Reaper

by A P Bateman

  “She has a sister?”

  “Yes. A fine-looking girl. She must have been about fifteen or sixteen. A good age. Ripe for the picking, but innocent enough to appeal to men with enough money. Helena went crazy when she turned up…”

  “What was her name?”

  “Catherine. Once seen, never forgotten. A real peach…”

  “Get on with it!” King snapped.

  “Helena got her out of town. Gave her a ton of money and sent her away,” he paused, shaking his head. “A ton of the brotherhood’s money. It didn’t go down well. We decided to teach her a lesson. Bring her back to heel. Like a disloyal dog. We had some drinks, too much vodka, a little cocaine, then a lot of the stuff… It all got a bit out of hand.”

  King frowned.

  “We had ourselves a little party. A sex party…”

  “You raped her…”

  “It wasn’t like that! Just a gangbang. We all took a go, she didn’t complain. But the drink, the drugs, it kind of went on all night. You know, for some people watching that keeps the mood up, a guy takes a turn, you drink, snort a line of coke, take your turn… The cocaine just keeps you going for hours.”

  “You fucking gang raped her!” King raised the machine pistol. “You raped her, and now she wants revenge! You and Sergeyev…”

  “Hey, it wasn’t just us! There were others…”

  “Who?”

  “Other enforcers.”

  “Their names!” King snapped.

  “It can’t have been so bad. There was another girl there. Sergeyev sort of kept her to himself. He ended up seeing her after that. They married a few years later.”

  “Anna?”

  “Yes. Hey, what’s it all to you anyway?”

  “Because Helena Milankovitch is all out of options! She’s on the run, waging a vendetta that started with you! I figured she wanted you out of the way, so she could make a claim on your business empire. Sergeyev, too. But this is revenge. If you hadn’t done what you did, if you hadn’t raped her, then my fiancé wouldn’t be…”

  King couldn’t finish his sentence. The glass doors behind him smashed, sending thousands of shards of glass into the room along with a heavy oak sun-lounger that had been used as a battering ram. King dived to his left as his chair took the brunt of gunfire from something distinctly Kalashnikov. King swung the Uzi wide and fired, but the weapon had been set to single-fire and the effect was less dramatic than the attacker’s. By the time he had realised and fired twice more, he was on the floor and Nikolai was on his feet and had kicked the glass coffee table into him, sending him sprawling into the kitchen. King rolled onto his back to see the muscle-bound bodyguard who had stopped him falling into his charge in the town earlier that day. The man was taking aim. King kicked his own chair into the man’s legs and fired a short burst from the Uzi. The man wobbled as he returned fire, enough for King’s bullets to miss him, but also enough for his own to pepper the floor to King’s right. The AK was clicking as he dry-fired on an empty chamber. King took aim, was about to fire again, but the weapon was kicked out of his hand. He turned to see Nikolai lining up another kick and shunted himself backwards, the Russian’s kick missing his face by inches. He looked back at the bodyguard, who had switched the assault rifle to hold it by the barrel. He raised it behind his head and threw it at him with considerable force. The rifle clattered into King’s face and chest and he fell back down onto his back. He could feel wetness on his face, stinging in his right eye, and knew he was bleeding. He pushed himself up, but was kicked again by Nikolai, who had now given himself more room and was standing to his right. King was tightly confined by the coffee table, and now his own chair, which the bodyguard had kicked his way again. Nikolai went for another kick, but King punched out hard and struck the man’s kneecap. He screamed as it dislodged, and he fell backwards onto the coffee table, falling through the broken glass and found himself caught up in the metal frame. The screaming did not stop, but the cuts and impalement of glass was nothing compared to the damaged joint.

  The bodyguard was breathing hard, but he bent down and retrieved the knife which had fallen to the floor, and he smiled back at King. “Transmitter, asshole. In the watch. It’s a Breitling and transmits to a dedicated receiver. That’s how I found you. I guess you gave him the chance to activate it. Amateur.”

