fallen on hard times, or who had simply become too old or infirm to look after themselves. All three of Weiss’s ex-wives had simply adored her. But the word was poor Betty was suffering from dementia and her loving husband, being the kind of man he was, had given up full-time work in order to devote himself more fully to care for the woman he loved, and who had sacrificed so much for him.

As a result, effective control of Bunter and Theobald had passed to Ronnie and Betty’s son Bradley, who was, in Shelby Weiss’s eyes, a genuine freak of nature. Here was a guy who had had it all. Not only were his parents rich and influential, they were also loving, attentive and devoted to their children. Brad himself was handsome, healthy and strong. Yet despite all these advantages—blessings for which the young Shelby Weiss, coming up the hard way, would have killed—Brad Bunter had somehow managed to become an ocean-going, weapons-grade, 24-carat shitweasel. The man was deceitful, treacherous, greedy, ambitious and filled with an undeserved sense of entitlement. Moreover, he was a notorious spendthrift, with a passionate attachment to fast women, slow horses, losing teams and white Colombian powder. His parents, being too decent themselves to even imagine that their son could be the man he was, had somehow never seen through his shiny veneer of surface charm, and Brad had always been smart enough to play nice with them, or as nice as he could manage, anyway. So when Ronnie Bunter’s peers had tried to tell him the truth, he had waved them away.

But everybody in the business knew that Brad Bunter was a second-rate oxygen-waster and it would surely not be long, Weiss reasoned, before someone took advantage of that fact. That someone, he decided, might as well be himself.

He called a private detective whom he had often used to check out his clients’ stories and replace incriminating information to use against their opponents. “I want you to do a number on Bradley Bunter,” Weiss said. “He’s the acting senior partner of his dad’s law firm, Bunter and Theobald. I need to know who he’s screwing, what he’s snorting, how much he owes, and to whom, and what the vig is. And a word of advice, take a big shovel. Believe me, you’re going to dig up a ton of dirt.”

A week later, having received a full and very informative report, and having the strong sense that he would be pushing at an open door, Shelby Weiss picked up the phone, was put through to Bradley Bunter’s office and said, “Brad, it’s been too long. I just wanted to say, I’m so sorry to hear that your dear mother is unwell. Please send her my kindest regards. Listen, I don’t know if this is a good time or not, but I have a business proposition, and I think you might be interested to hear it. Let me buy you a drink and tell you what I have in mind . . .”

Brad Bunter couldn’t believe his luck when Shelby Weiss offered him a million-five in cash, a partnership in a new, enlarged firm with his name in its title and a massively increased annual remuneration package in return for merging Bunter and Theobald into Weiss, Mendoza and Burnett. The other junior partners in Bunter and Theobald burst into applause when Bradley presented the equally sweet deals, relative to their current earnings, that were on the table for them.

“Here’s to the Hebrew!” Brad toasted, downing a double Jack Daniel’s at the bar to which he and his colleagues had retired to celebrate their imminent good fortune.

“The Hebe!” they all chanted, even the ones who were, in fact, Jewish.

The toasts continued: “Here’s to the Wetback! Here’s to the WASP!”

At the Bunter family home, however, the news of the proposed merger was received very differently. “I’m so sorry, Ronnie,” Jo Stanley said as she relayed the details of the partners’ meeting to her boss. “The deal’s going to be accepted. They were unanimous.”

“I can’t believe it,” Bunter said. He looked suddenly older, shrunken and more fragile, as though he had received a physical blow. “It’s not possible. Are you sure it was Brad that suggested this? My own son, throwing away our family firm . . . It’s not possible.”

“I don’t know what to say, Ronnie,” Jo said, moving closer to him, wanting to offer him some kind of comfort, but unable to hold out any hope. “From what I could make out it all happened very quickly. Shelby Weiss came to Brad with a deal, he jumped at it and, well, I guess it was just too rich for anyone to say no to it.”

“I could veto it,” Bunter said, regaining a flicker of energy. “I don’t get to the office much these days, but I’m still the senior partner, I could do that.”

“What would be the point?” Jo asked. “Brad would hate you. The others would quit. You’d still have Bunter and Theobald, but there wouldn’t be anything there. If you want to preserve your legacy, Ronnie, the best thing you can do is demand a partnership in the new firm. They won’t say no to you. And screw every last dime you can out of Shelby Weiss. If he’s going to take your firm, make him pay. And think of Betty . . . this way she won’t ever want for anything and neither will you.”

“I guess so,” said Bunter regretfully. “But to see it all go like this: three generations’ work, lost in an instant. It’s hard to take, Jo . . .”

She patted his hand, saying nothing, knowing from the look on Ronnie’s face that he was thinking about something and trusting that he’d share it with her soon enough.

“You say Weiss was the man behind this?”

“That’s right. Bradley was very insistent about the fact that he had Weiss’s personal assurance for all the terms he was offering.”

“I’ve never liked him, you know. Shelby Weiss, I mean. Oh, I know about his hard-luck story, how he worked his way up from nothing and I admire him for that. He knows his law, too, there’s no doubt about that, and he can put on a helluva show in court. If he’d been born a hundred years earlier, he’d have been selling snake oil at county fairs and making a good living at it, you can bet.”

Jo laughed. “Roll up! Roll up! Just a dollar a bottle!”

“Exactly, my dear, a dollar a bottle indeed. So what’s he peddling now, eh? What’s got him so excited that he’s willing to throw millions of his firm’s dollars at a stuffy old law firm like Bunter and Theobald? What do we have that he wants?”

“Why do I get the feeling that you already know the answer, Ronnie?”

Bunter laughed. “Ah, Jo, you know me too well! Let me elucidate . . . I don’t have to tell you that Weiss was the lawyer representing Johnny Congo in the time between his arrival here in Texas and the appalling disaster of his escape. Now, Betty gets tired very easily these days and needs to rest, which means I have a lot of time on my hands. So I’ve filled some of it by doing a little digging into the events of that terrible day. I still have a few old friends around the place, codgers just like me . . .”

“Those codgers run the state, Ronnie, as you very well know.”

“Not as much as they used to, but never mind. My point is, I have it on good authority that Congo, the professional and personal partner of Carl Bannock—wherever he may be—gave Weiss a great deal of money, millions of dollars in fact, a significant proportion of which ended up in Weiss, Mendoza and Burnett’s bank account. Just a couple weeks later, here comes Mr. Weiss, knocking on our door, using that very same money, I dare say, to present an offer that makes no financial sense, unless . . .” Bunter left the sentence unfinished and gave Jo a look inviting her to finish it.

“Unless he knows just how much money there is in the Henry Bannock Family Trust.”

“And he wants to get his greedy hands on it,” Bunter concluded. “Very well,” he went on, his energy now fully restored. “Here is what we are going to do. I will take as much money as Weiss is desperate enough to give me, and in cash. I will demand an emeritus partnership at the merged firm, with full rights to view the company accounts and attend partners’ meetings, or have a representative attend them on my behalf. As before, you will be that representative. I want you to watch Weiss like a hawk. Keep an eye on everything he does and let me know the instant you get any hint that he is trying to interfere with the administration of the trust. Henry Bannock was my dear friend and I promised him that I would make sure that all his descendants would be able to enjoy the fruits of his labors.”

Bunter looked Jo in the eye. “I may not be able to preserve my legacy. But I’ll fight till the very last breath in my body to preserve Henry Bannock’s.”

Among the many things Johnny Congo and Carl Bannock had learned through experience was this: If you wanted to buy political influence or protection, always go to the socialist governments first. It had nothing to do with the rights or wrongs of any political ideology; it was more a matter of psychology. “In life, a certain proportion of people realize that they are superior to the common herd,” Carl had theorized, one hot, lazy, drug-fuelled afternoon in Kazundu.

“Amen to that, bro,” Congo had agreed.

“Now, a country like America is filled with opportunity for someone who knows they deserve more than those around them, and who understands that the dumb masses deserve to be ripped off, screwed over and trampled underfoot, just for walking around, the way they do, like big, fat cattle too shit-stupid to know they’re heading for the slaughterhouse.”

“They got it coming, no doubt about it.”

“Say you’re someone who wants to take advantage of the opportunity afforded by the pathetic state of the mass of humanity. If you come from a nice, prosperous home, get a good degree, know how to present yourself properly, well, then you can go to Wall Street and make a killing. Did you know that ten percent of Wall Street bankers are clinical psychopaths?”

“Only have to see that American Psycho movie to know that, babe.” Congo laughed. “Christian Bale cutting up all the rich white girls. Whoo-ee! The Batman getting his evil on.”

Carl smiled. “Ha! Plenty of opportunity for being bad and getting away with it in Hollywood, too! But a man like you came up a different route. You didn’t have the advantages that the kind of guy who ends up as a banker enjoys. You came from the street. So you committed what the law calls crime. But, let’s get real, there’s no moral difference between someone dealing drugs and someone selling securities that turn out to be worthless junk. They’re both doing wrong, if you care about that. It’s just that one of those people is wearing a suit, sitting in a fancy office, and the other’s on a street corner, wearing a wife-beater and dirty jeans.”

“One’s white and the other’s black, man, that’s the frickin’ difference.”

“I’m white. Look where I ended up.”

Congo laughed. “Only ’cause you met me, baby. I remember it like it was yesterday, the new boy, all sweet-assed and innocent, being brought to my cell to get his lesson in prison manners. Well, I taught you good. Made a man of you.”

“You put me in the prison sanatorium. I had internal bleeding, my rear end all shot to pieces.” Carl gave a wry smile. “Hard to believe that was the start of a beautiful friendship.”

“Gotta start somewhere. So, ’bout these bankers and gangbangers, what’s your point?”

“My point,” said Carl, drawing the smoke from some locally grown weed deep into his lungs, “is they’ve got a million ways to thrive in America, or anywhere like it. But in a communist country, like a people’s republic or whatever, the State controls everything. So the only way the superior individual can screw the people is by ruling them, being a politician. So that’s where the people like us end up. And that’s why we can always make a deal in a place like that.”

“Plus, they hate the U.S.A. And when they replace out we’re on the run from Uncle Sam, it’s like, my enemy’s enemy is my friend.”

“And if my enemy’s enemy has millions of my enemy’s dollars they like it even better.”

Venezuela was the proof of that. Carl and Congo had flown in, put some serious coin in a few very well-placed back pockets and the result had been a pair of Venezuelan passports and an assurance that although an extradition treaty between Venezuela and the United States had been in force since 1923, there was no chance that they would ever be handed over to the gringos as long as the United Socialist Party of Venezuela was in power. And they intended to stay in power for a good long while yet.

And so, having left the U.S. as a ruler of Kazundu, Congo flew into Caracas as Venezuelan citizen Juan Tumbo. That was where he was now, sprawled in a leather recliner with a Montecristo No. 2 Cuban cigar clenched between his teeth, a magnum of Cristal in an ice bucket on the floor beside him and a heap of coke on a mirror on the side table: that and a big, fat tube of lubricant.

Congo had spent three weeks in the godforsaken Texas death cell. He’d been much too close to death for comfort. Now he wanted to live it up. He’d got R. Kelly on the sound system, laying down some old school R ’n’ B, telling his woman how her body was calling for him. And as Congo got into the music, feeling the slow, sexy rhythm, there were two bodies calling for him, too: perfect young bodies with flawless café-au-lait skin and tumbling blond hair the color of dark, sweet honey. Carl watched them dancing to the music, mirroring each other’s movements. Their every facial feature was drawn as perfectly as if God himself had said, “This is what I want humans to look like.” And what made them even more extraordinary was that they were identical. Looking from one to the other, Congo was unable to detect a single imperfection. There was not the slightest facial blemish to mark one out as different to the other, not a solitary hair on their heads cut to a different length or colored a contrasting shade.

In Houston, it was past nine in the evening and Tom Nocerino was putting the finishing touches to his newsletter, before sending it upstairs for final approval. The section on the Magna Grande oilfield of Angola was looking all right now, he thought. He’d finished with Hector Cross’s quote, boiled down to three short, snappy sentences, bam-bam-bam: “It’s going to be tough. It’s going to be hard work. But we’re going to get the job done.”

You can’t beat a good old-fashioned triad, Nocerino thought, sipping a cup of coffee as he gave the draft one last read-through.

The only section he was worried about concerned another big, new venture Bannock was undertaking. Once again it was an offshore field, but in the Arctic waters of the Beaufort Sea, off the north coast of Alaska: about as far removed as you could get, in terms of both distance and environment, from Angola. The Bannock board had sanctioned the purchase of a drilling barge, the Noatak, whose double-hulled construction was specially designed to withstand the pressures of Arctic pack ice. Resistance to compression also dictated that she was shaped like a giant steel soup bowl, 250 feet across. The Noatak was about as mobile in the water as a soup bowl, too, since she possessed no engines of her own. The board of Bannock Oil had decided that the multi-directional thrusters that would have provided the barge with the power to move and manoeuvre were too expensive to fit. They were, in any case, an unnecessary extravagance since Bannock had already acquired a $200-million icebreaking supply tug, the Glenallen, which was purpose built to tow huge, floating oil rigs into the waters off the North Slope of Alaska, anchor them in place and then keep them supplied with everything that the rigs or the men aboard them might need, under any conditions. She was more than 350 feet long, weighed almost 13,000 tons and her four Caterpillar engines produced more than 20,000 horsepower. Why buy more engines when those monsters were already available?

There was just one thing stopping Tom Nocerino from spinning the story of a weird but wonderful drilling barge and a state-of-the-art icebreaking tug into the kind of upbeat story that the investors’ newsletter demanded. After a spring and summer of exploration, Bannock Oil’s vessels and personnel had yet to replace any oil under their particular patch of the Beaufort Sea. The geologists’ reports were unequivocal. There were billions of barrels down there somewhere, it was just that they hadn’t yet found the right place to drill for them. But now, though the Noatak’s entire reason for being was that she could keep working through the winter, the Glenallen was towing her back around the far north-western corner of Alaska, en route to the mooring off Seattle where she would spend the next several months.

This ignominious retreat was being made to evade the levies that the state of Alaska imposes on any oil-drilling operations present on its territory or in its waters on 1 January of any given year. Tom Nocerino had to replace a way of changing “We spent hundreds of millions of bucks, we couldn’t replace any oil, so now we’re getting out before they tax us” into “Alaska—it’s going great!”

It wasn’t going to be easy, but he’d been seeing an incredibly hot tax attorney for the past couple of weeks and he was certain this would be the night she’d agree to have sex with him. So he was going to replace the right words, get them approved by Bigelow and press “Send” on the newsletter mailout before he left work, or die in the attempt.

High above the Arctic Circle, the Glenallen was towing the Noatak through the Chukchi Sea, the body of water that lies between the Beaufort Sea and the Bering Strait that separates the westernmost point of the United States from the far eastern tip of Russia. The two ships were harnessed together by hawsers thicker than a fat man’s waist, held by a massive, solid steel shackle aboard the Glenallen. In the calm waters that had prevailed so far, they had maintained a slow but steady progress during which the fact that the barge weighed more than twice as much as the tug that was towing her had not been an issue. But now the barometric pressure was dropping, the wind was rising and the ocean swells were building. The crew of the Glenallen didn’t need a weather forecast to tell them that a storm was coming: that much was obvious. What they didn’t know, however, was what would happen when it struck. Left to her own devices, the Glenallen had the size, strength and power to cope with almost anything the oceans could throw at her. But now she was handicapped by the huge, graceless, helpless craft that followed in her wake. The men on both ships just had to pray that handicap wouldn’t prove fatal.

The storm came roaring out of the Arctic in a fury of wind and ice, whipping the waters of the Chukchi Sea into a maelstrom. The waves piled one upon another, reaching higher and higher into the sky as if they were trying to grab the snow-laden clouds and pull them back down into the depths from which they’d come. These were conditions whose elemental savagery mocked the puny efforts of humankind to survive, let alone master the forces of nature. The air was cold enough in itself, some twenty degrees centigrade below freezing. But the winds that surged as high as eighty miles per hour made it feel more like fifty below. No man could look barefaced into the teeth of such a storm and survive, for the blast of freezing air laden with water droplets that had frozen as hard as buckshot would shred his skin and pulp his eyes. Yet somewhere out on the heaving black wastes two unlikely vessels, tied to one another like blind mountaineers in an avalanche, were making their slow, desperate way through the tempest.

Without the Glenallen, the Noatak was completely at the mercy of the ocean beneath her and the weather above, yet her size and helplessness were now in danger of destroying the very craft on which her own survival depended. As the Glenallen tried to climb up each successive, towering wave, the deadweight of the Noatak pulled against her, dragging her stern so low that water flooded over it, cascading down into the body of the hull. Then, as the tug rushed down the far sides of each foaming wall of water, so the barge charged after her, looming out of the snow-filled darkness like a runaway express train.

The Glenallen’s skipper could not cut the umbilical cord between his ship and the Noatak, for then the barge would be swept away on the waves and it would surely be lost, along with its fifteen-man skeleton crew. Yet if the link were kept, the Glenallen might go down too, for the high, triangular drilling tower at the dead center of the barge was acting as a combination of sail and metronome. The flat metal panels that shrouded the bottom third of the tower caught the wind, which thereby pushed the barge before it. And as the Noatak sped forewards, so the forces of wind and water made the tower swing back and forth in an ever-increasing arc, taking the hull with it. Meanwhile the snow and sea spray dashing against the metal structure of the tower froze in layer after thickening layer of ice, which became heavier and heavier, exaggerating the effect of each metronome swing, plunging the decks of the barge beneath the churning water. With every extra degree of motion, the top of the tower came closer to the water surface, hastening the moment when the Noatak would be unable to bob back to the surface after each successive wall of water had crashed over her. And should the barge go under, the Glenallen would be dragged down with her to the grave.

