Slingshot

by Matthew Dunn

  “You fucking . . .”

  “If you kill me, someone else you both know will die.”

  “Shut up, you bastard!” Alfie made ready to fire.

  But Will placed a hand over Alfie’s gun. “Wait.” He stared at Schreiber. “What do you mean?”

  Schreiber glanced out of the window. “Do you like the view? It’s so beautiful and tranquil.” He returned his attention to Will and Alfie. “If you kill me, Sarah will be killed.”

  Will’s stomach muscles tightened.

  “Did you think I’d leave her alone while she started her idyllic new life in Edinburgh?” Schreiber shook his head. “That would have been a mistake, particularly as I anticipated that you’d come for me. She’s being watched by men who won’t hesitate to carry out my orders. I called them as soon as I heard you were approaching and told them that unless I phoned them back within an hour and told them I was safe, they were to use knives on her. And”—his smile broadened—“I told them that they could take their time with the task.”

  Will removed his hand from Alfie’s gun. “Make that call!”

  “That’s a silly request. If I make the call, I’m dead.”

  “If you don’t, you’re dead!”

  “You’d kill your own sister? Because that’s what you’ll be doing if you shoot me.”

  Will was motionless.

  “He’s bluffing.” Alfie’s face was full of anger.

  Will slowly lowered his gun. “I don’t think so.”

  Schreiber rubbed his hands. “Correct, Mr. Cochrane. I never bluff. Instead I calculate and strategize accordingly. I’ve lived my entire life that way.” He stood. “If you let me walk out of here, nothing will happen to her.”

  “Liar! You’ve no interest in keeping Sarah alive.”

  Schreiber clicked his tongue. “You’re smarter than that. If I kill her, I have no leverage over you. It’s very much in my interest to keep her alive in order to keep you away.”

  “Someone else will get you. Your power’s dwindling. Soon you’ll have nowhere to hide.”

  Schreiber frowned. “Dwindling? On the contrary, my business is flourishing and expanding.” His expression turned cold. “However, I concede that I can’t hide from old age. Rübner’s death was a bit of a setback, as I was grooming him to take over my projects. But it doesn’t matter now, as I’ve found a replacement, a woman who’s perhaps even more talented.”

  “Who?”

  “None of your business.” He glanced away. “Call off your sniper. Let me walk away. Sarah will live. It’s as simple as that.”

  “Still think he’s bluffing. We can’t let him go, Will.”

  “I’m afraid you’ve no choice, Mr. Mayne. And Will Cochrane knows that.” He moved around the desk. “Don’t you?”

  Will nodded.

  “Bleedin’ ’ell, Will. This can’t be happening!”

  Schreiber took two paces toward them. “Call off your sniper.”

  “Don’t listen to him!”

  “Call him off.”

  “Will?”

  Will withdrew his cell phone and tapped numbers on the keypad.

  “Don’t do it, Will!”

  He held the phone to his face and spoke. “If I touch him, Schreiber will kill my sister. We’ve lost. Get right away from here. Don’t touch Schreiber.” He closed the phone.

  “Jesus!”

  Will glanced at Alfie. “Trust me, I’m sure he’s not bluffing.”

  Schreiber pointed a frail finger at him. “If that was a dummy call, my men will follow my orders.”

  “I made the call, he listened, and he will follow my orders.” Will nodded. “You’re free to go.”

  Schreiber nodded. “Very well.” He picked up his walking stick, moved across the room, passed Will and Alfie, and turned to face them when he reached the door. “Gentlemen, I do hope we never meet again.”

  “We won’t.” Will sighed. “What does it feel like?”

  “What?”

  “Being someone capable of orchestrating genocide.”

  Schreiber shrugged. “It feels just fine. But the bigger question you should be asking yourself is, how does it make you feel letting someone like me go?” He laughed and walked out of the room.

  Will and Alfie stood still, silent.

  They stayed like this for one minute.

  Alfie shook his head, felt utter disbelief. “You’re certain he wasn’t bluffing about Sarah?”

