by A P Bateman
“We have your friends,” said the first man. “You will join them, and then you will be sold tomorrow when the Russian comes.”
King said nothing. Vasyli had said as much. A new deal between Romanovitch and the Albanians. A new partnership, sealed on Romanovitch getting the people responsible for interrupting his business, making him lose face. He could only guess at what the Albanians gained, but he suspected a stronger foothold. For now. Organised crime alliances were uneasy and short lived.
They marched King to a curious looking all-terrain vehicle. The ATV was like a giant quadbike, but with seats and a roll bar. A steering wheel was on the left, and the screen had been folded down like an American Willie’s Jeep from the Second World War. King stiffened, pressed his weight down into his pelvis, hips, and thighs. He gradually became a deadweight for the men to push and as they reached the vehicle, they had to exert some strength to position him near the rear. The silent one stepped in towards him, but instead of butt beating him, he put the muzzle of his rifle near King’s face and practically growled at him.
King snatched his left arm back, rotated his wrist and broke free from the man’s grip, caught hold of the muzzle of the rifle and simply locked out his arm. A round from the weapon was never going to hit him, and he snatched his right arm free and clawed at the gunman’s left eye, striking with both his index and middle fingers pressed firmly together. But not quite straight. Just enough bend in them to get behind the man’s eyeball and hook it clean from the socket. The man was out of action, falling into shock as his optic nerve was severed and sent all kinds of signals to his overworked brain. There was no coming back for him, it was done, and the shock could well kill him.
King barrelled his right shoulder into one of the men, then headbutted the other on the bridge of the nose. The man was going down and fell onto his knees. King caught hold of the other man’s head with both hands and ripped downwards, smashing the top of the man’s head with the other man’s face. The ATV stopped the felled man from collapsing backwards, and King bludgeoned the man’s face into his companion’s head two more times. Both men were out cold, and the man who had suffered the eye gouge who had clearly been in shock and had remained silent until now, was screaming and clawing at his face. His legs were shaking, and he looked like a drunk about to lose the use of his legs at any moment. King picked up the man’s rifle and applied the safety catch, before turning it over in his hands and holding it by the barrel. He raised it high above his head, then brought it down with all his might onto the top of the man’s head with a sickening crunch. The man fell, poleaxed. His right foot twitched a few times and went still, just like the rest of him.
King retrieved his pistol and spare magazine. He saw that one of the men carried a 9mm Browning and he took it out of his holster and tucked it into the back of his waistband. He checked the pulses of the other two men. Nothing doing. So, he loaded them into the ATV and picked up their weapons. He checked his watch. Forty minutes had passed since the first gunshot, so he trudged back to the clifftop and called down for Alaina. There was no reply. He called again, dropped down onto the ledge, and made his way down to where she had taken cover between the two enormous boulders. He called again, but he knew it was in vain. He saw her two-way radio on the ledge below. King peered down the near-vertical drop, then studied the ground all the way to the far ridge. No movement. She had simply disappeared. King assumed she had used the time to run. He would have to adapt his plan. The text he had sent had been set up to multiple recipients. Flymo and Neil Ramsay. It had simply said he had been compromised and they had to assume he had been captured. He was a realist, and he knew his chances of rescue were around nil. But he hadn’t wanted to disappear without trace, and he had wanted them to know his last location.
King returned to the ATV, clambered inside, and pressed the start switch. The engine fired into life, and he checked the controls, realising it was an automatic, single gear set-up, like a snowmobile or a jet ski. He turned the vehicle around and drove back down to the cliff, stopping right on the edge. He got out and moved one of the bodies into the driver’s seat and called once more down the cliff for Alaina. Nothing.
King dabbed his foot on the accelerator and the ATV shot forwards. He moved his leg out as the front wheels went over the edge and the vehicle plummeted down the rocky face, crashing down onto the ground some two hundred feet or more below. It hit the ground with terrific force and two of the men were thrown out, and the vehicle eventually rested on its roll cage, the wheels spinning and smoke billowing from the engine.
