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Jack and Thomas didn’t talk about Istanbul until they were back in the UK and heading home from the airport. Jack hadn’t spent much time thinking about what he’d done. Was that good or bad? Had he so easily come to terms with taking someone’s life?

Apart from the rush of adrenaline, he’d been totally focused when he’d pushed the needle into Kubat.

Afterwards, he’d been calm. Clinging to Thomas had been an act.

Falling apart once the guy was dead would have wrecked everything.

Jack wasn’t riddled with guilt. He’d been given a job and he’d done it.

Kubat was a bad man. He’d died quickly. Probably quicker than he’d deserved.

The one thing that kept nibbling at him was the knowledge that now Kubat was dead, another would seize the opportunity to step in and take his place. Did this type of violent reckoning never end? Like some whack-a-mole game?

“How do you think it went?” Thomas finally asked. “And how are you?”

“Fine and fine.”

Thomas waited, obviously expecting Jack to say more, but fine twice was the best he could manage. He wasn’t completely fine but he wouldn’t admit that.

“Run through everything. Give me your analysis. What could have been done better?”

Facts were easier to handle.

Thomas didn’t speak until Jack had finished. “Which was more difficult? Pressing the needle into his neck or accepting you’d caused his death?”

Wasn’t it the same thing?

“It’s not the same thing,” said his mind-reading mentor.

“My chest knotted when I injected him but only because I was thinking—what if the succinylcholine doesn’t act quickly enough? What if it’s low grade? What if he realises what I’ve done, gets up and tries to kill me?”

“What would you have done?”

“Assuming I’d been able to hide the syringe, screamed that he was attacking me, fended him off in the least violent way I could, and hoped he died before someone burst into the room, or at least that he lost the power of speech before that happened.

Killing him in another way would have made things awkward. ”

“You’d not mentioned a worry about the drug.”

“It hadn’t occurred to me until that point. A mistake. Then again, how could I test it?”

“I’ve always told you not to fall in love with plan A. Be ready to be unfaithful with plan B, then C… Whatever you need to do, you do. When he flirted, you saw opportunity and acted on it. Eighteen is the age of consent in Türkiye and he didn’t care. He was a bad man. No loss to the world.”

“But to his wife and kids?” Jack had seen their pictures on Thomas’s computer.

“You already know the answer to that.”

“The other wives and kids who were his victims.”

Thomas reached over and patted Jack’s knee. “Well done. You were quick thinking, and did all the right things.”

Jack nodded. He couldn’t bring himself to say thank you for being praised for the way he killed someone. But he was glad Thomas was pleased with him.

It was only after they’d gone to bed that Jack checked his phone and saw all the calls and messages from Zeph who was clearly worried about him. Suddenly, Zeph was who he needed to see. Zeph would remind him of the teenage boy he was, not a deadly weapon.