But that wasn’t going to happen.
Victor maintained the choke for sixty seconds after the watcher went limp to ensure he passed from unconsciousness into brain death.
He climbed to his feet and stepped away from the corpse, toeing the dropped gun where it lay on the floor. Had he known it was that close,
he might have gone for it and saved himself some hassle. Still, good to get a workout. His abdomen and lower back stung from the repeated elbows but there was no real damage. He might have some bruises in the morning but that would be the most of it. His head hurt worse. His wounded arm continued to throb. The fight hadn’t done it any favours, but it hadn’t been significantly worsened.
He pulled open a curtain so he could see more clearly. There wasn’t time to search the room, but he checked the watcher’s pockets, and took his wallet, the suite keycard, and a spare magazine for the watcher’s gun. The weapon was a SIG Sauer P226. The watcher had fired eleven rounds so Victor knew the magazine had four left. Victor released it and loaded the fresh one.
For a second he thought about taking the computer with him but it was too big to conceal and would tie him directly to the crime. He put fifteen 9 mms through it to make sure the recordings on its hard drive could never be recovered, and threw the SIG down next to the dead watcher.
Victor exited the suite, figuring he had two minutes to get out before the first police responders arrived, and hurried back into the Presidential. He tore down a drape for light and saw a slim figure writhing on the floor, a bullet hole beneath his right collarbone. It was bleeding profusely. Blood soaked his clothes. His handgun was on the ground, only a few feet away, but out of the wounded man’s reach. Victor took it. Another SIG.
He grabbed the man by his shirt, looked him in the eye and asked in Russian, ‘Who are you?’
No answer, but Victor saw he’d been understood.
He pressed his free palm over the man’s mouth and hooked his thumb under the man’s jaw to clamp it shut. With his right hand still gripping the SIG, Victor pushed his spare thumb into the bullet hole.
His left hand stifled the screaming enough for Victor to twist his thumb around inside the wound. The man beneath him thrashed as agony wracked his body. Victor stopped in time to avoid the man fainting and wiped the bloody thumb on the guy’s jacket, keeping the palm pressed hard over the man’s mouth until he’d taken control of himself.
‘Who are you?’ Victor said again.
The man spoke, each word punctuated by heavy breaths. ‘Just. Kill. Me.’
‘Who do you work for?’
He didn’t answer, but managed to form a something resembling a smile.
Victor held the guy’s mouth shut and pushed his thumb back into the bullet hole. He twisted and jerked it around.
Muffled screams followed, louder. The man bucked, eyes wide, veins prominent under the skin of his forehead and temples. Victor counted to seven before removing his thumb. It was another five seconds before the man had calmed down enough for Victor to take away his hand.
‘Who?
‘
Kill
…
me
.’
The guy was deteriorating fast, his breathing shallow, voice even quieter, the time between words longer.
Victor leaned closer. ‘Who sent you?’
The man’s head lolled back, eyes closing. Victor checked the pulse. It was barely there, the heart on its last few hundred beats. He rifled through the dying man’s pockets. A wallet with fake ID inside, but maybe it would still help, some cash, and a set of car keys but no key fob. It had been four minutes since it went loud. If Minsk PD weren’t here already, they would be by the time Victor left. He stripped off the tactical harness, Kevlar vest and holster straps. He hid the gun in the back of his waistband and wiped the sweat from his face with his sleeve and headed for the stairwell.
He didn’t know who the four guys with SIGs were, but he knew he had inadvertently stepped into someone’s operation and killed the surveillance team. But these guys were more than just watchers. They knew how to shoot, and how to fight. Someone had sent them. Someone would want to know who had killed them.
Victor put his shoes back on and descended hurriedly, the pain in his arm worsening as the adrenalin in his system faded. He joined a group of frightened guests on the fourth floor and acted similarly distressed as they rushed down to the lobby. It was packed with people,
all scared by the gunshots from high above, security trying to keep control but smart enough not to risk their lives for the company if they didn’t have to. Hotel staff had lit candles to provide some illumination and the light helped Victor quickly find his way out through one of the side entrances.
Police cars were pulling up outside as he walked away.
‘Not long now,’ Abbot said.