  “Yes.”

  “In that case, you made the right call, son. Bloody hell—we had him bang to rights, but the devious bastard was one step ahead of us.”

  Will moved to the large window and looked at the mountain road winding down the ridge toward the valley. Alfie joined him. Will smiled. “He’s not the only devious bastard.”

  Kurt Schreiber exited the mountain residence, walking down the road toward the garages. As he passed the bodies of his men, his thoughts turned to his business empire. He’d need a new base of operations and more men, and would need to spend time with his new deputy so that he could groom her to take on day-to-day responsibilities for his activities while he kept a low profile.

  He grinned. So many people involved in the Slingshot project had failed.

  Dugan and the other conspirators.

  Dmitriev, who was now living in fear that one day Schreiber would order his assassination.

  Kronos.

  And Will Cochrane and his colleagues.

  The only man to walk away with anything to show for his involvement was Kurt Schreiber.

  He pulled out car keys and hobbled down the road, ensuring that he took in all of his beautiful surroundings. This was the last time he’d come here. He’d miss this place.

  Still, he’d never been a man to look back. Instead, he’d always embraced fresh beginnings.

  The .50-caliber bullet smashed through his upper torso. After he collapsed to the ground, another removed his head.

  Kronos stripped the sniper rifle down to its working parts, quickly slotted them into their compartments, shut the case, and walked back down the mountain. He wondered why Cochrane had let Schreiber walk out of the house. One explanation was that the two men he’d had in his sights were not Cochrane and the older man, rather were Schreiber’s guards. But if that was the case, why would they have let Schreiber expose himself to Kronos’s thermal imagery? No, the men in Schreiber’s room had to have been Cochrane and the older man. For some reason they couldn’t pull the trigger, so they did the next best thing and persuaded Schreiber that the sniper would not harm him when he left. Goodness knows how Cochrane had done that.

  He could have shot the former Stasi colonel as soon as he spotted him leaving the living room. Instead he’d waited until Schreiber had exited the house, so that he could switch off his thermal imagery. He’d wanted to see Schreiber’s face clearly through his sights. One last time. Before he shot the man who’d inspired Slingshot, ordered him to kill Dmitriev, and insisted that he leave his family after the assassination in Holland.

  Stefan smiled. Thanks to Schreiber, his family was five million dollars richer. But that wasn’t why he was smiling. Tonight he’d be back home, sitting around the kitchen table with his twin sons and his wife. He cherished every moment he had with his beloved family. And tonight would be special, because he’d be able to tell them the rest of the story.

  Hidden from view outside the property, Mikhail Salkov watched Sarah and James unpacking boxes within their new Scottish home. They were moving back and forth between the rooms, completely oblivious to the danger that had been surrounding them.

  He looked at the countryside around him. The house was isolated, though Edinburgh was only five miles away. His family home was similar. Located a few miles outside of Moscow, it gave his wife and daughters the chance to get their fixes of both city and country living. He hoped Sarah and James gained happiness living here.

  He looked at the dead man by his feet, then lifted and threw him on top of the three other bodies i
n the trunk of his SUV. Thank goodness he hadn’t needed to be here two weeks ago. Then, he’d still needed a walking stick to aid his injured leg. Fully fit, he was able to observe Schreiber’s surveillance team for hours before receiving the call from Cochrane.

  The MI6 officer had anticipated Schreiber’s ploy to use Sarah as leverage if Will succeeded in infiltrating his Bavarian residence and came face-to-face with the man. For weeks, he’d had other men watching Sarah and Schreiber’s team. The British Special Forces men were under orders to act if Sarah was threatened, but Will knew that they’d never agree to a cold-blooded hit on U.K. soil. He needed a ruthless, deniable expert for that. So today he’d ordered his men to leave and had asked Mikhail to take care of matters if required to do so. The call would be the trigger, the wording precise and intended to mislead Schreiber.