It was left to Mother Nature to cut the Gordian Knot with a succession of surging waves that caused the tether between the two ships to be pulled tight in a sudden, convulsive jerk, then to sag as the tug and barge were drawn together, only to be snapped tight again as they were pulled apart. The first time this happened, the shackle held firm against the incredible force exerted by the barge. But with every successive tightening the force on the shackle increased and the mountings holding it to the Glenallen’s aft deck juddered and loosened, only by fractions of a millimeter at first, but then more and more until they snapped.

The shackle—120 tons of steel—smashed its way along the deck, leaving a trail of damage in its wake until it finally flew off the tug’s stern and plunged into the depths of the Chukchi Sea.

The barge was swept away like a cork in a rushing stream, picked up by the waves and carried in the direction that the nor’westerly wind was driving them, straight toward the Alaskan shoreline. There was absolutely nothing that the fifteen men aboard the Noatak could do to fight the waves or steer away from the coast. All they could do now was pray for a miracle to deliver them, knowing that if it did not come they were surely doomed.

When the shackle had been torn from the Glenallen’s deck, and with it the cables that linked her to the drilling barge Noatak, the tug’s skipper had sent out a distress call. It had been picked up by the Munro, a U.S. Coast Guard cutter that was on patrol, more than 150 miles to the northeast. There was no way that the Munro could reach the stricken barge in time to rescue the fifteen crewmen who were still aboard her. But she did have a Dolphin search and rescue helicopter that might be able to make it. Heedless of the danger of even attempting to fly through a storm of this magnitude, the chopper’s four-man crew raced to their aircraft and took off into the wild and merciless night.

The Noatak was less than five miles from shore when the Dolphin emerged out of the darkness and snow and took up its position hovering like a fragile metal dragonfly over the bucking, plunging, oscillating barge. The best that the helicopter crew could hope for was to lower a man on to the Noatak’s landing pad and pray that he could grab the rig’s crew members one by one as they let go of the rails to which they were clinging and made their way across the fatally unstable pad, perched at the very edge of the barge’s upper deck, with no shelter from the wind as it came howling through the drill tower’s rigging. Should a crewman slip before he was safely clipped to the harness dropped from the helicopter there was nothing but the flimsy railing to stop him plunging into the sub-zero waters where the cold would certainly kill him, even if drowning did not.

One by one eight men ascended from the hell of the barge to the heavenly embrace of the helicopter. But then the pilot signaled that the Dolphin could take no more weight onboard and the helicopter disappeared off into the night. The seven men still left aboard the Noatak had a rational, intellectual grasp of what was happening. The Dolphin was flying to the Glenallen, which had closed to within a mile, and the process would be repeated in reverse as the Noatak’s crew were lowered on to the tug’s landing pad, grabbed by its crew and taken below. But it was one thing to be told that the helicopter would return and another to believe that it could when all the time the coast was getting ever nearer. Even when the Dolphin had taken up its station above the landing pad once again, the tension did not ease for a moment. The swinging drill tower might at any moment strike the helicopter’s rotor blades like a stick shoved between the spokes of a bicycle wheel, but to far deadlier effect. The coast was somewhere out there in the impenetrable night, coming closer and closer all the time, yet the crew of the Dolphin could not rush, for haste would only lead to mistakes.

The last seven men had to wait their turn, beating back the fear that was taking an even tighter grip of their minds and bodies, resisting the urge to fight their way past the men whose turn to be rescued would come sooner than their own. One by one, they rose into the sky. Wave by wave the inevitable impact of the barge against the shore came closer. Finally only the captain of the Noatak remained and he was still hanging in mid-air when the curtain of snow in front of the Dolphin’s cockpit parted for a moment and the light picked out a blackness that somehow seemed more solid than what had been there before. It took the pilot a second or two to compute what he was seeing and then he was pulling the Dolphin up and away, praying that both the helicopter and the men hanging beneath it would miss the rockface that had suddenly appeared before them and now threatened to flatten them like insects against a windshield.

Only seconds later the Noatak smashed into the jagged promontory. Its hull comprised two thick layers of steel, specifically designed to resist the crushing grip of Arctic pack ice. But even that steel proved no defense against the harsh, unyielding rock. The hull ruptured, the water flooded in and the drilling barge Noatak sank beneath the pounding waves, with only the drill tower rising above the water’s surface to mark its passing.

In Houston, John Bigelow, Chief Executive and President of Bannock Oil, had been up all night, following developments in the northern wastes from the comfort of his home office. Shortly after three in the morning he got the call he’d been dreading from Bannock’s office in Anchorage, Alaska.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Bigelow, but we lost the Noatak. I assure you, sir, that we did our best, the Coast Guard, too, but this was a helluva storm. For this time of year, we’ve not seen anything like it this century.”

Bigelow maintained his air of unruffled command throughout the next few minutes as he established the extent of the losses, both human and material. There was little environmental damage beyond the wreckage of the barge itself, that at least was something to be glad of. But when the call was finished he walked unsteadily to his drinks cabinet and poured himself a very large Scotch. He took one gulp and then set the glass aside, unfinished, as he slumped into a chair, held his head in his hands and asked aloud, “My God, what have I done?”

The early-morning sun was slicing through the semi-opened slats of the bedroom blinds and Congo was sitting up in bed, watching TV. A young girl lay on the rumpled sheets beside him. She rolled over in her sleep so that her head was level with his naked crotch. Then with one hand she reached out reflexively and cuddled his genitalia.

“Not now.” He pushed her hand away. “I’m trying to concentrate, for Chrissakes!”

The girl rolled back to where she’d started and dropped into deep sleep again. Johnny Congo had been awake all night, too jacked up on all the coke he’d snorted to be able to sleep. Now he was curious to know if his escape was still making any waves, so he’d turned the smart TV to CNN, keeping the volume down low because he didn’t want the little bitch beside him to wake up and start whining at him for her money. Next he opened up a screen within the screen to check all his and Carl’s email accounts. And then it wasn’t just the drugs that were keeping him wide awake.

It began with Congo replaceing a Bannock Oil newsletter that had been emailed to Carl in his role as the sole remaining adult beneficiary of Henry Bannock’s trust fund. The two words “Hector Cross” leaped out of the screen at Congo as if they’d been written in neon the size of the Hollywood sign. There the white Limey bastard was, bragging about how he was going to keep the Bannock installation in Angola safe and sound and Congo found himself laughing aloud at the way his bitterest enemy had delivered himself into his hands.

“Now I know just where to replace you, white boy,” Congo murmured happily, his wired mind so filled with random, half-formed ideas about how to revenge himself on Hector Cross that he did not at first pay much attention to the breaking news story about an oil-drilling barge sinking off the coast of Alaska. But then he thought he heard someone say the words “Bannock Oil,” so he put the news on to full-screen, turned up the volume loud enough to hear clearly and focused on the news story as it slowly took shape, each new reporter or talking head adding one more small piece to a puzzle that was still a long way from being completed.

The element of the sinking that most troubled Congo was its possible effect on Bannock stock. Cross’s attack on the palace complex he and Carl had built for themselves in Kazundu had left Carl dead and their buildings in ruins. When Congo had been captured and thrown in jail, the various criminal enterprises he had run alongside Carl all fell to pieces. That left the Bannock Trust as his sole source of cash, but the trust was largely funded by the dividends earned by the company stock that formed the great bulk of its capital value. If Bannock Oil suffered, so would the trust and so would Congo.

Congo felt put-upon, paranoid, convinced that the sinking of a barge in Alaska was somehow, in ways he could not quite work out, part of a scheme to rob him of the money that was rightfully his. Money was what this was all about, so he flicked channels until he got a network that was all about money: Bloomberg.

By this time it was six in the morning. The daily Bloomberg Surveillance show was just starting, and it was opening with helicopter footage of a searchlight, sweeping across storm-tossed waters. This had to be the sinking. Congo sat right up in bed and prepared himself to watch the show.

It was eleven o’clock in London and Hector Cross was finishing his third mug of coffee that morning as he worked on his pitch to the Bannock Oil board for the funds he would need to buy a military surplus ship. Aside from the brief glimpses of a kiddies’ TV show that he’d caught while attempting to shovel some breakfast down his little girl’s pretty but uncooperative mouth, Cross had deliberately stayed away from all media or means of communication. He was about to put in a request for several million of Bannock Oil’s dollars and he had to get it right first time, so he didn’t want anything to distract him. Then his iPhone pinged to alert him of an incoming message. Cross ignored it, but a minute later, programed to take offense when ignored, the phone pinged a second time and he could not help himself glancing at the screen. The sender was one of his contacts, named as “JB Private Office,” which meant Bigelow, or Jessica, his senior personal assistant. The message was so brief that it was all contained within the alert. It simply read: “Urgent. Turn on Bloomberg Surveillance NOW. CEO interview re Noatak.”

Cross frowned with annoyance. The word “Noatak” rang a bell, but he couldn’t remember why. Still, if it was important enough for Bigelow’s office to contact him at five in the morning, Houston time, he’d better replace out what the fuss was all about. He switched on his office TV, found Bloomberg on the Sky box and saw a middle-aged man whose thinning gray hair, horn-rimmed spectacles and bow-tie gave him the air of a college professor rather than a morning TV presenter.

“So,” the man was saying, “market-makers are waking up to two major stories that could have significant impact on early trading on the Dow this morning. We’ll be returning to one of them momentarily, the loss of Bannock Oil’s Alaskan oil-drilling barge Noatak.”

Cross gasped out loud. Now he knew why the message had been so insistent. He went online, looking for more information, while the presenter continued, “But before that, you can bet Slindon Insurance CEO Thornton Carpenter didn’t enjoy opening his inbox this morning, because it contained one of Seventh Wave Investment’s founder Aram Bendick’s legendary flamings.”

Cross was only vaguely aware of a photograph of a balding, pugnacious white male in a suit filling the screen as the presenter continued, “Bendick has made billions thanks to his hyper-aggressive, extremely personal attacks on corporate bosses, made in the form of personal emails that he simultaneously releases online. His strategy is to force company boards to ditch their existing strategies and run their businesses the way he sees fit, and which usually involves aggressive cost-cutting measures that boost short-term profits and stock prices but, say critics, including many of Bendick’s victims, leave previously healthy businesses hollowed-out and easy prey for competitors.”

Now an image of a letter with a few lines superimposed in much larger type appeared. Cross had gone on to the BBC News site and was working his way through the several stories that had already been posted about the sinking. He was only catching the odd word as the voice from the screen informed more attentive viewers that, “Bendick’s letter accuses Carpenter of, quote: ‘running Slindon for the benefit of himself and his fellow senior executives, rather than shareholders . . . wasting millions on golf tournament sponsorships that gave board members the opportunity to hobnob with top golfers and golf groupies, but did nothing to promote the Slindon Insurance brand’ and ‘indulging in orgies of over-eating, over-drinking and obscene overspending, only barely disguised as strategic-planning retreats for senior decision-makers.’

“Mr. Carpenter has yet to respond to these allegations, but Aram Bendick joins us now from his New York City apartment—good morning, Mr. Bendick.”

“Good morning, Tom.”

So now Cross had half the presenter’s name, at least.

“Slindon Insurance profits were up three percent last year, the company paid record dividends to stockholders, and that was all on Thornton Carpenter’s watch. So why the attack on him now, and why make accusations that some might say have nothing to do with his performance as CEO?”

Bendick’s reply was as confrontational as his appearance. In an abrasive “Noo Yoik” accent he sneered, “Because they’ve got everything to do with his performance, which is lazy, ineffective and lacking in any clear vision for the future of the business he’s supposed to lead.”

“And this is because Slindon—like a lot of major corporations—sponsor a PGA tournament? Really?”

“Yeah, really. Look, you said the company’s profits were up three percent. Their three closest competitors averaged over five. Why? Because their CEOs and their boards and their executives were thinking about growing their markets and cutting their costs, not about buying Bermuda shorts and suntan oil for a five-day, all-expenses-paid luxury holiday in Hawaii, dressed up as a chance to think outside the goddamn envelope—excuse my language but this kind of corruption, because that’s what it is, really offends me.”

“So you stand by all your comments in the letter?”

“I wouldn’t have written them if I didn’t.”

“And what do you want to see happen next?”

“I want, and expect, my fellow stockholders in Slindon to demand—and get—major changes in corporate policy. And if that means changes in personnel, so be it.”

“And do you have any other corporations in your sights right now?”

“Always, Tom . . . always.”

“So, Aram Bendick laying it on the line there, the way he usually does. We’ll be following this story as it develops and as soon as we get a response from anyone at Slindon, you’ll have it. Now to Alaska, where a Bannock Oil drilling barge sank at around eleven last night, local time.”

Now Tom had Cross’s complete attention as he continued, “This marks the latest in a string of setbacks for Bannock and a number of other oil companies trying to open fields in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, north of Alaska. They’ve been dogged by the difficulty of working in one of the most hostile environments on the planet, and by constant criticism and hostile lobbying from Green campaigners opposed to any further exploitation of Alaskan oilfields. I’m joined by Maggie Kim, noted Wall Street petrochemicals analyst and founder of the Daily Gas blog and newsletter. Maggie, what effect do you see this disaster having on Bannock Oil, going forward?”

Maggie Kim was a Eurasian woman who could, Cross thought, be damn good-looking if she ever took that stern “take me seriously” expression off her face and risked an occasional smile. But once she started talking he forgot all about her looks. This woman clearly knew what she was talking about, and it wasn’t good news for Bannock Oil.

“As you say, Tom,” Kim began, “the Noatak is not the first drilling barge to be lost in Alaskan waters. On New Year’s Eve 2012, the Shell barge Kulluk ran aground and had to be scrapped. A little over a year later, Shell halted its entire drilling program in the Alaskan Arctic, which had cost around five billion dollars to that point and announced an immediate six-hundred-and-eighty-seven-million-dollar write-off. Now, a loss like that is a serious blow, even to Shell which regularly ranks among the world’s three largest corporations. But a business like Bannock, which is much smaller, is correspondingly less able to withstand such a shock.”

“So was Bannock biting off more than it could chew, going into the Alaskan Arctic in the first place?”

Kim nodded thoughtfully. “That’s certainly a valid question. For the past several years, first under the leadership of Hazel Bannock, widow of the company’s founder Henry Bannock, and her successor as President and CEO John Bigelow, Bannock has had an aggressive, high-risk, expansionist policy. And I have to admit that it’s worked up to now. Hazel Bannock bet the farm on what industry experts believed was a played-out oilfield in the Arab Emirate of Abu Zara and hit an untapped subterranean chamber filled with five billion gallons of sweet and light crude. Now Bigelow and the Bannock board are playing double or quits, because they’re also opening a field off the West African state of Angola. The company won’t release precise figures for its combined investment in Alaska and Africa, but it has to be close to ten billion dollars.”

“Well, Bigelow lost his chips on one half of their bet when that barge sank last night. Can he and Bannock afford it if both bets go down the pan?”

“You know, I hesitate to give you a definitive yes or no on that right now, without knowing the exact numbers. But I can tell you for sure that John Bigelow’s got to be praying that nothing goes wrong in Angola. And when I think about all the security issues that have plagued the oil industry in West Africa—bombs, corruption, even hijacked ships—I’ve got to wonder if Bannock can possibly survive another disaster like the one last night.”

“Thank you, Maggie, and to answer the points that you raised, I’m joined now by John Bigelow himself. Good morning, Senator. I guess I should first ask you, have all the crew from the Noatak been recovered safely?”

“Good morning, Tom,” said Bigelow, who looked as exhausted, anxious and tense as any other 62-year-old man would do who’d been dragged from his bed in the early hours to be told that one of his ships had just sunk. “I’m delighted to be able to report that thanks to the hard work and courage of the fine men and women of the U.S. Coast Guard, all fifteen members of the crew were taken off the Noatak before she sank and are safe and well. And can I also say how glad I am that you led with that question, because our concern right now, as a company, is for our people, not our bottom line. At times like these, human lives matter much more than dollars and cents.”

“That’s very true, Senator, but like it or not, dollars and cents will very quickly become the issue. Maggie Kim has just been giving us her view that you have been playing double or quits, trying to develop two fields simultaneously . . .”

“Yes, I heard that.”

“Is she right?”

Bigelow faked a smile and gave a hollow, joyless chuckle that made Cross wince: if a man’s laughter was that unconvincing what did that say about his words? “Well, you know, Tom, I’ve enjoyed listening to Maggie over the years. She’s always got something to say, that’s for sure. But she’s in business, just like we are, and hers consists of saying things that will grab people’s attention. Mine is running a profitable, stable, successful petrochemicals business, and that’s what I plan to keep doing.”

“With due respect, Senator, you didn’t answer my question: has Bannock’s ambitious development program left it over-extended?”

“My answer to that is very simple: no. With respect to our Alaskan operations, the Noatak was fully insured, we will be able to commission a replacement and the oil will still be waiting when operations begin again. As for Angola, as I’m sure you know, Tom, I served for many years on the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, so I know a little about global affairs and have a great many contacts upon whom I can call for advice. And from everything I have been told, I can assure you, Maggie Kim and your viewers that the situation in Angola is nothing like that prevailing in Nigeria, where the government faces a serious threat from Islamist militants. Those people do not exist in Angola. The government is secure, the country is peaceful and there is no cause for alarm.”

