The Sniper and the Wolf (30 page)

79

THE CAUCASUS MOUNTAINS

Gil noted that Sasha Kovalenko favored his right leg as he turned to go back into the command tent, wondering what kind of wound he had sustained and when it had happened. Gil’s own battered body was still suppurating, his shrapnel wounds burning from the jagged pieces of metal still lodged in his flesh. He popped another dextroamphetamine capsule and gulped water from the CamelBak, knowing he was now robbing Peter to pay Paul.

He whispered to himself, “All you have to do is run three thousand yards, and you’re in the clear.”

Umarov took a seat on a log near a cooking fire, tussling the curly black hair of a small boy who knelt on the ground playing with a toy airplane. A woman gave Umarov a plate of food, and he sat eating, talking with a number of other men sitting around the fire.

A grenade exploded in the forest to the west, followed by the distant staccato of machine-gun fire, and every man in the camp sprang into action.

Umarov dropped his plate and stepped over the log, making for the command tent.

Gil put the crosshairs on the back of his head and squeezed the trigger.

Dokka Umarov’s head exploded like a watermelon shot off a fence post, and he dropped to the ground. The women screamed, grabbing up the children and running for the huts.

Gil slung the rifle over his back and began working to get his feet back on the ground as fast as possible.

COLONEL YABLONSKY AND
his men had been in the process of setting up their claymore screen when a small Chechen patrol stumbled across them. A brief firefight ensued, and all four Chechens were killed, but two of the Spetsnaz were hit with shrapnel, and one was shot through the shoulder blade.

“They’ll come fast,” Yablonsky said. “We’ll hit them hard and fall back through the MON screen.”

The Russian MON-50 version of the claymore mine came in two different variants. One variant fired 540 steel ball bearings, the other firing 485 short steel rods, each covering an arc of 54 degrees out to lethal range of fifty meters. Employing trip-wire detonators, the Spetsnaz had placed its mines (three of each variant) roughly thirty meters apart in order to deliver the maximum effect on the Chechen line of advance.

“Did anyone hear the American’s rifle?”

“I heard nothing,” Yablonsky said. “We have other problems to worry about now.”

The six of them formed up by twos and prepared for the attack. They could hear the Chechens shouting to one another as they came forward through the forest, ramming through rhododendron thickets and firing indiscriminately in an attempt to flush out the enemy. They were at least a hundred strong and moved with all the confidence of a superior force. Ali Abu Mukhammad commanded from the center, well back from the front, surrounded by a personal guard
of a dozen devoted men. With Dokka Umarov now dead, he was the new emir of the Caucasus Emirate.

The Spetsnaz let loose with a volley of hand grenades, hurling three apiece before falling back through the claymore screen. The grenades exploded all along the Chechen line, killing or wounding nearly twenty men. Taking up firing positions among the trees, the Russians waited as the Chechens sorted themselves out, shouting for the wounded to be recovered and to close the gaps in the line.

The Chechens drew within range once more, and the Spetsnaz opened up with rifle and grenade fire, killing a dozen more before turning to run. The Chechens saw them and opened fire, dashing after them and directly into the screen of MON-50s.

The mines exploded with devastating effect all along the front of the Chechen advance, killing or wounding at least thirty more men, and bringing the advance to an abrupt halt. Men were screaming everywhere, their bodies shredded.

Mukhammad saw the devastation and called for ten volunteers to continue the pursuit while they waited for the remainder of the camp to arrive.

His personal guards volunteered immediately, but they were denied. Ten former Zapad Spetsnaz men came forward and told Mukhammad they would track down the assassins and kill them. He sent them off at once, turning to ask where the hell Kovalenko was, but no one had seen the Chechen sniper. A search of the dead was carried out, but his body was not found.

SASHA KOVALENKO WAS
in the forest on the far side of the camp, perfectly camouflaged in his Russian leshy suit, slithering slowly along the ground at a snail’s pace. He could now see the great tree from where he lay, the rope hanging down from the high limb, but there was no sign of the American sniper. He could feel him, however; his combat instincts telling him that Gil had not fled the scene. The rhododendron were not as dense here on the east side of
camp, where the elevation was slightly higher, so visibility through the trees was about 60 percent.

Something moved along the forest floor to his right, no more than thirty feet beyond a rhododendron thicket. The sound was slow and deliberate, like that of a man crawling, moving parallel to his position toward the east. Kovalenko realized at once that the American was maneuvering to intercept him at the far end of the thicket.

