Julia had heard enough –

“It wasn’t Rita!” she said aggressively. “It was that unbelievable story about how she got her money.”

“Mmm – for once you may be right,” Marlon said gruffly.

Marlon was sick of this – he’d rather eat alone.

He drained the dregs of his glass and rose to his feet –

“It’s a damn shame to complicate a straight-forward operation like this but… they need me to do a job on the President.”

“A job?” Buck asked, curious.

“Don’t you worry about that,” Marlon said. “That mealy-mouthed, golf-playing goose will be easy meat. He’ll end up doing exactly what I want.”

He slapped Buck on the shoulder as he left –

“This delay will only help. Now you can rest assured that when I do give the order it will have been cleared all the way to the top. That should make it real easy for you.”

12.3

At the door of room 665, the embrace lingered. The kiss that followed was warm and delicious, expanding like a filling dam and cascading to an unexpectedly explosive climax.

That was fucking fantastic!

“You’re a beautiful thing Roger,” Julia said, blissfully exhausted.

“I know,” Buck said with a laugh. “I’ve been trying to show you that ever since we met!”

12.4

News spread quickly on the mountain and by the time the old sadhu arrived at Shard’s hut he had already attracted a sizeable following.

“Well, great man,” Shard said. “What brings you here?”

The sadhu spoke quickly in an impossibly thick southern dialect. The only word Pierre understood was “Max”, but he couldn’t miss the point as the sadhu lifted the imaginary rifle and, with a funny little popping sound, pulled the trigger.

“Is someone going to shoot Max?” he asked, horrified.

“Someone is thinking about it,” Shard said with a wry smile.