He jumped from the passenger door of the Range Rover as Alexa exited the rear passenger door. He had briefed them well. He moved around the front of the target car and trained his Sig MCX rifle on the occupants of the front seats, indicating with a flick of the weapon that they should raise their hands. Which they did. He watched as Alexa moved to the rear passenger door of the target car and trained her rifle on the occupants.
“Out,” she shouted. “Out of the car.”
The nearest passenger opened the door and slowly exited the car with his hands raised.
“Keep those hands up. No sudden moves and we all go home.”
He did as he was told, moved to the side and Blain exited the car. The fourth occupant didn’t move, he stayed in the car.
“Alexa, are we good,” Ian shouted.
“One occupant in the car.”
“Leave him, get Blain in the Range Rover I can cover them.”
He watched as Alexa grabbed Blain by the shoulder and ran him around the back of the Range Rover. Alexa shoved him into the rear passenger seat and followed him in. He fired two shots into the front tyres and a further two into the engine block of the car, it wasn’t going anywhere. He moved towards the front of the Range Rover with his rifle still trained on the target car, he wasn’t going to take any chances. As he lost sight of the occupants he ran the final few meters, jumped in the car and waited for Lyndsey to pull away. She did as he expected, turned the steering wheel, put her foot on the accelerator and pulled away from the scene. The Range Rover was a tough vehicle but it was badly damage. Along with the missing rear window from the skirmish at the cabin the drivers side was completely caved in, it would be easy to spot once the authorities started looking for it.
“We need to lose this car and find a new one,” said Ian. “Get off at the next junction and get us out into the country to find new transport.”
Lyndsey did as she was told, she didn’t have to worry about being spotted or taking care. She floored the accelerator, speeding around cars on the Garden Ring until she could get to the next exit and get lost in the outskirts of Russia.
* * *
Renat had been silent the whole journey from the safe house to the Kremlin. Pavel had tried to make conversation but his efforts had been in vain, in the end he gave in and they drove in silence. He was glad when they reached the security gates. The guard came over to the car and motioned Pavel to wind his window down, he did as he was asked.
“ID,” the guard said as he looked at Pavel and Renat.
“I am Pavel, head of FSB and this is Renat your next President. Now open the gates.”
The guard looked at the ID and handed it back. He motioned to the guard house and the security gate raised.
“See my friend that wasn’t so hard was it,” Pavel said as he drove the car through the gates.
Renat was still silent.
“Listen Renat you need to play your part in this.”
“What do you mean?” replied Renat.
“You can be as silent as you like with me but when we get in that room with the President you need to be strong, you need to command him to step down. You need to take the Presidency, he won’t just hand it to you on a plate.”
“What if other members of the cabinet want to run for President.”
“They won’t.”
“You can’t know that.”
“It doesn’t matter what I know. Anyone who wants to run against you will be dissuaded from doing so. I have enough on every single one of them to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
“Do you have a file on me?” asked Renat.
“Yes, your affair with Darya was in it of course. Your gambling problems and your wife’s cocaine addiction... of course that all looks insignificant compared to releasing false statements and trying to frame the President with them. Right, here we are.”
Pavel parked the car and exited the drivers side. He waited for Renat to exit the car and stared at him.
“Remember one thing Renat, you owe all of us. As long as you don’t try any stupid nationalist antics while President or try and start a world war then we will leave you alone.”
Renat just stared back, he had no words.
* * *
Alexa had taken the phone call from Darya as the four of them were changing cars. Andrei hadn’t found any trace of Letitia booking a flight so he had started to look for private jets that had logged flight plans and manifests. There weren’t many manifests that just had a single occupant and only one was flying to Dubai, a well known place to hide out. It was a calculated guess but it was the best lead they had so far for catching up with Letitia.
The Range Rover had been dumped and swapped for an inconspicuous Kia. The four of them squeezed in, Alexa punched the address of the airfield they needed to get to into her phone.
“This is where we need to go according to Andrei,” Alexa said as she passed it to Ian. “It says it’s a thirty minute drive but Andrei says the plane is scheduled to leave in twenty minutes.”
“I am sure Lyndsey can cut ten minutes off our journey time,” said Ian.
“The Range Rover would have been better,” replied Lyndsey. “but I’ll give it a go.”
She slid the phone into a holder attached to the car window and put her foot down.
“Hold on everyone, I hope you don’t get travel sick.”
* * *
Pavel had been in the President’s office many times. The first time had been three years ago when he had been offered the role as head of the FSB, he had been so proud. He had worked hard to climb the career ladder. He had overseen operations that had secured his countries security, he had outed foreign spies and broken terrorist rings. It was only in the last year that he had become disillusioned with the direction his country was taking, yes every Russian should be patriotic and proud to be Russian but the world was changing, it was shrinking and Russia needed to adapt. He had tried to work the system for the greater good but it hadn’t worked, that’s why when he had been approached by his old friend Ian he didn’t hesitate to help him and install Renat as President.
