Shadow State by Andy McNab

Author:Andy McNab [McNab, Andy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: WelBeck

CHAPTER 25

Gasana had cleared his schedule.

He was supposed to be taking meetings with wealth managers who believed they could secure him higher returns on the investments he made with the dividends he occasionally took out of GMA, and hearing the pitches of a group of young entrepreneurs looking for funding for some new venture. But they had only ever been pencils, and they were all happy to be moved if some flexibility meant the possibility of currying a little more favour. Instead, he’d been mostly locked away by himself in his office in the Kigali mansion, monitoring progress from Nyungwe remotely, and killing time.

Gasana was not a naturally patient person. He understood the importance and power of long-term planning, but he preferred to always be active in the present somehow – doing deals, planning new strategies, plotting the possible outcomes of any decision so that he could be prepared for whichever way the wind blew. However, he had learned that sometimes simply waiting was unavoidable.

The world didn’t always spin as fast as he wanted it to, and there was a thin line between being the energetic voice driving things forward and a hectoring drone people eventually found a reason to tune out. Enthusiasm could be contagious but it could also be irritating. Force could inspire resistance as much as change.

Yet, even when he was waiting, he wasn’t doing nothing. He was in a constant state of readiness – prepared to act and seize the initiative as soon as he could. Which meant it took all of an hour from him receiving the message from Mexico in his secure inbox and asking Dusabe to make some enquiries about office space in the Malak Ali free zone for the invitation to an extremely exclusive event in Athens to be sent to his official GME email address.

He appreciated the speed with which things were suddenly happening. It was bold, and flattering.

The invitation wasn’t about lineage, influence, or being the right class of person. It was purely, simply, about money. He was someone who had it. How he acquired his wealth and what he used it for wasn’t important. The only thing that mattered was that he might be persuaded to part with some of it in exchange for joining a private club of the equally rich.

Gasana forwarded the second email to Dusabe, telling him to RSVP on his behalf, then got to thinking about the kind of first impression he wanted to make when he made his entrance while he poured himself a glass of Martell XO cognac from the bar cabinet that was built into the wall behind his desk. He usually made a point of championing his mother continent’s ability to craft luxuries on a par with anything the rest of the world could produce, but even he had to admit that African spirits still had a way to go before they could compete with their European counterparts.

He decided he needed a jet.

He was normally happy to fly business or first-class

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