‘Oh, I know you’re a tough motherfucker. But the company has manuals on covert assassination thicker than a phone directory, and ways and means like you wouldn’t believe. Nobody sees them coming. Not even you.’

‘Seems I had a lucky escape there. So why the change of plan?’

‘Because when you contacted Keegan wanting to talk to me, of all people, some bright spark inside the company figured that maybe there was another angle here, one we could use.’

‘Keegan?’

Roth chuckled. ‘Getting it, aintcha? Yeah, Keegan was part of the setup. Most of the PMC assignments that he handles are really just fronts for covert CIA operations in countries where the US government can’t openly operate. He’s one of us, or as good as.’

‘Small world,’ Ben said.

‘Getting smaller every day, that’s for sure,’ Roth replied.

‘The island. Is that really your house or is it some kind of CIA station?’

‘No, the island is the real deal, home sweet home. We wanted you well out of the way, so we figured, why not bring you over to my place? While you were enjoying my hospitality a couple of our Parisian assets were sent in to snatch your pal Thierry and his friend from your apartment and take them into protective custody. Turns out to be a talented fellow, that Thierry. Once he had access to some proper resources to help him decrypt the audio track on the Juneau video recording, he started getting much better results. The audio was very interesting.’

Ben didn’t know whether to marvel at the cynical ingenuity of Roth and his associates, or just reach across the desk and break his nose in a couple of places. ‘And where is Thierry now? Or was he “removed” once you had what you wanted?’

‘Oh, don’t you worry about your little forger buddy. Like I said, quite the talented individual. He’ll be kept plenty busy working for us from now on, with a whole new identity and a pleasant life somewhere far, far away from all the people he pissed off back home.’

‘That’s very sweet of you. And as for me, my whole involvement in this was to use me to get Nazim. You knew how dangerous he was, and you didn’t want to risk the lives of your own agents. Correct?’