Dillon lifted the scope to his eye.
Tatiana was coming — and it appeared that she was in trouble.
The Mercedes accelerated madly down the narrow lane.
A black Range Rover Sport spun around the corner, gripping effortlessly with its four wheel drive and winter tyres. It must have been laying in wait for her, ready to attack; it accelerated down the lane and started to gain ground on the Mercedes.
Dillon sighted smoothly. The auto-focus gave the Range Rover instant clarity. The six occupants became pin-sharp images inside the luxury 4x4. He could see them clearly — large men in dark clothing, some were wearing dark glasses. One window was down, allowing snow to blow into the vehicle — an automatic weapon appeared and began firing.
The cracks echoed up the hillside a moment later.
Dillon trained the Nemesis on the driver; the Range Rover slowed, immediately slewing to the left and then right, under heavy footed braking as it negotiated a large snowdrift and Dillon cursed, the figures inside the vehicle being thrown around, unsteady targets…
He closed his eyes, opened them and breathed out slowly. Squeezed the trigger gently — once — reloaded and squeezed again.
The rapport would have been deafening, had he not been wearing ear protectors, the stock punched his shoulder with a sharp kick, and he saw the windscreen shatter and disappear into a billion tiny pieces; the first round had missed the driver and hit the shooter, hanging out of the rear window with the automatic, in the neck, severing the main artery and spraying blood across the interior. The second shot, had slammed into the forehead of the man sitting next to him, blood, brain matter and fragments of skull turned the rear windscreen a bright crimson. With a scream of gears and engine, the Range Rover swerved left, smashing into the embankment and then violently righting itself; the rear bumper was hanging off, split and dragging noisily along the ground.
The lane, and Dillon’s advantage, was fast running out.
“Bollocks,” Dillon said out loud.
He repositioned the Nemesis and squeezed off a round. The bullet slapped into the front wing bursting the tyre, the heavy 4x4 veered, Dillon reloaded round after round, and bullets continued to slam into the door panels.
As the last round was fired, Dillon left the rifle in the snow and sprinted down the hillside for the castle and the cover it would afford him — if he could make it in time. Every muscle in his body felt alive as he powered forward down the hill, he heard the Range Rover’s engine pitch change as it spun into the private lane that led up to his property, and then pass by him far below. More gunshots ricocheting as the 4x4 flashed from view and Dillon pushed on, arms pumping as he pushed on through the snow, the Glock automatic in his left hand, a cold sweat covering his body, stinging his eyes.
More gunshots rang out from up ahead.
Dillon came over the ridge at a full sprint and the world opened up before him, his home in the foreground with the stunning mountain range as a backdrop on the far side of the loch, snow falling in an idyllic postcard scene. Punctuated with the harsh full stop of; savagery and destruction.
Tatiana had swung the Mercedes around in the turning circle to form a barricade behind which she was crouched, gun in hand and resting on the edge of the bonnet.
As Dillon appeared, the Range Rover howled straight for the Mercedes, Tatiana darted out of the way as the heavy 4x4 ploughed into the sports car amidst the devastating noises of screaming crunching metal; the Mercedes was shunted into the front of Dillon’s home, buckled and twisted, the windscreen exploded under the pressure and the Merc’s boot popped open as the vehicle was pushed into the main steps. The Range Rover’s doors were opening even as the collision took place and men tumbled from the 4x4, automatics and sub-machine pistols drawn.
Tatiana had taken cover behind Dillon’s Landrover, at the right moment she came out, firing — in seconds bullets smashed across space. One of the men was spun sideways with a bullet to the shoulder, ripping apart clothing and flesh, and dropping him spinning to the ground in a flurry of snow and a spattering of blood.
The sound of automatic gun-fire echoed around the valley, as a fusillade of bullets scythed across the clearing. Four bullets smacked into the large oak tree behind Tatiana in quick succession, their impact making dull thuds in the bark.
The fifth bullet found its mark, catching Tatiana, puncturing her flesh and knocking her backwards off her feet, legs and arms flaying wildly as she went down hard onto snow covered gravel. She landed awkwardly in a heap, wedged against the trunk of the oak tree, face to the ground, legs twisted in a macabre abstract.
“No!” shouted Dillon.
Chapter 7
The highest level military headquarters in the UK, providing political control of all British military operations around the planet. The central staff is made up of integrated service and civilian personnel who are responsible for, amongst other things, planning strategy for the three principle services — and now the Scorpion units. They control the monetary budgets and financial deals, from buying and selling land, weapons and military hardware to the masterminding of stock market economics. Battles have been won, and some lost from within the inner sanctums of this austere Whitehall building…
Those who knew of Scorpion, or who worked for them, would often wonder about finance: how had this clandestine organisation, part of the British military war machine against terror, become so important? And how did it fund such impressive worldwide schemes and plans?
There were no simple answers. But Ferran & Cardini International was never very far away and always on hand to guide and advise the top-brass at Scorpion. They now had fingers in many pies — Scorpion held the controlling shares in some of the largest PLC companies and financial institutions, owned a myriad of businesses from matchstick making factories to oil corporations, worldwide. If there was money to be made — big money — then Scorpion would in some way be involved. And sitting in their eyrie, high-up in the atrium of their Docklands’ headquarters. The partners of Ferran & Cardini stroked their egos and congratulated themselves for being such clever chaps…
Scorpion HQ was not visible from the air; it was hidden deep underground, deeper than even the London tube lines, a massive self-contained complex linked by hundreds of metres of labyrinthine tunnels leading to rooms housing an array of hi-tech surveillance equipment, canteens, satellite interface terminals and the main servers that linked the worldwide Scorpion G8 network. Along with two hundred highly trained Government men and women. Above Scorpion HQ was a busy London high street; all normal and oblivious to what lay beneath the pedestrian walk-ways, the bustling shoppers and camera-toting tourists. Below the heavily guarded London Underground… Scorpion HQ existed…
Deep down; an underground base, an underground world. The entrances were disguised; hidden from the casual passer-by; only the elite few knew of these access points, and where they were located. One of them was located within the reception area of a travel agent’s building. On this particular afternoon, the automatic sliding door opened silently to reveal a stunning looking young woman. She was smiling as she emerged outside, her expensive designer suit looking sharp and business-like, and her company name badge concealing a high-tech security access device to allow her to enter Scorpion’s underground HQ.