The Alex King Series A BATEMAN (summer reading list txt) 📖

22

The man carried an Uzi machine-pistol in one hand and a two-way radio, or walkie-talkie, in the other. It was an old fashioned-looking handset with a long, rubber antennae. King supposed the mountains made receiving a clear reception difficult and he knew that smaller units with discreet, or built-in aerials often struggled in remote areas, so there was purpose to the choice of equipment. Either that, or Luca Fortez had not reinvested his money into security. He supposed men with Uzis should be enough. But it put King in a quandary. He had not wanted to kill the mafia guards. They were bystanders to his plan, for the most part, and his primary target was Nicolai. But, intentionally wounding a man with an Uzi was as dangerous as pulling on the tail of a tiger. King couldn’t breach the fence while the man was there, and he was running out of daylight. For his plan to work, he needed to move now. He hadn’t wanted collateral damage, but he hadn’t wanted Caroline kidnapped either. He didn’t know this man, knew that his career choice didn’t make him a choir boy. This man would have done terrible things, and he would have earned good money from it. If you wanted to dance, eventually you’ve got to pay the band.

King had a clear shot of the man, hoped the bolt would pass through the mesh fence without clipping a link of wire. He had a good sight bead on the man’s neck and figured it would go a long way towards silencing him as well as stopping him in his tracks. The guard tucked his radio into his pocket and fiddled with a packet of cigarettes. King waited. Eventually the man would take his hand off the grip of the weapon and his finger away from the trigger. Lighting a cigarette was one of those tasks. The man pulled the cigarette out with his lips, pocketed the packet and reached for his lighter, proving King wrong. He lit the cigarette, savoured the flavour and aroma, the hit to his senses. King steadied his aim and squeezed the trigger. The bolt shot through the fence and whipped through the air missing the man by less than an inch. The man straightened, dropped his cigarette and turned. King had the bowstring pulled back but was struggling with loading the bolt. Time, as it always did in close quarter battle, slowed. The man pointed the Uzi out like a handgun and fired. King blinked, hearing the dry-fire of the safety. The man looked stunned, brought the weapon back and held the fore-end with his left hand as he flicked the safety over with his right thumb. He had the machine-pistol back out, but this time aiming more carefully with both hands, the sight lining up with his right eye.

King had already moved to his right, putting the post of the fence between them and had got the bolt under the spring clip and was aiming carefully, but this time he centred the sights on the larger target – the centre of the man’s chest. He fired, and the man shuddered. He glanced down at the bolt, which was lodged under his diaphragm. His white shirt was growing red, the blood looking like a rose, but some foot or so across. It had hit the aorta, and King assumed from the man’s build and the length of the bolt protruding, that the wicked-looking hunting tip would have exited near the man’s spine.

King reloaded the crossbow. The Uzi was still in the man’s hand, and although he didn’t look as if he was going to get it back up to aim, he couldn’t risk the man firing the weapon and warning the security in the property below. King aimed, was about to fire, when the man fell backwards, and the weapon clattered out of his hands and across the rocky ground.

 There was no time to waste, and he had started the ball rolling. He dropped the crossbow by the fence, took out his tactical sheath knife and slipped it between the links of the fence. The W shape in the haft of the blade, near the hilt, was a military grade wire cutter. He slipped the wire into one of the vees, then twisted and pulled the knife downwards. The wire was severed, and King worked quickly until he had enough room to pull the wire back and slip through. He replaced the wire, leaving it tidy enough to pass a walk-by inspection.

The man was dead. King rolled him onto his side, saw that the head of the bolt had been broken in the fall. No point pulling the bolt out, and it would have been a grisly task that King was happy to avoid. He took the spare magazine out of the man’s pocket and picked up the Uzi. It wasn’t a precise and accurate weapon, but it could make a good noise and strafe targets at fifty-metres with little skill. King could comfortably take this to volleys of aimed shots out to one-hundred metres with great effectiveness. He checked the action and magazine, each one held thirty rounds of 9mm, but sixty rounds in an Uzi wasn’t going to last long. He slung it over his shoulder on the worn leather strap and picked up the crossbow. The radio came with him too. His Italian was poor, but he could cause some problems for them with the radio when the opportunity presented itself.

King skirted the fence, moving quickly down the steep gradient. He could see a group of guards milling around where the driveway met the gardens. He could still see the pool as well, the two children playing and the woman sunbathing. The light was getting low, so she would not be there much longer. King imagined her changing into something long and sheer and flowing and sipping cocktails beside the pool later.