In the back of the Audi, the severed head beside him, Frend was writing down the license number of the Mercedes. Miloje had spotted it shortly before they entered the city. Frend thought it might have been sent by Kiš or Stajić to keep an eye on them, but he had reconsidered when he saw it parked near the bar as they emerged, the driver still in place.

Miloje was writing in his notebook with his right hand while driving with his left. He showed the page to Frend. The message read Do Not Go To Hotel.

‘Where, then?’ said Frend, and Miloje raised a hand to let him know that the matter was being taken care of.

They drove for half an hour, making cutbacks and illegal turns until Miloje was sure they were not being followed, before stopping at a surburban hotel frequented by Eastern European tourists on strict budgets. Miloje went inside and came out a short time later with a key. He returned to the notebook and wrote Stay In Your Room.

‘What about tomorrow?’ said Frend. ‘I have to fly back to Vienna.’

Not From Belgrade. Timisoara.

Timisoara Airport was in Romania, about 160 kilometers away, by Frend’s reckoning.

‘How?’

We Drive.

‘When?’

5 a.m.

Frend thanked him. There was no one at reception as he passed, and he entered his room unnoticed. It contained a single bed, a television that did not work, and a bathroom that reeked of human waste.

Six million euros. The Vuksans did not have access to such funds. Even had they been able to lay their hands on that kind of money, it was a deliberately absurd price. Kiš and Stajić wanted the Vuksans dead. Had Frend gone to his original hotel, Stajić’s people would have been waiting in his room. He would have been drugged and removed without fuss. Then, in some quiet basement that smelled of vinegar and burning, Stajić would have gone to work on him.

Frend stayed awake until Miloje came to collect him the following morning. Only when they crossed the Romanian border did he begin to feel safe, and he did not truly relax until he was on the Tarom-Romanian Air flight to Bucharest with an onward connection to Vienna.

As for the velvet bag, Miloje delivered it to Nikola Musulin’s widow.

He did not stay to watch her open it.

But he did hear her screams.

Chapter XLIII

At thirty-one, Luca Bilbija was the youngest of the men who had assisted the Vuksans on the night De Jaager and the others were murdered. He had known only that a final job was to be done, one that would necessitate violence, after which he would receive a bonus and be free to seek employment elsewhere, if he chose; alternatively, he could return with the Vuksans to Serbia, where Radovan had promised him a position as his personal driver and bodyguard.