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Back The Double Save as PDF
Chapters (63)
  1. 1
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  10. 10
  11. 11
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  30. 30
  31. 31
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  37. 37
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  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
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  45. 45
  46. 46
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  48. 48
  49. 49
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  63. Acknowledgements

‘Try not to worry. I’ll do everything he asks. Just stay calm and…’

The phone went dead.

Gessen made eye contact with his head of Security and nodded. His own preference was to storm the house, but since that might endanger Hélène’s life, they’d come up with a different plan. More complicated to execute, and with significant risks, but who knew what Vidor might do if he were cornered? Gessen placed the brown envelope with Vidor’s passport, money, and travel tickets on the welcome mat by the door. The shutters were latched closed, but Vidor was almost certainly watching him from one of the heart-shaped peepholes carved in the wood.

Gessen walked backwards, holding up his hands to show they were empty. As he moved away from Hélène’s front door, his mind raced to consider the best course of action. Good friends for more than ten years, but how they had fought in those early days, when he’d tried to buy Hélène out of her home. No amount of money could make her budge. She was a survivor, Hélène was. Always elegant and polite, even under pressure. He just hoped Vidor – or Malik – or whoever he was dealing with at the moment, would not do anything rash.

The door of the house swung open and Hélène stepped out. Clever man, Vidor. He must have suspected a sniper was lying in wait, with his head in the crosshairs.

Hélène looked straight at him and nodded before retrieving the packet of documents and money and slipping back inside. Now what? He waited in the freezing air for what seemed an eternity until his phone rang.

‘Vidor?’

‘It’s Hélène. He says that the documents appear to be in order, and he wants to head into the village now. He’s taking me with him, and he has a knife.’ The phone was muffled, followed by the sound of scuffling feet and Vidor’s voice in his ear. ‘I won’t hurt her,’ he said, ‘if you do as agreed. So call off your guards, I know they’re out there. As soon as I’ve arrived back home in Cambridge, I’ll let her go. If I see any sign of the police, I’m sure I don’t need to tell you what could happen to Hélène. Do as I say, and all will be well.’