  “Didn’t see you down at the villa,” King said, as he got unsteadily to his feet. “You may have the knife, but you haven’t got the fight. Run off into the woods, did you?”

  “Fuck you!” He twisted the knife in his hand. “Looks sharp. And now I’m going to cut you up before you die.”

  King took a step forward. “Done talking?” He had dropped into a fighting stance, much like a boxer, but instead of waiting for the Russian, he lunged forward, like a sprinter off the blocks, and kicked the chair into the man’s legs, but when it crashed into the man, he carried on, stepped onto the base of the chair with his right foot, and stepped up to the back of the chair with his left. At fourteen stone, even with a distinct size disadvantage against the muscle-bound bodyguard, King rode the chair right over the man. The bodyguard swiped with the knife but missed as he was driven downwards. King already had the flick-knife in his hand. He pressed the stud button and the four-inch blade whipped out. The bodyguard fell flat on his back, let out a gasp as he was winded, the chair on top of him, with King standing on the chair, legs apart and balancing like a surfer on a wave. King dropped down, drove the blade deep into the man’s trachea. At the point where the breastbone met the throat. He dropped all his weight onto it, pressed so deeply the hilt went into the wound. The man gargled and gasped, but with each intake of breath, he took more blood into his lungs. King side-stepped the chair, keeping a grip on the knife. The man’s eyes had glazed, his movements minimal. King gave the knife a twist as he pulled it clear and the blood flow more than doubled. The man was gone, his body just going through the motions. He wasn’t breathing now, and as King wiped the blade on the man’s jacket, he could tell that he was circling the drain. He stood up, turned and surveyed the scene. Nikolai was still caught up in the frame of the table, he was whimpering, had been watching intently, no doubt praying his man would win.

  King bent down and checked the Uzi. The breach showed a round. He dropped the magazine and saw he only had the one bullet. He turned to Nikolai, kept the weapon trained on him.

  “So much for appealing to your better nature,” King said. “Where else gets the signal? The police? Rescue services? That’s what those watches are for.”

  “Just my security.”

  King smiled. He glanced at his own vintage Rolex. He was merely estimating how long it would take to get clear of the villa. “Now I know you’re lying,” he said. “You’re desperate enough to chance the local police. Well, I’ll tell you now, they’re being paid off by Luca Fortez.”

  “We’ll see,” said Nikolai. “Maybe their payments will stop now you’ve killed their meal ticket. Maybe they’ll want to get even with you? Maybe they’ll accept a deal from me?”

  “Who else raped Helena Milankovitch?”

  The Russian tried to move, but the glass was cutting into him badly, and his knee was beyond grinning and bearing it as he got out of the mess of twisted metal and broken glass. He looked back at King. He was beaten, and King knew it. What’s more, he knew King knew it as well.

  “Okay… Just help me out.”

  King put his foot against the frame, held out his hand and when the Russian took it, he heaved him out and spun him over into the deep chair. Nikolai cursed and yelled. He was as pale as a sheet, and he panted deep breaths to get through the pain, like a woman in labour.

  “Who else is she wanting revenge on?”

  “It’s hazy, you know… There was a guy called Dimitri Romanovitch. He got out of the brotherhood. Started a series of businesses, legitimate ones. But once a Bratva, always a Bratva. He’ll have done things to get where he is now.”

  “Who else?”

&
nbsp; Nikolai glanced at his watch. King raised the machine pistol and the Russian looked back at him. He shrugged. “It won’t do you any good.” He smirked. “You may have killed Sergeyev, you may well kill me. You can kill Romanovitch if you like. But you won’t get near the other man.”

  “Who is it?”

  Nikolai smiled. “Oh, what a place the new Russia is. Like the Wild West, no? A man can do as he pleases. He can kill, have blood on his hands. He can take a man’s property, business, empire even. And then what? When he has taken what he wants, what then? When is enough? Enough is a word some people have no understanding of. Enough is not even a word to a man like that.”