“Well, that’s bloody well asking for trouble,” Hector Cross muttered to himself.

“So you’re confident that your bets on Alaska and Angola will pay off?”

“They’re not bets, Tom, that’s what I’m saying,” Bigelow replied. “They’re sensible, pragmatic investments made on the basis of known oil and gas reserves. And, yes, those investments will provide Bannock Oil and its shareholders with a significant return on their capital for many years to come.”

The interview ended and Cross switched off the TV. He wondered whether it was even worth writing the funding request. John Bigelow had done his best to put up a strong defense. But Cross knew him well enough to be able to recognize when the Senator was saying what he actually believed, or just toeing the party line.

Meanwhile, in Caracas, Johnny Congo was feeling like he was watching a lottery draw and all the numbers on his ticket were coming up one by one: the news that Cross would be working on Bannock’s Angolan project; then the hedge-funder that liked sticking it to corporate bosses; then the Bannock oil rig going down. Somewhere in all that there was a way of nailing Cross once and for all. He couldn’t quite figure it out yet, but it was there all right, no doubt about that. What he needed now was something to distract and relax him, so that his subconscious could work on the problem and figure out an answer, and that something was lying right beside him.

He stretched out his right arm and gave the sleeping girl beside him two rough shakes. She woke up, raised herself on one elbow and looked at him through groggy unfocused eyes as he pulled the sheet down to his knees.

“Put your mouth over here, girl. Time you got back to work.”

Well, gentlemen, the hot news that I wish to share with you is that Mateus da Cunha is holding a reception at his French grandparents’ apartment in Paris to launch a foundation he is setting up, officially to raise awareness of Cabinda and promote the cause of independence in that country. Unofficially, I believe it’s a front for his plan to gain control of Cabinda by force.” Nastiya O’Quinn was addressing the meeting of Cross Bow Security high command which she had asked Hector Cross to convene. She was sitting on Hector’s desk and the rest of the team were spread out around the room in front of her, draped in various attitudes of relaxation over the furniture. Nastiya was wearing a tight-fitting skirt which had rucked up above her knees to reveal her calves. No matter how often they had been presented with this view it still demanded their full attention. But now, as one, they raised their eyes to her face.

“So fasten your seatbelts, ladies and gentlemen, we are about to take off,” Hector cut in. “As you will recall from our previous discussions, the oil reserves in the province of Cabinda could be worth two or three hundreds of billions of dollars.” There was a general murmur of interest and excitement and her audience sat forward on their seats.

Nastiya nodded. “Some estimates put the amount even higher, especially if oil ever gets back to a hundred dollars a barrel. I have been invited to the da Cunha reception not as Nastiya O’Quinn, but as Maria Denisova, an investment consultant, whose clients are Russian oligarchs and other ultra-high-net-worth individuals from the former Soviet Union. Although the Duchêne family is known for its tradition of liberal, even radical opinions, it’s one of the oldest and richest families in France. So this will be a very smart occasion, attracting the cream of Parisian society, as well as many guests from across Europe and even the United States. On the other hand, it will also be a money-raising event. Now I will hand you over to Dave Imbiss to give you further details. If you please, David.” She flashed her famous smile at him across the room.

“I’ve put together the legend for Miss Denisova,” Dave Imbiss told them. “I’ve set up her company website, along with a trail of newspaper articles, social media pages, and photographs of Nastiya with men whom da Cunha will certainly recognize. We’re also working on setting up a Moscow office, with an email address and a phone that will be manned by old contacts of Nastiya’s.”

“I plan to go to Moscow in the next few days to put everything in place. I will also be hiring a personal assistant, who will act as the receptionist if anyone calls the office or visits it.”

“I’m concerned about security,” Hector cut in. “Can you trust these contacts of yours and some dolly-bird receptionist to sound convincing if da Cunha gets in touch, and to keep their mouths shut at all other times?”

“I met these friends of mine when we were all being trained in the arts of espionage, so yes, if you can trust me, you can trust them too. As for the receptionist, I do not know the term ‘dolly bird,’ but I have someone in mind and, yes, I am confident that she can be relied on, too,” Nastiya told him forcibly.

“Fair enough. Now, can you get an invitation to this party?”

“I already have one. I called up da Cunha’s office, as Maria Denisova. I explained who I was, what I did, and how much money my clients had to spend on interesting investments that offered above-average returns. They put me straight on the list.”

“Will you need Dave to be with you in Moscow, or Paris?”

“I can make sure you’re tracked all the way, so if anything goes wrong I can get you out of it,” Imbiss assured her.

“No, that’s all right, Dave. Moscow is no problem and you’ve got equally important work to do here, helping Hector to get the Caracas job set up. As for Paris, I can look after myself there, too. Just get me the smallest video camera you can replace, show me how to set it up and I’ll be fine.”

“You’re not making a sex tape are you?” said O’Quinn, trying and failing to make it sound like a joke.

“Don’t worry, my darling,” said Nastiya, talking for once as a loving wife rather than a tough professional. “You know how it is: I may have to blackmail da Cunha. The best way of doing that is to have damaging material that he would never want publicized. Would it embarrass him to be seen having sex with a white woman? No. But if that woman had slipped Rohypnol into his drink, knocked him out and then created footage that appeared to show him tied up while she whipped him, then I think he would tell her almost anything to stop the world seeing him humiliated that way.”

“Ah, that old whipping routine,” said O’Quinn, nodding in understanding. “It always works. The men’ll say anything. For example, I said, ‘Will you marry me?’ when you did it to me.”

When she got to Moscow, Nastiya went straight from the airport to the Sadoyava Plaza office building, a prestigious location just a couple of hundred meters from Tverskaya Street, where many of the world’s smartest designer names had their flagship Russian stores. She rented a serviced suite on the fourth floor, where all the building’s short-let office space was located, and made arrangements to have it accessorized with equipment, decorative displays and furniture that would be appropriate for a business serving high-net-worth clients.

With that element of her cover secured, she made her way to her mother’s apartment, where Yevgenia was staying. The three women hugged and kissed, laughed and cried. She was delighted to discover that the swelling on her sister’s face had subsided and any remaining traces of bruising could be concealed by make-up. The two of them spent the rest of that first day together talking, beginning the task of filling in the gaps left by all the years they’d spent apart, and getting to the point where they could call one another Nastiya and Zhenia without feeling at all uncomfortable. Zhenia did not know it, but she was being tested, or more precisely auditioned for the role of Maria Denisova’s personal assistant.

“Oh! My first real job!” said Zhenia excitedly the following morning when Nastiya told her that she had a role set aside for her in the da Cunha operation.

“Well, it’s your first real fake job,” Nastiya pointed out. “But this is a very important pretence. I need to know that if anyone comes looking for my business, they will replace one that is credible enough to make them trust me. I will have a couple of my colleagues from the old days—”

“Do you mean spies? Papa once said that you’d become a spy.”

“Never mind that, all you need to know is that they are good men, completely trustworthy and tough enough to keep you safe. All you have to do is learn the whole of Maria Denisova’s legend: who she is, what she does, who her clients are—everything.”

“I can do that,” said Zhenia, “but what am I going to wear? I mean, wouldn’t a personal assistant go around in, I don’t know . . . business clothes? I don’t have anything like that.”

“Then we’ll buy you some.”

“Oh good! But there’s still one other thing that worries me. You said that I have to know all about Maria Denisova’s clients.”

“That’s right. And if anyone wants to speak to them, you must make the connection.”

“But who are they? This business of yours doesn’t really exist. How can it have clients?”

“Because our darling father is going to give them to me.”

“Are you sure?” Zhenia asked dubiously. “I don’t think he’ll want to give you anything.”

“And I don’t think he’s going to have any choice in the matter. Give me his number. It’s time I said hello after all these years.”

Voronov was intrigued by the prospect of meeting his long-lost daughter, and interested when she said she knew where he could replace her younger sister, who was still missing. He summoned her to his dacha, just outside Moscow, where he lived when the demands of business weren’t keeping him in the city.

Nastiya had no intention of giving her father any excuse to degrade her with the same kind of insults he had hurled at Zhenia, and she certainly didn’t want to provide him with the slightest encouragement to develop any incestuous feelings toward her as he had done with Zhenia. So she put her hair up into a very casual chignon and donned an impeccably tailored, slim-fitting trouser suit by Jil Sander that played with the idea of a man’s double-breasted jacket without being in the slightest bit butch. This she teamed with a pair of flat brown brogues that were not only chic, but also had artfully hidden steel toecaps. As a fighting outfit, this gave her complete ease of movement, and a dash of hidden danger. But by pulling her hair up off her face and neck, she merely revealed the perfection of her bone structure, while the trouser suit was cut so cunningly that it constantly hinted at the figure it was apparently disguising.

She was met outside her hotel by a chauffeur-driven black Maybach limousine. The driver, she saw at once, was trying to hide a gun in a shoulder holster beneath his uniform jacket. The fact that she had found it so easy to spot reassured her. It suggested that he was far from first-rate and, if the need arose, could be dealt with relatively easily. Nastiya smiled sweetly as he opened the door for her, deciding to play the role of the pretty little woman: one of her great pleasures in life was seeing the look of surprise on the face of stupid, thuggish men when they realized, too late, that she was not at all what she seemed.

They drove out of the city and into the woods where, in decades gone by, the Party bigwigs had built their dachas, or country cottages. Today, all those relatively humble buildings had been knocked down, replaced by grotesquely oversized mansions, temples of bad taste for men with ill-deserved fortunes, hidden behind endless kilometers of high walls, watched over by security cameras as if the men and women beyond them were prisoners of the State, rather than its owners. Finally, the Maybach turned off the road and drove up to an ornate wrought-iron gate, guarded by a sentry box. The limo stopped by the box, the driver conferred with the guard and the gates swung open. The tree-lined drive that greeted them twisted and turned around an open landscape dotted with trees, classical follies and even a lake with an ancient stone bridge at one end that hardly seemed Russian at all. Then Vitaly Voronov’s country cottage came into view and Nastiya suddenly found herself gripping her hand to her mouth to stifle her giggles. The building in front of her would have been instantly recognizable to hundreds of millions of people around the world, for it was an apparently perfect reproduction of Highclere Castle, the stately home in Berkshire, England, best known as the location of TV’s Downton Abbey.

“My God,” Nastiya whispered to herself, “the crazy, drunken pervert thinks he’s the Earl of Grantham.”

The car scrunched up the last stretch of gravel and came to a halt before the main entrance. The driver opened the passenger door and Nastiya walked up the front staircase to the massive, studded wooden doors that opened, as if by magic, at her approach. She steeled herself for the moment when she and her father would clap eyes on one another for the first time in more than fifteen years. But when she stepped into the great hall, the first person she met was her stepmother Marina.

Marina was exceptionally beautiful—Nastiya saw at once where Yevgenia had got her looks. However she was so impeccably dressed, groomed and painted that she seemed less like a living person than a precious object. But there was a look in her eyes that Nastiya recognized at once, for she had seen it in her mother, many years ago. It was the despairing, broken look of a woman who has had the joy of life beaten out of her, whose soul has been ground down by violence and abuse. At once, any hostility or suspicion Nastiya might have felt toward the seductress who had taken her father from her vanished, replaced by a fierce determination to defend a woman who was herself defenseless.

Marina did not say hello. Instead, she stepped forward, took Nastiya’s hands in hers and, in a voice that was little more than an anguished whisper, asked, “How is she?”

“She is safe and well,” Nastiya assured her, leaning forward to kiss Marina on the cheek. She paused when their heads were side by side and murmured, “And you will be too. I promise.”

Then they stepped back and Marina raised her voice to the normal pitch of one woman greeting another and said, “You look so chic, my dear. You must tell me where you found that divine suit. Doesn’t she look lovely, darling?”

Vitaly Voronov grunted noncommittally as he walked into the lobby. He was wearing a tweed shooting jacket and a pair of plus-fours that were clearly the work of a Savile Row tailor, yet even the skill of the craftsmen who had cut and sewn them could not disguise the vulgarity of the mustard-colored checked pattern that Voronov had chosen, or the fact that the man inside them was a crude, uncultured boor.

“You didn’t tell me Anastasia was so beautiful,” Marina added. “You must be very proud.”

Voronov ignored his wife completely and looked at his oldest daughter with an indifference that bordered on contempt. Nastiya was mortified by how deeply the little girl in her was hurt by the total absence of love in his voice. She told herself that she should never have been so stupid as to expect even a shred of paternal affection from a pig like him.

“Go,” Voronov said to his wife, dismissing her with a wave of his hand.

One more reason to hate him, thought Nastiya, watching her stepmother vanish obediently into the depths of the vast house.

“Follow me,” Voronov said, leading Nastiya into one of the reception rooms that led off the hall. However faithful the architects had been to the exterior of Highclere, they had paid no attention whatsoever to its interior decoration. The homely grandeur of family portraits, antique furniture and great bookcases filled with leather-bound volumes had been replaced by a vulgar profusion of black marble, glittering mirrors, gleaming chrome, gold knick-knacks and white leather furniture that seemed more appropriate to a sheikh’s bordello in downtown Riyadh or a bachelor pad for a Colombian cocaine baron than a family’s country home.

Voronov sat himself down in a large armchair, indicated that Nastiya should take a similar one opposite his and picked up a telephone handset from a side table. “You want a drink?” he asked.

“No thank you.”

“Your loss. Give me a bottle of vodka. No, not that gutrot, the good stuff.” Voronov put the phone down and looked at his oldest child. “So what do you want? Because if you want money, you can just piss off. You aren’t having any from me.”

“No, Father, I don’t want money.”

“Good. So what is it then?”

A waiter in a white jacket—also covering a weapon, Nastiya noted—placed a tray on the table beside Voronov. Nastiya saw a heavy crystal tumbler and a silver ice bucket from which protruded the neck of a vodka bottle. The waiter then reached for the bottle, swathed it in a gleaming white napkin and poured it into the tumbler, all the way to the top, before replacing the bottle in the bucket. He then disappeared without a word.

Nastiya watched the little performance and let her father have a good long drink before she spoke. “There are a number of things that I want from you, Father, and they will not cost you a single rouble. But before I explain precisely what they are, I want to ask you a question: do you want to die?”

Voronov put down his glass and looked at her as if she were talking gibberish. “What kind of stupid question is that? Of course I don’t want to die.”

“Good, because you will die, and I will be the one who kills you, unless you do exactly what I say.”

Voronov burst out laughing. “You? Kill me? Don’t make me—”

But he never finished the sentence. Somehow—for Voronov could not possibly have explained how she’d done it—Nastiya covered the gap between them before he was able to move. She pinned him down with a crushing grip on his throat.

“I assume that your security people are watching on closed-circuit TV,” she told him.

Voronov made a squawking sound and flapped his hands weakly.

“You will agree that I could have killed you and been gone from the house before they reached you. You see, Papa darling, I was trained by the Spetsnaz.” She released her grip on his throat and slipped gracefully back into her chair. “When your useless buffoons arrive, tell them there’s nothing to worry about. Just a little spat between a father and his daughter. If you say anything else, I will not be so kind the next time and, believe me, your guards will not be able to save you, or themselves. So, I can hear them coming . . .”

By the time the bodyguards burst into the room, Nastiya was sitting with her legs demurely crossed and the first thing they heard was her laughing prettily and saying, “Oh Papa, you’re so amusing!”

The lead guard stopped in the doorway. “Is everything all right, sir?”

Voronov opened his mouth to speak, discovered that he could emit no more than a harsh, painful croak and waved them away with a desperate grin.

“You should have paid more attention to me, Father,” Nastiya said as the door closed behind the last guard. “Then you would have known about the work that I’ve been doing and the skills I’ve picked up along the way. But since you’ve now learned from experience what I’m capable of, I’ll tell you what it is you’re going to do for me.”

She got up from her seat, walked toward Voronov and was delighted to see him cringe away from her as she approached. “Here,” she said, “let me be a good daughter and pour you another drink. You’ll feel better with this inside you.”

As her father drank, gasping at first as the alcohol went down his bruised throat, Nastiya listed her demands. “Firstly, you are going to give me everything Yevgenia needs to get on with her life, including her internal and international passports, her driving license, the keys to her car—I assume it’s where she left it in the garage beneath the Moscow Tower—her laptop and tablet and three large suitcases filled with her belongings. I have a list of what she needs. Give it to your staff and we will pick it up from the tower this evening, at the same time as we pick up her car.”

“Forget it,” Voronov rasped. “I’m not giving that ungrateful little bitch the dogshit off the bottom of my shoe.”

Nastiya gave him an indulgent smile, as if talking to someone with a tragic mental handicap. “No, you’re going to give her everything. Do you need another demonstration, just to remind you what I can do?”

Voronov looked at her. Perhaps he was trying to work out if her threats were real. Or maybe he was wondering how the little girl he’d left behind more than twenty years ago had somehow turned into a trained killer. Nastiya really wasn’t bothered either way. She stared right back at him until he cracked and said, “What else do you want?”

