Donovan returned Purkiss’s stare. Purkiss said, ‘Two men at the door.’ He was at Donovan in two strides and barrelling into him and sending him backwards into the armchair he’d risen from. He felt Donovan’s sinews tense, his arms come up and his torso twist in the automatic defensive posture that had been drilled into him over gruelling years of training. But the momentum had carried him back and the chair tipped over and Purkiss was on him with his forearm across his throat. ‘How many out there?’ He relaxed the pressure just enough that Donovan could speak. The man’s voice emerged as a throaty hiss: ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ Purkiss had tried to bring down Donovan with the minimum of noise but it evidently hadn’t been enough, because the door to the living room swung open and the two guards from earlier came through with handguns drawn, shouting, ‘Back off, back off.’ Purkiss rolled off Donovan and dragged the older man across him where he crouched and slid an arm across his throat once more, this time from behind.