Xavier Callo was in a small apartment in a tower block somewhere in Minsk. He’d arrived with Abbot and Blout several hours before and had spent most of the following time lounging on the sofa watching US sitcoms dubbed into Russian. He had plenty to eat and drink, mostly junk food and soda, but Blout had fetched the groceries and good eating obviously wasn’t something the inexpressive ape understood. Still, food was food and despite being thin Callo had a big appetite. Empty bags of potato chips and candy bar wrappers lay on the floor around his bare feet. He wasn’t allowed to wear shoes.
Abbot stood by the window and Blout was elsewhere in the apartment. At least one of the two was with Callo at all times. They’d only let him use the john with the door open and Blout standing just outside. Callo had given the prick something to listen to.
They were waiting for something to happen, that much was as clear as polished diamond. Callo had no idea what his captors were waiting for. He hadn’t been told or given any indication and he wasn’t about to ask.
He was tired. There were no clocks in the apartment but Callo knew the time and the date by checking the news channel on the TV when no one was looking. He did so several times and felt very proud of his cunning. The apartment consisted of two bedrooms, one bathroom, lounge and dining area, kitchen and hallway. It was neat and clean but the whole thing, furnishings included, probably cost less than Callo’s last trip to Athens. Whoever was running this operation, CIA or otherwise, was obviously a cheapskate. If the powers that be had splashed out for a nicer pad maybe the two ogres guarding him would be able to relax a little. Callo’s eyelids were heavy.
‘Can I go to bed?’ he asked, when he could no longer fight the tiredness.
‘You’re having a giraffe,’ Abbot said without looking at him.
‘Then I’m just going to fall asleep right here.’
‘Suit yourself,’ Abbot said. ‘I’ll wake you when we need you.’
Immediately Callo felt less tired. What did they need him for? Blout entered the lounge and gestured for Abbot, who followed Blout back into a bedroom, leaving Callo alone for the first time. He contemplated dashing for the door, but the idea was short-lived. He’d be caught before he had it open, and would no doubt get a serious beat down for his actions. Better to just sit tight. They couldn’t keep him indefinitely, after all.
Callo muted the TV and edged along the sofa so he was closer to where Abbot had disappeared and heard voices speaking Russian, maybe from a radio. They were too quiet for Callo to understand what was being said.
Abbot re-entered suddenly and Callo leapt back to the middle of the sofa. If Abbot had seen him move, he didn’t show it. Abbot thrust a cell phone into Callo’s hands and then took a piece of paper from a pocket of his jeans. He held it in front of Callo.
‘This is what you’re going to do,’ Abbot said, expression intense, a hard edge to his British accent. ‘You’re going to phone Gabir Yamout. You’re going to tell whoever answers what’s on that piece of paper. You speak Arabic, right? You can paraphrase it, put it in your own words, but you’d better say it all.’
Callo took the paper and quickly read what was written. ‘Yes, I speak it. But I don’t understand. This doesn’t make any sense.’
‘You don’t have to understand it,’ Abbot said. ‘You just have to say it.’
‘But I—’
Before he could finish, Abbot slapped Callo hard across the face. The phone fell at Callo’s feet. His cheek stung badly. He looked up at Abbot, suddenly afraid. He noticed Blout was back in the room.
‘Phone Yamout,’ Abbot repeated coldly, ‘and say what’s on the facking piece of paper.’
Callo picked up the phone and dialled the number.
‘Please,’ Callo said. ‘But no one will answer. It’ll go to voicemail. Then I’ll get a call back.’
Abbot shrugged. ‘Just make sure you act scared.’
Callo didn’t get it, but he sat listening to the phone ring for about ten seconds it went to voicemail.
Callo repeated what he saw on the paper. It was just a few short sentences – an outright lie – and Callo didn’t have to act scared.
Before he’d finished the last line, Abbot snatched the phone from him and hung up. ‘That was good.’
He seemed genuinely happy and Callo managed a weak smile in return, despite his face still stinging. Blout went back into the other room.
Callo looked at the piece of paper again. ‘Oh no,’ he said. ‘I missed out the part about the hotel. I’m sorry.’
Abbot gave a big shrug. ‘That don’t matter. The exact details aren’t the important bit, it’s the delivery that sells it. And yours was top notch. Very convincing.’
‘Really? Thank you.’