The movement stopped, and he lay listening for five full minutes before he heard the American move again through the dead leaves. He smiled and moved carefully forward on his elbows and knees, his eyes peering out from within the leshy suit, the suppressed AK-105 cradled carefully in his arms. The ground was cleaner on his side of the thicket, so he made very little discernible sound as he moved.

GIL WASN’T SURE
of Kovalenko’s position, but he could feel him drawing closer, a kind of ozone slowly pervading the air around him. His arrector pili muscles contracted along his arms and shoulders, tightening his skin into gooseflesh, and he pulled the .338 into his shoulder.

He studied the terrain before him, watching not for the movement of a man but of a segment of the forest. Although highly effective from a static position, a ghillie suit was no more effective in motion than any other type of camouflage. The sound of fighting on the far side of the camp had dropped off immediately after the claymores had detonated, and there hadn’t been a shot fired since.

He closed his hand around the end of a one-hundred-foot length of parachute cord taken from Mason’s rucksack. The other end of the cord was attached to the rucksack, which he had stashed in the rhododendron thicket a hundred feet out in front of him. The cord was concealed beneath the dead leaves and other forest debris, so it would not be readily visible to anyone who didn’t already know it was there. Gil gave the rucksack a slow, steady pull of about three feet, hoping to lure Kovalenko in for the kill shot.

He was very tired, approaching exhaustion, and he was a bit shaky from the amphetamines, so when he first detected Kovalenko’s movement in the fading light of the forest, he wasn’t sure whether or not his eyes were playing tricks on him. Gil eyed the spot through the scope and finally realized that he was looking at one of the finest ghillie suits he’d ever seen. The Chechen’s movement was scarcely faster than that of the minute hand on a clock, and Gil had to blink his eyes to be sure he was seeing what he was seeing. As of yet, he did not have a shot because Kovalenko was belly-down against the ground, and Gil was concealed within a natural depression in the earth, a leafy rhododendron branch dangling overhead. His scope had an untrammeled view of Kovalenko, but the muzzle of the rifle did not. In order to fire now, he would have to raise up onto one knee, and he was not about to give a man like Kovalenko that kind of opportunity.

LISTENING TO THE
movement on his right, Kovalenko decided the American must not know his position after all. He was moving too fast and making too much noise, shifting position with impatience. The movement stopped, and Kovalenko knew he had him.

He increased his pace, though only slightly, and over the next twenty minutes, he worked his way to the end of the rhododendron thicket. He shifted his angle of attack to the right, training the AK-105 in the direction he had heard the American’s movement. Then he lay motionless.

Ten minutes passed, and finally there was another sign of movement. Kovalenko caught a glimpse of a tan rucksack through the rhododendron and opened fire on full automatic, emptying the magazine and chopping the rhododendron to salad. He quickly reloaded and then got to his feet and stepped into the undergrowth for a look at the body.

The instant he saw the shredded rucksack, he knew he’d been had. He stood waiting for the lights to go out, feeling Gil standing fewer than thirty feet behind him. His hand closed around the grip of the rifle, fingering the trigger.

“You shouldn’t wait,” he said over his shoulder. “This is no game to play fairly.”

Gil had the TAC-338 shouldered, the crosshairs fixed dead center between the Chechen’s shoulder blades. “I wanted to say it’s been a helluva fight.”

Kovalenko nodded. “I watched you in the Panjshir Valley on satellite two years ago. Dragunov was there as well. You were all any of us talked about for weeks.”

“You were still with the Spetsnaz then?”

“Yes. Now, before we finish this, I want to ask you a question.”

“Ask it.”

“What did you do with the key you found aboard the
Palinouros
? The key you took from Miller’s body.”

“It’s in my pocket,” Gil said.

Kovalenko chuckled sardonically, shaking his head. “If I were you, I’d wait to find out what that key opened before I gave it to Mr. Pope.”

“Why’s that?”

Kovalenko whipped around with the AK-105, and Gil shot him through both lungs halfway through the spin, exploding his heart and killing him instantly. The Chechen fell over in the rhododendron, and Gil ran to the body, knifing him under the jaw and quickly shaking him out of the ghillie suit. He put on the suit and grabbed up the suppressed AK, moving out toward the camp, hoping that most of the fighting men had joined in the hunt for Yablonsky and his team.

80

THE PENTAGON

General Couture watched Gil disappear from the infrared screen the second he shrugged into the ghillie suit. He snapped his fingers at an aide de camp. “Get the president on the horn, and tell him that Dokka Umarov is dead. He’ll want to inform Putin.”

