‘Before you begin, Jacob,’ Klara says, turning to George. ‘Where are we headed? I’m just driving blindly here.’

They’re almost out on the ring road around Brussels. Out of old habit Klara is driving towards the airport, but their plan stretched no further than picking up Karl at the Palais de Justice.

George looks away from Jacob and back to her. ‘I don’t know. Depends a little on what you say, Karl, or Jacob, or whatever your name is.’

‘I don’t know where to start…’ Jacob says. ‘I contacted Gabriella because…’

Slowly and quietly, almost hesitantly, the young man they have in the back seat starts to tell them a story. He starts from what he says is the beginning. An internship at the Swedish embassy. A rooftop in Beirut. A garden at a deserted palace. A mysterious man and an overwhelming and passionate love.

Then a young woman who claims to work for the Swedish intelligence service. And a memory card that’s surgically inserted under his skin. A love that slowly turns to doubt. Here he falls silent. As if it’s become too much, tears start to run down his cheeks.

‘But he’s dead now,’ he whispers. ‘Yassim is dead.’

Klara lets go of the wheel with one hand and reaches back to touch his knee, to show she understands what it’s like to lose someone in the way Jacob just lost Yassim.

George regards Jacob with suspicion. ‘What a fucking story,’ he says. ‘It sounds almost a little too dramatic.’

‘I want to remind you that you drugged a Russian spy this morning and shot the tyres on a van like we’re in a goddamn gangster movie,’ she says drily. ‘You might not want to talk about what’s a little too dramatic.’

He flinches as if offended and turns to Jacob again. ‘I just mean it doesn’t hurt to be a little critical,’ he mutters. ‘Who is this Yassim anyway?’

Jacob looks at him, annoyed. ‘I’m just telling you what happened.’

‘Don’t mind him,’ Klara says. ‘George is a well-known arsehole. But Jacob?’

‘Yes?’ Jacob says weakly and looks at her.

‘What’s on that memory card, and where do you have it now?’

‘And you still haven’t explained who these Russians are,’ George adds. ‘Or why you contacted Gabriella.’

Jacob takes a deep breath and stares out at the dusk falling around them. ‘Yassim’s part of a group that’s been collecting information about drone strikes in Syria,’ he says. ‘About all the civilians that have been killed, all the war crimes. That’s the information on the memory card. Myriam calls him a spy because the information is classified.’

‘So Yassim is the new Snowden?’ Klara says. ‘Is that what you mean?’