Kasakov had watched an hour of footage already and there was another two hours to go. He would check on Izolda shortly to make sure she was asleep. If she wasn’t, he would climb into bed with her and wait until she was snoring again before returning to the video. This was the second time Kasakov had viewed it, and like any good movie he was able to appreciate it even more on a repeat viewing.
He blinked away tears and closed his eyes to picture Illarion’s face while through the earbuds flowed the exquisite screams of Ariff and his family.
It had rained all week. Victor lay in the undergrowth that covered the outcrop. With the limited viewpoint over the back of the dacha, he hadn’t seen the arms dealer arrive, but had become aware of Kasakov’s guards patrolling the property. Soon afterwards, Victor glimpsed the Ukrainian as he passed one of the visible window on the second floor, but he didn’t loiter long enough for Victor to put the binoculars down and shoot accurately. Victor hadn’t expected to complete the contract with such a shot, but that was why he’d trimmed the trees that screened the house.
A very beautiful woman accompanied Kasakov, who from the dossier Victor knew to be his wife, Izolda. She was tall and slim, carrying herself with the confidence of a runway model. There were no other guests. Victor counted five bodyguards in total, just as he’d been told there would be. They slept in the guesthouse in shifts, so there were always at least three awake and ready. As in Minsk, they weren’t particularly big, but spec ops and intelligence guys usually weren’t. Each had the gait and manner of a serious operator, and the dossier stated that Kasakov had a penchant for hiring ex-Spetsnaz soldiers. Victor’s last run-in with the Spetsnaz was not something he was eager to repeat.
He lay in a shallow between two trees on the highpoint. With binoculars, he continuously watched the rear of the dacha. The branches he’d cleared provided a small corridor of space through the otherwise overlapping foliage of the three trees. The line of sight was far from ideal, but he could see the back entrance and a thin sliver of ground outside of it. A limited view, but enough to put a bullet into Kasakov should he use the door.
Victor had prepared the ground by removing stones and branches
from where he would be lying and landscaping the soil flat. He knew he could be in the same spot for several days and every annoying lump and bump on the first day would be agony by the fifth. Any distraction had the potential to throw a shot and he wanted to squeeze the trigger just once and be gone.
Birds chirped above his head. They were used to his presence now, not scaring even when he was forced to move. A waterproof sheet stretched across the two trees formed a makeshift shelter. It only partially covered him, due to where he needed to lie, but it kept some of the rain off and allowed him to keep his weapons and equipment dry.
The CIA-supplied rifle Victor planned to kill Kasakov with was a Dakota T-76 Longbow chambered for .338 calibre Lapua Magnum ammunition. Victor wanted to be able to kill Kasakov from as far away as possible and, short of using a huge .50 calibre, a .338 offered the best range and power. The .338 Lapua Magnum was designed to penetrate five layers of military body armour at one thousand metres and have enough force left for a one-shot kill. Victor knew from painful experience the round’s effectiveness against supposedly bulletproof glass.
As well as generating over five thousand pounds of muzzle energy, the Longbow was extremely accurate. The manufacturers even guaranteed .5 minutes of arc at fifteen hundred metres. It was an impressive claim but Victor would be shooting from half that. As long as he did his part, the Longbow would deliver.
He wouldn’t be using a suppressor, to guarantee accuracy and killing ability, and a .338 made a lot of noise. The back door was seven hundred and twenty yards away so the sound of the shot would reach the dacha a little under two seconds after the bullet left the barrel. He could potentially get another two shots off before the noise reached the area, but Victor favoured doing things right the first time.
The Longbow came with a matte black finish that he’d sprayed with green and brown paint. He was dressed in the same green Gore-Tex clothes as he’d worn for his reconnaissance of the dacha’s grounds. They hadn’t been washed and Victor hadn’t bathed. He
didn’t want the smell of soap and shampoo to alert the local wildlife and give him away if Kasakov’s bodyguards were extra diligent and patrolled outside of the mansion’s grounds.
A nearby rucksack contained rations and other equipment. In the pockets of his tactical harness were full magazines, a torch, waterproof matches, binoculars, compass, GPS reader and a combat knife. He had a bottle and plastic bags to serve as a toilet. There was no way of knowing when Kasakov might appear within Victor’s limited target area and he couldn’t afford to move in case the call of nature coincided with that moment.