  King stared at the man. He was no longer the big, powerful mafia boss, leader of one of the most ruthless brotherhoods to emerge from behind the Iron Curtain. He looked broken, desperate. King knew he was biding his time. “I’m getting my fiancé back from Helena. I’ll do it with or without your indulgence. So, another guy on her list is going to be difficult to get to. I get it. But I got to Sergeyev, and I got to you.”

  “You have no idea!” Nikolai spat at him. “You don’t know what you’re up against! You think you can fuck about in the shadows? Think again!”

  “Who, then?” King snapped. “Who else raped her?”

  “The fucking president, that’s who!” Nikolai laughed and wiped a tear from his eye. He looked faint with the pain he was suffering, but the tear could well have been from the laugh. It seemed heart-felt and genuine. “Helena Milankovitch is just warming you up! Have you got a way to the president? Can you take on a million soldiers? Two million reserves?” Nikolai laughed again, he seemed delirious. He had either accepted his fate or was plaintively unaware that he was both crippled without medical attention, or at the very least, losing blood from the lacerations over his back, neck and legs. “Forget it! Forget your lover. Move on, it’s done. You won’t get to the new president of Russia! Just accept that you have lost, and Helena will kill your fiancé. Hopefully swiftly, but I doubt it…”

  King squeezed the trigger and stopped the Russian mid-sentence. He sagged, his head lolling onto his chest like he’d fallen asleep. King glanced at his watch again. He estimated another five minutes before the police arrived in response to the GPS signal and recorded message they would have received from the tracker inside the Breitling watch. He was already packed, estimated he would be clear of the property inside three minutes.

  33

  London

  Rashid had taken a run around the Thames, estimated it at five-miles and finished up sprinting at full pace back over Westminster Bridge. He had showered and changed and headed downstairs for breakfast, where the Holiday Inn had made it’s first mistake. A breakfast-buffet. Rashid had filled a plate with toast and pastries, taken the entire jug of orange juice back to his table. He ordered coffee, then went back up to the buffet where he filled another plate with sausages, bacon, fried eggs, mushrooms and beans. The waitress raised an eyebrow when she brought his coffee, but he polished it off quickly and took advantage of the Holiday Inn’s second mistake: there didn’t seem to be a one-visit rule. Rashid filled his plate again, returned to his table and started all over, as Neil Ramsay walked in, caught the waitress to order a pot of tea, and headed over.

  “Sleep well?” he asked, sitting down and watching him eat with amusement.

  “Yes, before you ask; it’s bacon and pork sausages.”

  “Wouldn’t think of it,” he smiled. “Looks like a heart attack on a plate to me. Didn’t fancy muesli, then?”

  “How far have you run this morning?”

  Ramsay shrugged. “Fair point,” he said. “Well, when you’ve finished stripping the Security Service’s hospitality budget, we’ll head back to Thames House and see what we have on Helena Snell.”

  “Milankovitch,” Rashid said. “Snell will be a shadow. She married a billionaire, started a fashion concern, but she even kept her Russian lover the entire time. She then plotted with her lover, formed a terrorist organisation as a front to detract from the real motive of killing her husband. In doing this, she sacrificed people to act as a cover for her plan. She’s a cold bitch. There will be nothing worth knowing from the time she was Helena Snell. But believe me, there will be something as Helena Milankovitch. That’s the key. Her past.”

  34

  Caroline came around slowly. The bright light shining through the bathroom window, shafts of golden light warming her face, forcing her to blink as she opened her eyes. She felt groggy, her mouth dry. Her head thudded like a hangover after a night of champagne. A sharp, incessant thud that she not only felt inside her head but heard incessantly in her ears.

  She raised her head, had to fight through the light-headedness to refrain from falling back down. She could not place exactly where she was at first, but it flooded back to her and filled her with foreboding and fear. She sat up, blinked away her dry eyes. And then she felt herself all over. Her underwear was intact. The thought, as she checked, made her feel close to vomiting. She looked at the door. It was an inch ajar. She looked under the door, near the jamb. The wingnut had scarred the floorboard, dug in deeply. She got up slowly, knelt on the floor. Her head banging and pulsing. She pulled on the door, but it did not budge. She felt a wave of relief, a near-euphoria. But she was in no doubt that she had been drugged for sex.