Blout returned with a rucksack that he set down on the dining table. He opened it and took out a wallet. He threw it to Abbot, who emptied the contents. Callo watched his credit cards, receipts, cash and other litter from his wallet rain down on to the carpet. Abbot then tossed the wallet away and used his foot to spread the pile around on the floor.
‘What are you doing?’ Callo asked. ‘That’s my stuff.’
Abbot didn’t answer. Callo looked to Blout, who was rooting around inside the bag.
‘Is that all you wanted me to do?’ Callo found the courage to ask.
Abbot rolled up his shirtsleeves. ‘That was half of it, and you did great. You did a good job. Like I said, very convincing. Which is what we needed you to be. But now we need you to be convincing for the second part.’
Callo nodded, eager to please. ‘I can do that.’
Abbot gave a strange smile. ‘I’m sure you’ll do fine.’
Blout put on a pair of latex gloves. He gave a second pair to Abbot.
‘When do I make the next phone call?’ Callo asked.
Abbot shook his head and stretched the gloves over his big hands. ‘No more phone calls. What we need you to do now is convince your A-rab friends that you were attacked like you told them.’
Callo’s gaze flicked back and forth between Abbot and Blout. ‘But I said I’d escaped my attackers.’
‘Ah,’ Abbot said with a nod, interlacing his fingers to push the latex into place, ‘but they found you again.’
Blout stepped menacingly closer. Callo stared up at Abbot, finally understanding, his eyes filling with water, head shaking weakly from side to side.
Abbot stood over Callo and pulled his right elbow back and made a fist.
‘Sorry, mate,’ Abbot began, ‘but you really should have seen this coming.’
Victor arrived back at the Best Eastern half an hour after leaving the Europe, which was quicker than how he would prefer to do things, but proper counter surveillance wasn’t an option with an injured arm. Two hours making sure he wasn’t followed was fine in theory but not if the wound got infected as a result or was spotted by a vigilant police officer.
In his room, he stripped off his clothes and ran a bath. While the bath was running he examined his wound in the mirror. Blood stained his entire arm. The wound itself was about four inches in length, maybe an eighth of an inch in depth, and it was bleeding far worse than when he’d first been shot. He fitted the plug in the sink and turned on the hot water tap. The hotel room came with a kettle, mugs, teabags and sachets of instant coffee and sugar. Victor dropped two teabags into a mug and poured in just enough cold water to wet them. He took a clean T-shirt from his luggage and ripped it into strips. The resulting pain made him grimace.
He lowered his injured triceps into the sink and in seconds the water had turned a pale red. With gritted teeth, he washed the wound to get rid of any traces of clothing or other debris. He patted dry his arm with a towel, took the damp teabags from the mug and pressed them over the wound. He kept his elbow and shoulder horizontally aligned to balance the teabags while he wrapped a strip of T-shirt around his arm. He bound the wound firmly, but not too tight, to give the teabags the best chance at working. The haemostatic tannins found naturally in tea would help stop the bleeding, reduce the chance of infection, and aid the healing process. Victor checked the teabags after five minutes, finding them soaked with blood. He replaced them with two more and bound the wound with slightly
more pressure. When he checked after another five minutes the bleeding had stopped.
Victor tore open a sachet of granulated sugar and carefully poured it into the wound channel. He didn’t know if the wound was infected, but the sugar’s antimicrobial action would ensure that it wouldn’t become so. And if it was infected the sugar would hopefully kill the bacteria, or at least slow its spread. He then rebound his arm with another strip of T-shirt, downed two miniature bottles of vodka from the mini bar and lowered himself into the bath, keeping his right arm clear of the water.
Now his wound was clean and had stopped bleeding it could begin healing properly. He was going to have another scar, but when he already had so many one more wouldn’t make too much difference. He wasn’t in the habit of taking off his shirt in public, but if the scar turned out to be too prominent yet more of his money would end up in the pocket of plastic surgeons. Aside from rich women, assassins were probably their best customers.
Good as teabags and sugar were at patching up injuries, it would have been better to use proper first-aid equipment. He hadn’t been able to risk trying to find an all-night pharmacy so soon after the attack as the police would be at their most watchful. Victor doubted they would know they were only looking for one man, at least so far, but if he was out on the streets he could be stopped at random. They would probably be smart enough to put hospitals and drug stores under surveillance.