‘We’re not going to find Gillian.’ The words were bitter in his mouth. ‘All I’ve done is get people killed. Bret, Dr Haltung, now Brother Jerome.’
‘Brother Jerome was my fault,’ said Emily quietly. ‘If I hadn’t taken you there he’d never have been involved.’
‘If I hadn’t brought you here you’d never have been involved.’ Nick squeezed the stem of his wine glass, so hard he thought it would shatter.
He glanced up. Emily seemed not to have heard him; her face was fixed in an emotionless stare over his shoulder. He began to turn to follow, but she grabbed his hand and pulled him back.
‘Keep looking at me. There’s a man three tables behind you who’s been watching us for the last five minutes.’
Nick felt a familiar surge of dread. ‘What does he look like?’
‘Dark, heavy build. A crooked nose. Italian, maybe. He hasn’t taken off his coat since he came in.’
Nick flicked his eyes to the gilded mirror on the wall but couldn’t pick him out. His mind raced.
‘I’ve got an idea.’ His whole body was tensed, half expecting to feel a gun in his back any second. He locked his eyes on Emily’s to steady himself. ‘In a moment, we’ll have a blazing row. You’ll run off in tears to the bathroom. I’ll storm out the door. We’ll leave the bag on the table and see what he does.’
‘What if he comes after you?’
‘Then you come after him.’
‘And if he comes after me?’
‘Scream the place down. I’ll be right there.’ Nick gripped her wrist. ‘Are you ready?’
She nodded – then suddenly pushed back her chair and leaped to her feet.
‘How dare you say that?’ she shouted. Around the restaurant, the rattle of cutlery and conversation went still. Even Nick was shocked. ‘You don’t have a clue what I’m feeling.’
She looked wildly around, then threw up her hands and ran out to the toilets. Nick sat stunned for a moment, then pushed back his chair so that the bag hanging on the arm was clearly visible. He slammed a twenty-euro note down on the table and stalked to the exit, keeping his eyes glued to the floor.
Even before the door shut, he heard the scrape of a chair being hurriedly vacated. He ran along the well-trampled pavement to the nearest corner, ducked behind it and looked back.
Almost at once, the restaurant door banged open again. A thickset man in a long black coat strode out. The lantern over the door bathed him in yellow light. Nick glimpsed dark hair, dark skin, a boxer’s nose and his own backpack dangling from the man’s fist. There was something familiar about him – from the Belgian warehouse, perhaps? He looked briskly up and down the street, then pulled his keys out of his pocket. The man pressed whatever was in his hand. Orange lights blinked on a black Audi across the street. No snow had settled on the roof: it couldn’t have been there long. Nick tried to look inside, wondering if there was anyone else behind the dark windows.
The man crossed the street and opened the driver-side door. Nick made up his mind. The snow was silent underfoot. The man had his back to Nick and was fumbling with the backpack, perhaps making sure that the book was inside. He didn’t hear Nick coming until he was almost on top of him. Nick dropped his shoulder and drove his fists into the man’s stomach. All the anger, fear and frustration he’d endured in the last week released itself in that one moment of contact, a perfect spear of rage. The man doubled over; the keys fell out of his hand into the snow. Nick kicked them under the car, then kneed his adversary in the face. He grabbed for the bag.
But Nick was an amateur. The other man was a pro. Nick’s knee had unbalanced his opponent but not knocked him over. As Nick stretched out for the bag, the man’s big hand whipped out and closed around his arm. He twisted; Nick felt his arm almost torn off its elbow. His whole body was wrenched around. His feet skidded on the snow, lost their grip and slid from underneath him. The man threw him back onto the ground.
Nick gasped as the breath was forced out of him. Looming above, the man took a step back. For a split second Nick thought he might just turn and run. But he was only giving himself more space. He reached inside his coat and pulled out a pistol. It looked tiny in his hoof-like fist.
This was how it would end. Lying in the road, his blood melting into the snow around him until it cooled and froze. He’d never know what had happened to Gillian, never understand why he’d come to this icy corner of France to die. He raged at the injustice of it.
With a scream, Emily flew out of the night and hurled herself against the man. She was too slight to have much effect, but she wrapped herself around his arm and dragged it down, away from Nick.
Nick sprang to his feet and grabbed for the gun. His hand closed around the cold barrel and clung on for his life. For a moment the three of them were caught in a heaving tangle of limbs and steel, swaying and staggering in the snow. Then something gave. Nick lost his balance; the next thing he knew his cheek was planted in the snow, pinned down by somebody on top of him.
‘Are you OK?’
Emily pushed herself off him and stood. Nick scrambled up after her. He still had the gun, holding it by its muzzle like a club. Where was their opponent?
Halfway down the street, a large shadow flitted across the snow under a street lamp. Nick looked around.
‘He’s still got the bag.’
‘Wait,’ Emily called. But Nick was already running. His feet crunched in the snow; his arms pumped so fast he barely noticed the weight of the gun. The man might be strong but he wasn’t quick on his feet. Nick had little trouble keeping him in sight as they sprinted along the empty streets. The black and white frames of the half-timbered houses were skeletal in the gloom, their shuttered windows blind to the frantic chase.
The man glanced over his shoulder, then ducked down an unlit side street. His heavy tracks were printed clearly in the snow – especially here, where few other feet had disturbed it. Nick followed, gaining. He glimpsed the black gleam of water below as he crossed a bridge and turned again.
The houses thinned, giving way to a strip of grass and trees. To his right, he saw a jumble of wooden battlements and turrets – a children’s playground. The chill air rasped in Nick’s lungs. But he could see his quarry clearly now, barely twenty yards ahead of him. He swallowed the pain and kept going.
Between the trees, Nick saw water on all sides. They must have come onto some sort of island in the river. Ahead, a row of high stone towers stood floodlit against the darkness where the island ended.
The man was trapped. He slowed to a walk, then stopped. Nick skidded to a halt on the icy path, keeping well back. He raised the gun as his quarry turned to face him. They stood there among the trees and snow in silence, a dozen paces apart like duellists. But only one of them had a gun.
‘Who are you?’ Nick shouted. The night seemed to swallow his words.
The man didn’t answer. He looked down at the bag still dangling from his hand, then let it drop. It landed in the snow at his feet. The movement drew Nick’s attention; in that moment, the Italian’s hand dipped inside his pocket. Nick’s gaze snapped back. With the sickening knowledge that he’d made a fatal mistake, he raised the pistol. But his finger hesitated on the trigger.
The man hadn’t pulled another gun. Instead, he’d extracted a sheet of paper. His hands scrabbled with it as he folded it over and over, then began tearing it into pieces.
‘Stop!’ Nick shouted. Tiny fragments fluttered to the ground like a shower of snow. Nick jerked the gun – but he couldn’t shoot a man in cold blood.
A brilliant beam of light swept across the park behind him. A barge was coming up the river, its captain taking no chances in the darkness. In a second, Nick would be picked out like an actor on stage. He lowered the gun to his side, into the shadows. Like deer caught on a road, neither he nor the man dared move.