King regretted not taking one of the assault rifles, but anybody discovering the scene would know how the men had been armed. He briefly gave thought to tossing the Browning over the edge, but it wasn’t out of the question for a single pistol to have become loose from a holster and get lost in the gaps between the boulders. He turned his back on the scene and made his way into the trees. Behind him a whoosh of petrol igniting filled the air and smoke billowed high into the sky.
40
From her vantage point high on the slope, on the edge of the forest clearing, Caroline had seen the grisly scene in front of the chateau. She had separated from Big Dave, both circling the property, to do a full reconnaissance and they had planned to meet on the east side. She eased back into the fringe of trees, her foot catching a rock and sending it bouncing down the slope. Almost at once, gunfire erupted behind her and she took off into the trees.
She did not know how many men were chasing her, but there was an array of gunfire and as she pounded through the trees, she could make out both pistol and rifle rounds pinging past her. The muted tones of pistols and the sharp crack of a rifle on semi-automatic filled the air. She had fifty or sixty metres on them, but it wasn’t enough. She veered right, where the gradient increased. If she could run at full pelt down the slope, then she would hit the belt of trees way ahead of them and be able to use them as cover as they headed down the slope. Tactically, it was a sound move. But she slipped and fell, and by the time she got back to her feet, she could tell they had gained on her.
And then the ground shook and the air around her seemed to vibrate and her insides slushed erratically, and she was lifted off the ground and thrown down into the dust and pine needles and forest debris. She rolled onto her back, her ears ringing and her chest aching. She struggled to breathe and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand as she rolled onto her knees and finally took a deep breath.
There was no more than three metres between her and the man directly in front of her, and ten more between her and the man directly beyond the first. The third man was twenty-five metres away, but he had an AK2000 assault rifle in his hands and that more than changed the game. She had fallen onto her side, the grenade knocking her clean off her feet. Again, she thought how crazy it was for her to be here. No back-up and an ill-conceived plan at best, but she was fully committed and so tantalisingly close to her objective, to get to the man she loved, that she couldn’t afford to weaken at the thought of being injured or outnumbered. Because outnumbered she may well be, but outclassed, she was not. The concussive shock of the explosion had reverberated inside her, feeling as if her insides had been shaken loose. She had lost her baseball cap, her mousey-blonde hair spilling out and cascading around her shoulders. Slowly, she got back to her feet, turning to see the man now standing in front of her. His 9mm Sig Sauer pistol aimed at her, his eyes blinking disbelievingly and the expression upon his face telling it all. A woman. Unexpected and at odds with the Albanians and the grisly scene he had just witnessed.
She held up both her hands, but as she straightened, she feinted a stumble. The man momentarily forgot himself, leaned forwards to assist her. Maybe he’d been brought up right. A long time ago. Before his chosen career path. Before the Russian mafia had eaten at his soul. Showing respect to women, instilled into him by his sisters, his mother, his grandmother. It was all Caroline needed and she faked another stumble, looking up and making sure that he now sto
od directly in front of the man with the AK2000. He was, so she drew the small but heavy Makarov pistol from her back pocket and shot him in the throat. He hadn’t even begun his slump to the ground when she took another step forward and steadied her aim. When the man fell, she already had the vee and pin sight aimed at the man with the assault rifle twenty metres distant. She fired a single well-aimed shot at the man’s forehead, then double tapped centre mass as he went down. Dropping to one knee she twisted to her right and fired three rounds in quick succession at the man in between, and adjacent to, the two bodies. He had been pulled in by the sight of her being a woman and putting up such resistance to their pursuit, and hadn’t known it was she who had fired until he had seen the second man drop to the forest floor, and by the time he managed to fire back at her, he had already been hit by two of the punchy 9.2mm bullets, but his own bullet went desperately wide of his target and the next three went high and wide as he fell to the ground and the pistol flailed wildly in the air.