“You are going to call two of the richest, most powerful people you know. I don’t care where they live: Moscow, St. Petersburg, London, New York, Paris—doesn’t matter. They just have to be rich, trustworthy and willing to do you a personal favor. You’re going to tell them that you have a new mistress. Her name is Maria Denisova. She used to work in a bank, but now she wants to set herself up as a financial adviser, replaceing unique investment opportunities that offer massive potential rates of return: from companies that are way undervalued, to new artists who are about to hit the big time. You are indulging her in this foolish ambition because the happier you make her, the happier she wants to make you, and we all know how she can do that.

“So now this mistress has found a man with investment potential. His name is da Cunha. She needs to be able to tell him that she is working for other ultra-high-net-worth individuals. All you need your friends to do is to be ready to take da Cunha’s call and to reassure him that Maria Denisova can be trusted. If he tries to sell them anything, they should tell him that they’d rather everything went through Miss Denisova.”

“Who is this da Cunha?” Voronov asked.

“A Portuguese, with an African father who has big development plans in West Africa.”

Voronov suddenly perked up. “Really? Should I invest with him?”

Nastiya answered his question with a question of her own. “When you get an email from Nigeria, asking you for money, do you send them the cash?”

Voronov nodded. “OK, I get it. So what’s your interest in this da Cunha, then?”

“Professional. I can’t say any more than that. If I did, it would only give me another reason to kill you.”

Voronov laughed. “That’s funny!”

“No . . . it’s not. And just to be clear, da Cunha will be given your name too, so if he contacts you, reply to him in the way I have outlined. So now, please, you have two calls to make. Start dialing.”

It took Voronov five attempts to replace the two men Nastiya needed: he’d already used up a lot of goodwill having Yevgenia shut out of Moscow society. But in the end he persuaded a newspaper magnate based in London and a retired petrochemicals tycoon now taking it easy at a palatial villa in Cyprus to act as referees for his fictional mistress. “If she ever gets sick of you, Vitaly,” the oil boss said, “tell her to give me a call. She can forget her little finance business. Just lie in the sun all day and screw me all night. Then she’ll know what a real man feels like!”

Voronov gave a forced laugh and ended the call. “There.” He looked at Nastiya. “Are we done now? I’d like to get on with my life. Without you in it.”

Nastiya did not answer him immediately. She looked deeply and steadily into the eyes of her father and she saw there the confirmation of what she had known about him all along. Vitaly Voronov, for all his boasting and manly posturing, was a craven coward. She, her mother and her half-sister had nothing more to fear from him, ever.

“Yes, we’re done,” she replied to his question at last. “But there’s one more thing you should know. If I ever hear that you’ve laid a finger on Yevgenia, Marina or any other woman unfortunate enough to enter your life, I will hunt you down and kill you. No matter where you are in the world, no matter how many men you hire to protect you, I will terminate your miserable existence. Now, could you tell your driver to get the Maybach? I need a lift back into Moscow.”

While Dave Imbiss and Nastiya O’Quinn had been setting up the da Cunha sting, Hector Cross had been thinking about the other matters on his agenda. It had not taken him long to work out that while the sinking of the Noatak had created one problem it might then have immediately solved it. After all, there was now a perfectly good, ocean-going tug with nothing to do in the Arctic any more. So why not take it down to Cabinda in the Atlantic to act as his floating headquarters on the Magna Grande offshore field?

Then one morning, soon after Nastiya’s return to London, Hector Cross summoned the team and told them, “I received a report last night from our investigator in Caracas—his name is Valencia, by the way. Guillermo Valencia. He and his people have been carrying out surveillance on the Villa Kazundu, or as I like to think of it ‘Chateau Congo’ for the past two weeks, and he’s done a damn good job. So, this is what we know . . .”

Cross pressed a key on his computer and an image appeared of a large house and its grounds, seen from above. “The villa is part of a private estate, built on a hill overlooking Caracas. The house is built against the hill and partly dug into it: from the huge garage that’s actually dug into the rock at the basement level to the bedrooms on the top floor. It’s in the highest, and therefore smartest row of houses, with just a short, steep stretch of scrubland above it before you get to the ridge that runs along the top of the hill. So this shot is taken from that land and you can see that it’s a very handy vantage point, one we should make use of.”

Cross pressed the key again and a grainy, zoom-lens image of a large African-American, dressed in swimming shorts and an open towelling robe, sitting astride a recliner by the pool, with an iPad on the cushion between his two thighs and a phone pressed to his ear.

“I don’t have to tell you who that is,” Cross said. “The reason Valencia made a point of sending it to me was that he said Congo spends a lot of time on the phone, or his iPad. In other words, he’s in touch with people in the outside world, and he’s talking to them for a reason.”

“I guess you’re the reason, Heck,” Dave Imbiss said.

“That’s one possibility, yes.”

Now three photographs of men in identical black suits, edited together into a single image, popped up onscreen. “Congo shares the property with three groups of people,” Cross continued. “The first are his security guards. They work in shifts of three at a time: one in the gatehouse and two patrolling the grounds. These men work for a security company, so they don’t have any personal loyalty toward Congo. They’re used to Congo being away, so they’ve become very slack in their procedures and Valencia says they don’t look like they’ve sharpened up much since Congo arrived back. Finally, they’re not expecting trouble. A lot of the residents on this estate are connected to the Venezuelan government, so if anything ever happened to them or their property, it would be taken very seriously indeed. They’d probably bring in SEBIN—short for Servicio Bolivariano de Inteligencia Nacional—the political police, who’ve been doing the dirty work for every Venezuelan government, whether hard right or far left, since 1969. And no small-time crook in their right minds would want to screw with them.

“One last important point about the guards: they’re armed, but only with pistols, rather than any fully automatic weapons. Turns out the gun-control laws are surprisingly strict in Venezuela. All guns apart from licensed hunting weapons are banned for private citizens. So the guards carry pistols, keep them well hidden and the local police turn a blind eye. So now the second group of people at the house: domestic staff.”

Cross pressed the key several times in quick succession and a series of images of men and women in different uniforms flashed by. “There’s about a dozen in all: the housekeeper, the chauffeur, plus assorted maids, cooks, gardeners and car-mechanics, some of them resident at the property, others just part-timers. Our only interest in them will be making sure they don’t get in our way.”

“So how are we going to do it?” asked Paddy O’Quinn.

“Very carefully,” Hector answered him. “This isn’t like charging into Africa, landing a bloody great plane filled with trucks and ordnance in the middle of nowhere and blasting away anything that moves. We’ll be operating in a guarded house in a fancy neighborhood, in the capital city of a relatively wealthy, sophisticated western nation. So, just for a start, we can’t take any weapons into the country. In fact we’re going to be completely unarmed when we breach the perimeter—which reminds me, something I forgot to say earlier: there’s an alarm system, a good one: cameras, motion sensors, pressure pads, panic buttons, the works. The feed from the CCTV cameras goes to the gatehouse. All the alarms are connected to the local emergency services. And one final thing: the doors to the house itself have all got keypad locks, each with a different code, and no one apart from Congo knows all the different codes.”

“Excuse me for repeating myself,” said O’Quinn, “but once again: how are we going to do it?”

Cross grinned: “Easy. So gather around, children, and I’ll tell you how . . .”

Hector needed three men for the Caracas job, so he made a quick trip to Abu Zara, where Cross Bow’s main operational base was located: there and back in under twenty-four hours. He spoke to half a dozen of his best men, telling them that he was looking for volunteers for an off-the-books mission, making it very clear that this was highly risky work that could end up with any or all of them in jail, or in the ground. More than once he was asked, “Are you going after Congo?” He didn’t reply to the questions, which was all the men needed to know. They all said they were up for it and so Cross drew lots, selecting Tommy Jones, Ric Nolan and Carl Schrager, who were veterans of the Parachute Regiment, SAS and U.S. Army Rangers respectively. They were booked on to separate flights that would take them on three different routes to Caracas. They were all staying in different hotels, just as Paddy O’Quinn and Hector himself would be doing.

Before he returned to London, Cross gave them a thorough briefing on precisely what he had in mind. Valencia had by now managed to get hold of the original architect’s plans for Chateau Congo and the men were given PDF copies and told to memorize them before they left Abu Zara, because they weren’t taking anything with them that could possibly link them to the property. On the night of the operation, they wouldn’t be carrying any form of ID.

“If anyone’s KIA, they’ll have to be put into an unmarked grave,” said Cross bluntly. “But I’ll know, and I’ll make sure your loved ones are looked after.”

The final instruction he gave them was to make sure they would be able to dress for action head to toe in black. “It’s stating the bleeding obvious, but don’t wear it all on the flight, or stick it all in the same case. I don’t want you walking into immigration at Caracas looking like a bloody SWAT team. Wear a black T-shirt, pack the black trousers—that’s pants to you, Schrager.”

“Yeah, he is pants and all,” bantered Jones.

“Balaclavas go in the carry-on. Roll ’em up so they look like socks. Right, any questions?”

Cross dealt with a few queries about the practicalities of the journey to Caracas and how to make contact when they got there. He listed a few items of civilian equipment that should be brought for use on the night. “Right, gentlemen,” he concluded. “Next time I see you, it’ll be in Caracas on the night of the mission. Good luck . . . and good hunting.”

The Duchêne apartment was located on the first and second floors of a mansion block on the Avenue de Breteuil, within a stone’s throw of both the Eiffel Tower and the Invalides. It was the epitome of Parisian elegance and sophistication. The building looked out on to a broad, tree-lined esplanade that provided a delicious sliver of parkland—immaculate lawns and paths made for slow, romantic strolls—running beside the avenue. Nastiya stood on the edge of the esplanade, in the shadow of the trees and watched for a few minutes as a stream of limousines disgorged the evening’s guests. The men were mostly dressed in anonymous suits and ties, though a few signaled their intellectual leanings in the slightly longer hair that was immaculately swept back off their foreheads and over their ears; the shirts daringly unbuttoned to mid-chest and the casually draped velvet scarves that kept those exposed, middle-aged ribcages protected from the winter chill. The women, of course, were as fanatically dieted, groomed, coiffed and couture-clad as Paris, that most fashionable of all cities, demanded.

Nastiya paid particular attention to the women. She was looking for signs of competition: single, predatory females who might have their own reasons for wishing to seduce a rich, handsome African leader-in-exile. Having made her assessment, she emerged from the trees, picked her way across the road and went through an arched gateway lit by flaming torches that led to an inner courtyard on to which the main entrance to the building opened. A line of guests awaiting admission trailed down the low flight of broad stone steps that led up to double doors, both open. These were flanked by a pair of black-suited security guards, complete with earpieces and, Nastiya noted, guns holstered beneath their jackets. Every so often a guest would be asked, very politely, to step to one side to be frisked. Just inside the door, two more female operatives were casting an eye into all the women’s bags. Finally another pair of younger, prettier women in matching cocktail dresses were checking guests’ names and IDs against a list. The very visible security precautions only added to the cachet of the event. They suggested the presence of something genuinely dangerous: an idea of liberty by which a government might be threatened and against which it might act. And that, she knew, would only serve to flatter the guests and make them feel all the more daring for attending.

Nastiya made her way past all the various checks and into a hallway floored in white marble on which exquisitely patterned Persian rugs had been laid. The magnificent staircase that rose up from an atrium to the first floor was marble, too, with an iron balustrade whose pattern was picked out with dashes of gold. Family portraits, lit by electric candelabra, lined the walls of the atrium, as if to remind anyone who wished to enter the Duchênes’ apartment that this was a family that could trace its line back through the centuries and would surely endure for centuries more to come. Waiters stood poised at the top of the stairs, bearing silver trays on which glasses of champagne sparkled invitingly. Nastiya took one and walked into the main salon. All the furniture, bar a few antique armchairs, had been removed to allow maximum space for guests to mingle, talk, admire themselves in the full-length mirrored panels set into the wood-panelled walls, or wander out through the three sets of French windows on to a terrace surrounded by stone balustrades and warmed by patio heaters.

A small dais with a microphone had been placed at the far end of the room, in front of a grand marble fireplace which was now flanked by a pair of loudspeakers on stands. Nastiya had just completed a circuit of the entire room and terrace when she saw a man who she knew to be almost eighty walk up onto the dais. This was Jérome Duchêne, the family patriarch. Now I know where da Cunha gets his looks, Nastiya thought to herself, for Duchêne could easily be taken for a handsome man in his sixties. He was still blessed with a full head of silver hair and slim enough to carry off an ensemble of a midnight-blue velvet dinner jacket with satin lapels, open white silk shirt and narrow-cut black evening trousers. He walked up on to the dais, tapped the microphone to check that it was on and, speaking in French, said, “Ladies and gentlemen, it is with great pleasure and a father’s pride that I present to you my grandson, Mateus da Cunha!”

There was a polite ripple of applause, followed by something that seemed like a mass intake of breath as the women in the room caught sight of their host. It was partly in the fluid, athletic way he strolled up on to the dais. His suit and shirt were both black, but his skin was a perfect, smooth café-au-lait and his features seemed to combine the strength of African features and the refinement of Nordic ones to create a perfect combination: a vision of what humanity would look like in a post-melting-pot age. He was tall and very obviously in excellent physical shape beneath his perfectly tailored clothes. But there was something more that became apparent the moment he looked around the room and was only underlined when he started to speak. It was that quality which can be called charisma, stardom, leadership, even charm, but which amounts to the ability to make oneself, without the slightest obvious effort, the center of everyone’s attention, while at the same time persuading every individual, male or female, that you are talking directly to them, that you are as fascinated by them as they are by you and that their wellbeing matters even more to you than your own. Da Cunha had it, and knew it, and every single person in the room soon knew it, too.

Da Cunha held out his hands, palms up, as if reaching out to everyone in the room. “My friends . . . my dear friends . . . first I must begin by begging your forgiveness. Here, in the capital of France, the city of my birth, I am speaking to you in English. It is, I know, an inexcusable treason . . .” He gave an almost bashful, apologetic smile that provoked a ripple of laughter. “But there are people here tonight from many nations and it is, perhaps sadly, a fact that English is the language they are most likely to share.”

It’s also, thought Nastiya, the language in which your French accent makes you sound the most charmingly seductive.

“So,” da Cunha continued, “thank you all for coming tonight. Simply by being here you are expressing your belief in the dream of an independent, prosperous, peaceful nation of Cabinda. And how perfect that we are sharing this dream in the city where the greatest of all rallying cries for people yearning to be free was born: Liberté, égalité, fraternité! That freedom, that equality and that brotherhood are what I desire for my people. But those blessings cannot be secured without the support of the outside world, a support that is moral, political and—yes, I cannot deny it—also financial. And so tonight I am announcing the creation of the Cabinda Foundation, a non-profit organization that will campaign for the cause of a free Cabinda. The foundation will hold events to raise money and awareness of the political situation in Cabinda, but also, more importantly, to educate people about the beautiful land of my forefathers.

“Now, I know what you are thinking . . .” da Cunha paused, looked around the room and again let the hint of a smile play around his lips. “Where the hell is Cabinda?”

This time the laugh was louder, an outburst of relief that he had acknowledged what all but the African experts were thinking, and forgiven them for thinking it.

“I will tell you. It sits on the west coast of Africa, just five degrees south of the equator, surrounded by much bigger, more powerful countries. One of these countries is Angola, which claims Cabinda as its province even though there is, as a matter of fact, no common border at all between Cabinda and Angola. This geographical reality is supported by historical precedent. Cabinda has been recognized as a distinct entity, separate from Angola, since the Treaty of Simulambuco of 1885, which was agreed between King Louis the First of Portugal and the princes and governors of Cabinda. The treaty also stated, and I quote: ‘Portugal is obliged to maintain the integrity of the territories placed under its protection.’

“So we are not asking for something new. We are demanding that the imperialist Angolan government, along with the entire global community, recognize a Cabinda that has existed for more than a century. So, you may ask yourself, what kind of place is this country of which, until this evening, I had never previously heard? Why should I care about it? What reason can there be for investing money in this Cabinda project?

“Well, mine is a small country, but it produces seven hundred thousand barrels of oil a day, generating enough revenue to provide an income of a hundred thousand dollars a year for every man, woman and child in the state. Think of the houses, the schools and the hospitals that could be built for those people. Think of the clean water they could drink and the roads, the airport, the telecommunications network that could be created for their benefit and that of overseas visitors and investors.”

Again, da Cunha paused to survey the room, but this time it was not for comic effect. “And consider this: a nation state that has a population of about four hundred thousand and an income of forty billion dollars does not need to levy income tax, sales tax or property tax on its citizens, or anyone else. And to anyone who loves to lie on a sunny beach I say that this is also a country with a tropical climate, one hundred kilometers of undeveloped coastline and no jetlag for anyone flying from Europe because Cabinda is just one hour behind Central European Time.

“My friends, I am talking of a Dubai with rainfall and lush green forests, or a Monte Carlo with oil. This is Cabinda, and I hope, and believe, that its future will be your future, and its prosperity will be your prosperity. Now, ladies and gentlemen, please raise your glasses and join me in a toast . . . to a free Cabinda!”

“A free Cabinda!” a chorus of voices replied as warm applause broke out around the room.

Da Cunha basked in the success of his speech for a moment and then said, “We are fortunate enough to have a number of respected members of the press here this evening. I am happy to take a few questions. But only a very few—this is a social occasion, after all. So if anyone would like to ask me anything, this is your chance.”