“Pavel, how good to see you,” said Stepan. “Have you and your traitor friend come to hand yourselves in, I am assuming that’s what you told the guards so they would let you through,”
“I don’t think so Stepan,” replied Pavel.
“Mr President to you Pavel.”
“You see , that’s where you’re wrong. If you deserved to be called that I would, but your nothing more than a common criminal.”
“Common criminal,” Stepan shouted as he stood from his desk and rounded it in two strides. “Who the fuck do you think you are. I’m the President of Russia, your just... your a... your a fucking nobody who is going to spend the rest of his life in the gulag.”
Pavel could see the vein in Stepan’s neck throbbing, he had touched a nerve, he was going red in the face with anger.
“You need to calm down, Stepan,” pleaded Renat.
“Oh your just as fucking bad, you traitor. Both you and your whore of a secretary will be in the same cell as this idiot.”
“Stepan, sit back down behind your desk,” said Pavel.
“Who the fuck...”
Stepan stopped in his tracks as he turned to see Pavel pointing his FSB issue pistol directly at him.
“Are you going to shoot me?” Stepan asked.
“No, in a fit of remorse you will take your own life,” replied Pavel. “Of course you will leave a suicide note explaining all about your criminal activities.”
“I’m not going to take my own life, that’s a cowards way out.”
“Of course your not, I am going to kill you but the official story will be suicide.”
“No one will believe you.”
“The cabinet are being briefed now and the medical examiner has already written his report.”
Stepan walked slowly back around his desk and sat down. Pavel didn’t take his eyes or the sight of his weapon off him, he did
n’t trust him.
“Well I suppose you have it all planned out. You had better...”
Pavel didn’t give him time to finish his sentence. He had seen the small movement in Stepan’s right shoulder. He had tried to disguise it but Pavel knew that the small movement would end in Stepan reaching for the pistol he kept taped under his desk. A single shot to his forehead had killed Stepan instantly. A line of blood running down from the bullet hole to the bridge of his nose.
The sound of the shot alerted the guards outside who came racing into the office. Pavel held his hand up and they stopped.
“Our President has committed suicide. You may leave us now.”
The two guards nodded and left the office.
“You shot him,” said Renat. “Did you need to shoot him.”
“Yes I did, he would have carried on fighting for his job, his expensive lifestyle.”
“What do we do now? Why did those guards listen to you when it’s obvious he didn’t commit suicide.”
“They are loyal to me and now we must bury our President and swear in you as the new one.”
“There has to be an election.”
“There won’t be an election, you will be the only candidate and you will be President,” Pavel took his phone from his jacket pocket and dialled. “It’s done. Is everything else in place... Good, set the press conference for this evening. We will announce the death of the President and the inauguration of the new President.”
He put the phone away and turned to Renat.
“Right let’s get out of here so my men can clean up.”
Pavel walked towards the door. He took one final look at the scene he was leaving and felt happy, excited even. Excited about the future. A new President and a new working relationship with his old friend Ian. The future for both countries was looking up.
Twenty
Alexa couldn’t help but feel a sense of dejavu. The last time she was at a private airfield she was involved in a gun fight, slid across the tarmac on her back holding a child and got shot. Maybe this time it would go better, she doubted that would be the case. Letitia wasn’t the type of person to surrender. This was only ever going to end badly.
Alexa stared out of the window trying not to think about Letitia or what was about to happen. She watched the blurred apartment blocks race by as Lyndsey drove the Kia at speeds it had probably never been designed for.
“We are ten minutes out,” said Lyndsey as she swerved the Kia around another car that was travelling along at the speed limit.
Alexa checked her pistol first and then her rifle. She had half a magazine in the rifle and two spare, a full magazine in her pistol and one spare. Ian had done the same.
“What am I supposed to do?” asked Blain.
Alexa looked at him. “What do you mean... what are you going to do. Sit there and hope she doesn’t come hunt you down.”
“But I can help.”
“I don’t trust you, what’s to say being arrested is all a rouse. You could get out there with a weapon and shoot the two of us in the back.”
“Stop Alexa, I trust Blain,” said Ian. “There’s a spare Sig set in the back, I took it out the Range Rover before we dumped it, take that and Alexa... if he does shoot me in the back you make sure you shoot him in the head.”
“We’re here,” said Lyndsey.
Alexa looked around, private airfield might have been a slight over exaggeration. A tarmac strip running across the middle of a field was edged by a mixture of wooden huts on one side and planes lined up with military precision on the other. Right at the end of the line of ten or so old and dirty planes was a gleaming white Gulfstream G5 jet. Alexa guessed it belonged to Letitia.
