Gunshots cracked and popped somewhere nearby, but muted, perhaps by distance, perhaps because her ears were full of blood. Granger cursed again, but he trailed off into a groan as he struggled to release himself, or to retrieve something from beneath his seat.

Jules could not put one thought after another in any sort of coherent fashion. She was annoyed at ruining the clothes she’d bought just hours ago, even though she hated them and would have thrown them away. She felt cool, despite the heat of the day pouring in through the damaged windscreen, which looked as though a giant had put his fist through it.

And still the gunfire popped and crackled. Until, without preamble, a single shot roared with the concussive power of a small bomb going off beside her head. Someone screamed – it was her, she was screaming – at a blast wave of mutilation. Blood, bone, skin, gore. And Granger yelling and roaring, and trying to push her head down between her knees as he fired out of his window with the cut-down shotgun.

Two bangs sounded next to her ear, followed by metallic crunching, and then her door was open and she caught a glimpse of a blade. She tried to cry out, to warn Granger of the threat. But he was snarling and shouting as he fired off round after round from the pump-action shotgun.

Julianne tried to sit up but this man was too strong. But then the blade was gone, and her seatbelt had been cut, and she was being dragged out of the vehicle and away. Away from the burning oil, the iron blood, the tangy aftertaste of gunfire. She fought to free herself until she recognised Birendra’s voice.

‘It is fine. It is good. You are safe, Ms Julianne. You are safe. Just come with us, we have to go. Now.’

The world was a red mask of death and chaos. Her eyes were tacky with blood. What little she could see and understand gave her to believe they had been rammed at an intersection and two more cars had blocked them in. Both of the blocking cars were burning, riddled with bullet holes. She and Granger had been ambushed and would have died, save for three carloads of Shah’s men who had materialised from the traffic flow.

Some of the attackers lay on the ground. One man in a pair of Levi’s cut-offs lay across the hood of the cab, still twitching from the last sparks of his neurons as they faded away.

The gunfire had ceased, she realised. It had stopped some unknown time ago. Her internal clock seemed to have been damaged in the crash. Had she been here for hours?

‘Come on,’ said Birendra. ‘We have to get you to a hospital. The others can chase them down.’