I nodded. “That sounds nice.” I meant it. I couldn’t stop myself glancing at Erin again, imagining a life like that with her. Fuck!

Gina pointed to a street sign. “Nearly there.” She sighed in relief. “I don’t even care about having to fly commercial. I’m gonna get on board, order a big glass of red and—”

We turned the corner and stopped dead. The street was packed with firefighters, their hoses aimed at the window of an apartment block. Flames roared from inside. I counted windows and floors, praying I was wrong. “That’s….”

“...the safehouse,” finished Gabriel.

“What happened?” asked Gina. “Someone attacked it?”

Cal shook his head. “It’s burning too cleanly. Look how intense the flames are, but they’re not spreading to the other apartments.” He turned to scowl at us. “CIA safehouses are rigged so they can be burned with just a couple of minutes’ notice. They’re getting rid of any evidence we were there. They’re cutting us loose, just like they did with JD.”

“Why?” I asked. “We did it! We got JD back, we got back to Latvia. Job done!”

“I don’t know, but we should get out of here,” muttered JD. We slunk around the corner and into the next street. That’s when Erin gave a choked cry and pointed to a TV screen in a shop window.

It was showing JD’s face. I didn’t speak Latvian but I could figure out what the big red banner across the top of the screen meant. A manhunt was underway for us. Gabriel’s face appeared on screen, then Bradan’s.

“How did they get our photos?” demanded Gabriel. “We wiped the cameras at the prison.”

“Why are they hunting us?” asked JD. “Becker was holding me off the books. The German government should be investigating him, not—”

The screen changed to show a German politician, reading a statement in English. “We are in full co-operation with our colleagues across Europe and NATO,” he was saying, “to ensure that the terrorists behind this senseless, tragic attack are brought to justice.”

“Tragic,” croaked Gina. “He said tragic. Why would he—”

“Our thoughts are with the families of the seven brave members of our armed forces who gave their lives at the prison,” continued the politician.

I buried my hands in my hair. “Oh Jesus.” I felt physically sick. “This is Becker. He must have killed some of the guards at the prison and pinned it on us. He’s got the whole of Europe searching for us. The police’ll either shoot us or throw us in jail: either way, he gets rid of us.”

We all stared at each other in horror. I looked at Erin and my stomach knotted. She’d go to jail with the rest of us.