He put two bullets in the Russian gangster as soon he had handed over the gun; one in his head and one in his chest, as instructed. He let the dead man keep the cash. He wouldn’t need money where he was going. Then he made his way to the next post – a public toilet. He locked the door, stripped and used the last bottle of DNA Away to coat his skin. All he could smell was the chemical as he moved on to the Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood, St Petersburg.

To the promised land.

CHAPTER 6

Long Bay Correctional Complex, Sydney, NSW, Australia

JAX’s cell was dimly lit and still cool when he returned from the yard. He scanned it for his tubs, hoping especially that his blanket had arrived, so that he could avoid another night of hypothermia.

Nothing. And in the grey daylight, the cell was even grimmer than it had been in the dark. Jax could now see all the cell’s dirty little secrets. There was a splatter of blood on one of the walls. He shuddered as it triggered a flash of that day when his life had changed forever.

The mattress was even more limp and urine-stained than he’d first realised and the toilet was filthy. A pile of dead cockroaches in the corner completed the bleak picture.

Three metres by one and a half. It seemed bigger in the gloom. Eight steps by four steps.

Jax was suddenly struggling for air. A tomb. My tomb. Each breath he took was shorter than the last. I’m going to die here. He hadn’t been aware that he was claustrophobic – until he’d begun hyperventilating. Got to get out.

He felt light-headed. Tiny lights, bright and brilliant, flashed and flickered in front of his face. He swiped at them. Then a darkness crept over him.

‘Oh my,’ came the voice. ‘Oh, you poor boy. Oh my. This is not good. Let’s see if I can help.’

Jax took a gasp of air as he turned to see a blurry figure in the doorway of his cell. The voice was soft and the words sincere, but Jax couldn’t trust such things, not in here.

His vision sharpened and he saw that the voice belonged to a flushed-faced, portly older man whose black coat seemed to be topped by a band of white.

‘There, there,’ the man said, moving towards Jax with one arm half-raised, as though he were approaching a wounded animal.

Jax dropped his guard as the priest came nearer. Surely he could at least trust that collar?