  If I touch him, Schreiber will kill my sister. We’ve lost. Get right away from here. Don’t touch Schreiber.

  It meant, kill the men watching my sister.

  He’d been surprised that Cochrane had given him the task, though he had quickly concluded that it was Cochrane’s way of saying that he trusted the SVR spycatcher because he’d broken rules by not taking Lenka Yevtushenko back to Russia. If he ever met Cochrane again, he hoped it would be in circumstances that allowed them to remain allies. One never knew in this line of work.

  He slammed the trunk shut and got into the vehicle. He had a long drive ahead of him to reach the deserted woodland where the bodies would be buried. After that, he could finally go home.

  Sixty-Four

  The taxi stopped on the long residential street in Minsk. Will told the driver to wait and turned to the man sitting next to him in the rear of the vehicle. “I promised her that I’d bring you home. In return, I want you to give me your word that you’ll have nothing more to do with intelligence work, will get a job in one of the local universities or schools, will never return to Russia, will stay with Alina and Maria for the rest of your life.”

  Lenka Yevtushenko nodded slowly. “I give you my word, but it’s not a difficult thing to do because I want all of those things more than anything else.”

  Will handed Lenka a grocery bag. Inside were the ingredients to make kotleta pokrestyansky, the meal that Alina had promised to one day make for Will. “You’ve been apart for quite some time. There’s nothing like cooking a meal together to break the ice.” He smiled. “You caused a lot of trouble by stealing that piece of paper.”

  Lenka opened the door. “You mean pieces of paper.”

  “What?”

  “Pieces of paper. Schreiber instructed me to steal twenty of them. Only one had a partial grid reference on it. The other nineteen were full codes. When I was held at the farmstead, the guards spoke openly about it. I guess they believed I was a dead man so didn’t care what I heard. Schreiber needed backup options in case Kronos had died during the last twenty years, or was no longer fit to conduct the assassination.”

  “He had the ability to activate nineteen other sleeper assassins?”

  Lenka nodded. “Kronos was his preferred choice for the assassination of Dmitriev, because he was the very best. In any case, Schreiber was of the view that the other assassins would still be of value to him because he could use them to kill anyone who tried to go after him at some point in the future.” He bowed his head. “If only I’d known the true value of what I’d stolen.”

  He exited the vehicle, shut the door, and walked to the front entrance of Alina’s apartment building. Within one minute, Alina and baby Maria were there. Alina threw one arm around Lenka and pulled him close to her. She was shaking with sobs. They stayed in their embrace for minutes before speaking inaudible words. Alina looked at Will. She gave the slightest smile, kept her eyes on him, then turned and took her partner and her child into their home.

  Will sat motionless.

  Staring at other people’s happy lives, with no idea how to become like them.

  No hope of becoming like them.

  He told the driver that he’d decided to walk back to the city center, thrust cash at him, and got out of the car. Tomorrow he’d be in London. He’d report to Alistair that Schreiber’s anonymous female successor had nineteen other sleeper assassins who could be activated if Will or others tried to destroy Schreiber’s empire.

  That wouldn’t stop Will Cochrane.

  He’d never stop.

  Until he was killed.

  Snow began to fall.

  Spartan buttoned up his overcoat and walked along the empty street.

  Alone.

  An Excerpt from Dark Spies

  Dedication

  To Margie, my children, and the spies who carry secrets to their graves

  PART I

  ONE

  Prague, 2005

  It was no easy task to identify a spy and make that person betray their country. But that was what the Russian man was here to do.

  Wearing a black tuxedo, he entered the Intercontinental hotel’s Congress Hall and fixed a grin on his face so that he looked like every other insincere diplomat who was attending the American embassy’s cocktail party. There were hundreds of them, men and women, beautiful, plain, and ugly, from at least forty different countries. The less experienced of them were huddled awkwardly in small protective groups, pouring champagne down their throats to ease the pain of being here.

  The Russian wasn’t interested in them.

