So the story went, at the start of his criminal career as an armed robber, Chumak had been betrayed by a member of his own gang and spent years in a Ukrainian prison. The eventual death of the traitor had been something out of a nightmare, and ever since, the Salt Seller had nothing but loathing for anyone who would willingly give aid to the police.

  Glovkonin pushed a folder across the table and Chumak snatched it up. Inside were printouts of surveillance images from a long-lens camera, each one expertly altered by Andre to show what appeared to be Giovanni Da Silvio in conversation with a prominent Interpol officer. For the latter, Andre had specifically picked someone Chumak would recognise – a Dutchman who had been trying to dismantle one of the Salt Seller’s smuggling pipelines for years.

  ‘What are they talking about?’ Chumak grew more irate by the minute. He stabbed a finger at Glovkonin. ‘This is about your thing, eh? What do you call it? Combines.’

  Glovkonin shook his head, like a patient teacher with a dim child.

  ‘I’m sorry to say, he places your friendship far lower in his interests than the Combine. Da Silvio is informing on you.’ Seeing that he now had the man’s full attention, he pressed on. ‘You lost a cargo recently, I believe? Some trucks crossing the border from Azerbaijan?’

  ‘Yes.’ Chumak bit out the word. ‘Fucking cops took it. What of it?’

  Glovkonin had no idea what the cargo had been, nor how it had been discovered, but it was a useful fact to anchor his story.

  ‘Da Silvio knew about it. He gave that up to them.’

  Chumak sat back in his chair, sucking in a long breath through his nicotine-stained teeth.

  ‘Show me proof.’

  ‘Saito!’ Glovkonin pitched up his voice, so he would be heard in the suite’s other rooms. ‘Bring him in.’

  The Japanese assassin appeared at the door to the anteroom and gave a solemn nod, returning a moment later with a slight, sweating man in a cheap suit at his side.

  ‘This is Olezka Turgenev,’ Saito explained, escorting his charge to stand before Chumak. ‘An investigator with Sledkom.’

  Saito offered the criminal the man’s identity wallet, which the gangster gave a cursory once-over and then tossed on the table.

  Chumak spat on the carpet. ‘You brought a piece of shit cop in here?’

  ‘Mr Olezka has assisted me on occasion,’ said Glovkonin.

  ‘Hello.’ Turgenev managed a weak smile.

  A wiry figure, animated with a nervous energy that the man could not quite be rid of, he visibly recoiled from Chumak’s seething glare and bumped into Saito standing behind him.

  Glovkonin never dealt with Turgenev this closely, preferring to allow Saito or someone else to handle him at a remove – but the needs of this deception meant it had been necessary to bring him in. Turgenev operated at a mid-level in Sledkom, the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation, a federal law enforcement department roughly equivalent to the American FBI or the British National Crime Agency; he was also a Combine asset. His role today was to back up what Glovkonin said, beginning with a rapid-fire description of how Giovanni Da Silvio had actively sold out Pavlo Chumak.

  He produced a digital recorder and played an audio file Glovkonin had provided, adapted from the conversation between the Russian and the Italian in the restaurant a few days earlier. The prearranged narrative Turgenev presented continued for a few minutes, and Chumak listened sourly, gesturing at one of his men to bring him the caviar while he waited.

  The Salt Seller’s cheeks darkened. He clearly believed what he was hearing.

  ‘You swear this is truth?’ Chumak growled, ladling a heap of black roe on to a cracker. He gripped the slender mother-of-pearl spoon tightly in his heavy, calloused fingers as he swallowed the wafer whole.

  ‘Every word,’ said Turgenev, straightening his jacket, aiming for some composure.

  ‘You do this?’ Spittle and flecks of food flew from Chumak’s lips. ‘You take information from the Italian, you use it to fuck me?’

  ‘Well, yes, but—’ Turgenev never finished the sentence.

  Chumak grabbed the man, one hand grasping the back of his head, and pulled him close. With a bullish snarl, the criminal rammed the caviar spoon in his hand into Turgenev’s eye, forcing it through the socket and into the man’s brain. Bone crackled wetly as Chumak’s big wrestler’s hands ended his life.

