‘Tough. You set the terms and I delivered.’ Hope reached for a glass of orange juice and took a sip. ‘My brother made a huge error of judgement and almost jeopardised my chance of becoming president. I don’t intend to let anything else get in my way.’ She slammed the glass down on the table and looked across at him. ‘Including you.’

‘Yes, but…’ From the corner of his eye Taher spotted something through the window. Someone.

He held a hand up to Hope, edged up to the opening and peered down. Two men lay prone by the wall in the olive grove. One was brown-skinned, with short black hair, not much more than a boy. The other was older and white, a few strands of grey hair on his head, flabby features. Taher had seen the man before in a dossier given to him by his contact in London.

‘MI5,’ he whispered to himself.

Hope pushed her chair back and stood. ‘Visitors?’

‘Yes.’ Taher moved back from the window and grabbed his AK-47 from where he’d propped it against the wall. He checked his Glock was secure in his shoulder holster and went to the door. ‘I’ll deal with them.’

Downstairs, he crept along the corridor which led to the veranda. A slit of light came through a narrow window. He peered out. The men were still there, hunched behind the stone wall. Neither looked armed.

Taher continued along the corridor. He stopped and listened before he stepped onto the veranda. Anybody approaching along the track would have triggered the PIR alarm, but the alarm was silent and apart from the wind there wasn’t a sound. By the state of these two they must have climbed up from the ravine. This was amateur hour.

Taher slipped out onto the veranda and across to the steps that led down to the olive grove. He moved silently until he was within a few feet of the men and then cleared his throat.

‘You’ve been after me, old man.’ Taher raised his gun as the two men scrabbled upright. ‘For a long time.’

‘Taher.’ The older man pushed himself up from the ground and beckoned his colleague to do the same. He didn’t appear to be surprised.

‘And now you’ve found me. Job done.’

‘I’m not finished yet,’ the man said. ‘Not until you’re behind bars.’

‘You’re out of touch. There are no bars these days. Missiles from the sky, helicopters bringing special forces – so much easier than all the legal problems imprisonment brings.’ Taher gestured towards the steps with the barrel of his gun. ‘And I’d welcome that. I wouldn’t want to rot in a prison wearing a hessian hood and an orange jumpsuit. Wouldn’t want to receive a daily waterboarding from my brave and fearless captors. No thanks. Give me martyrdom every time.’

‘A British prison,’ the man said. ‘We do things differently.’