Stephen Leather - True Colours

‘Dead?’ repeated Tarasov.

‘The killer’s down here,’ said Shepherd. ‘He’s taken Alina’s radio.’ He put his hand up to his earpiece. ‘Ivan, this is Tony. Where are you?’

There was no answer.

‘Ivan. Where are you?’

Popov interrupted and spoke rapidly in Russian. The only word that Shepherd could make out was ‘Ivan’.

‘Dmitry, I think Ivan’s in trouble,’ said Shepherd, though he knew that he was underplaying the situation. Koshechkin was probably already dead. ‘From now on we’re going to watch what we say on the radios, he’s probably listening in.’

‘So what do we do?’

Shepherd went through Podolski’s pockets and found her phone. He switched it on and gave it to Popov. ‘Where are the fuses?’ asked Shepherd. ‘In this room?’

‘In the briefing room.’

‘Find out if he’s just pulled the fuses or cut the wire. Either way do what you can to restore power. I’ll go down to Grechko.’

‘Leo can go with you.’

‘I’ll move faster on my own,’ said Shepherd, taking off his jacket and tossing it on to a chair. ‘My memory’s pretty good, even in the dark. But it’ll slow me down if I have to worry about Leo. But see if you can find another phone for him and send him down after me.’ He stood up and headed for the door.

Monotok walked quickly down the corridor. Ahead of him was the door to the pool room. He took the severed thumb from his pocket, pressed it against the scanner and tapped in the four-digit code.

He pushed the door open and stepped inside, the tang of chlorine stinging his nose. Grechko was at the far end of the pool, sitting on a lounger with a towel around him. ‘Is someone there?’ Grechko shouted. ‘Who is it? Dmitry?’ His voice echoed off the walls.

Monotok walked slowly towards him. ‘No, it’s not Dmitry,’ he said. ‘It’s just you and me.’

Grechko drew his legs up against his chest. ‘Who is it? Who’s there?’

‘My name is Kirill Luchenko, does that name mean anything to you?’

Monotok could see Grechko frowning as he peered into the darkness. Monotok stopped next to a lounger. He put down the gun then took off his night vision goggles, blinking in the darkness.

‘Who are you? What do you want?’

‘I told you. My name is Kirill Luchenko, but my friends call me Monotok. And I’m here to kill you.’ He took his knife out of his pocket and placed it next to the goggles.

Grechko stood up and the towel fell from his shoulders. Grechko stood there naked, his hands out in front of him as he moved his head from side to side in a futile attempt to improve his vision. ‘You are an assassin, is that it? Someone paid you to kill me and you skulk in the dark like the coward that you are?’ He jutted his chin up, his hands still moving through the air.

Monotok reached into his pocket and took out a small Magnalite torch. ‘No one paid me, Grechko. This isn’t about money.’ He switched on the torch and shone it at Grechko. The light was blinding and Grechko threw up his hands to shield his face. Monotok bent down and picked up the gun. He wasn’t planning to shoot Grechko — he was going to use the knife to end the pig’s life — but he wanted him to know that he had a gun and that he would use it if Grechko came at him. He shone the torch at the gun, and then back to Grechko’s face. ‘If you take one step towards me I’ll shoot you in your shrivelled-up nuts.’

Grechko stayed where he was, squinting into the light. ‘You don’t have to do this,’ he said. ‘I’ll pay you whatever you want. Anything.’

‘You’re not listening to me, are you?’ said Monotok. ‘This isn’t about money. This was never about money.’ He stopped and stared at Grechko. ‘Actually, that’s wrong, isn’t it? This is all about money. It always has been.’

Shepherd hurried down the stairs, two at a time, keeping his left hand against the wall for balance, The light from the phone was barely enough to see by but his memory stood him in good stead and he knew exactly where he was. He saw the glow of the thumb scanner and keypad at the door to Basement Two but hurried on by.

He put his hand up to his earpiece. ‘How’s it going, Dmitry?’ he asked.

‘I can’t make sense of the wiring,’ said Popov. ‘I’m not an electrician.’

‘We really need lights down here, Dmitry.’

‘I’m doing my best, Tony.’

Shepherd’s foot caught on something and he pitched forward. His left hand slammed against the wall and he twisted as he fell, his right hip slamming against the stairs. The fall knocked the breath out of him and he lay against the wall, gasping for air. He pointed his mobile at whatever had caused him to stumble and winced when he saw Koshechkin’s pale face, his eyes wide and staring. Shepherd panned the light down the bodyguard’s body and winced again at the glistening blood all over the chest. He pushed himself to his feet, then took the last few steps to the door that led to Basement Three.

‘There he is,’ said Harper. ‘There’s the bastard now.’ They had parked the Transit van next to Khan’s CRV behind the supermarket where he worked. Khan had just turned around the corner. He had a carrier bag in each hand and had his head down, deep in thought, as he walked.

‘Get the tape ready, Jock,’ said Jimbo. He was holding a large spanner in his gloved hands. They didn’t want to use the guns in the city, even with suppressors fitted. McIntyre reached for a roll of duct tape and pulled off a piece.

Shortt opened the passenger door and climbed out.

Harper wound down the driver’s-side window as Khan got closer. ‘Hey, mate, you got the time on you?’

Khan looked up as if his mind was elsewhere. ‘What?’

‘The time, mate? What’s the time?’

Khan looked at him, frowned, then twisted his left wrist to get a look at his watch. He opened his mouth to speak but Shortt came up behind him and slammed the spanner just behind his right temple and Khan dropped like a stone. His carrier bags fell to the ground and one burst open, scattering oranges across the tarmac.

McIntyre kicked the rear doors open and helped Shortt drag the unconscious man into the back. As McIntyre slapped duct tape across Khan’s mouth, Shortt picked up the bags and spilled fruit and threw them into the van before slamming the door shut. McIntyre pulled a sack down over Khan’s head.

‘Nicely done, lads,’ said Harper as Shortt climbed back into the van and put the spanner into the glove compartment. He started the engine and drove slowly on to the main road as McIntyre wound duct tape around Khan’s arms and legs.

‘I was too young to know what was going on when the Soviet Union imploded,’ said Monotok. ‘My father tried to explain, but I was a kid. He was excited, though. He thought Russia was going to change for the good. He thought it would make his life easier and the lives of the men who worked for him.’ He shook his head sadly. ‘He had no idea.’

He jabbed the knife towards Grechko and Grechko flinched.

‘During Gorbachev’s perestroika it was every man for himself. But when Yeltsin took over, everything changed. The rules changed. You had only two ways of getting rich. Yeltsin handed it to you, or you took it. He gave whole industries to his friends, lock, stock and barrel. But you, you were never a friend of Yeltsin. You had to take what you wanted, didn’t you? You had to grab it with both hands and you didn’t give a fuck who you hurt in the process.’

‘You don’t know what it was like back then,’ said Grechko. ‘If you weren’t in with Yeltsin or his cronies you got nothing. It was a closed club.’

‘So you and Zakharov and Buryakov and Czernik formed your own club, didn’t you? You decided to take what you wanted. To kill for it.’