This was Nastiya’s moment. If she could engage da Cunha now and pique his interest, she could shortcut the whole process of getting to know him. But for that to work, she had to be the last person to whom he spoke and thus the freshest in his mind. So she did nothing as an earnest-looking woman, standing directly in front of the dais, raised her hand and said, “Pascale Montmorency, from Le Monde. My question for you, Monsieur da Cunha, is this: For many years FLEC-FAC, the organization that you represent, like your father did before you, supported the use of violence as a means to gain the freedom of Cabinda. Where do you personally stand on the question of violent action?”

Da Cunha had given a couple of thoughtful, appreciative nods as the question was asked. Now he replied, “I stand by my personal belief in seeking change by peaceful, political means, so I do not advocate violence. But I understand that when the conditions of life are intolerable, then some people will feel impelled to fight for their freedom. That has been the case for centuries. It was the case for the people of France when they rose up against the House of Bourbon in 1789, and when they resisted the Nazi occupiers of their nation during the Second World War. So I will not condemn those inside my country who wish to fight now, though I do counsel them that their actions must be proportionate and must never be targeted at the innocent. That I can never condone.”

An unshaven man in a shabby corduroy suit and a loosened tie gave his name as Peter Guilden from the London Daily Telegraph, then said, “Isn’t that just another way of saying that you don’t want to get your hands dirty, but you don’t mind if someone else does it for you? Surely you cannot hope to persuade the Angolan government to give away the most valuable province in their entire country, just by force of argument.”

Nastiya could see that the question irritated da Cunha, but the flash of anger in his eyes was swiftly replaced by humor as he smoothly replied, “How is it that a nation as polite as Britain can produce an institution as rude as the British press?”

Guilden pressed on, ignoring the laughter around him. “We’re not rude, Mr. da Cunha, just independent. As a lover of freedom, surely you welcome that.”

“Up to a certain point,” da Cunha said, with a very French shrug of the shoulders and pouting of the lips, earning more smiles from his audience. “But to answer your original question, I don’t believe that violent action is an essential prerequisite for regime change, or national independence. I think there comes a point when the injustice of a situation becomes intolerable to the whole world and change is then the only possibility. Violence did not end apartheid in South Africa. The Berlin Wall came down without a shot being fired. And neither South Africa nor East Germany had oil, which, as we all know, has a way of making the West pay attention. One last question . . .”

This was Nastiya’s moment. She fixed her most dazzling smile on her face, stuck up her hand, prayed that da Cunha would notice her and was relieved to discover that she, too, could still attract attention when she wanted to.

“The lady over there, in the green dress,” da Cunha said, looking straight into Nastiya’s eyes.

“Maria Denisova,” she said, looking right back at him. “Forgive me, Monsieur da Cunha, I am not a member of the press, but I do have a question to ask you.”

He gave her a charming smile, revealing perfect, dazzling white teeth and Nastiya could actually feel the envy-laden female stares boring into her back as da Cunha said, “I am proud of my Cabindan blood, but I am also half-French and it is therefore quite impossible for me to turn down a request from a beautiful woman. Please, madame, ask your question.”

“Actually, it is mademoiselle,” Nastiya purred, flirting shamelessly and provoking even more silent rage.

“All the more impossible for me to say no, then.”

“Very well. My question is this: you are the leader of the political movement for freedom in Cabinda and the creator of the Cabinda Foundation. Can we assume, then, that you will be the first leader of a free Cabinda? After all, you will go to so much trouble on Cabinda’s behalf, it would only be natural.”

Nastiya had, in the sweetest possible way, effectively accused da Cunha of wanting to stage a coup d’état, and she could sense the sudden tension in the room and, for a second time, the pattern of suppressed anger, swiftly followed by apparently lighthearted humor.

“What a question!” da Cunha exclaimed. “Are you sure you’re not really an English journalist?” He let the laughter subside before he continued, “I will answer you like this: I am not a prince in exile, waiting to be acclaimed by his people. I am a man who dreams of bringing freedom and democracy to a homeland from which he has long been excluded. By that same token I must accept the will of the Cabindan people. If they one day choose me to lead them, that would be the greatest honor I could ever receive. If they do not, then the knowledge that I helped give them the right to choose will be enough of a reward. Benjamin Franklin was never the President of the United States of America, but his place in history is just as secure as those who were. I would be honored to be Cabinda’s Benjamin Franklin.”

It was a mark of his arrogance that da Cunha could compare himself to one of America’s Founding Fathers, and an equal proof of his charisma that his audience responded with rapturous applause. Da Cunha bowed his head in thanks; then he stepped down from the dais and made his way straight to Nastiya.

“Are you sure you’re not a reporter?” he asked with another dazzling smile calculated to set any female tummy fluttering.

“Quite sure,” Nastiya said, reminding herself that she was just as adept at manipulating the male of the species. “But I admit that I had a reason for asking my question.”

“Apart from attracting my attention?”

“Maybe.” Nastiya produced a little shrug and pout of her own.

“So what was your reason?”

“It was a practical, business issue.” The words and her straightforward, no-nonsense tone were not what da Cunha had been expecting. “As I informed your office, I act as a representative and consultant to a number of very wealthy individuals. My job is to seek out interesting investment opportunities, like the work of a young artist who’s about to become a star; or a property that’s not officially for sale, but whose owner is open to offers . . . or a country that does not exist yet, but which could make a great deal of money for anyone bold enough to back it from the start.”

“And you want to know whether I am a safe investment?”

“Exactly. My clients need to know that you will be in a position to deliver your promises once Cabinda is free. They don’t want someone else coming in and saying, ‘Sorry, the deal’s off.’”

“Someone who doesn’t owe them anything, you mean?”

“That’s one way of putting it. So, my question stands: What guarantee can you give that you will achieve independence for Cabinda, or that you will lead the new nation when it wins its freedom?”

“Hmm . . .” da Cunha paused, and Nastiya could see that for once he wasn’t performing, or trying to create a particular effect. He was genuinely weighing up the degree to which he should take her and her potential backers seriously. “Those are certainly important questions,” he finally said, “and they deserve serious answers. I must attend to my other guests now and I am busy in meetings with potential supporters all of tomorrow and most of the day after. So perhaps you might join me for dinner, two days from now, and I will do my best to give you the right answers.”

“That sounds like a delightful idea.” Nastiya smiled, just to let him know that she wasn’t all just business, and da Cunha replied in kind.

“Then dinner it is,” he said.

Just as the capital of Mexico is Mexico City, so the capital of Cabinda—in fact, its only sizeable town—is also called Cabinda. It stands on a promontory that juts into the Atlantic like a stunted thumb. Jack Fontineau had been in Cabinda for less than a month and already he was so sick of the place that it was all he could do to stop himself walking out of his stifling office—where a single ancient fan, too old and decrepit to rotate at any speed, was all that stirred, let alone cooled the air—across the plain of dirt and dust littered with rusting containers and washed-up hulks that served as a dockside, on to the single long jetty at which ships of any size could berth and right into the shark-infested sea.

It was ten at night, which meant four in the afternoon back home in Houma, Louisiana, where his office at Larose Oil Services, his Chevy Silverado and the house which he shared with his wife Megan and their three kids were all not just air-conditioned, but damn near refrigerated. Jack could be there now if he hadn’t been foolish enough to accept what his boss Bobby K. Broussard swore was both a promotion and a great opportunity. “Go out to Africa, it’s the new frontier,” the lying bastard had said. “We want you to set up our office in Angola.”

Jack knew guys that had worked out of Luanda, and they said it was all right. There were decent hotels, beach clubs, bars where you could get any kind of imported booze you wanted. Sure, the prices were insane, but what did that matter when you were on expenses? But Jack wasn’t sent to Luanda. No, B. K. had figured out that most of Angola’s oil was up to the north, off Cabinda. So if Larose Oil Services could get into Cabinda ahead of the other companies that provided services for offshore rigs they’d have a captive market. It was only when Jack got to Cabinda that he discovered there was a reason everyone else was still in Luanda. The place was a dump. Most of the houses weren’t much more than shacks, and a three-story building with rusty metal windows and filthy whitewash peeling off the sides of crumbling walls was the locals’ idea of a luxury office complex.

As for running a serious offshore supply operation here, forget it. The government had plans for a fancy new port and oil terminal a few miles up the coast from the city. They’d put up a website with maps showing where the deep-water jetties, the rig-repair dock and the warehouses would be. But they’d yet to stick a single shovel in the ground, or cement one brick on top of another. A man could die of old age around here, waiting for things to get done. Forget mañana, that was way too soon for your typical Cabindan. But Jack couldn’t make the folks back at head office understand that, any more than he could get them to appreciate that he was six hours ahead of Louisiana time, which was why he’d ended up starting his working day around lunchtime and then staying at work till eleven o’clock at night, or even midnight, just so he could be on the end of the line when someone tried to call him. It was marginally less hot working evenings, too, which helped.

So now he was getting ready for another call from head office in which he’d try to explain why he wasn’t anywhere near hitting his new business targets for the quarter and pray that they’d send some other sucker out to take his place, even if it meant getting fired. Better that than taking a walk off the end of the jetty.

There were five men in the ancient Nissan Vanette driving down the Rua do Comércio, the main road that runs along the Cabindan waterfront. They wore a combination of jeans, cargo pants and calf-length shorts. One of them had a Real Madrid football shirt, another sported a Manchester United crest on his T-shirt. He had a baseball cap on, too, the peak pointing sideways. All five of the men were armed with guns or machetes, though they weren’t expecting to have to use their weapons because this was only meant to be a symbolic operation: a wake-up call to the authorities to pay attention and take their demands seriously, or the next time people would get hurt. The message would be sent by the very basic IED—not much more than a block of C4 explosive, a detonator and a timer—that was sitting in a canvas bag in the footwell of the front passenger seat. The van pulled off the road and drove across an open expanse of unpaved ground to a cluster of small warehouses and offices, slowed down so that the driver could pick out the sign he was looking for and then came to a halt. There was a brief burst of conversation as the men debated whether they’d found their target, agreed they had and then geed one another up with shouts of encouragement and exhortations to have courage and get the job done. Then they piled out of the Vanette, looked around to make sure that no one was watching and headed for the warehouse door.

Listen, B. K., you can set all the targets you like, but they don’t mean shit once you get out to a place like this,” Jack Fontineau said into the telephone. “Most people don’t have any kind of presence here at all, and the ones that do aren’t authorized to make decisions, so we’ve got a better chance of getting their business in Luanda, or even back home than we do here . . . Yeah, yeah, I know that this is where the oil is, but . . . Hold on, I think I just heard something. Gimme a second, will ya? I’m just going to check it out . . .”

The five amateur bombers were surprised to discover that the side door to the warehouse was unlocked at this time of night, but it made their job a lot easier. Once inside they received a second shock. One of the men was carrying a torch, but the moment he switched it on it was apparent that far from being filled with supplies for offshore rigs, the warehouse was virtually empty. In fact, the only object of any significance was a brand-new Toyota Land Cruiser sitting just inside the main goods entrance. They stood pondering the significance of this for a moment and then someone pointed toward the far end of the warehouse, about thirty meters away, where there was an office with its lights still on. Through the window they could see a white man, talking on the phone. Then he put the phone down, got out of his chair and walked toward the office door. Someone hissed a warning at the man with the torch and he turned it off. Now the only light was coming from the office and in the semi-darkness the men raced to hide behind the hefty bulk of the Land Cruiser.

Jack Fontineau had a torch, too. He picked it up as he walked toward the door and switched it on as he stepped out on to the warehouse floor. He wasn’t entirely sure what he’d heard, just a combination of noises and a flicker of light in the corner of his eye that added up to a sense that there was someone else in the building. There it was again, a pattering sound like running feet. He swept the torch very deliberately from left to right across his field of vision and then back again and it was on that second sweep that he saw something—or someone—scuttling behind his Land Cruiser.

“Who’s there?” Fontineau called, wishing he’d got more than a torch with which to defend himself. “Come out. I know you’re there.”

He walked forward slowly, not really wanting to go any further, but forcing himself to stay calm, breathe steadily and keep going. There was nothing to worry about, he told himself. Anyone could see there wasn’t anything here to steal apart from the Land Cruiser and they were welcome to that. He wasn’t going to risk his own safety for the sake of a company car.

Then he heard another sound. Fontineau stopped in his tracks and frowned as he tried to place where the sound had come from. He shone the beam to his left but saw nothing. Then he swung it back the other way, to the right . . .

. . . and saw a man, no more than a couple of paces away. He was young, black, a head taller than Fontineau and built like a cruiserweight. The man was moving right at Fontineau and raising his right arm. Fontineau saw a flash of metal, glinting in the torchlight. He tried to shout, to beg for mercy, but before he could even form the words the man had hurled his arm back down, plunging the blade of his machete so deep into the side of Jack Fontineau’s neck that his head was almost severed from his body. As Fontineau fell to the ground, a geyser of blood erupted from the terrible wound, covering his attacker’s arm, chest and face and spattering across the bare concrete floor of the warehouse and the Land Cruiser’s white bodywork like paint flicked on to a bare canvas.

Now the other four members of the bombing team emerged from behind the vehicle, shouting and gesticulating in a mixture of excitement, bloodlust and panic until their leader, who had the canvas bag with the bomb in it, called for silence. The voices subsided as the leader took out the bomb and placed it inside the rear of Fontineau’s car, close to its massive 138-litre fuel tank. He set the timer and then pointed toward the warehouse door. It was time to leave.

The five men were back inside the Vanette and heading out of town on the Rua do Comércio when the bomb exploded. A cheer rang around the interior of the battered old vehicle. They had done their job. Now they would get paid.

A bomb that’s planted in an empty warehouse in an obscure African city is not a news story. But a bomb that’s planted in a warehouse that’s empty except for an American, whose charred, dismembered body is found in the smouldering ruins, well, that’s a whole different matter. Jack Fontineau’s death was made all the more dramatic by the fact that he was on the phone to his boss in Louisiana when the attack took place. Bobby K. Broussard was soon besieged by reporters and, with a suitably mournful, emotionally stricken expression on his face, he told them: “Jack said, ‘Give me a second, I’m just going to check it out.’ Because that’s the kind of man Jack was. He didn’t shy away from danger. He didn’t leave it to other people to risk themselves for him. He faced up to his responsibilities, like a man. And in the end that bravery cost him his life. Now our thoughts and our prayers are with Jack’s wife Megan and their three darlin’ children.”

Megan Fontineau was a former cheerleader at Louisiana State and she made sure to face the cameras looking her beautiful, blonde best, with glamorous designer shades that she removed to reveal her tearful, cornflower-blue eyes. Her two daughters were both as pretty as pictures and Jack Jnr, aged eight, was a photogenic, all-American, gap-toothed little scamp. Their pictures hit every TV network, front page and news website in the western world.

Pretty soon the media were doing background stories on Cabinda and reports were coming out of Paris of a rebel leader called Mateus da Cunha, who was half-French, sophisticated and looked great on camera. He gave the world’s media the same line he’d given the guests at his reception: he wasn’t in favor of violence himself, but he could understand the frustrations that led other people to take up arms in their struggle against oppression. One starstruck CNN reporter called da Cunha “a new generation’s Nelson Mandela” and the phrase started to gain traction as other commentators picked it up and ran with it.

In Caracas, Johnny Congo laughed out loud when he heard that. “Mandela, my ass!” he chortled at the TV screen. Congo knew a scam artist when he saw one. Da Cunha didn’t disapprove of violence; he loved it, any fool could see that. In fact, Congo was prepared to bet the man had set the whole thing up himself. Plus, the story concerned Angola and oil, two subjects currently of great interest to Congo, who went online and checked da Cunha out. Soon he’d learned all he needed to know about the Cabinda Foundation and the struggle for independence from Angola. This, he realized, was the final thing he’d been waiting for, the last nail he’d hammer into Hector Cross’s coffin.

Congo called a satphone number that belonged to Babacar Matemba, a West African paramilitary commander, whose political, criminal and homicidal activities had been funded by the sale of blood diamonds and coltan, a metal essential to the electronics industry that, ounce for ounce, is the next best thing to gold. In the days when Johnny Congo and Carl Bannock had been running their own private kingdom in Kazundu they’d helped Matemba smuggle his contraband goods on to the global market. Now it was time to get back in touch.

The two men exchanged greetings. Congo told Matemba about his escape from Death Row and assured him he’d soon be back in business. “In fact, that was what I was calling you about. I wondered if you could spare me some men. I need experienced fighters, good enough to train other people, so they’ve gotta be smart. I need the best and I’m willing to pay real well, maybe make up for some of what you’ve not been getting from Carl and me lately.”

“What do you want my men to do?” Matemba asked. He listened while Congo told him and then said. “I like the sound of that, Johnny.”

“Me too, Babacar. Me too.”

The next call Congo made was to the Cabinda Foundation. “I want to speak to da Cunha,” he said.

“May I tell Monsieur da Cunha who is calling and what it concerns?”

“My name is Juan Tumbo. I want to donate money to your foundation. A lot of money.”

The call was put right through. Ten minutes later, the Cabinda Foundation had a major, anonymous donor and Johnny Congo knew exactly how he was going to destroy Hector Cross, and make a shedload of money doing it, too.

As an ex-Marine, Congo was well acquainted with a lot of men who had been trained to a very high level in the arts of sabotage and destruction, and had practical battlefield experience of putting their training to work. As a former convict and career criminal, he also knew a large number of individuals who had a total absence of scruple or conscience and were prepared to cause any amount of material damage or physical harm if the money was right. In a few particular cases, which Congo valued highest of all, these were one and the same men. Chico Torres had served in the Marines as a combat engineer. His particular genius was for blowing things up, on land, on sea—hell, if you found a way to get Chico to Mars, he’d blow the shit out of that, too.

