Night Strike

by Chris Ryan

  Also by Chris Ryan

  Non-fiction

  The One That Got Away

  Chris Ryan’s SAS Fitness Book

  Chris Ryan’s Ultimate Survival Guide

  Fight to Win

  Fiction

  Stand By, Stand By

  Zero Option

  The Kremlin Device

  Tenth Man Down

  Hit List

  The Watchman

  Land of Fire

  Greed

  The Increment

  Blackout

  Ultimate Weapon

  Strike Back

  Firefight

  Who Dares Wins

  The Kill Zone

  Killing for the Company

  Chris Ryan Extreme

  Hard Target

  In the Alpha Force Series

  Survival

  Rat-Catcher

  Desert Pursuit

  Hostage

  Red Centre

  Hunted

  Black Gold

  Blood Money

  Fault Line

  Untouchable

  In the Red Code Series

  Flash Flood

  Wildfire

  Outbreak

  Vortex

  Twister

  Chris Ryan Extreme: Night Strike

  Chris Ryan

  www.hodder.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain as ebooks 2011 by Coronet

  An imprint of Hodder & Stoughton

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © Chris Ryan 2011

  The right of Chris Ryan to be identified as the Author of the Work

  has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright,

  Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,

  stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any

  means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be

  otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that

  in which it is published and without a similar condition being

  imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance

  to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

  ISBN 978 1 444 77693 5

  Hodder & Stoughton Ltd

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.hodder.co.uk

  contents

  acknowledgements

  one

  two

  three

  four

  five

  six

  seven

  eight

  nine

  ten

  eleven

  twelve

  thirteen

  fourteen

  fifteen

  sixteen

  seventeen

  eighteen

  nineteen

  twenty

  twenty-one

  twenty-two

  twenty-three

  twenty-four

  twenty-five

  twenty-six

  twenty-seven

  twenty-eight

  twenty-nine

  thirty

  thirty-one

  thirty-two

  thirty-three

  thirty-four

  thirty-five

  thirty-six

  thirty-seven

  thirty-eight

  thirty-nine

  forty

  forty-one

  forty-two

  forty-three

  forty-four

  forty-five

  forty-six

  forty-seven

  forty-eight

  forty-nine

  fifty

  fifty-one

  fifty-two

  fifty-three

  fifty-four

  fifty-five

  acknowledgements

  To my agent Barbara Levy, publisher Mark Booth, Charlotte Hardman, Eleni Lawrence and the rest of the team at Coronet.

  one

  Knightsbridge, London, UK. 1738 hours.

  His name was Hauser and he moved down the corridor as fast as his bad right leg allowed. The metal toolbox he carried was heavy and exaggerated his limp. He paused in front of the last door on the right. A yellow sign on the door read ‘WARNING! AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY’. He fished a key chain from his paint-flecked trousers and skimmed through the keys until he found the right one. His hand was trembling. He looked across his right shoulder at the bank of lifts ten metres back down the corridor. Satisfied the coast was clear, he inserted the key in the lock and twisted it. There was a sequence of clicks as the pins inside jangled up and down, and then a satisfying clack as the lock was released.

  Hauser stepped inside the room. It was a four-metre-square jungle of filing cabinets, cardboard boxes and industrial shelves with a tall, dark-panelled window overlooking the street below. Hauser hobbled over to the window. An electric pain shot up his leg with every step, like someone had taped broken glass to his shins. He stopped in front of the window and dumped a roll of black tarpaulin he’d been carrying under his left arm. Then he set the toolbox down next to the tarp and scanned the scene outside. He was on the fourth floor of an office block adjacent to the Lanesborough Hotel at Hyde Park Corner. The current tenants were some kind of marketing agency who, he knew, were badly behind with their rent. They’d have to relocate soon. Shame. From that height Hauser had quite a view. The pavements were packed with commuters and tourists flocking in and out of Hyde Park Corner Tube station. Further in the distance lay the bleached green ribbon of the park itself.

