Diego must be the man with the rifle. One of the men from the van. Diego’s cronies hidden back there among the rocks sounded anxious, even frightened. Ben had no doubt that they were armed like their comrade – but they held their fire, no doubt worried about hitting the vanished Diego in the darkness. Nobody came out.

Ben could guess why that was. These hunters who had come here tonight, seeking to do violence against someone, were beginning to realise that they should have brought more men. They were not the predators in this scenario. They were losing their confidence and growing fearful of what was out there waiting for them.

Ben wanted to know who the hunters had come after. Wanted to know if his guess was right.

Keeping low to the ground, he ran up the slope to where Diego had vanished. It took him half a minute to get there, bush to bush, rock to rock, fast and stealthy and unseen. He covered the last few yards with extreme caution, pistol ready, watching the shadows, watching everything. Diego’s pals could open fire if they spotted him. But Ben sensed that Diego’s pals weren’t the greatest danger up here on the escarpment.

As for Diego himself, he was no longer a threat to anyone. As Ben crept like a panther through the shadows he saw the body slumped among the rocks. Diego was a rough-looking character, or had been, with a mess of curly black hair and a bristly moustache. He lay on his back and stared up at the stars with bulging eyes that were unblinking, unseeing. Something dark and wet oozed from his neck and pooled on the ground. His throat had been slashed, straight and surgical, from ear to ear. The scoped hunting rifle was gone.

Only one kind of person could have sneaked up on an armed opponent from close quarters and taken him down so fast and efficiently. That was a trained professional like Jaden Wolf.

Ben flinched and ducked behind the rocks as another shot rang out. At first he thought Diego’s friends had spotted him and opened fire, mistaking him for the man they’d come here to kill. But then another shot crashed and echoed across the escarpment and this time he spotted the yellow-white muzzle flash coming from a V-shaped cleft further up the slope. The sparking impact of a bullet strike told him that the shooter was aiming down towards the rocks where Diego’s friends were taking cover. Whoever he was, he had an excellent position and an open field of fire.