  Saito reacted in shock, one hand dropping to where Glovkonin knew he had a holstered pistol, but the Russian warned off the assassin with a shake of the head, silently telling him to let it play out.

  Turgenev’s twitching body collapsed to the carpet, and the corrupt policeman gasped out his last breath.

  Glovkonin suppressed a sigh. He suspected that Chumak’s notorious temper might get the better of him, but he had hoped it would not be so. Now they would have the additional chore of disposing of a body.

  ‘Was that necessary?’ he asked.

  ‘I will tell you what is necessary!’ Chumak snarled his reply. ‘I’m going to gut that shit-eating rat Da Silvio and hang him from the bridge! No one crosses me and lives, no matter how much fucking money he has!’

  ‘I thought you would feel that way.’ Glovkonin raised both his hands in a gesture of conciliation. ‘But if I could ask you to just . . . take a moment? Storming into the middle of a party and murdering one of Italy’s most prominent industrialists is a rash act, don’t you think?’

  ‘An example has to be made!’ Chumak retorted. ‘Every second a traitor breathes is an insult to me!’

  ‘I brought this information to you so we can deal with him.’ Glovkonin rose to his feet, and the criminal’s ire ebbed. ‘Together, yes? But not tonight. Tomorrow. At the exchange. Then we can conclude our business in Sochi and remove this problem at the same time.’

  ‘When he least expects it,’ said Chumak.

  For the first time, the thug’s ugly features split in an even uglier smile.

  *

  ‘Will you let me tell you what excites me the most?’

  Da Silvio raised his voice to be heard over the hubbub of the party. He exhaled rich tobacco smoke through his perfect white teeth, making lazy loops with the lit tip of his cigar.

  ‘Oh, I’ll let you do anything, mate.’ Grace finessed her reply with a sultry giggle, her imitation of Sunny Wehmeyer pitched somewhere between seductive and daring.

  The Italian spared Lucy a glance, where she perched on the arm of Grace’s chair. Lucy remembered to look interested. Satisfied his audience hung on his words, Da Silvio made a clutching gesture with both hands.

  ‘The power.’ He made the word into a tiger’s growl. ‘You strap yourself into one of those boats, open up the throttles and let. It. Go.’ To underline the point, the man kited one hand up into the air, like a rising wing. ‘Incredible!’ Da Silvio chuckled. ‘But that’s why my own team won’t let me race our boats, I am too . . . What is the phrase? Heavy in the shoe?’

  ‘You’re a lead-foot,’ offered Lucy. ‘Can’t stay off the gas.’

  ‘Sì, sì . . .’ He frowned briefly, unsure if Lucy was mocking him. The Italian looked out, across to the waterline. Now the evening had drawn in, the boats bobbing along the shore were motes of light floating around the grand illuminated form of the Marine Luxe Hotel. ‘Ah. You could almost believe we were in Sicily, am I right? If you didn’t look at the food, of course!’ He laughed, his amusement echoed by his entourage.

  ‘Booze is great, though,’ said Grace, winking and saluting him with her oversized cocktail. ‘Russkis get that right, don’t they?’

  ‘I am surprised we’ve never spent any time together.’ Lucy could almost hear an audible thud as Da Silvio switched gears, going in for the kill. ‘You’ve been keeping your distance from me!’

  Grace gave a shrug. ‘To be honest, at first I thought you were a bit of a cock, mate. But I prejudged, didn’t I?’

  That pleased him, and he flagged down another server.

  ‘I apologise profusely if I gave you that impression, Ms Wehmeyer.’

  Lucy watched him smile to himself.

  This asshole thinks he’s winning here. Negging the Aussie chick, then she comes crawling back to him.

  She wanted to upend her drink over the guy, but resisted the temptation. Undercover work always had its unique challenges.

  She monitored the space around them, careful not to be obvious about it, looking at the faces of the partygoers who came and went. Many of them Lucy recognised from her walk-through of the hotel a few days earlier – the racer groups, the hangers-on and the criminal cliques mingling as they necked expensive champagne and overpriced vodka.

  But the one man she had expected to see here wasn’t around. Pytor Glovkonin was conspicuous by his absence, and that was a mixed blessing. The Russian oligarch knew the faces of the Rubicon survivors, if not from first-hand experience then at least from their surveillance files, so if he wasn’t here, he couldn’t burn them.