  Yep. It was quite a view. Especially if you wanted to shoot somebody.

  Hauser was wearing a tearaway paper suit that had been vacuum-packed. The overalls came with a hood. He also wore a pair of surgical gloves. The suit and gloves would both prevent his DNA from contaminating the scene, as well as protecting his body from residue such as gunpowder. Now Hauser knelt down. Slowly, because any sudden movement sent fierce voltages of pain up his right leg, he prised open the toolbox. It was rusty and stiff and he had to force the damn thing apart with both hands. Finally the cantilever trays separated. There were three trays on either side of the central compartment. Each one was filled with tools. Hauser ran his fingers over them. There was a rubber-headed hammer, tacks, putty, bolt-cutters, a pair of suction pads, a large ring of different-sized hexagon keys and a spirit level.

  There were two more objects in the bottom of the main compartment of the toolbox. One was a diamond cutter. The other was a featureless black tube ten inches long and three and a half inches wide. Made of carbon-fibre, it weighed just 300 grams, no more than a tennis racquet. Hauser removed the tube. There was a latch on the underside. Hauser flipped this and a pistol grip flipped out, transforming the tube into a short-barrelled rifle.

  Hauser cocked the bolt. The whole operation had taken four seconds. Four seconds to set up a selective-fire rifle effective up to 300 metres.

  Hauser set the rifle down and took the diamond cutter from the toolbox. Moving with speed now, he ran the cutter around the edges of the window until he had cut out a rectangle of glass as big as a forty-inch TV. Then he took out the suction pads and, with one in either hand, pressed them to the sides of the cut-out sheet. The glass came loose easily. Hauser laid this down on the floor with the suction pads still attached. Then he took the black tarp, hammer and tacks and pinned one end of the material to the ceiling, allowing the rest to drape down over the opening. Seen from the street below, the tarp would give the appearance of reflective glass. If anyone looked up at the windo
w, they wouldn’t see shit.

  Going down on one knee, Hauser tucked the stock tight into the Y-spot where his shoulder met his chest. His index finger rested on the trigger, then he applied a little pressure. He went through the drill he had practised thousands of times before.

  Breathe in. Breathe out.

  Keep the target in focus.

  Firm shoulder. Left hand supporting the right.

  The woman in his sights meant nothing to him. She’d simply been the first person he targeted. She was sitting on a bench and eating a sandwich. The optics were so precise that Hauser could identify the brand. Pret A Manger.

  He pulled the trigger.

  She was eating a sandwich one second and clutching her guts the next.

  The subsonic .22 long rifle rimfire round tore a hole in her stomach big enough to accommodate your middle finger.

  And he went for the stomach with the next seven targets too. Unlike head shots, gut shots didn’t kill people, and Hauser had been specifically told not to kill. Only maim. He kicked out the rounds in quick succession. Two seconds between each. With each shot the muzzle phtt-ed and the barrel jerked.

  The bodies dropped.

  The crowd was confused by the first two shots. The built-in suppressor guaranteed that the shots didn’t sound like the thunderous ca-rack of a bullet. But when the third target fell they all knew something terrifying was happening. Panic spread and everyone ran for cover.

  Twenty-four seconds. That’s how long it had taken Hauser to leave eight civilians sprawled on the pavement soaked in their own blood and pawing at their wounds. The victims were strangely silent. No one else dared approach them. Any sane person would wait for a clear sign that the shooting had stopped.

  Hauser stepped back from the window. He was confident no one had seen him. The suppressor had phased out more than ninety per cent of the sound, making it difficult for anyone to clearly understand that they were gunshots, let alone pinpoint their origin. A breeze kicked up. The tarp fluttered. Hauser quickly folded up the weapon and stashed it in the toolbox. He removed the overalls and stuffed them into the toolbox. The overalls he would dispose of shortly, in a nearby public toilet, courtesy of a lit match and some wetted toilet paper to cover and disable the smoke detector. He left the room.