Chico was all ears when Congo got in touch and told him all about his new-found interest in the Angolan offshore oil industry. He asked a few pertinent questions about the specific nature and scale of Bannock’s set-up at the Magna Grande field, then told Congo, “Yeah, I can see the weak link in the chain. Think I know how to break it, too. Just need to do some detailed investigation, get my numbers right, you know what I mean. Gimme a few days, I’ll get back to you, man.”

Johnny Congo had not been the only interested party calling the Cabinda Foundation in the aftermath of Jack Fontineau’s death. Nastiya knew that a man like da Cunha needed to be challenged, taken by surprise and kept a little off-balance. So, having watched his stellar appearances on the world’s news networks she called his office and informed his secretary that she had made a booking for them both at Sur Mesure, the Mandarin Oriental’s own restaurant, famed for the avant-garde “molecular cooking” of its head chef Thierry Marx. Da Cunha kept the appointment, but soon tried to reassert control by suggesting that he was already entirely familiar with his surroundings.

“Monsieur Marx is a great enthusiast for Japan,” da Cunha said when they had been seated in the extraordinary, cocoon-like dining room, whose walls were swathed in loosely draped, cream-colored fabric, piled and gathered like crumpled paper. “He takes a holiday every year in a Buddhist monastery there, and holds a third dan in judo and a fourth in ju-jitsu.”

“Really?” said Nastiya, putting down the champagne glass from which she’d been sipping. “Then I advise him not to fight me. He would lose.”

Da Cunha laughed. “I’m sure! Women never fight fair!”

“Oh, but I was being quite serious. He would have to be much, much better than that to stand any chance of winning.” She gave da Cunha a sweet, innocent smile and, almost girlishly said, “I could kill you, too, right now, before you even had a chance to get up from the table. But don’t worry, I would have to be very upset indeed before I became that violent, and I’m feeling great, right now. This Krug is delicious! It really is the best of all the great champagnes, wouldn’t you say? And it goes so well with this starter.”

The starter, consisting of a single, immaculate quail’s egg wrapped in spinach and a disc of foie gras, surrounded by a ring of spinach jelly, had been placed in front of them. Nastiya attacked it with great enthusiasm, but da Cunha just picked at his dish.

“I hope I haven’t ruined your appetite,” she said.

“No, but I admit my mind is not giving the food the attention it deserves.”

“Why not?”

“Because I am trying to decide whether you are the most intriguing, intoxicating, dangerous woman I have ever met, or the biggest bullshitter of all time.”

Nastiya smiled. “Maybe I’m both. Maybe it’s my bullshit that makes me so dangerous.”

“Ha! Time to stop talking and eat.”

For the next ninety minutes, as the nine courses of the tasting menu followed one another—each a small, perfect experiment in the art of capturing flavor at its most intense in a myriad different forms and textures—they talked about their lives. Nastiya worked on the principle that the best covers are those that contain as much truth as they can fit, so she spoke about her former life as an FSB agent. “Though I sometimes tell civilians I was trained by the KGB,” she said. “No one knows what ‘FSB’ is, so it’s easier to use a name that everyone has heard before.”

“Then it’s true, what you said about being able to fight and kill?”

“Yes, but honestly”—she reached out and delicately laid the tips of her fingers on his arm—“. . . I’m really not going to try and prove it tonight.”

“That’s a pity,” da Cunha said. “It might add a touch of excitement. After dinner, perhaps . . .”

“We’ll see . . .” She left the merest suggestion of an invitation hanging in the air. Da Cunha’s expression showed that he had taken the hint, but he was smart enough not to push the point. Instead, he got down to business.

“So, what qualifies you to seek out interesting investment opportunities and why on earth should wealthy clients take your advice?”

“I don’t know . . . What qualifies you to set yourself up as the first leader of an independent Cabinda? Please, I know you had to answer the way you did in public. But you don’t want to be Franklin. You want to be Washington—without the possibility of ever losing an election.”

“Did I say that? Answer my question . . .”

“Well, apart from my combat skills”—she had not mentioned the word “sex,” but somehow they both knew that was what she meant—“I speak a number of languages fluently, I’m trained to gather and assess intelligence, I have contacts around the world who alert me to possible opportunities and as a woman I have advantages that a man does not. If I were male, you would not have been so willing to let me ask you a question, nor so keen to approach me immediately afterward, nor so ready to extend an invitation to dinner.”

“I can’t deny it,” said da Cunha with a smile.

“Finally, I am Russian and do not have the pathetic western obsession with human rights and non-violence. So why don’t you tell me what you really intend to do, how much money you need to do it, and what you will give in return for that money?”

“Well, Miss Trained Russian Agent, if you were in my situation, what would you do?”

There was a pause as a new course was brought to them, accompanied by a fresh glass of wine. Nastiya waited until they were undisturbed again and then replied, “I would create instability. I would do everything I could to make western oil companies and western governments believe that they can’t be safe in Cabinda as long as it is a province of Angola. So I might start by, say, attacking the offices of an American company that supplies oil rigs.”

“Ah yes, that was a very unfortunate incident. I believe that an American executive was among the casualties. You understand, of course, that I was not involved in any way.”

“Pah!” Nastiya gave a flick of her hand to wave his weasel words aside. “Weren’t you listening? I told you I’m not squeamish. But perhaps I didn’t make myself clear. I work for oligarchs, and you know how they made their money, every single one of them? Crime. Sure, they weren’t all Russian mafia, though some were. But they stole state assets, or bribed someone to sell them at a fraction of their real value, or forced the original owner out of the business. Men like that will not think you are a bad guy if you fight to get what you want. But they will think you are a pussy if you stand on the sidelines, wringing your hands and telling the world that you are frightened by a drop of blood.”

There was no humor or flirtation in da Cunha now. His eyes bored into hers and his jaw was set as he leaned toward her and lowered his voice to a rumbling growl. “Then go back to these men and tell them that I wouldn’t be frightened by an ocean of blood. Tell them that I need money for personnel, weapons, training, housing and supplies. I must also fund a major international public relations and lobbying campaign that will win over media opinion-formers, buy the support of key politicians and force governments to recognize Cabinda. And I need to do just enough for the people that they, and the outside world, think that their lives will improve in an independent Cabinda.”

“What about the Angolan government?”

“Simple. I will make it hell for them to keep Cabinda, and very worthwhile for them to let it go. Everyone has their price, and if we have to put ten million, or a hundred million, or even a billion dollars into the bank accounts of the President and his key military and political allies, then that is what we will do because the prize is worth so much more.”

Nastiya sensed that this was the real Mateus da Cunha: a man of limitless ambition, naked greed and an absolutely ruthless will. Her professional self now saw him as an enemy to be taken seriously and even feared. Her moral compass told her that he had the potential to commit acts of great evil to achieve what he wanted.

She had anticipated the evening ending in some kind of sexual advance from him, so it came as no surprise when, at the end of the meal, he did not so much ask as tell her, “Come back to my apartment. We can finish our discussion in comfort.”

At this point she had planned to reply, “No, I can’t wait that long. My room is much closer.” She had a well-stocked bar from which to pour him a drink and the powdered Rohypnol to slip into it. The hidden camera was pointed at the bed, waiting to capture whatever humiliating pose she could draw him into. But now she realized that it simply was not safe for her to invite him up. For once in her life she could not count on her ability to remain in total control of any sexual situation and she was not prepared to risk her marriage, her job and the faith that Cross had placed in her. So she smiled as she declined: “That’s a very tempting invitation, but no. Another time, perhaps.”

Da Cunha shook his head with a sigh. “So, you’ve led me on and then you disappoint me. I must be losing my touch.” He paused, looked at her and then gave a very Gallic shrug. “Ah well, perhaps we have both deceived one another. You see, the truth is, I don’t need any money from your investors, not at this moment. I’ve found a backer who can fund the first stage of my campaign. But I don’t want your people to lose interest because there may be opportunities for more investment later. So I’ll tell you something that will make them all a great deal of money. They must do nothing for a month. Then go short on Bannock Oil. Tell them that whatever the price of Bannock stock is, they must bet on it going lower. Start slowly, but build their positions: tens, even hundreds of millions of dollars, all staked on Bannock dropping. Tell them from me, they won’t regret it.”

Nastiya could hardly believe her luck. He had just given her as much information voluntarily as she could have hoped to extract from him by blackmail. Perhaps it was true and good deeds really were rewarded: that truly would be a surprise.

They walked together out of the restaurant and into the hotel foyer. “You’re quite sure I can’t tempt you?” da Cunha said before he took his leave.

“On the contrary, I’m sure you can tempt me,” Nastiya replied. “But I am equally sure that I can resist temptation.”

He looked at her and nodded, a half-smile playing around the corners of his mouth as he said, “Tonight, perhaps. But there will be another night. And then we will see just how strong our resistance really is.”

While Nastiya was in Paris, Cross had taken a brief break from his work preparing Cross Bow’s deployment at the Magna Grande field to visit an old friend and comrade-in-arms, Dr. Rob Noble. He was a former Army medic and Hector had met him when they were both serving members of the SAS. Rob now had a flourishing practice in Harley Street, providing all manner of health-boosting, anti-aging, sex-life-enhancing treatments to rich patients, who were very rarely ill, but almost always in need of the latest, most fashionable prescription drugs. He made a great deal of money doing a job he realized was of no social benefit whatever, which explained why the bulk of his profits went to fund free clinics for mothers and children in conflict zones around the world.

Noble’s experience, both in the Army and out of it, had led him to the view that there were people walking the planet who did so much harm to others that they needed culling. When Hector Cross gave him a brief introduction to Johnny Congo’s CV, Noble readily agreed that this was a man who perfectly fitted his criteria for swift and terminal removal from the scene. “Though I’d rather not supply you with the poison to do it, if that’s all right,” he added. “I’ve taken the Hippocratic Oath, after all, promised not to give anyone deadly medicine and all that.”

“Don’t worry,” Cross reassured him. “I’m just looking for something that’ll knock someone out quickly and painlessly, then leave them with as little recollection as possible of what happened to them when they wake up.”

“Hmm . . .” Noble considered the problem. “You do know, of course, that there’s no such stuff—outside of an operating theater—as an instant knock-out drop. Still, I should be able to put something together for you. Come back in a couple of days and I’ll have it ready for collection. Half a dozen doses should be enough for you, I hope?”

“More than enough. And I could use a few morphine ampoules, too, in case anyone gets hurt who’s not meant to be.”

“Consider it done.”

Two days later, Cross returned to Harley Street to be given two small plastic cases, each containing six ampoules. One box had a small red cross on it, the other did not. Each ampoule bore a prescription label, describing it as insulin, with instructions for use.

“You’ve just developed a case of diabetes,” Rob Noble told Hector. “The first ampoule in each box really does contain insulin, just in case any customs man is minded to test it. The other ampoules in the Red Cross box are morphine, as requested. The ones in the plain box contain a subtle blend of party drugs, funnily enough. I’ve combined a four-thousand-milligram dose of gamma-hydroxybutyric acid, otherwise known as GHB Juice or Liquid G, which should induce unconsciousness about as fast as anything around, and mixed it with ketamine, a tranquillizer much prized by blithering idiots who like to mess with their brains for its ability to create a dissociative, otherworldly effect—like a less extreme version of an LSD trip, I suppose. It also induces amnesia, so it should do the trick for your purposes. As a combination they should leave the recipient feeling very, very strange, but providing their general health is all right, the dose shouldn’t prove fatal.”

“Thanks, Rob, you’re a genius,” Cross told him.

“I would agree with you wholeheartedly. But does the Nobel Prize Committee ever give me a call?”

Cross returned to his office to replace Nastiya returned from Paris. “So, did you get anything out of da Cunha?”

Nastiya nodded. “Yes.”

“And . . . ?”

“Da Cunha says that he is trying to achieve freedom for Cabinda by peaceful means, but he is lying. He will do whatever it takes to control the country and its oil revenues and he is looking for backers to fund his military and PR campaigns and pay the bribes he needs to persuade politicians to do what he wants. At first he was very interested in the possibility of using Russian money, but when we met for the second time he made it clear that he already has someone who has enough money to pay for the early stages of the struggle.”

“Did he say who it was?”

“No, but he did say who his next target would be. He was worried that my clients would feel snubbed by his refusal of their money now. So as a gesture of good faith he asked me to pass on a message to them, telling them to invest heavily in short positions, against Bannock Oil.”

“You’re sure it was Bannock Oil?”

“Absolutely, he was very insistent that Bannock stock would plummet in value.”

“Did he say when?”

“Yes. He told me to tell my people not to do anything for a month, but then to attack Bannock with as much money as possible.”

“That’s great work, Nastiya. You’ve delivered the goods once again. It’s just a pity the package stinks.”

Cross told Agatha to put him on the next available flight out of Heathrow to Washington DC. He called Bobbi Franklin and invited her to dinner at Marcel’s, on Pennsylvania Avenue, just a five-minute cab ride from the State Department.

“This is very short notice,” Franklin said, though she sounded as though it was a pleasant surprise. “Business or pleasure?”

“Both.”

“I’m intrigued. I’ll see you there.”

Congo’s bomb-making buddy Chico Torres was as good as his word. Within days, he’d produced a detailed plan of attack; a quantified list of all the materials Congo would have to supply so that Torres could assemble the ordnance that the job would require; and the specifications of the delivery system and personnel needed to convey the right package to the right place at the right time to produce the effect that Congo desired. “If you want, man, I can see the whole operation through from planning to execution. If I get the Benjamins, you’ll get the bang, you know what I mean?”

Congo and Torres concluded their financial negotiations satisfactorily. The price and the time-schedule were set. Over the next few days, Congo started the recruitment process for the men who would work with Torres on his side of what was swiftly becoming a much bigger, more intricate and potentially devastating scheme than even Congo had initially envisioned. Further discussions with Babacar Matemba and Mateus da Cunha put flesh on the bones of their half of the deal. Now Congo just needed to sort out the financial pay-off that his military actions were designed to create. So he put in a call to Aram Bendick, worked his way through the army of gatekeepers Bendick employed to keep casual callers off his back and finally got through to the financier himself.

“I like your work, dog,” Congo said, having introduced himself as Juan Tumbo. “Badmouthing the CEOs, driving the stock down, picking up assets for a song—gotta love that, right? So I looked you up on that Forbes list of billionaires, saw you at eight-point-two bill, ranked hundred and sixtieth. Man, that’s gotta hurt, don’t it? Y’know, not even being in the top one fifty.”

“Those figures are wildly inaccurate,” Bendick said testily.

“Yeah, well, reporters, right, what do they know? But let me ask you something: however many billions you got, you can always use a few more, am I right?”

“Where are you going with this, Mr. Tumbo? I’m just online now, looking at the exact same list as you; only difference is, I don’t see your goddamn name anywhere. So you better tell me why I should listen to any more of your shit, or this call ends now.”

“You don’t see me on no list because I don’t wanna be there. I keep my business to myself. But now I’m telling you, Mr. Bendick, I can double your money. So now you’re going to say, bullshit, how can I do that? I’ll tell you that, too, when we meet, but first I’m assuming you can follow the money going in and out of your Seventh Wave Funds, yeah?”

“Of course.”

“So check out your U.S. Special Situations Fund. You seeing that on your screen?”

“Yeah, what of it?”

“In about ten seconds the amount invested in that fund is gonna rise by fifty million dollars. Wait for it . . .”

“Got it!” For the first time, Bendick sounded interested, enthusiastic even, about the way the call was going.

“There you go, that was me. I just gave you fifty mill—boom! Consider that a proof of funds. Now, when we gonna meet? I wanna tell you how we make billions.”

Hector Cross came to his feet with a genuine smile of welcome when he saw the maître d’ escort Bobbi Franklin across the crowded restaurant to their table. Not only was her face even more elegantly beautiful without her glasses, she had the figure to match, and unless she made a habit of going to work in little black dresses, heels and pearls, she’d bothered to change for dinner. That was a most promising sign.

They got the business out of the way before the meal was served. Cross told her about the threat he believed the Bannock operation in Angola was facing, and how the information had come into his possession.

“Is there any chance da Cunha was bullshitting?” Bobbi asked. “Guys will say almost anything to impress an attractive woman.”

“She said, speaking from years of experience . . .”

Bobbi laughed. “Hey! I thought we were keeping it strictly business until the food arrived! But thank you for the compliment, anyway . . .”

“You’re welcome, and no, I think he meant it. Da Cunha believed that Maria Denisova represented some seriously wealthy, powerful individuals. He wouldn’t have wanted to make enemies of them by giving false information. The question is, what can anyone do about it?”

“Well, we can talk to the Angolan government and ask them to redouble their security efforts. I can have a word with our friends in Langley, see if they can take a real close look at Mateus da Cunha, but he has French citizenship and our European allies have become very sensitive indeed about us conducting intelligence operations against their nationals.”

“How about the military? Can we get any naval protection?”

“It’s tough. We’re facing multiple threats in the Middle East, South-East Asia, Eastern Europe, and this is happening after years of defense cuts. If you had information about a specific threat, at a particular location on a given date, that might be enough to prompt some action at the Pentagon. But if all you know is that something may happen, somewhere at some point, well, that’s not going to do it.”

