Her foot intruded, which he’d been expecting. He was ready to use force to get rid of her if he had to. He had too much to lose to be gentle.

Astrid withdrew a hand from the generous pocket of her hoodie, her fist wrapped around something the size of an apple.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I can’t. I wish I could, but you did this to us, Luc. You called out to me. You gave me a cause. You knew I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from helping you. Now, I need you to show your appreciation. We have to agree on our next steps. There are lots of options. I know people who’ll give us alibis. Or we could simply disappear together. You’re not happy here. I read your emails to your mother. She really shouldn’t have used your name and year of birth as her password. The emails nearly broke my heart …’

‘What’s in your hand?’ he asked, wondering why his heart was thumping so hard when his brain was still insisting that he was simply imagining the worst.

‘You were an Interpol agent. You know what this is. How many arms dealers did you bring down? More than half a dozen, if memory serves me right.’

She opened her hand and pushed it forwards into the light. In her palm sat grey-green death, her thumb through the circle of the pin. While her thumb was there, any attempt by Callanach to grab it from her would have only one result. It would be the end for both of them without a shadow of a doubt and perhaps the start of a fire, which would also kill anyone else sleeping in the apartments.

‘You’d better come in,’ he said, stepping aside.

She pocketed the hand grenade once more, keeping her hand in there with it, and kissed him on the cheek as she walked past. Callanach shut the door behind them and wondered how long he had left.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

18 March

The Crow stared down at the two bodies on the floor. It was a mess, both literally and metaphorically. He knew who the male was now. Lance Proudfoot, journalist. Leech. Anyone who made a living out of reporting other people’s misery deserved to die. Even if it had been outside the boundaries of his plan, he didn’t need to feel guilty about ending the journalist’s life. If Proudfoot walked free, he would go straight to the police and The Crow had no desire to be incarcerated. Some deaths were simply necessary. Janet, though, had taken him by surprise. He’d checked the entire flat. There was no evidence that she was a police officer, nor that the Max she’d texted was in fact Max Tripp, detective sergeant. But she’d known his name and that The Crow had met him previously.