  But what’s worse, seeing the shark’s fin in the water or not seeing it?

  Lucy’s attention snapped back to the moment as the Italian noticed a group from the British Hawkeshead team walking by. He switched his attention away from the women without even the slightest consideration, undoubtedly expecting them to sit and wait patiently while he engaged with someone else. Da Silvio’s voice rose, becoming macho and boisterous to match the other men.

  Lucy briefly caught the eye of the Italian’s assistant and received a chilly glare in return. The Germanic ice princess stood a few paces away from her boss, stiff like a statue, dressed in a drab trouser suit with asymmetric sleeves and a mandarin collar. The outfit, the stillness of her, and the fact that she didn’t appear to blink made the woman resemble some kind of sci-fi show android.

  Cradled in the crook of the woman’s arm was the target package, the digital ‘book’ containing the intel they needed to access to complete their mission. Lucy kept it in sight from the corner of her eye, wondering how much longer they were going to have to wait.

  Not long, as it turned out. Lucy heard the soft chime from the smartwatch on the assistant’s wrist. The woman’s severe expression tightened as she read something off the watch’s screen.

  Lucy touched the jewelled choker around her neck in a bored, distracted fashion, activating the skin-contact throat mike hidden inside it.

  ‘Active, wake up.’ She subvocalised the words, so softly that only the mike would register them.

  ‘Just resting my eyes,’ said Marc, his voice resonating from the radio bead in her right earring. ‘Are we on? Please say yes, my legs are going numb crouching down here.’

  She pictured him in the Marine Luxe’s sub-basement, hiding out in the oily crawlspaces beneath the main elevator shaft.

  ‘Think so,’ she replied.

  Grace touched her lightly on the arm and nodded towards the hotel. Another of Da Silvio’s assistants approached, carrying an identical tablet computer to the one in the woman’s hand.

  ‘Signor?’ said the woman in the grey suit, catching sight of her subordinate. ‘A moment?’

  ‘What? Oh. Drake is here, already?’ Da Silvio allowed himself to be drawn out of his conversation for a moment to press his thumb to a sensor on the tablet she carried. He noticed Lucy’s attention and showed his teeth again in a wide smile. ‘Technology. As much a benefit as a bane, don’t you think?’ He didn’t wait for an answer and waved the woman away, returning to his over-loud discussion. ‘Grazie, Willa. Carry on.’

  Lucy raised her glass to cover her mouth as she spoke. ‘All units, the book is in play. We’re on.’

  ‘Copy,’ said Marc.

  ‘Copy.’ Kara’s voice echoed the Brit’s a moment later. ‘Good news, I have partial access to the elevator control subsystems. Looks like someone forgot to patch that after last night.’

  The man Da Silvio had called Drake handed the woman Willa the new tablet and took the old one into his custody, with the solemnity of someone handing over nuclear launch codes. Without a word, Drake took his burden in both hands and threaded his way back into the hotel, towards the elevator bank.

  ‘What’s shakin’, babe?’ Grace glanced at Lucy, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes.

  Lucy spoke again, but her words were for the others. ‘The book is on the move. Active, the courier is coming to you.’

  *

  ‘Active copies,’ said Marc.

  He stood with his head below the level of the ground floor, where the doors to the lift shaft met the metal frame. In the basement, the grease-covered machinery filled the space, and in the semi-darkness he had to move carefully or risk snagging his gear on something.

  Pale light from his smartphone illuminated Marc’s face, where the screen showed a mouse’s-eye view of the crowded lobby floor. A thin, flexible cable led up from the device to a tiny camera wedged in the gap at the bottom of the lift doors, sending him a live video feed. As he watched, he saw Drake moving through the crowd of partygoers, escorted by one of the hotel’s uniformed security men.

  Da Silvio’s assistant came up to the lift doors and Marc heard the click as he pressed the call button. Marc reeled in the wire-camera, and the lift car up on the fourth floor began to descend.

  He skirted back around the safety cradle at the base of the shaft, moving to his ready position. The car dropped into place and halted. As the doors opened to allow the hotel residents inside to exit, Marc stepped up and wedged himself into the corners of the lift’s exterior frame. Magnetic strips in the kneepads he wore thudded quietly against the outer shell of the car, holding him in place.

