The moment Victor heard the sniper step forward to get a better angle on the bathroom, he hurled himself forward, sending the door crashing into his enemy and knocking him back through the doorway. Spinning around, Victor raised the Five-seveN and fired twice. Two holes blew through the door, chest height. There was a grunt, followed by a stumble from outside the room. He hesitated, unsure whether his opponent was dead. A shotgun blast tore through the door.
The exclamation of a foe still very much alive.
McClury grimaced, feeling warm blood trickling down his chest. He’d been shot just beneath the collar bone on the left side, but the bullet hadn’t come out so there was no huge exit wound leaking blood. No organs pierced, no bones broken, no arteries severed. Tissue damage mostly. It hurt like fuck but there was no immediate risk.
He was low on ammunition, and the target was alive and fighting. If anything, McClury was now the more wounded of the two. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. He thought all he’d have to do was finish him off, not have a room-to-room gun battle. This wasn’t working out.
He wasn’t an assaulter; he was a sniper.
So snipe, he told himself.
CHAPTER 21
14:34 CET
Victor waited, crouched in the far right corner from the door — diving distance from the bathroom if the assassin tried any more grenades. He had the FN reloaded, sights lined up to put bullets through his enemy’s skull the moment he showed himself. But nothing was happening. Victor watched the minutes tick by, glad of the chance to rest. The small wound in his chest had stopped bleeding. It hadn’t stopped hurting.
He was hoping the assassin’s wound was worse, but he couldn’t rely on it. He knew his enemy was doing exactly the same as he was, waiting, gun trained on the door, ready to fire the instant Victor revealed himself. If the sniper was playing a waiting game, Victor knew he could wait longer, but with each passing second the prospect of the assassin charging into the room seemed more unlikely.
The sound of an engine, coming from outside.
Victor sidestepped to the window, making no noise, gaze never leaving the door. He peered briefly through the glass, seeing two big SUVs with police markings heading up the steep track to his chalet. Smart, Victor thought.
He rushed over to the door, hooked his big toe under the bottom to pull it open. There was no shotgun blast. He stood shoulder to the frame and peered around quickly. No assassin. As he expected. A pair of boots sat unlaced on the floor, removed to aid a stealthy withdrawal.
Victor ran back into his bedroom, dressed quickly into khaki pants, fleece, winter jacket, waterproof hiking boots. He zipped the flash drive into a jacket pocket, opened the drawer by his bed, took the remaining magazines for the FN.
Downstairs, in the boiler room, he severed the pipe to the 250-gallon propane tank. Escaping gas hissed, quickly filling the room and drifting through the chalet. Victor entered the code for the high explosives. The timer began the three-minute countdown.
He saw through the front windows the police vehicles nearing. Possibly four officers in each, armed. The assassin must have notified them, told them some enticing story, trying to flush Victor out of the chalet. And it was going to work. But he couldn’t use the front door now. Eight against one and they had vehicles. If he started shooting it would only bring more cops. He moved to the opposite end of the chalet. The back door was hanging off its hinges, blown open by a shaped breaching charge. The noise that woke him. Somewhere on the other side the sniper would be lurking, crosshairs hovering over the back entrance, an easy shot when Victor was forced to rush out. Not a bad trap. Credit where it was due.
He couldn’t leave through the front. He couldn’t leave through the back.
He couldn’t stay.
The smell of propane was strong, urging him to move, reminding him if he hesitated too long there would be nothing left of him to need identifying. That was due to happen in all of two minutes.
The bright sun that found its way through the blinds made him squint. He looked into the light, blinking. He pictured his enemy, poised, waiting, oblivious to distractions, concentration absolute, one eye closed, one eye staring into the scope’s eyepiece, gaze fixed on the back doorway. Close to the rear of the chalet were dense pines that impeded line of sight. If the assassin was positioned to snipe him he could only do it from one place.
Victor turned around on the spot, catching his reflection in the mirror that hung near the back door. He approached it. Roughly two feet square, smooth, clean. Perfect. He lifted the mirror from its hooks.
McClury kept his breathing steady and regular despite the pain in his chest and his thumping heartbeat. He was in a crouch a hundred yards from the chalet, among the trees halfway up a gentle slope, the L96’s bipod resting on a fallen tree trunk. It was the only location that allowed a clear line of sight to the chalet’s back door. The sun was directly behind McClury so wouldn’t reflect off his scope and give away his position. The distance was good. The concealment was good. The trap was good.
He ignored the cold, the pain, everything but the image the scope provided. He had the door centred in his scope, the Schmidt and Bender calibrated for the distance, windage, and shallow downward angle. He couldn’t keep the reticule still — the pain caused his arm to tremble. But at this distance it wouldn’t matter. A bullet just above the eye would have the same effect as one between them. When the door opened and the target came running out, it would be over.
The rumble of the approaching police vehicles was close, almost outside the chalet. McClury’s prey would have to make a dash for it now.
He did. The wrecked door swung open and McClury held his breath, waiting for the target to emerge from the shadows of the doorway. McClury saw something move but stopped himself squeezing the trigger too early. It wasn’t him. It was shiny, moving erratically. Reflective. A mirror.
The target was still in cover but holding a large mirror through the doorway. McClury could see his arms but not his head, torso, or legs. McClury waited, staying calm, watching the mirror, wondering what the hell was going on. Was he trying to signal someone? It made no sense. McClury considered blowing off one of the target’s arms, but then he’d never come out, and the police would only keep him alive. Then the sun caught the mirror’s surface at just the right angle and the reflected light shone right into McClury’s eye, magnified by his scope to ten times intensity. He winced, dazzled, large opaque spots appearing in his vision. He instinctively pulled away from the scope and fired.
The bullet shattered the mirror into a thousand glittering shards.
McClury could barely see but he managed to make out the target sprinting away from the doorway. He was heading for the trees, head down, weaving from side to side. McClury cursed, wrenched up the rifle, put his left eye to the scope. He swung the rifle to the side, trying to track the target through the blinding spots, crosshairs hovering a little way in front of him to compensate for his speed.
He fired, the bullet kicking up snow near the target’s feet. The recoil from the unsupported rifle made McClury’s arms rise sharply. He worked the bolt action quickly, loading another bullet into the chamber, and fired again. This time blowing a chunk out of a tree. Goddamn.
McClury loaded another round, swept across with the scope, went to fire, but the target was in the trees.
Gone.
Victor ran, his chest burning. Each beat of his heart sent jolts of pain through him. The snow was ankle deep and slowed him down, but he was in the trees now, and the mass of pines would hamper the assassin’s line of sight. Hitting a moving target was hard enough without a forest in the way. Victor had cuts on his arms and hands from the shattered mirror. He ignored them.