Caroline stood back a few paces and shuffled to her left. She did not want to be where the men had last seen her when his comrades had fallen. She had not yet confirmed that he was dead, and she did not want to be there if he managed to steel his resolve and fire wildly. She dropped the magazine, slotted another in place, but did not work the weapon’s slide. She could count, after all. Now she was nine up. She aimed between the three bodies, rubbing her stomach gently, comfortingly with her left hand. She had grazed herself on the ground and could feel splinters and pine needles and wood bark on her skin. She was shaking, the adrenalin subsiding after such a peak of endorphins and the exertion of running up the slope and sprinting down the other side.
One of the men was still moving. Her compassion told her to walk over to him, kick his weapon aside and walk away. Let him die in peace or give him time to be recovered by the rest of his team. But she’d seen what he had done. He was a ruthless killer and would offer her no quarter if their situations had been reversed. Besides, she had been with King too long now, and her instincts had been honed through training, if not osmosis from working - and living - with such a man. There were too many variables involved in such an act. Too many things to consider and counter. She was outnumbered, after all. She aimed and fired, and the man’s head rocked, then he rested still. The brutal action could well have saved her life and the lives of her friends and acknowledging the fact made her feel nothing for what she had just done. They would have done worse to her, once they had gotten over the fact that she was a woman. Undoubtedly, they would have soon taken advantage of that fact, considering who these men were and who they worked for. They deserved no mercy, and least of all from her. And, as she picked her way through the forest floor, she just prayed she was still in time. Prayed that the man she loved was still alive.
She picked up the AK2000 and checked the action. She looked around her to get her bearings and headed downhill.
Big Dave came crashing out of the trees and lowered his rifle when he saw her. “The fucking place is crawling with hostiles!” he said breathlessly. “It’s no good going that way!” He charged past her and said, “Follow me!”
“I’m okay, thanks,” she said sarcastically as she struggled to jog behind him.
“I can see that.” He paused. “I’ve just seen King…”
“Really!?”
“Fucking Romanovitch just went apocalyptic on the Albanians!”
“I know, I saw,” she said breathlessly. “Now, where’s Alex?”
“He’s chasing two people into the woods!” He paused. “South and west. Get Flymo on the phone and sort out a shoot ‘n scoot!”
“A what?”
“He’ll know what you mean. Just tell him the north side only.”
“But we’re on the north side!”
“Then pick up the pace, sweet cheeks! You don’t want to be here when he flies over!”
41
King was tired and hungry. He had used all his water and the biscuits and packets of pre-cooked rice he had put in his rucksack had been eaten, but he was a world away from a steak dinner and a good night’s sleep. He had completed his thorough reconnaissance of the property and had holed up in a thicket in front of the house, waiting for an opportunity to get closer, but the area had become a hive of activity with numerous guards checking the grounds. He had seen that the ATV and bodies had finally been discovered and had skirted the chateau on his way back. The man he had followed had reported to his leader, and then he had watched the Mercedes S-Class arrive, followed by the SUV. In his heart of hearts, he knew he was too late. Too late for a plan at least and would have to see what happened and play it by ear.
King had a feeling when he watched Romanovitch’s body language. He had been involved in enough ambushes to know, and he had seen the muzzle flashes in the fringe of the forest as soon as Romanovitch had taken a knee. By then, the Albanian leader was already dead, and the Albanian brotherhood only had mere seconds before they joined him.
The Russian gunmen had emerged from the trees, ten in all, and then a sudden movement further up the slope, where there was a fire break, had sent three of the gunmen in pursuit. King had watched Romanovitch return to his vehicle, then open the rear door and help a woman out onto the gravelled driveway. His heart pounded, and he rubbed his eyes, struggling to make out the woman’s features at this distance. But he knew enough to recognise the height and shape, and the gait as she walked across the gravel and stood staring at the chateau.