  She turned and ran the cold tap, splashed some water on her face and swilled her mouth out. Then she drank until she was full. The water would flush her system, take the toxin out of her, slowly bring her back. She rubbed some water around her neck, shuddered as it trickled down between her shoulder blades.

  It was with a mixture of anger and a sense of hope that she kicked the door closed. The wingnut was pulled out of the floorboard, and she picked it up and tucked it back into her bra as she opened the door inwards and stepped back into the bedroom. She would not be a victim anymore. The coffee Michael had given her had been drugged. She would not let her guard down with him again. It was time to discover her fate. Or at least take a hand in controlling it.

  35

  King sipped his orange juice and picked at the pastries. They tasted like yesterday’s. Maybe older. He’d always found breakfast in Italy to be a lacklustre affair, neither appealing to his appetite or constitution. Coffee, which he did not drink, a few biscuits, or perhaps bread and jam, or cheese and charcuterie. He wondered how the Italians got anything done before lunch. And he’d given up trying to order a pot of tea.

  He had decided to put some distance between himself and the mountain. There was a lot happening up there, in all three locations, and he needed to be as far away as possible while the police scoured the mountain region for a person or people, undoubtedly armed, certainly dangerous.

  As always, when making a getaway, King had driven right on the speed limit and made sure he observed traffic signs and signalled accordingly. He needed to be invisible, and he knew from his personal experience and cost that police could pull over a motorist and get lucky. It had happened to him a lifetime ago. Any lesson learned through pain and suffering did not need learning twice.

  King had found the hotel in Siena using an app and Google Maps on his phone. Situated conveniently on the outskirts, overlooking the attractive, culture-rich city of spires and castles, fortified walls and towers. It had been on the list to visit with his wife Jane. Caroline had also put the city of her list, along with Florence, but King had merely agreed with her and not mentioned the fact he had dreamed of visiting with somebody in a previous life. Caroline had to have some things for the two of them, something she had not been beaten to, or be competing with a dead woman’s dreams.

  The hotel had a vacant double room, which out of habit, King took for two nights, although he did not plan on staying any longer than the time it took for him to eat his meagre breakfast on the balcony and plan his next move.

  After he had arrived, he had tipped the barman for two buckets of ice and returned to his room where he ran a deep bath of cold water,
tipped in the ice and set about soaking away his bruises, swelling, aches and pains. He had learned the practice as a boxer and it had stood him in good stead in later years. It was always agony at first, but if he remained until all the ice had melted, then he knew he would heal quickly. He had wrapped some of the ice in a towel and held it against his face. He was bruised and cut, but the swelling subsided soon after the ice worked its magic. The time was well-spent, but it had also given King time to think.

  Counter surveillance measures like taking the room for an extra night, or moving the car, as he had and parking it in the street adjacent to the hotel’s carpark, gave him the edge he needed. He had slipped comfortably back into the role he had been trained for. Another department, another life. That of an assassin. He had battled with the ethics, the ideals for so long. But he had always served his country, always been on the side of what seemed right. But as he contemplated over breakfast, the deaths of so many men on the mountain, he found there was no conflict battling within him. He had simply performed the tasks necessary to secure, or work towards the release of the woman he loved. For the first time in recent years, he had found the task of killing as simple and as functional as any other task within the parameters of his work.

  He had decided to keep the mobile phone he had been given switched off. He had used his own to find the hotel, but this was not his MI5-issued phone. He had checked for messages but had none. He used it to check his various email accounts, and his data cloud. There was nothing there either. Apart from the one email from Mereweather asking him to return, a few days after he had left for Sweden. He checked the date again but knew the man would not email again. He had the man’s email, unless there was a significant development regarding Caroline, King wouldn’t bank on more contact from MI5. He was as out in the cold as he’d ever been.