Then he picked up the phone. Mark Vance, the CEO of Obsidian Optio, was waiting on the line. “Mark, I’m gonna need your helos again. Shannon and six Russian Spetsnaz are headed for the bridge in the Sba Mountain Pass. They’ve got about a hundred Chechen militants hot on their ass, so it’s gonna be shittin’ and gittin’ the whole way.”

“Bill, I’m sorry as hell,” Vance said, sounding very official, “but I can’t send my helos back into Russia. I’ve already got the Russian ambassador to Turkey on my ass. They know we were in there, and they’re hotter than a whore in a peter patch over it.”

“They don’t need to invade Russian airspace this time, Mark. I
just need ’em to stand by on the Georgian side of the bridge. Maybe fire a rocket or two across the river if it becomes necessary.”

“Bill, I can’t do that!”

“Yes, you can! We just bagged Dokka Umarov, for Christ’s sake!”

“What? You’re shitting me! That’s confirmed?”

“I’m confirming it!” Couture growled. “And now your precious pipeline is safe again. So get those helos inbound!”

“Okay, but if there’s any international flack over this, the State Department better cover my ass, and I’m not kidding. We’re trying to expand our business into the Russian market.”

Couture rolled his eyes. “Your ass will be covered, Mark. Don’t worry.” He hung up the phone not knowing if it was true or not, and not really caring. Mark Vance was a millionaire many times over. He looked at the White House chief of staff. “We just bagged Dokka fuckin’ Umarov, Glen.”

Brooks chuckled. “I wonder if Moscow will send us a thank-you note.”

The secretary of defense came back into the room. “I was just told that Dokka Umarov is dead. Is that confirmed?”

Couture looked across at the air force liaison. “You got it cued up, Major? Play it for the secretary.”

One of the screens blanked out for a moment. Then they watched as Dokka Umarov threw down his plate and stepped over the log. A second later his head exploded, and the body went down in a heap, falling over onto its back to reveal the obliterated face.

“Christ,” the secretary said. “All that’s left is the goddamn beard! What was Shannon thinking, taking a head shot?”

Couture chuckled. “Well, Mr. Secretary, he was probably thinking he wanted the bastard dead.”

81

HAVANA,
Cuba

Crosswhite and Mariana didn’t have too much trouble climbing over the gate to the
finca
. He gripped the pistol in his hand as they made their way along the wall around the side of the two-story house. They had studied the satellite photos, and so they knew the general layout as viewed from above. There were bars over the windows, and the drapes were all drawn at ground level. They stopped at the side door, and Crosswhite looked inside. The kitchen was deserted, but the door was made of steel, and the window was equally barred.

“We have to go around back to the patio.”

They moved to the end of the house, and Crosswhite stole a look around the corner at the pool. It wasn’t large, only about twenty feet long and four deep in the shape of a rectangle. The still blue water shimmered in the sun.

“Will he have a gun in there?” Mariana whispered.

“He’s a fool if he doesn’t. Wait here.” Crosswhite stepped around
the corner and onto the patio, keeping close to the wall as he made his way toward the door. He stopped at another barred window. The window was open, and the white drapes blew out through the bars with the breeze, suggesting there were more open windows elsewhere in the house.

A man sneezed just inside and then cleared his throat and sniffed, mumbling something unintelligible before clearing his throat again.

Crosswhite stepped in front of the window and pointed the 1911 pistol through the bars.

Peterson looked up from where he sat in a chair reading a book, his feet propped on a leather hassock four feet away from the window.

“You even twitch,” Crosswhite snarled, “and I’ll blow your fuckin’ brains out.”

Peterson turned white, staring at the yawning maw of the .45. “How did you get in here?”

“Apparently I pay a helluva lot better than you do.” Crosswhite called for Mariana.

She came around the corner and looked in through the window, her anger and hatred boiling up unexpectedly. “Kill him!”

“Go check the door,” Crosswhite said quietly.

She went to the door. “It’s locked.”

“Look for another way inside.”

She slipped around the front. “Everything’s locked and barred,” she said, coming back around. “It’s like a prison.”

Crosswhite kept his eyes on Peterson. “Check the balcony.”

She stepped back from the house and looked up. “The door to the balcony is open.”

“Find a way up there.”

She glanced around. “There’s no ladder.”

“Find a way, Mariana.”

She went into the brick pool shed, but there was nothing of use in there either. “There’s nothing, Dan.”

Crosswhite stayed relaxed, but he knew that sooner or later, Pe
terson would make a move, and he’d have to make a decision. Firing the gun would be a risk. The cops outside the gate might get the bright idea of coming into the
finca
and killing him and Mariana; stealing the rest of the money and making up whatever story they liked. If the cop behind the wheel wasn’t such a cowardly type, Crosswhite would have half expected them to try it anyhow.