“Pull up next to the jet,” Alexa said. “I doubt she will be using one of the other planes.”
Lyndsey had already left the road and was racing across the field towards the jet, the Kia was not designed to go off-road, it was bouncing its occupants around as it hit every part of the uneven surface.
Alexa could see that the steps to the jet were down but there was no car, maybe they had beaten her to the airfield.
Just as Alexa thought this job might go easier than she thought, two men descended the steps. She could see the rifles in their hands and that fact was confirmed as they raised them and stream of bullets headed in the direction of the Kia. A few hit their mark puncturing one of the front tyres and ripping the passenger side wing mirror from its mounting.
“Can you still drive?” Ian asked.
“Just about, it won’t be comfortable though,” replied Lyndsey.
“It hasn’t been comfortable since you hit this field, just keep going, get us as close as you can.”
Alexa watched as the men moved further forward, constantly firing at the Kia. Bullets bounced off the roof, the doors. The drivers wing mirror had also been destroyed by the time Lyndsey pulled the car to a stop.
Alexa threw the door open, lifted her rifle to her shoulder and fired off a burst of bullets in the direction of the two attackers. They were nowhere near their mark but did make them think twice about moving further forward. They started to retreat towards the jet to find cover.
She moved forward slowly, firing small burst of fire as she moved. Ian, Blain and Lyndsey caught up with her. They formed a line of four moving in unison towards the jet. Alexa let off another burst, this time with more purpose as she saw one of the men appear from behind the plane steps. He must have fired as he moved from his cover. Alexa felt a bullet fly by the side of her head, another of the bullets hit Lyndsey in the shoulder and she fell to the ground with a scream. Alexa kept going, fired off another burst, this time hitting her target.
Alexa took a quick look behind her, she saw Lyndsey getting herself up from the ground and jogging towards them. As she turned back she heard the sound of the jets spinning up. The sound got louder, they were getting ready to leave, Letitia must be in the plane already.
“We need to stop that plane from taking off, I think Letitia is on-board already,” Alexa shouted across the roar of the twin jets that now sounded like they were up to speed.
Alexa watched as the plane started to move, the steps down seconds ago were now being lifted up as the plane made its way towards the end of the tarmac. They hadn’t waited for the second attacker to board the plane. The movement of the plane and lifting of the steps left him out in the open. Alexa was squeezing her trigger as she heard a burst of gunfire from her left and the attacker went down.
Alexa and the team watched as the jet bounced along the short piece of grass between its standing point and the end of the tarmac.
“If it reaches the tarmac we won’t stop it,” said Blain.
“No shit Sherlock,” replied Lyndsey. “We need to take out it’s tyres.”
“Okay, everything we have at the tyres,” Alexa said.
By the time the four of them opened fire the plane had taken up position at the end of the tarmac, spun up the twin jets to full power and was now racing down the tarmac. The flurry of bullets hit the tarmac and various places on the jet but missed the tyres and any vital parts of the aircraft completely.
All they could do was watch the jet disappear into the distance as it lifted from the tarmac, retracted it’s wheels and took flight to it’s destination.
Twenty One
They abandoned the car and weapons about a mile away from the safe house and continued on foot. The journey from the airstrip had been silent. Alexa couldn’t believe that Letitia had escaped, they wouldn’t get another chance like today, she would be on high alert after such a close call.
No one spoke even back at the safe house, it wasn’t until Pavel arrived thirty minutes later that anyone dare speak.
“They haven’t said a word since they got back,” said Vladimir as he let Pavel in.
“I’m not surprised. From what I heard there was a gunfight at a private airstrip. Four people tried to stop a jet from taking off but didn’t.”
“Also Lyndse
y is hurt.”
Alexa momentarily looked up from her stitching as Pavel walked into the kitchen.
“Stepan is dead, he shot himself,” Pavel said.
“Did he?” replied Ian.
“No I shot him in the head, but the guards will report he shot himself and the post-mortem will conclude the same.”
“Good, and Renat?”
“Renat is meeting with the cabinet backed up by my team who are making them aware of the files we have on them and that they will vote for Renat to stand for President uncontested.”
“At least you had better luck than we did then,” said Alexa. “Letitia escaped in her private jet.”
“Any idea where it was going?” asked Pavel.
“Dubai.”
“Good then you can go after her.”
“No, we get back home and start to dismantle Soteria. All the Soteria groups in other countries need to be broken up,” replied Ian. “Then, when she has no one to help her, then we go after her.”
“Finished,” said Alexa.
Alexa threw the needle and thread on the kitchen table and walked out.
“She isn’t happy,” said Pavel.
“There’s a lot of history between Letitia and her. She just wants her dead and doesn’t want to wait,” said Ian.
“Okay. You will be pleased to know that you have all been cleared of any charges so will be free to fly home tomorrow using commercial flights.”
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