Should things go wrong, either with the kill or the extraction, Victor had two other guns to assist him. Strapped to his right thigh was a tactical holster containing the Heckler & Koch MK23. Near to the rucksack was an MP7A1 with a forty-round box magazine. The MK23 was a fine handgun, designed to meet the requirements of US Special Operations forces. It fired the .45 ACP cartridge and had a twelve-round capacity. The gun was very accurate, considered match grade, capable of two-inch groups at fifty yards. The .45 ACP also struck with substantial stopping power but was naturally subsonic and almost silent when shot from a suppressor.
The MP7, also made by Heckler & Koch, fell somewhere between a sub-machine gun and an assault rifle, and had the designation of a personal defence weapon. In Victor’s opinion such a designation was an awkward one. There was nothing defensive about the gun. The MP7 was all about offence. Lightweight at 4.19 pounds, and just over twenty-three inches in length with the stock collapsed, the gun was effective beyond four hundred yards. It was chambered for the high velocity 4.6 × 30 mm round, which dismissed lead and brass in favour of a hardened steel penetrator, making it better suited for use against targets in body armour than the traditional pistol-calibre ammunition used in regular sub-machine guns.
Kasakov’s men had worn body armour in Bucharest and if Victor had to tangle with them he didn’t want his bullets lodging in their vests. Using a suppressor would have been pointless with the high-velocity
ammunition and using subsonic rounds would have countered the benefits of using the MP7 in the first place.
So far, Kasakov hadn’t stepped outside the back door, which wasn’t surprising as it had rained continuously since the Ukrainian’s arrival. Lying in wait for hour after hour was boring, but Victor did not let his concentration lapse. With his restricted line of sight, he needed to stay focused at all times. The second after Kasakov fell he would be fleeing north-easterly through the trees, hiking two miles around the hillside to where his getaway vehicle was hidden off road, beneath a net covered with leaves, branches and earth.
His diet consisted of nuts, chocolate and supplement pills. He wanted maximum calories and protein in a minimum of food to limit time spent with a plastic bag. He had brought a one-gallon water bottle, which was set up with a funnel to catch rainwater to top up as he drank. Water purification tablets would be mixed with his urine if it didn’t rain enough to keep him hydrated.
He flexed his muscles regularly and adjusted his prone position every hour to keep from getting too stiff and to help against the inevitable aches. As Kasakov was less likely to emerge through the back door during the night, this was when Victor slept. He had a small air cushion to lay his head on, but no sleeping bag or tent. Such things were great for keeping warm and dry but not for aiding fast movement if surprised. He slept for a few hours at a time, always to be awoken by some sound or cramp.
There had been no sign of Kasakov’s men patrolling the woods outside the dacha’s walls, but there was a lot of woodland and Spetsnaz guys knew how to keep a low profile. Victor wouldn’t expect to see them unless they were close by. He kept the MP7 within reach for just such an occasion.
It hadn’t rained this morning and the air was dry and relatively warm. The weather forecast he’d read before beginning his wait had predicted clear skies and hot temperatures, and from what he could see of the sky through the canopy, it looked blue and clear. If the forecast was accurate, hopefully it would be warm enough to go for a swim in the outside pool. Even if only Izolda liked to swim, her husband was more than likely to step outside to at least accompany her.
Victor’s preference wasn’t to kill targets in front of loved ones, but this time it might be unavoidable. He had to take the first opportunity that came his way. Because there might not be a second.
Victor threw some nuts into his mouth and waited.
Nearby, a man watched. He was an American. He wore Universal Camouflage Pattern military fatigues, jungle boots and head sock. Over his jacket, he wore a hooded poncho customised to form a ghillie suit. Sewn and glued on to the poncho was a fine nylon net. Attached to the net were rough six-inch burlap flaps of varying shades of green and brown. Twigs and leaves were distributed among the flaps and held in place with dried mud. Burlap flaps were also glued to the arms and legs of his fatigues. A thick layer of camouflage grease covered his face and hands.
Four days before he had discovered a thin path of squashed detritus in the grounds of the dacha and knew exactly who had created the trail. It had led him to the hide he now watched.
The target, though unaware he was being observed, was alert and skilled. Even with the aid of the ghillie suit, which broke up the American’s silhouette in three dimensions and made him all but invisible, he kept low in the undergrowth and didn’t risk getting any closer.