Gunfire erupted further up the slope, and then the sound of a grenade. Below him, small arms fire sounded, and he watched two of the remaining Russians fall at the side entrance. A small, fit-looking man with a crew cut of red hair edged out of the doorway, a pistol in his hand. He ducked as he experienced incoming fire, then eased the pistol out and returned fire. King could see two men crouched beside a low wall with their backs to him. He watched them aim and fire, saw the man in the doorway return a volley, but he knew he would be low on ammunition, and he could see he looked weak. King broke cover and ran down the slope. When he was thirty metres from the two gunmen, he slowed and fired a double tap into each of their backs. Closer to the building, he could see that the man in the doorway was Mac. King had familiarised himself with Rashid’s team, and he recognised the man’s features from the photographs in the file. Behind him, two figures struggled to remain upright. King took a step towards them, but a trace of gunfire sent him into a dive towards the wall for cover. He pulled one of the bodies towards him and wrenched the Steyr Aug 5.56mm assault rifle out of his dead hands. He already knew from the track of the bullets where the gunman had been, but that did not necessarily mean they were still there. In the same situation, King knew he wouldn’t have stayed put. The Steyr Aug’s fixed optic was one of the best in the business, but King did not look through it to acquire his target. Anyone who did would risk seeing too much magnified detail and most likely be looking in the wrong place. Instead, he looked above the sight and saw the gunman aiming at him from one-hundred metres away. King lowered his eye to the scope, placed the tip of the post on the man’s upper body and fired three rounds. The man went down on the third shot. King looked back towards the doorway where Mac was firing at someone closer but blocked from King’s line of sight by the Mercedes SUV. He took out the Walther P99, on account that it would probably stand up better to what he was going to do next, then lobbed it high and far. It tumbled in the air, then bounced on the gravel and skidded to Mac’s feet. King stood up, stepped closer to the SUV and opened up with a sustained burst through the windows at an unseen target beyond. When he looked back at where Mac had been, he was no longer there.
King got to his feet and set off to where he had seen Romanovitch running south and west of the chateau. As he reached the rear of the chateau a helicopter roared overhead. He was thrown to the ground by the rotor wash, but as he rolled over and watched it climb to around eighty feet, he could see it was the Bell Jet Ranger with Flymo’s ‘optional extras’ bolted in
placed. There was no mistake. The M-134 Mini-gun – a gatling gun which could fire six-thousand 7.62mm bullets a minute – flared up and whirled away, the sound curious, but unmistakable. Five seconds after the first burst, and the helicopter now a hundred metres further up the wooded slope, the sound of brass shell casings raining upon the gravel sounded like a thousand windchimes. The chopper pulled a hard-starboard turn, and the mini-gun flared again, and King could see branches fall from the trees and men scattering through the forest. Now the craft rose high into the air, banked hard before straightening up, and the mini-gun fired in shorter bursts, before the first Hellfire missile fizzed away in a puff of smoke from its mounting under the fuselage. The forest erupted in flame and the helicopter banked away, flames licking at the belly of the craft.
King turned his back on the scene and sprinted across the garden and towards the scree slope on the other side of the property. He could see Romanovitch ahead of the woman, who was almost into the trees. King stopped, aimed the rifle, and fired. Romanovitch went down. The woman stopped in her tracks, hesitantly looked down at the Russian for a moment, then bolted into the trees. King started to run again, but Romanovitch got to his feet and limped after her. King stopped and aimed again but lost him to the treeline. He fired three shots, about a metre apart and the rifle dry clicked on empty.
King tossed the weapon onto the ground and took out the Browning 9mm pistol. It was the weapon he was probably most practised with and it felt comforting in his hand. He started out across the slope made up of scree and larger boulders but headed uphill. When he reached the treeline, he was sixty metres higher than where Romanovitch had entered the forest, which gave him the luxury of heading downhill through the trees. He knew that they could not have covered the ground before him, especially with Romanovitch limping, and he had time to assess the situation as he stalked them through the trees.