‘No thanks,’ he said. ‘He will heal me in five minutes.’

‘Five minutes?’ Sami said with urgency. ‘Five minutes?’

Martin looked back towards the clock.

‘Closer to four now,’ he said.

Jax was about to speak when Clarke hurled himself towards the priest. He threw a brutal right hook straight into the chaplain’s ribs. Martin grunted before attempting to stand, struggling against the restraints that kept him pinned to the seat.

‘I am the Mahdi,’ he boomed, his chubby cheeks wobbling with fury. ‘Uniter of all religions. Ruler of all dominion. I am the one who will bring Him back. Jesus will rise and I will be standing by HIS side!’

‘Want to bet?’ Jax said as he jumped to his feet.

He turned to Sami. ‘Give me a computer,’ he demanded. ‘Now!’

JAX didn’t even have to click on the link to get his result; the number was in the preview.

QURAN, SURAH 85, AYAH 159: He will rise with the Mahdi, redeemer of all religion: Twelfth Imam and high priest, to defeat the . . .

And there were the numbers:

85:159

And there was his number:

59

The target was the fifty-ninth church on his list. The Cathedral Church of St Andrew, Hawaii.

Behind him, Sami yanked his phone from his pocket and began mashing at the screen, ignoring Clarke’s puzzled inquiries.

‘Agent Sami,’ he snapped. ‘ID CIA444323. Put me through to the head of the Secret Service. Fucking now!’

Jax looked at Martin. The tough man who’d hardly flinched as his gag was removed was gone. The whimpering fool frightened by the intercom was back.

‘ETA to delivery: two minutes,’ Wallace declared after Sweeper One cleared the final stretch of road. Wallace returned to the screens that showed the end of the line: Honolulu’s Cathedral Church of St Andrew.

Since being elected seven years earlier, the President had spent every Christmas in Hawaii with his family, partly to avoid the chill of an East Coast winter and partly to escape, at least for a while, the madness of the mainland. But he’d still insisted on attending a public Christmas Day church service despite Agent Wallace’s recommendation that he opt for the ceremony held at the Marine Corps base.

‘Y’all want me to spend Christmas morning in a soldiers’ shack,’ the devout Christian had roared. ‘Find me a proper church.’

And that’s why Wallace was once again sitting in the back of a truck scanning the faces of the hundreds of people crowded in front of the cathedral, hoping to get a glimpse of the President.

The red light on the emergency phone suddenly flashed. Wallace snatched the black phone from its cradle and slammed it against his ear. Two mug shots flashed up on his priority screen as the caller introduced himself. The facial recognition software automatically went to work.

WALID could not see the procession from where he stood, but the buzz among the crowd told him the first car had been spotted.