“Look for a key,” he said.

“Where?”

“How the hell do I know? But there has to be one. You don’t risk getting locked out of a fortress like this.” He noted the slightest change in Peterson’s eyes. “There’s a key! Find it.” He grinned at the CIA man. “Make a move, fucker. I dare you!”

Peterson just stared back at him.

Mariana searched the patio high and low, running her fingers along window ledges, turning over the patio chairs, and poking around in the flower garden with a fork from the table. She even looked for a loose tile, but there didn’t seem to be a key.

“Is there a lot of shit in the shed?” Crosswhite asked.

“Yeah.” She went back to the shed and stepped inside, pulling the chain to turn on the light. The little building was crammed with pool chemicals and old bags of flower fertilizer left over from the previous owner. There was broken patio furniture, stacks of spare tile left from when the pool was put in years earlier, and various jars containing odds and ends. On one of the shelves was an old metal tobacco can. She took it down and pried off the lid. It was full of nuts and bolts, but she pushed her finger around in it and couldn’t believe her eyes when she found a shiny new key at the bottom.

“I’ll be damned.”

She went back to Crosswhite, whispering into his ear that she’d found the key.

Crosswhite noted the increasing concern on Peterson’s face. “I’m going to give you the gun,” he told her, speaking deeply to cover the sound of him engaging the slide lock to safe the weapon. “If he makes a move, you shoot his ass. Is that clear?”

Mariana hesitated.

“I said, Is that clear?”

“Yes!”

“Put the key in my back pocket.” She did as he said. “Now stand next to me and take the weapon without moving it off target.”

They switched hands carefully, and Crosswhite stood behind her for a moment, helping her to steady the weapon. “I’m going in.”

He went to the door, and as he was putting the key into the lock, Peterson made his move.

Mariana pulled the trigger, but the weapon didn’t fire. Crosswhite swung the door open and ran inside, tackling Peterson on the tile as he was diving for the table where the .38 revolver sat in the open. He slugged the CIA man in the stomach and then hit him in the throat.

Mariana came running in with the pistol. “I tried to shoot him—I swear to God!”

He stood up and put the .38 in his back pocket. Then he took the .45 and tucked it away beneath his shirt. “Don’t worry,” he said, touching her shoulder. “You did perfect. I knew he’d make a move as soon as one of us started to open the door, so I put the safety on.”

Peterson started to choke and rolled to his side, holding his throat.

“I’d like to say you’ll be fine,” Crosswhite said, hauling him up by the hair, “but that isn’t true.” He slugged him in the stomach again and shoved him across the room. “Now I’m gonna tell you a story about a Mexican girl, you piece of shit.” He slammed Peterson down into a chair and took the folding knife from his pocket. “Her name was Sarahi, and she was one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen . . .”

Five minutes later, Crosswhite and Mariana stepped out through the gate to the
finca
and walked across the street to where the cops still sat in the car. Crosswhite looked around and handed the cop the rest of their money wrapped in a dish towel.

“We arrived too late,” he said, “but I’m a man of my word, so I’m paying you anyhow.”

The cops looked at each other. “What are you talking about?”

“He committed suicide,” Crosswhite said. “Cut his own carotid artery. It’s an ugly scene in there.”

“I told you, no blood!” the driver hissed.

“And I just gave you another ten thousand dollars apiece!” Crosswhite hissed back, startling the cop. “The crime scene is perfect—so you make it work!”

They walked off down the street and got into Ernesto’s car, driving straight to the airport.

Mariana bought a ticket, and Crosswhite walked her to the security checkpoint. “How soon will you follow after me?” she asked.

He shrugged. “Not before Pope is up and around again. I’ve got the sat phone, so I’ll keep in touch. When you get to Mexico City, don’t leave the airport. Get on the first available flight to the US—
any city
!
”

She smiled. “Yes, sir.”

“You gonna be okay?”

“I think so,” she said, feeling suddenly lonely. “I wish you were coming with me.”

He shook his head. “I’m not your type, Mariana.”

She put her arms around his neck. “Thank you for—for everything.”

“There’s nothing to thank me for.”

He watched her go through the security checkpoint, waved to her a last time, and went back to the car.

An hour later, Paolina opened the door to him, and the smile that spread across her face was like no smile anyone had ever smiled at him before.

“You know that I’m not a saint,” he said.

She reached up to touch his face, looking deeply into his eyes. “Every saint has a past, Daniel . . . and every sinner has a future.”