  Instead he was here because he wanted to watch the people whom he termed “the predators”: the seasoned, clever, heads-crammed-full-of- juicy-secrets diplomats who glided through events like these, moving from one person to another, offering brief, charming, inane comments, touching arms as if the act conveyed profound meaning, before floating effortlessly to the next person. Diplomats called it “working the room,” but the Russian understood that wasn’t what they were doing. They were controlling the room and everything within it, watching for a moment when they could snatch a vital piece of information from someone weaker than themselves, or choosing the right moment to speak a few carefully chosen words and manipulate vulnerable minds.

  The Russian knew the predators, and some of them thought they knew him—Radimir Kirsanov, a forty-something, low-level diplomat who was on a short-term posting to the Russian embassy in the Czech Republic. The women in the room liked Radimir because he had cute dimples, sky-blue eyes, blond-and-silver hair that was styled in the cut of a 1960s movie star, and the physique of a tennis player—the kind of shape that was not particularly good or bad in the naked flesh, but that wore a suit with rapierlike panache. Plus, they thought his dim mind made their superior intellects shine. The men, on the other hand, briefly glanced at him with disdain, as if he were a brainless male model.

  Radimir grabbed a glass of champagne from one of the dozens of black-and-white-uniformed waiters who were navigating their way across the vast room, dodging diplomats, and skirting around tables covered in immaculate starched white cloths kept firmly in place by heavy candelabra and artificial-flower arrangements. The Russian held the glass in front of his chest, with no intention of drinking from it, moved past a bored-looking string quartet, and walked into the party. All around him was the sound of laughter, manifold languages, and women brushing against men who were not their partners.

  Radimir made sure he didn’t glide with the confidence and precision of a predator. He wasn’t supposed to have the skills to do that. Instead, he meandered his way across the room, smiling to show off his dimples. He stood in the corner, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, sometimes smoothing a hand against his suit, as if he were fidgeting because he was ill at ease and had sweaty palms.

  For a while, people noticed him. Beautiful people get that kind of attention. But as with gorgeous art, there’s a limited period of time one can stare at a good-looking person before it becomes boring. After thirty minutes, he was sure he was invisible.

  He moved to another part of the room, not too far, just a few yards to the next table, whe
re he could pick at some canapes and fiddle with part of the flower display. He kept his gaze low, as if to avoid the embarrassment of having to talk to someone cleverer than him. Thankfully, the demigods around him knew that Radimir was aware of his limitations, so they left him alone. It was the only good thing they did for him.

  Holding his champagne glass with two hands so that he looked like an amateur at this type of event, he walked to another table, then another, then several more. Forty minutes later he returned to his starting point in the corner of the room. Poor Radimir, he imagined the pros would think if any of them had seen his awkward and pointless amble around the room, though he doubted any of them had noticed. The predators were moving up a gear, pouncing on late and desirable new arrivals, placing firm arms around them and guiding them to people they didn’t know but just had to meet, cracking jokes, whispering in ears, kissing cheeks, flattering, nodding with sage expressions, and all the time acting to hide their agenda: pure lust for information.

  The Russian placed his full glass on a table, leaned back against the wall, folded his arms, and smiled his very best pretty and dumb smile. He’d practiced the expression many times in front of mirrors and he was convinced he’d perfected the look. It was an expression that he hoped said, I’m resigned to the fact that my looks are all I have.

  It kept people away. Even the ones who were as dim-witted as he was, because no one wants to stand next to a man who’s as stupid as they are but four times more attractive.

  Radimir momentarily closed his eyes.

  When he opened them, he was the cleverest person in the room.

  A man who was not called Radimir.

  Instead, someone who was known to a limited number of people as Gregori Shonin, an SVR intelligence officer. And a predator with skills that were way beyond those of the other predators around him.

  There was a third side to the Russian, one that did not carry the false names of Radimir or Gregori, one that was the truth, but right now that was buried so deep inside him that he gave it little thought. This evening, being Gregori undercover as Radimir was sufficient for what he hoped to achieve.