  Police sirens in the distance. And now screams from the crowd, as if the sirens gave them permission.

  two

  Hereford, UK. The next day. 2233 hours.

  He downed it in three long gulps that had the barmaid shaking her head and the three gnarled alcoholics at the other end of the bar nodding welcome to the newest member of their club. Joe Gardner polished off his London Pride and tipped the foamy glass at the barmaid.

  ‘Another,’ he said.

  The barmaid snatched his empty glass and stood it under the pump. Golden beer flowed out of the nozzle and settled into a dark-bronze column. She cut him a thick head and dumped the glass in front of him.

  ‘Cheers, Kate.’ Gardner raised his glass in a toast but she had already turned her back. ‘But you’re forgetting one thing.’

  Kate sighed. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Your phone number.’

  ‘The only thing you’ll get from me is a slap.’ A disgusted expression was plastered over the right side of the girl’s face. Gardner doubted her left side was any more pleasant. ‘That’s your last pint till you settle your tab.’

  ‘Give us a break,’ Gardner grunted, rooting around in his jeans pocket for imaginary change.

  Then a voice to his left said, ‘This one’s on me.’

  On the edge of his vision Gardner glimpsed a red-knuckled hand slipping the barmaid a pair of crisp twenty-quid notes. She eyed the queen’s head suspiciously before accepting it.

  ‘Thanks. This’ll about cover it.’

  ‘My pleasure,’ the voice said. ‘After all, we’ve got to look after our own.’

  The voice was hoarse and the man’s breath wafted across Gardner’s face and violated his nostrils. It was the smoky, medicinal smell of cheap whisky.

  ‘Didn’t I see you on the telly once?’

  Gardner didn’t turn around.

  ‘Yeah,’ the voice went on. ‘You’re that bloke from the Regiment. The one who was at Parliament Square. You were the big hero of the day.’

  The voice swigged his whisky. Ice clinked against the glass.

  ‘You look like a bag of bollocks, mate,’ said the voice. ‘What the fuck happened?’

  Gardner took a sip of his pint. Said nothing.

  ‘No, wait. I can guess what happened. I mean, fucking look at you. You’re a joke. You’re a right fucking cunt.’

  Gardner stood his beer on the bar. Kate was nowhere to be seen. Then he slowly turned to face his new best friend.

  ‘That’s right. A complete and utter cunt.’

  He looked as ugly as he sounded. Red cheeks hung like sandbags beneath a pair of drill-hole eyes set in a head topped off with a buzzcut. He was a couple of hundred pounds or thereabouts, half of it muscle and the rest fat that had been muscle in a previous life. The glass in front of him was half-full of whisky and ice. The glazed expression in his eyes told Gardner the drink had not been the guy’s first of the night, or even his tenth.

  ‘I’m not looking for trouble,’ Gardner said quietly.

  ‘But you found it anyway. You know, there’s nothing more tragic than a washed-up old Blade.’ The man pulled a face at the prismatic bottom of the tumbler. ‘Know what? Someone should just put you out of your fucking misery now.’

  Gardner attempted to focus on the guy and saw two of him. Sixteen pints of Pride and a few shots off the top shelf will do that to a man. Rain lightly drum-tapped on the pub windows. The guy leaned in close to Gardner and whispered into his left ear.

  ‘Me, I’m from 3 Para. Real fucking soldier. Real fucking man.’ He winked at the barmaid. ‘Ain’t that right, Kate?’ She smiled back flirtatiously. Then the guy turned back to Gardner. ‘Now do me a favour and fuck off.’

  A shit-eating grin was his parting gift.

  Gardner swiftly drank up. Made for the door.

