‘And the second thing?’
‘You have to accept that your life here is over. No more marriage, no more flat, no more job. Basically, no more Eve Polastri.’
‘So . . .’
‘She dies. And you leave all this behind. I take you into my world.’
Eve stares at Villanelle. She feels as if she’s in free-fall, weightless.
Villanelle hitches up the sleeves of her sweater. Her hands are strong and capable. Her eyes, all business now, meet Eve’s. ‘The first thing we have to do is convince Anton that I’ve killed you. Once he thinks you’re dead, we’ve got a very short breathing space before he comes after me. We have to misdirect him, and whoever he sends. Then we disappear.’
Eve closes her eyes. ‘Look,’ she says desperately. ‘Let me contact someone I know in the police. DCI Gary Hurst. He was involved in the Kedrin investigation. He’s a good guy, and completely straight. He’d put us under full close protection, and I’m sure you could do some sort of a deal, testifying against the Twelve in exchange for immunity. I’d much rather go that route.’
‘Eve, you still don’t get it. They have people everywhere. There’s no police cell, no prison, no safe house that they can’t get to. If we want to live longer than twenty-four hours, we have to disappear.’
‘Where to?’
‘Like I said, another world. Mine.’
‘And what do you mean by that?’
‘I mean the world that’s all around you, but which is invisible if you’re not part of it. In Russia we call it mir teney, the shadow world.’
‘Surely that’s the Twelve’s domain?’
‘Not any more. The Twelve are the establishment now. You know what the assassination department is called? Housekeeping.’
Eve stands up and starts to walk around in tight circles. She’s still in free-fall, plummeting down some endless lift-shaft. She can feel the barrel of the Glock rubbing sweatily in the cleft of her buttocks. Pulling the gun from her waistband, she holds it loosely in her right hand. Villanelle doesn’t move.
‘Niko would think I was dead?’
‘Everyone would.’
‘And there’s no alternative?’
‘Not if you want to stay alive.’
Eve nods, and continues to pace. Then, quite suddenly, she sits down again.
‘Give me that,’ says Villanelle, gently taking the Glock.
Eve narrows her gaze. ‘What happened here?’ she asks, reaching out and touching the scar on Villanelle’s lip.
‘I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you everything. But this isn’t the time.’
Eve nods. Time rushes almost audibly past her ears. There’s the world that she knows, the world of work, alarm calls, email, car insurance and supermarket loyalty cards, and there’s mir teney, the shadow world. There’s Niko, who loves her, and is the kindest and most decent man she has ever met, and there’s Villanelle, who kills for pleasure.
She looks into the waiting grey eyes.
‘OK,’ she says. ‘What do we do?’
On the dining table, Villanelle places the medical supplies from Whitlock and Jones, and from her backpack takes a bin bag, a tin of Waitrose dog food, a white porcelain cup, a plastic belt, a tin of modelling wax, a small glass dropper of spirit gum, a fountain pen, a packet of hair-grips, a face powder compact, an eye-shadow palette, a comb, several condoms, her Sig Sauer automatic and suppressor and Eve’s Glock.
‘OK, the first thing I need is some of your hair. I’m going to pull it out.’ She does so, Eve winces, and Villanelle smiles. ‘Now I need a dark sheet. Darkest you’ve got. Quickly, while I set everything up.’
Taking herself to the bedroom, Eve returns with a folded dark blue bedsheet, which Villanelle places on the table with the other items. She’s turned the TV on, and is streaming a noisy Japanese cop show. ‘Sit,’ she orders Eve, pointing to the sofa. ‘Pull up your sleeve.’
A little apprehensively, Eve does as she’s bidden. From the table, Villanelle takes a cannula, a hollow blood collection needle. The cannula has a twistable port and a clear PVC transfer tube attached. Villanelle feeds the open end of the tube into a condom, holding it tightly in place with an elastic hair-grip. Taking the plastic belt, she tightens it around Eve’s bicep until the vein in her forearm is bulging, and then, surprisingly gently, slips in the cannula and opens the port.
‘Squeeze your fist,’ Villanelle tells her, as blood flows through the PVC tube and begins to fill the condom. After a few minutes, it holds two-thirds of a pint of Eve’s blood, and Villanelle turns off the port, and detaches and knots the condom.
Picking up the Sig Sauer, Villanelle walks to the centre of the room, then, holding the sagging condom over the carpet, she fires a single, downward-angled shot into its dark, distended belly. There’s a wet smack, and an outward burst of blood. From the centre of the carpet, a shining red spatter fans outwards towards the window, shading into a myriad of fine droplets which gleam on the floor and furniture and walls.
Villanelle regards her work with a critical eye, then moves back to Eve. Taking a pinch of modelling wax, she rolls it into a marble-size ball, flattens it, and glues it to Eve’s forehead with spirit gum. Then taking the cap off the fountain pen, she presses the circular end into the low mound of wax, cutting a neat hole through to the skin. With the face powder, she blends the wax into Eve’s forehead, fills the hole with black eye-shadow, and surrounds the raised area with bruise-coloured purple.
‘You’re going to have such a pretty entry wound,’ she tells Eve. ‘But now I need more blood. It’s going to leave you feeling a bit weird, OK?’
This time she takes two condoms of blood, another full pint.
Eve is very pale. ‘I think I’m going to pass out,’ she whispers.
‘I’ve got you,’ Villanelle