The American was armed with a Heckler & Koch MP5SD-N1 camouflaged with green and brown paint and using leaves and branches as stencils to break up the weapon’s lines. The N1 variant of the submachine gun featured a retractable metal butt stock, three-round burst trigger group and a stainless-steel integrated suppressor made by Knight Armament Company. As close to silent as any firearm could hope to get, it was the perfect weapon for a close-quarters engagement. A single squeeze of the trigger could put three 9 mm Parabellums in the target, and although the stopping power of the 9 mm round was significantly reduced flying at subsonic speeds, the overlapping of the hydrostatic shock waves on internal organs due to three bullets hitting the target almost at the same time more than made up for it.
‘This is Cowboy Daddy,’ a gravelly voice said through his earpiece, ‘Cowboy Gamma, gimme a sitrep. Over.’
Another voice answered, ‘Cowboy Gamma. I’m ten metres south-east
of the guesthouse. No sign of Mr and Mrs VIP yet. A gorilla is on patrol near the swimming pool. Over.’
‘Copy that, Cowboy Gamma,’ the gravelly voice replied. ‘Let me know when you have eyes on Mr and Mrs VIP. What’s the target’s status, Cowboy Bravo? Over.’
‘Cowboy Bravo. The target is awake and having himself some breakfast. He has absolutely no idea his ticket is gonna get punched. Over.’
Kasakov stirred from his sleep and groaned. His face was buried in a big goose-down pillow. One of Izolda’s slender arms was draped across his waist. He lay still for a minute, enjoying the intimate feel of his wife’s limb, the softness of her skin, the warmth of her flesh. When Kasakov rolled on to his back, the movement roused a sleepy moan from his wife. He gently kissed her on the forehead, the tip of her little nose, and then finally on the lips. She smiled and kissed him back. He found her especially beautiful first thing in the morning when only he got to see her.
‘What time is it?’ she asked, eyes still closed.
‘Just before eight.’
‘Wow,’ she said with raised eyebrows, ‘and you’re still here in bed. I’m honoured.’
‘I’m on vacation, aren’t I?’
‘Does that mean you won’t answer the phone when Yuliya and Tomasz call?’
‘I’ll do my best. How does that sound?’
She grunted. They kissed again.
Kasakov sat up and yawned. ‘What would you like for breakfast, my love?’
She stroked his wide chest. ‘Hmm, your famous scrambled eggs, please. Plus orange juice and some melon. And coffee, lots of coffee.’
‘A veritable banquet.’ He scratched the back of his head. ‘What might I receive in return for preparing such a feast?’
Izolda gave a cheeky grin. ‘You get the pleasure of making it and bringing it to your gorgeous wife.’
‘Ah,’ Kasakov said, ‘sustenance enough for any man.’
‘You had better believe it.’
He climbed out of bed and opened the drapes. The dacha’s master bedroom was at the front of the house and the window provided a breathtaking view of the Black Sea. Kasakov stretched as he stared outwards at gulls circling near the shoreline.
This was his favourite part of the country. Sochi had sandy beaches, the climate was as hot as it got in Russia, and the nearby Caucasus Mountains offered excellent skiing. Kasakov came with Izolda at least a couple of times a year, though he kept away from the tourist-heavy city itself, as well as the havens where Russia’s elite frivolously spent their wealth. He preferred the isolation his dacha provided. It had its own private beach, accessible via a path through the woods, where he could relax without the bother of other people, and especially their children.
He’d bought the house when the international efforts to bring him down started to pick up momentum. He hadn’t left the country for any purpose other than the most important business trips since then; the risks were so great that even those trips were growing less frequent, and only then to nations who wouldn’t go running to the UN.
‘What’s the weather like?’ Izolda asked.
‘Blue sky, sunshine,’ Kasakov answered. ‘It’s going to be nice for once.’
‘Great,’ Izolda said. ‘I think I might have a swim after breakfast.’
Victor glimpsed a blur passing by one of the mansion’s visible upstairs windows, which he recognised to be Kasakov’s wife by the slightness of the silhouette. Kasakov’s large frame followed a moment later, but again did so too fast to risk a shot, especially when the temperature was continuing to rise and the sky remained clear of rainclouds. Another ten degrees and it would be perfect weather to use the swimming pool.