  Outside in the deserted car park the rain was lashing down in slanted ice sheets. Gardner zipped up his nylon windcheater to insulate himself against the cold and wet. The Rose in June pub was set on the outskirts of Hereford and the low rent was probably the only reason it hadn’t shut down. Gardner made his way down the back streets, snaking towards the Regiment’s headquarters. He navigated around the housing estate that used to be the site of the old Regiment camp on Stirling Lane. Now it was all council-owned. The rain picked up, spattering the empty street that edged the estate. Gardner couldn’t see more than two or three metres in front of him. A ruthless wind whipped through the street and pricked his skin. Gardner closed his eyes. He heard voices, subdued beneath the bass line of the rain.

  When he opened his eyes a fist was colliding with his face.

  three

  2301 hours.

  The fist struck Gardner hard and sudden, like a jet engine backfiring. He fell backwards, banging his head against the kerb. A sharp pain speared the base of his skull and it took a moment to wrench himself together. You’re lying on your back. Your cheek is on fire from a fucking punch. And Para is towering over you.

  Para’s hands were at his side and curled into kettlebells. He hocked up phlegm and spat at Gardner. The gob arced through the rain like a discus and landed with a plop on his neck.

  ‘Get up, prick.’ Para’s voice was barely audible above the hammering rain.

  Gardner wiped away the spittle with the back of his hand.

  ‘I said, get the fuck up.’

  Gardner noticed two guys with Para, one at either shoulder. The guy on the left was shaven-headed with black dull eyes and the kind of hulking frame that you only get from injecting dodgy Bulgarian ’roids. He wore a grey hoodie and dark combats. Gardner noticed he was clutching a battery-operated planer. The guy on Para’s right stood six-five. A reflective
yellow jacket hung like a tent from his scrawny frame. He smiled and revealed a line of coffee-brown teeth. He was holding a sledgehammer. Raindrops were cascading off the tip of its black head.

  ‘Call yourself a Blade,’ Para said. ‘You’re just a washed-up cunt.’

  Hoodie and Black Teeth laughed like Para was Ricky Gervais back when he was funny.

  Gardner began scraping himself off the pavement. The rain hissed. The guys were crowding around him now. He swayed uneasily on his feet.

  Black Teeth was gripping the sledgehammer with both hands. He stood with his feet apart in a golf-swing posture and raised the hammer above his right shoulder. Gardner knew he should be ducking out of the way but the booze had made him woozy. Dumbly he watched as the hammer swung down at him.

  Straight into his solar plexus. Thud!

  A million different pains fired in the wall of his chest. He heard something snap in there. Heard it, then felt it. His ribcage screamed. He dropped to his knees and sucked in air. The valley of his chest exploded. He looked up and saw Black Teeth standing triumphantly over him.

  ‘What a joke,’ he said.

  Black Teeth went to swipe again but Hoodie came between them, wanted a piece of the action for himself. He’d fired up the planer and was aiming it at Gardner’s temple. Gardner managed to climb to his knees. He didn’t have the energy to stand on two feet, but he wasn’t going to lie down and leave himself defenceless. First rule of combat, he reminded himself: always try to stay on your toes. The planer buzzed angrily. Gardner was alert now, his body flooded with endorphins and adrenaline. In a blur he quickly sidestepped to the left and out of the path of the planer. Momentum carried Hoodie forwards, his forearm brushing Gardner’s face, the planer chopping the air.

  Then Gardner unclenched his left hand and thrust the open palm into Hoodie’s chest. Winded the cunt. Hoodie yelped as he dropped to the ground. The planer flew out of his hands and Gardner reached for it, but Black Teeth was on top of him and bringing the sledgehammer in a downward arc again. Gardner feinted, dropping his shoulder and leaving Black Teeth swiping at nothing. Out of the corner of his eye Gardner spied Para fishing something out of his jacket. Gardner folded his fingers in tightly and jabbed his knuckles at Black Teeth’s throat. He could feel the bone denting the soft cartilage rings of the guy’s trachea. The sledgehammer rang as it hit the deck.