“So what you’re basically saying is that we’re going to be on our own.”

“Sounds like it.” She took a sip of wine while Cross digested what she had said and then added, “I hope you’re not going to blame the messenger.”

“No, I’m not going to blame the messenger for being so honest, I’m going to ask her to do what she can, just to make people aware of the threat. And then I’m going to say: Forget about Cabinda, and oil, and threats of violence. Tell me about yourself.”

The rest of the dinner was pure pleasure. Bobbi Franklin was bright, full of humor and as genuinely interested in him as he was in her. For the first time in a very long while, he was able to relax, forget about the cloud of violence and danger that seemed to be permanently looming over him and just enjoy the company of a woman who mixed brains, beauty and sheer niceness in apparently perfect proportions.

When the meal was over, she allowed him to escort her back to her apartment, but left him with just a kiss, albeit a very pleasurable and lingering one at the door.

“I like my men to work just a little bit to get what they want, even if I want it too,” she said.

“I’m not afraid of hard work,” he said. “But I won’t be able to do much for you for a while: not till this Cabinda business is sorted one way or another.”

“I understand. But you know where to replace me in future. And I’m not planning on moving.”

In the morning Cross flew from Washington to Houston. In his Bannock Oil office he gave John Bigelow a more detailed version of the briefing he had provided Bobbi Franklin.

“I wanted us to meet face-to-face and in private because I need to give you my considered, professional opinion,” Cross told him. “Bearing in mind the losses that the sinking of the Noatak have already inflicted on the company, and the irreparable damage that could be caused if we suffer a similar loss at Magna Grande, I believe that we should scale down and even cease operations in Angolan waters until the precise threat facing them has been identified, analyzed and dealt with.”

“That’s out of the question,” Bigelow said. “We have to go ahead with Magna Grande and it has to be a success.”

“Respectfully, I disagree,” Cross said. “The revenues from Abu Zara are still rock-solid. If we scale back costs across the board, live within our means and just let the wounds from Alaska heal, we can still survive.”

“And what will the shareholders say if the best I can promise them is lower revenues and profits? I’ve already got that vulture Bendick writing public letters accusing me of incompetence.”

“Speaking as both a director of Bannock Oil and the father of a girl whose entire fortune is dependent on the prosperity of Bannock Oil and the long-term strength of its shares, I’d say forget about Aram bloody Bendick. The man’s a bloodsucker, but he can’t destroy this company. Mateus da Cunha can, particularly if he’s being bankrolled by Johnny Congo.”

“But why would Congo want to destroy Bannock?” Bigelow asked. “He’s Carl Bannock’s buddy and as much of a disgusting lowlife as Carl is, he lives off the proceeds of Bannock Oil, too. So what interest would he have in hurting his own livelihood? Look, I appreciate you coming to talk to me, Heck. You think we face a threat, and I hear you. But you’re the best goddamn security chief I ever met in my life and I trust you and your guys to do a great job, keeping our investment in Magna Grande safe. You just head out to Africa and do what you do best. We’re going to extract billions of gallons of oil, the shares are going to go nowhere but up, Bendick’s ass is going to get the kicking it deserves and you, my friend, will get the thanks of a very grateful corporation.”

Well, at least I tried, Cross told himself as he headed back to his hotel. His next stop was Caracas. And now he realized that the hit on Johnny Congo wasn’t just a matter of personal revenge. The future of Bannock Oil could hang on removing the threat that Congo posed.

It was just past midnight in Caracas, Venezuela, as a gray Toyota Corolla paused for a moment about 500 meters from the entrance to the Villa Kazundu and Tommy Jones, all in black, just as Cross had specified, slipped out of the passenger seat on to the roadside. There were no other cars to be seen or heard and the neighborhood where the villa was located boasted few streetlights, for the men who owned the properties behind the high walls and thick hedges valued their privacy more than road safety—they paid their chauffeurs to worry about that. So it was easy for Jones to slip across the road and on to the dirt track that ran uphill on to the bare terrain beyond the final row of houses. He turned and jogged along the hillside, parallel to the road, until he reached the vantage point, first established by Guillermo Valencia, where one could look down on to the Villa Kazundu and its grounds. Jones then lay down, his head pointing downhill, and removed a state-of-the-art thermal-imaging camera from a thigh pouch. He turned it on, checked that the Bluetooth link to the transmitter on his belt was working, lifted the camera’s viewreplaceer to his right eye and began scanning the property. One after another two human shapes appeared in shades of white and gray against the darker background of the foliage around them: the security guards patrolling the grounds. Jones spoke in little more than a whisper.

“Are you seeing this, boss?”

“Crystal clear,” Cross replied. “How about you, Dave?”

“It’s all good here,” came Imbiss’s reassuring voice from London. “I’ve hacked into the villa’s camera and alarm systems and am ready to disable them on your command. The entry code on the front door keypad has been changed to zero-zero-zero-zero. Thought I’d keep it simple for you.”

“My tiny mind and I thank you for that. Do you have any readings from inside the house, Jones?”

The camera panned across to the villa itself. It was sensitive enough to penetrate basic domestic brickwork, but the three figures that now appeared on the screen were little more than vague, pale gray blobs. “Reckon that’s the master bedroom, boss,” said Jones.

“Good,” said Cross. “Let’s hope the master stays there, preferably asleep. We go at oh-three-hundred, as planned. Keep me updated if anything changes between now and then.”

“You got it, boss.”

The rented Toyota, with Paddy at the wheel made another pass along the road, barely pausing as Hector, Nolan and Schrager got out and ran to the point on the Villa Kazundu’s perimeter where the three of them would go over the wall. Each man had been assigned a specific guard and knew exactly where to replace him. They were all dressed in black and wore latex gloves to prevent them from leaving fingerprints. Hector ordered Nolan and Schrager to inject an ampoule of Rob Noble’s patent concoction into their guard’s neck, allowing enough time for him to become incapacitated. Next, they were to take the guards’ handguns: these would be used to shoot Congo, giving the police no connection between the murder weapons and the assailants. Third: rendezvous by the main entrance to the house. Then the real fun would begin.

Jaime Palacios had been manning the gatehouse for five hours, three more to go. This was the job reserved for the senior operative on the shift: partly because the gatehouse guard had to greet people going in and out of the property; partly because he also had to watch the bank of mini-screens that displayed the views from the security cameras; and partly because he could spend the whole shift sitting down, instead of walking around the grounds. Since there had never been the slightest threat to the villa or its occupants, this was about the easiest work a man could get, and thus much prized by all the agency’s longest-serving men.

Palacios had drunk a little rum, watched porn on his Samsung Galaxy TV, picked his nose, scratched his backside and occasionally contacted the two other men who were working the night shift with him, ostensibly for an update on the security situation, but mostly just for a few seconds’ conversation. He had not worked with either of his colleagues before. They were both new to the agency, unlike Palacios who’d been coming up to the Villa Kazundu for almost six years, on and off. In that time, he’d seen some pretty crazy things happening there. He knew for sure that Señor Tumbo and his maricón boyfriend had powerful friends and that they liked to be entertained by men, women and anything in-between: the freaks he’d seen pass through these gates looked wilder than any stars of any porno he’d ever seen. He hadn’t been up to the property since Señor Tumbo had been living there alone, but he’d heard stories of wild orgies, to which the security guards like him had been invited and given their pick of the girls to enjoy.

Nothing like that had ever happened to Palacios, so he had to make do with the low-grade filth he downloaded from the internet. At that moment he was so absorbed with it that he had not noticed the CCTV screens going blank, or the black-clad figure slipping silently through the open gatehouse door and coming up behind him. He hardly even felt the prick of a needle going into his neck.

For a few seconds, Palacios struggled against the powerful hands that covered his mouth to prevent him crying out and held him tightly to his chair, but then his head began to swim and he dropped into a state of deep unconsciousness.

Jones had warned Hector about Johnny Congo’s change of location within the building, which had been revealed both by the concentration of blobs on the thermal imager’s viewreplaceer and the music coming from the living room.

“It sounds like he has the usual females keeping him company.”

“I don’t want any collateral damage,” Hector told his men. “No one fires without a clear line of sight on Congo. If you can, grab a girl each and get her out of the way. Leave Congo to me.” He waited for their nods of acknowledgement, then said, “OK, then, let’s do it.”

Cross led Nolan and Schrager across the forecourt and up the steps to the front door. The code that Dave Imbiss had changed worked. They were in.

The room in which Congo was sequestered with the girls was across from the entrance hall, to the right. The door to the room was ajar. Cross moved silently to the door and slipped a mirror on a telescopic handle out of his leg pocket. He squatted down on his haunches, extended the handle until the mirror was just beyond the edge of the door, about a meter off the floor, and studied the image it revealed.

He had a view of the back of a leather sofa and beyond it the torsos of two girls, dancing with one another, their bodies pressed together in a blatantly sexual bump-and-grind routine. At first Hector could not work out Congo’s exact position, until he saw the top of his head, the skin almost the precise shade of deep, dark brown as the leather on which he was sitting. His scalp was protruding an inch or so above the top of the sofa.

But from this angle Hector’s view was partially obstructed. He couldn’t see the girl’s faces, or get any more of a sense of the room as a whole unless he tilted the mirror upward. But if he did that there was a strong chance of catching the light from the ceiling and alerting the quarry to his presence. Silently he signaled to his men: indicating that Nolan should move to his right and Schrager to his left. Then he raised his fingers and counted down: three—two—one—go!

Hector burst through the open door into the room beyond. But almost immediately his speed faltered, because he’d seen what had previously been hidden from him. This was the mirror hanging over the fireplace. And as Cross saw the mirror, so his prey saw his image in it. With the reflexes of a wild animal Congo sprang instantly from the sofa. He dived across the room and grabbed hold of the nearest of the two naked dancing girls. Twisting her arms up behind her back, he spun the woman around to face Hector Cross, holding her in front of him as a shield. The second woman shrieked when she saw Hector and the pistol he was pointing at her; then she turned and darted away through the open glass doors behind her and vanished into the dark interior of the house. Johnny Congo continued to face Hector, still holding the first blubbering female before him as he backed away toward the open doors through which the other girl had disappeared.

“Put the girl down!” Cross snarled.

Congo threw back his head and laughed. “Oh, I recognize that voice. Screw you, Cross, I ain’t putting no one down. But all three of you bastards had better drop those pieces on the floor right away or I slit this bitch’s throat!”

“Cut her then,” said Cross with feigned indifference. “Go ahead. Do it . . . But if she dies, you die a second later. Believe me, I’ll take that deal.”

Cross saw the girl’s eyes widen. She’d understood what he was saying. He had not expected that.

Congo didn’t flinch. “You haven’t got the balls for it. You’d have shot her already if you had. Put the gun down, Cross.” He nodded at Nolan and Schrager: “Them too . . .”

“That’s not going to happen, Congo.”

“Then we got ourselves a stand-off, don’t we?”

All the time Congo was edging backward, getting closer to the open door. As he moved he bobbed and weaved his head, like a boxer evading punches, making himself a harder target to hit. But no matter how much his head might move, Congo’s eyes were locked on to Cross, darting only occasional glances at the other two men. He knew who was the danger man.

Cross moved with him, standing off five meters from him, meeting Congo’s stare and returning it, holding the pistol out in front of him, two-handed, aiming at a point just above the girl’s forehead. If the shot was clear for even a fraction of a second, he was determined to take it.

But by now Congo was directly in front of the glass door and barely a pace in front of it. From the plans of the house that Hector had studied he was almost certain the door led to the main kitchens and, beyond that, the servants’ quarters. In that area of the house, the rooms were far smaller and more numerous, linked by a maze of corridors and stairs that ran up toward the bedrooms on the first floor and down toward the garages where he knew there were at least two fast cars and a Suzuki 500-cc motorbike parked.

That was where Congo was certainly heading. He could run full pelt to the garage and once he was there and in a car, or on the motorbike, he’d be gone, and the last chance Hector would have of stopping him would be Paddy O’Quinn. But Paddy would have a hell of a job to intercept Congo in the darkness. He would have to be in exactly the right place at exactly the right time.

So it was up to Hector to stop him now. But Hector was running out of time. He calculated the odds against him. There was only one way of doing it: firing at the girl’s legs. At this range a 9-mm bullet would drill its way right through her and into Congo. The girl had great pins. It would be a crying shame to wreck one of them. But better a bad wound and a lifelong limp than a knife in the throat. And better one wounded hostage than a killer back on the run.

Hector’s aim never wavered, but in his head he was visualizing the precise moment in which he’d bring it down and fire, shin-high, at the girl. He breathed in and then slowly out. When he reached the fullest point of the next breath, he’d fire.

Congo was almost inside the frame of the door. It had to be now. Cross started breathing in. Then Congo did the unexpected. He stabbed the girl low down in her back and her scream of agony distracted Hector for an instant. In that brief flicker of time Congo lifted the girl as easily as if she were a rag doll and hurled her at Hector’s head. Hector flinched and his shot was blocked by the girl’s flying body. But now Congo was fully exposed to both Nolan and Schrager.

They fired together but an instant before the shots rang out Congo somersaulted backward and their shots flew high. They had both been aiming at his head. Congo landed in a perfectly balanced crouch. Immediately he used all the power of his massive legs to throw himself sideways; with the speed and agility of a big wild cat he dived behind the heavy door frame. The back-up shots fired by Nolan and Schrager came a second too late. They smashed clouds of white splinters from the wooden frames. But Johnny Congo was gone. Stunned for a moment by the speed with which it had happened, they heard his footsteps pounding on the concrete stairs as he raced down to the garages on the lower level of the rambling old house.

Bitterly Hector realized how cunning Congo had been. If he had killed the girl outright, Hector could have ignored her. But wounded, she demanded his attention.

“Nolan! Deal with her,” Cross shouted. He looked at the girl, and spoke in Spanish. “You want to live? Then do exactly what he says.” Then he glanced at Schrager. “Schrager! On me.” He was already running as he barked one more order, “Jones! Get to Paddy’s car. Go!”

Congo had less than ten seconds’ start. But if Cross couldn’t get to him before he reached the garage, it might as well be ten hours. Cross ran into the passage that led to the kitchen. It was pitch black. He pulled out his phone and turned on the torch. Another two seconds lost. Ahead of him he heard a crashing sound.

Now he ran: down the corridor, left through the swing doors and into the kitchen. Cross saw four staff: two chefs and two in maid’s uniforms standing in a terrified huddle to one side of the room. Now he knew what sound he’d heard. Congo had pulled down a rack of metal shelves that had been stacked with pots and pans. There was a clear way through the chaos to the far end of the kitchen, but it was slow. More time lost.

Cross kept moving. He heard a burst of muttered expletives behind him as Schrager trod on an upturned pan, but ignored it and kept moving. On the far side of the kitchen the passage forked: one way, right, to the servants’ quarters; the other, left, to the staircase that led down to the garage. Cross turned left and was almost at the top of the stairs when he heard running footsteps at the bottom.

There were three flights of stairs, arranged in a zig-zag. Cross didn’t bother running, he just jumped each flight, landing on the levels, spinning around in a one-eighty then leaping down the next flight. He landed at the bottom of the stairs, stumbled and fell on to the bare concrete floor of the small lobby between the stairs and the door to the garage.

As Cross hit the floor, driving the air out of his lungs, the door above his head was shredded by an extended deafening burst of close-range submachine-gun fire that ripped through the air at precisely the level where Cross would have been if he’d been standing. Schrager jumped right into the blizzard of steel and aluminum rounds that reduced his ribs to kindling, snapped every bone in his arms and pulped his head into a shapeless, faceless pink and crimson blob in the instant before he dropped down beside Cross, stone dead.

Cross ignored the corpse beside him. His mind was on the bullets that had hit it. They had been fired by a weapon that could not sustain more than two seconds’ fire without running out of ammo, which meant that Congo almost certainly had to change the magazine, which in turn gave Cross the time he needed to get up on to his hands and knees, hurl himself at the door, crash through it and then go straight into a roll that took him away from the center of the door and the line along which Congo would be aiming, once he’d reloaded.

Cross ended the roll in a low, crouching position. His gun was in his hand and he swung it through an arc, looking for Congo. But there was no sign of him. The garage was huge, with spaces for at least twenty cars, most of them filled. Cross’s ears were still ringing with the sound of the gunfire. He couldn’t hear Congo as he ran, bent low beneath the roof lines of the vehicles to either side of him.

Then suddenly there was the whirring sound of an engine starting up, bright white Xenon headlights bloomed directly opposite him, dazzling him, disorienting him, and then the lights grew even brighter, and he was aware of them bearing down on him. Cross fired four fast shots, aiming between and slightly above the retina-searing blaze of light; then he threw himself out of the way as two-and-a-half tons of supercharged V8 Range Rover roared past him and out on to the ramp.

He stood up, placed his hands on his knees and panted for breath. Now it was down to Paddy O’Quinn and Tommy Jones in the gray Toyota Corolla.

Johnny Congo cut the Range Rover’s lights as soon as he hit the ramp that led up from the garage to the Chateau Congo forecourt. They’d served their purpose by dazzling Hector Cross, but from now on they’d only mark his position for his pursuers. As he burst out of the gate of the property and turned hard left on to the road downhill, leading back into the city, he saw a pair of lights appear in his rearview mirror. Congo took the first right and looked again: they were still there.

“Fine!” He nodded. His blood was up. “We know just how to deal with you,” he whispered.

