Fiction
Linger No Longer
A contemporary, female-focused thriller about a flight for life — and about what running does to the people who run.
Ambitious businessmen willing to fund political stardom with criminal wealth abound. Few are as methodical, pragmatic and visionary as Michael. Used to getting what he wants every single time, he is caught unaware by Allison — his wife and business co-host — who decides, in a daring move, to make a run for it.
Allison, who soon becomes Marianne, finds herself an expert on the battered-women disappearing business. Diana lives to save other women’s lives. Always aware of her surroundings, anticipating events, she is able to make Marianne and herself invisible for seven full days. Until she does not.
In a chase full of near misses and ingenious escapes, a dangerous game run by professionals goes on rhythmically and authentically until a first death triggers vengeance. For the hunters, the contract becomes personal. The escapees, in turn, realise they cannot run forever. Slowly, building up a curious and unlikely team, the hunted realise their only way out is to fight back.
Chapter 1
Diana kept moving in quick, small steps. The light drizzle prompted some inconspicuous trotting now and then. She watched the shop windows on the other side of the street for her pursuers. There were two of them. A tall one, in a green windbreaker. A shorter, bulky one with brown beard and furious eyes. They no longer tried to maintain cover. They were in for a launch. She was nervous, apprehensive even, but she was scanning options in her mind, discarding, pondering, choosing fast. A busy small plaza was ahead of her. Some men stood, some talked, some played cards. An old tramp was slowly walking with bags and clutter in his hands. There were some wooden benches, a small playground to the left, pigeons and a hot-dog cart to the right.
When the two guys looked right to cross the one-way street, Diana bumped into the old man in rags, swiftly crouched and went behind the bench. At the same time, she freed herself from her dark overcoat, tossed it on the floor and put the old man’s cap onto her own head, bringing her hair to the front. All of that in a single hand sweep. Immediately thereafter, she got a child’s hand and stood talking to her and smiling, moving as in a backwards diagonal, so that the men were in her left field of vision, but not within a direct line. After two or three steps, she dropped the kid’s hand, explicitly pointed ahead in the general direction of the swings and kept walking. A happy mom in a woolen white sweater and cap.