  There was barely a half-metre gap between the back of the lift car’s exterior and the inside wall of the shaft, but Marc’s narrow, wiry build was just about thin enough to fit in there. He had a couple of centimetres of clearance once the thing started to rise, and the prospect of being scraped along eight storeys of wall was more than enough to keep him hugging the lift.

  With care, Marc placed a metallic pad the size of a sheet of paper against the shell of the lift and connected it to his smartphone.

  Indicators blinked on, showing that the reader pad had good contact and was ready for capture. Marc kept his attention fully on the phone as he thumb-typed in a key string that activated a scanning program. The lift bounced on its shock absorbers as the last of the hotel guests disembarked, and then the weight shifted again as Drake and the security guard boarded.

  The failure of the original plan to siphon off the data from the digital book meant that Marc was now forced to turn that operation inside out to get what they needed. The tablet computer used a near-field system, a wireless means of transmission that would operate when two sources were close enough to swap data. Normally, that was the book and its charging cradle, but the pad Marc had placed on the wall of the lift duplicated the same signals. Once Drake moved into range for the near-field to connect, the book would think it was in download mode and drop its guard. From there, it would only take a few seconds to copy every last byte of Giovanni Da Silvio’s private and personal emails stored on the device.

  Simple in theory, but complex in reality. The operating range was limited, and with a steel wall in the way, that distance reduced even more. Drake would have to be close.

  The smartphone’s screen flickered green as the word DOWNLOADING blinked on, and Marc felt a surge of elation as the data capture began.

  ‘Elevator is ready to move,’ said Kara.

  ‘Eighth floor, please.’

  Marc heard Drake’s voice from inside the lift car, heard the man moving around. With a click, an automated announcement in Russian warned to stand clear of the closing doors.

  The green screen suddenly switched to an accusing crimson, the text NO SIGNAL flaring brightly. Marc swallowed a curse. The reader pad had lost its data capture as its target moved outside its range.

  Drake wasn’t standing still inside the lift. Da Silvio’s assistant moved around, nervously shifting as he waited for the doors to close.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ said the man, as he pressed the floor button once more.

  Maybe Drake had a thing about lifts, maybe he was wound too tight, but whatever the reason, he moved in and out of the near-field radius, continually making and then severing the connection between the book and Marc’s spyPhone.

  DOWNLOADING. NO SIGNAL. DOWNLOADING. NO SIGNAL.

  For fuck’s sake, stand still!

  Marc willed his thoughts into Drake’s skull, but it made no difference. Unless the man stayed close, they would not get what they needed.

  *

  ‘Problem?’ said Grace, leaning in to speak into Lucy’s ear as Da Silvio brayed with laughter at some locker-room joke cracked by one of the racers.

  ‘No connection,’ she hissed.

  Through the windows of the hotel atrium, Lucy could see the elevator bank, and Drake moving back and forth by the open doors.

  ‘Can your girly hold the lift?’

  Grace stood up quickly, reaching for Lucy’s arm as she parsed the situation.

  ‘Uh, yeah . . . Maybe.’

  ‘Tell her to do it.’

  Grace pulled Lucy off her perch.

  Lucy pressed her throat mike. ‘Kara, hold the elevator.’

  ‘I can give you ten seconds.’

  ‘That’ll have to do.’

  ‘You’re leaving?’ the Italian called after them as the pair moved off.

  ‘We’re going to take a leak, no worries,’ Grace shot back, then turned to Lucy. ‘Follow my lead.’

  Lucy said nothing, but she didn’t stop Grace, letting the other woman guide her across the lobby.

  Without slowing the pace, Grace snatched an open bottle of champagne from a nearby ice bucket and glugged down a mouthful, then thrust it into Lucy’s hand. The woman’s expression turned slack.

  ‘Have some fizzy pop,’ she grinned, slurring her words like a drunk and giving a boozy wink. ‘And play along.’

  Grace let go of Lucy’s hand and released a sound somewhere between a whoop and a giggle, as if she had said something hilarious to her. Without looking where she was going, Grace pitched straight into the elevator doors as they started to close, catching them in mid-motion.