From the moment that Congo and Carl Bannock had first arrived in Caracas, they’d started planning what to do if they ever had to leave it in a hurry. Anything could happen. A new, less sympathetic government might be elected, or just seize power: Latin American countries had a history of revolutions and military coups, so that was always a possibility. The U.S. government might decide that they wanted Congo back in custody badly enough to make their pursuit of him more aggressive. Or a fellow criminal might just decide to take them out for business reasons: if the word got out about the money they were making from coltan and blood diamonds it would be enough to tempt a saint, let alone a sociopath.

Having spent many years at Huntsville, first observing the obvious inadequacies of the wardens who guarded him and then learning how to control them by a brutally effective system of bribes and threats, Congo took it for granted that the men guarding him and Carl were equally unreliable and open to persuasion by his enemies. So Congo had devised a complex series of exit strategies. His recent experience in Kazundu, where he and Carl had been caught napping by Hector Cross’s airborne military assault, followed by Carl’s death and his own narrow escape from execution, had only deepened Congo’s determination not to leave anything to chance. He’d gone back over his plans in exhaustive detail, making sure that all his escape routes, within the house itself and beyond, were still operable, with weapons cached throughout the building so that everything he needed would be available to him, no matter how extreme the circumstances.

Even so, Congo had spent enough time playing football and fighting in the Marines to know that it didn’t matter how good the coach’s playbook might be, or how thoroughly a mission was planned, there were always times when the unexpected happened, a whole new kind of shit hit the fan, the play broke down and you just had to improvise your way out of trouble with the resources that were available. So when he was caught unawares, with no firearm within reach, he’d grabbed the knife in one hand and the woman in the other and taken it from there. Not killing her, that had been a nice touch. He wouldn’t have thought of it if he hadn’t recognized Cross’s voice and known that he was too pussy to just let a bitch bleed to death without doing something to save her. So that was the second time Cross had paid for being soft: seemed like the honky asshole just hadn’t learned his lesson.

Had it killed him, though? That’s what Congo wanted to know. He’d heard two sets of footsteps coming after him, but only one man came through the door into the garage. Someone had been shredded by his two-second burst from the FN P90 Personal Defense Weapon that had been waiting for him just inside the door and no one could survive that, no matter how much body armor they were wearing. Congo almost hoped Cross had been the survivor. Killing him blind on the far side of a closed door would not give him much satisfaction. He wanted to see Cross die in front of him and he wanted to make the process as slow and painful as possible. However, right now Congo had his own survival to think about.

Once outside the Chateau Congo grounds, his black Range Rover, which boasted dechromed black wheels, fenders, radiator grill and running boards, simply melded into the darkness around it. Knowing the roads as well as he did, Congo was able to drive with his foot flat on the accelerator, even without lights, making turns so late that the driver pursuing him had to slam on the brakes, losing valuable momentum and falling far enough behind that Congo was able to turn off the road on to a heavily shaded stretch of driveway that led to a pair of gates set back from the road without being seen. He cut the engine and watched as the chasing car raced past, waited fifteen seconds for it to disappear around the next bend and then pulled back on to the road and drove off in the opposite direction.

Now Congo was heading for his safe house, which was an apartment above a fried-chicken restaurant in a working-class area of the city. The apartment looked to all the world like just another dirty, badly maintained, down-at-heel fleapit. But while Congo had done nothing at all to improve its appearance, he had installed steel doors and bulletproof windows. Amid all the jumble of TV aerials on top of the building, he’d installed dishes providing him with satellite phone and internet access. He’d worked out escape routes from the front, rear and over the neighboring rooftops. And if he ever got hungry, he could always count on plenty of fried chicken.

Congo parked the Range Rover at a reserved space in a downtown car park. He unclipped an interior door panel beside the driver’s seat, reached into the hidden storage well and removed a waterproof plastic pouch. It contained the IDs and money that had been in his safe-deposit box in Zurich, plus other bearer bonds and documentation that he’d had waiting for him at the villa. Now in possession of everything he needed to get anywhere in the world, Congo took a bus to within a half mile of the safe house and walked the rest of the way. Over the next twenty-four hours, he’d select one of a number of possible combinations of boat and plane that would take him across 180 miles of Caribbean water to the island of Curaçao in the Dutch West Indies, or a short distance further to its neighbor Aruba. Both islands possessed international airports open to scheduled and private flights and were thus ideal jumping-off points for the longest stage of his journey. Congo knew exactly where he was heading and what he would do when he arrived there. The only issues left to be determined were exactly how he’d make the journey, and what identity he would adopt along the way.

Back at the villa, Cross had just got back to his feet when the sound of Dave Imbiss’s voice on the radio cut through the ringing in his ears caused by the burst of FN fire that had taken Schrager down.

“The Caracas police have had a report of gunfire in your neighborhood. I don’t get the feeling that they’re taking it too seriously, but a squad car’s been despatched to check the property out. Get out or bluff it out, those are your two options,” Dave told him.

“How long have I got?”

“Five minutes tops. But call it four minutes: three to be safe.”

Cross was on the move at once, running out of the garage and back the way he’d come, straight past Schrager’s remains. There were blood spatters all over the wall and fragments of balaclava, hair, skull and brains smearing the floor and the stairs. Cross ignored him: forget the dead; the only ones that mattered now were the living. He spoke into his mike once again: “Nolan, how’s the girl?”

“I’ve given her a morphine ampoule and that’s calmed her. I’m getting a bandage on her now, but she’s still bleeding heavily. Needs a doctor, that’s for sure. Did you get the bastard?”

“No. He reached the garage before we could cut him off. Schrager is down. I’m on my way back up to you.”

By the time he got to the kitchen it was empty. The servants must have heard the gunfire and scarpered. In the living room, Nolan was taping up a bandage that was wrapped around the stabbed girl’s waist. “It’s not safe for you here, understand?” He told her in Spanish, and she nodded mutely.

Cross turned back to Nolan. “Take her down to the garage. Get the biggest motor you can replace. There should be keys somewhere. If not, just take it the old-fashioned way. She goes on the back seat. We will drop her wherever she wants. Schrager stays where he is. Got it?”

“Yes, boss.”

Cross started the stopwatch on his phone. He wanted to know, to the second, how much time he was using. There was just one thing he needed to do before they left. If he couldn’t get Congo he wanted one of his communications devices. He’d already scanned the living room to see whether Congo had left a laptop, tablet or phone there, but could see no sign of either. There was an office marked on the plan, on the far side of the hall. Cross was on his way there when Imbiss came on the air again: “The cops are getting closer. Less than three minutes. You need to get out.”

“Got it.”

Cross went into the office, turned on the light. He could see a desk, but it was bare. Congo had to have a laptop, or an iPad; everyone did. Where the hell would he use it? Cross thought about his own routine. Since he’d been living alone, he seemed to turn off his laptop, last thing at night, the way he always used to turn off his bedside light. Maybe Congo was the same. His bedroom was upstairs. Cross looked at his watch: thirty-eight seconds gone.

He took the stairs at a run, expecting at any moment to hear the sound of an approaching siren. When he got to Congo’s bedroom, the light was already on. Cross didn’t think anything of it. Congo was the kind of guy who’d leave lights on everywhere. He could afford the electricity bill easily enough and he wasn’t going to lie awake at nights worrying about global warming, either. Cross swept his eyes around the room. The bedclothes were strewn all over the place and he caught the sight of blood on the crumpled bottom sheet. He didn’t see anything he was looking for, though, and there wasn’t time to start searching cupboards and drawers. He was about to leave when he heard a sound from across the room. The doors to what looked like a walk-in wardrobe were open and Cross was certain someone was inside. He raised his gun, walked soundlessly across the room to the wardrobe, paused behind one of the doors and then stepped into the wardrobe.

The girl was there. She’d put on a T-shirt—one of Congo’s presumably, for it was so big that it looked like a dress on her—but nothing else; and she had a holdall in one hand, but she wasn’t filling it with clothes. Instead she was holding a great fistful of gold and diamond jewelry: necklaces, bracelets, watches—men’s and women’s alike. There was a wall safe behind her, its door hanging open. She gave a startled little squeak when she turned and saw Cross pointing a gun at her, but then straightened up, squared her shoulders and glared at him, defiantly.

“We earned it, what he did to us.” She paused, waiting to see how Cross would react.

Cross nodded. “OK.” He lowered the gun, looked at the watch. One minute, nineteen seconds. The voice in his ear sounded again.

“A minute before they get there.”

“Did he have a computer, a phone, anything like that?” he asked.

The girl nodded. “An iPad. Look by the bed.”

“Go down again to the garage. Wait there. We will give you a ride into town. . . wherever you want to go.” She nodded again, then picked up the holdall and headed for the door.

Hector found the iPad where she had told him it would be.

As he ran back down the stairs to the garage a car horn bleeped ahead of him, followed by a quick flash of headlights. Nolan had found and been able to start another black Range Rover. Hector ran toward it, and saw the girl waiting beside it.

“Get in the back!” Cross ordered her. Then he spoke on the radio to Dave Imbiss again. “Which way are the cops coming, Dave?”

“Up the hill, approaching the house from the left, as you leave the gates. So turn right and pray to God you can be out of sight before they get there.”

“Right at the gates,” Cross said to Nolan.

“If we beat them to it,” Nolan muttered.

The twin sheets of solid steel were looming before them. Cross prayed that the car had some kind of transponder that would make the gates open automatically, but they were getting closer and closer and still nothing was happening. The Range Rover slowed as Nolan hit the brakes.

“Keep going!” Cross barked.

“But, boss . . .”

“I said give it the gun, damn you!”

Nolan took his foot off the brakes, inhaled sharply, muttered, “Here goes nothing,” and hit the gas. The Range Rover surged forward. The gates were filling the windscreen, a gleaming metal wall, closer and closer still.

And then, when even Cross was bracing himself for the impact, they slid open and the Range Rover raced through, almost scraping its paintwork against the bare steel on each side of the chassis. Nolan spun the wheel right and the car surged up the ramp and around the bend. Cross had been watching the rear mirror all the way, but he saw no sign of a police car’s flashing lights. He relaxed, slumped back in the passenger seat and only then realized that he’d not heard from Paddy O’Quinn.

“Paddy, are you there? Do you have a tail on Congo?”

“Sorry, Heck, the bastard was driving a black car along unlit roads without his lights on. We had him and then . . .” O’Quinn sighed. “We didn’t have him any more.”

“Damn! Well, keep looking and let me know if you get even a sniff of him.”

Cross closed his eyes and gathered his thoughts. The primary aim of the mission had failed and he’d lost a good man, one with a wife and kids at home, which made it even worse. Congo had escaped and all Cross had to show for his night’s work was Congo’s iPad.

When they dropped the wounded girl on the outskirts of the city she limped away without another word, and without looking back.

The police arrived at the property belonging to Juan Tumbo just as the steel gate to the underground garage slid the final few centimeters back into the closed position. They were unable to enter the property, or to rouse any of the security guards or other employees. They could, however, hear the distant sound of dance music coming from the house. When they checked with their station commander they were told that although the house, like all the others in the neighborhood, was equipped with security cameras, alarm systems and panic buttons, none of them had been sounded. Nor had there been any further reports of gunfire. If a weapon had been discharged, the chances were that it was the owner, fooling around or trying to impress a woman.

“Forget it,” the officers in the patrol car were told. “If someone reports a crime tomorrow, then we will investigate it.”

When morning broke at the villa, the staff held a meeting. None of the guards had any idea what had happened. They were still deep in what ketamine-users know as the “k-hole,” a place where people lose their sense of time, place, identity and reality, where their memory is wiped away and their mind is beset by hallucinations. The rest of the staff agreed that Señor Tumbo had been alive and well when he left the building, so if he wanted to come back, he would. In the meantime, there was the mutilated body of a stranger to dispose of. All of them agreed that it was not wise to trouble the police with such a trivial matter. And the head gardener named César was given the job of burying it as deeply as possible in the furthest, least accessible corner of the property, while the others got to work cleaning up the mess.

When they thought about it, the staff of the villa realized that they were actually in an ideal situation. Everyone in the neighborhood was accustomed to Señor Bannock and Señor Tumbo being away for months at a time. The supermarket where they bought their food kept an account that was paid automatically by a bank somewhere in America that also handled all the utility bills. The garage was filled with cars and there was a credit card for the petrol. If they all just kept quiet and told anyone who asked that the owners were away on business, they could keep living in luxury for as long as they liked.

The police therefore received no further reports from the villa, and saw no reason to return. So far as everyone was concerned nothing of any note had taken place at all.

Hector called the royal palace in Abu Zara City, asked to speak to His Highness the Emir and, once he’d given his name, was put straight through to the Emir’s private office. A few moments later, he heard the voice of the ruler of Abu Zara.

“I am so glad that you called, Hector. I was very sorry—in fact, disgusted to hear that the Americans allowed that animal Congo to escape. I can only imagine how you must feel, after all that he has done to your family. If there is anything I can do, you have only to ask.”

Most Englishmen, confronted by an offer like that, instinctively refuse it, not wanting to put the other person to trouble on their account. But what might pass for good manners in England would constitute a profound insult to a man like the Emir, who would not take kindly to the refusal of an offer of help. Cross knew that, and so had no compunction about replying, “Thank you, Your Highness. Your concern means a lot to me and, as it happens, you could be a real help.”

“I am delighted to hear that. What is it that you require?”

“A few days ago I discovered where Johnny Congo was hiding in Caracas. My men and I attempted to seize him, but he escaped. I am very concerned that my daughter Catherine Cayla may once more be in danger. I would like to move her immediately to the apartment in Abu Zara where I know she will be safe. May I have your permission to do that?”

The Emir chuckled softly. “You know that I have, how do you say, a ticklish spot for the young lady in question. Please send her to be a guest in my country forthwith, if not sooner.”

“Thank you, Your Highness. I’m very grateful indeed for your kindness.”

Catherine Cayla, accompanied by her nanny Bonnie Hepworth and her entire entourage, took off the following morning and flew directly from London Heathrow to the little Gulf State where the Bannock Oil security headquarters were situated.

They were immediately installed in the apartment on the top floor of a building whose other occupants were all senior politicians or members of Abu Zara’s vast royal family. As a consequence the building was a virtual fortress, from the razor wire that guarded its perimeter to the security systems that monitored every square millimeter of every floor and the steel baffles, designed to deflect any rocket grenade or missile fired from the ground below, that protected the windows of the Cross apartment.

The place had been created as a safe house for Catherine Cayla, where she could live without Cross having to worry about her. Her trust fund took care of the phenomenal cost of upkeep.

Ten days had passed since the Caracas operation. Cross and O’Quinn were back in London and preparations for the offshore assignment at the Magna Grande field were in full swing when Nastiya’s phone started ringing and she saw Yevgenia’s name pop up on the screen.

“I just had a call from da Cunha,” her younger sister said.

“Did you give him the numbers that Papa got for us?” Nastiya asked.

Yevgenia giggled. “He didn’t seem awfully interested in them. He was much more interested in your private number.”

“I hope you didn’t give it to him—the real one.”

“No, I told him I’d get in touch with you and let you know he’d called.”

“Good.”

“So are you going to call him?”

Nastiya knew that her sister was smiling in a conspiratorial, gossipy sort of way as she asked the question. She replied in what she hoped was a flat, businesslike fashion: “Why? I found out what I needed to know. There’s nothing to be gained by talking to him again.”

“He sounded very sexy,” Yevgenia wheedled. “You know, with his French accent . . .”

“To some people, maybe.”

“Well, I thought he was very charming.”

“Yes, he’s got charm all right . . .”

“Oh, so you do like him!” Yevgenia exclaimed, delighted to have caught Nastiya in her trap.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Come on, admit it, you think he’s sexy.”

Nastiya decided it was time to show who was in control. “Let me remind you, little sister, that I am a married woman and I love my husband, so even if I can see how other women might think a man was attractive, that doesn’t mean that I replace him attractive myself.”

“Well, then, tell me what another women would see when she looked at Mateus da Cunha?”

“Hmm . . .” Nastiya wondered whether to end the conversation right here and now. But Yevgenia was her long-lost sister and one of the things sisters did—or so Nastiya assumed—was swap tittle-tattle about men, so she went along with Yevgenia’s question. “Well, another woman would see a man who’s about one meter eighty-five tall . . .”

“Ooh, I like that! It means that even in my highest heels I still have to tilt my head up to kiss him. Does he have a good body?”

“I think it’s clear that he takes regular exercise, yes.”

“And is he black? I’ve never had a black boyfriend. Papa would go crazy!”

“He’s mixed race: his mother is French. So his skin is paler than a full-blooded West African and his facial features are more Caucasian: narrower nose, thinner lips.”

“What about, you know . . . down there? Is that African? I hope so!”

Almost certainly, Nastiya thought, but what she said was, “How should I know?”

“Oh, don’t play the innocent with me, big sister! I bet you know exactly how big he is!”

“I haven’t a clue.”

“Then I’ll just have to replace out for myself!”

Now Nastiya really was concerned. Yevgenia wasn’t nearly ready to take on a man like da Cunha. “No, Yevgenia, don’t do that,” she said. “Listen to me, this is serious: Mateus da Cunha is very handsome, very clever, very charming and he knows exactly the effect he has on women.”

“Mmm . . . yummy!”

“But he’s also a very dangerous, ruthless, cynical bastard. The only thing he really cares about is power and he’ll do anything to get it. Do you hear me?”