‘Her daddy won’t be happy when we send her back in pieces.’

‘No. But by then we will be a long way away.’

‘Our new identities are finalised?’

‘Yes. Passports, ID cards, bank accounts, everything. We will have to be very careful, but one day…’

Kadyrov nodded. ‘So you said you were wondering if… what?’

Shishani hesitated. ‘I was wondering if perhaps we should move tonight?’ he said. ‘Now.’

Kadyrov looked at him, carefully. ‘Only Shaladi and his courier know our location?’ he said.

‘Yes.’

‘And you’ve just said that neither of them will talk.’

‘Yes, but…’

‘You are unusually nervous, Argun,’ said Kadyrov, with a smile. ‘Are we timid women, who flinch when the wind blows, or are we men? It is right that we should move, but there is no immediate rush. Better to let the men who are sleeping have a night’s rest, and the guards sleep tomorrow, and then move in an orderly fashion tomorrow evening.’

‘I suppose that way we would avoid travelling by day,’ said Shishani, rubbing his chin, thoughtfully.

‘Exactly,’ said Kadyrov. He reached out and clapped the other man on the shoulder. ‘Go back to bed. Preserve your strength. Who knows when it will be needed?’

Chapter 94.

94.

GEORDIE AND FRED arrived ten minutes after John Carr’s last radio message.

The four men formed a small huddle in the dark date palm plantation, and listened in while Carr outlined the plan that they were about to execute.

When he’d finished, he looked round them.

‘Any questions?’ he whispered.

No-one spoke. Each knew his part, and each knew, too, that this was either the ballsiest or the stupidest thing he’d ever done, and probably both.

The plan was sketchy, and full of what-ifs and other unknowns, and they were outnumbered and had no support.

A few minutes from action, each man’s life now hung in the balance, suspended by the thinnest thread.

And they loved it – even Kevin McMullen’s dark thoughts were long behind him.

This was what it was all about.

They’d signed up for the money, but the truth was the money meant nothing.

Every man jack of them had really come for the chance to feel like this: alive, focused on what was ahead, exhilarated at the prospect, about to test themselves in the greatest arena of all and risk their lives to give two young women, whom they did not know, the chance to live theirs.

Carr grinned to himself.

Geordie Skelton must have read his mind.

‘We must be proper fucking daft, man,’ he said, chuckling softly. ‘But let’s be fucking at it.’

Suppressing all thoughts of his family, McMullen crossed himself, though it was out of habit as much as anything, the battlefield being the only place he prayed.

Skelton hefted a Minimi in his hands, enjoying the extra weight, anticipating the awesome firepower it would bring at close range.