Tom Hinshelwood: The Killer

He could use the stairs but not if one of them had taken that way down to make sure he didn’t. Because there was another problem. He was unarmed. The FN that killed Ozols had been stripped and each piece disposed of separately. The barrel in the Seine, slide down a storm drain, guide rod and recoil spring in a Dumpster, magazine in a trash can. Victor only ever used a gun once. Walking around with all the evidence a jury would ever need to convict him was not his style. If he could get to his backup he could at least defend himself.

There was only one functioning elevator though. An out-of-order sign dangled from the other’s doors. Victor strolled across the lobby and stood in front of the working elevator the two men had used. He cracked the knuckles of his right hand one by one with his thumb.

There was a ting as the elevator reached the lobby. Just before the doors began to open Victor stepped to one side and pressed his back against the adjacent wall in a small recess where an elaborately decorated vase stood. He remained motionless, ignoring the bewildered gaze of a five-year-old boy. Everyone else was too preoccupied to notice him.

One of the two assassins walked out of the elevator and took a few steps into the lobby. The second didn’t follow, obviously on his way down through the stairwell. The man with his back to Victor was compact, thick at the neck, ex-military by his build and gait. He was standing casually, no head movement. Even though apparently motionless Victor knew he was surveying the room, but with his head fixed, just moving his eyes, not wanting to draw unnecessary attention his way. He was good, but not so good as to look behind himself.

Victor waited until the last possible moment before slipping between the closing elevator doors. He passed within six inches of the assassin.

A second before the doors fully closed the man noticed the young boy pointing in Victor’s direction and turned. Random chance. For an instant the man looked directly at Victor.

Recognition flashed in the assassin’s eyes.

The doors closed.

08:27 CET

Victor took a series of deep breaths, pulling the air into the very bottom of his lungs, holding it to the count of four before exhaling. The adrenaline in his system caused his heart rate to soar to better supply his muscles with essential oxygen. But beyond one hundred and twenty beats per minute the ability to use fine motor skills-those that require small muscle movements, such as lining up a set of gun sights-were reduced. At above one hundred and thirty those skills are almost entirely lost. To the body such abilities aren’t immediately necessary to survival.

Victor would beg to differ.

By controlling his breathing Victor interrupted the normal working of the autonomic nervous system, effectively putting the brakes on his climbing heart rate. Victor couldn’t override his instincts but fortunately he could manipulate them.

He figured the guy in the lobby wouldn’t waste any time in contacting the other units, informing them they had been spotted and the target was on the run, heading upstairs. Victor could get off at any floor, find a window and be gone in a matter of moments. But he needed his effects. If the kill team didn’t get to them the authorities eventually would. Passports had stamps of countries and dates. Credit-card numbers could be traced. The gun would ensure they investigated him thoroughly. Every piece of documentation was for an alias, but one that he had used before. He took every precaution imaginable, but there was always a trail to follow for those who knew how to look, and at the end of that trail was the real him. He couldn’t allow that to happen.

The elevator passed the first two floors without stopping. Victor kept his breathing steady. He counted off each long second until the ting.

Victor was out in the hallway while the doors were still opening, moving fast, heading left toward the stairwell at the end of the corridor, maybe thirty feet from the elevator. Closed.

He didn’t need to press his ear against the door to hear two sets of feet leaping up the stairs. They were fit, strong, maybe twenty seconds away. He needed time to secure his things, time he didn’t have. Unless he made it for himself.

A fire ax hung on the wall farther along the corridor. Victor smashed the glass with his elbow and lifted it from its perch. Returning to the stairwell he pushed the blade under the door handle, wedging the bottom of the haft on the floor. It was a good fit, sturdy.

There was a fire extinguisher beneath where he’d taken the ax. Victor hoisted it up in his left hand and moved back to the elevator. It was still on the fourth floor. He pressed the button to open the doors.

Suddenly the stairwell door shook but the handle remained rigid, the ax preventing it from turning regardless of how much strength was applied. They tried again, more forcefully, but again the handle didn’t move. After that there were no more attempts.

Victor turned his attention back to the elevator. He placed the fire extinguisher between the open doors, leaned inside, and pressed the button for the lobby. They closed as far as the extinguisher before the retracting and repeating the endless cycle. Victor estimated he’d bought himself at least two minutes. He needed less than one.

He reached his room without a sound and stood before the door. There could be others waiting for him inside. They’d be alert, ready. He kicked the door open and went in, immediately dropping into a low crouch, reducing his profile, head lower than where center mass would typically be. It took a split second to survey the room, another second to check the en suite bathroom.

No one.

There were the two in the stairwell, plus surveillance outside, and possibly others elsewhere in the hotel. They were good, organized. If they were really good they would have a sniper in a building across the street.

Victor didn’t go anywhere near the window.

In the bathroom Victor took the lid off the toilet tank and retrieved the ziplock bags from inside. One contained his passport, plane ticket, and credit cards. He removed the items and placed them inside his jacket. The second had another fully loaded FN Five-seveN and sound suppressor. It always paid to prepare for the worst, Victor reminded himself. He tore the bag open, took the gun, screwed the suppressor in place, and pulled the slide to put one in the chamber.

An attaché case containing a change of clothes and the rest of his possessions was already packed and sitting on the bed. Victor grabbed it with his left hand and went, keeping his gun out of sight down by his right side. He walked briskly down the corridor, alert, away from the stairs and elevator, heading for the fire escape. He would be gone long before they realized what was happening.

He stopped.

If he left he would leave knowing nothing about his would-be killers. Whoever had sent them wouldn’t just call them off. He was on someone’s hit list now. If they had found him once they could do so again. Next time he might not spot them so quickly, if at all.

They were a numerically superior force but they had lost the initiative. One of the first things he’d learned about combat was to never give away an advantage.

Victor turned around.

They came to his room breathless, guns in hand. One moved to the right of the door, the other stayed to the left. The target’s door was ajar, the lock broken. The taller of the two, the more senior, took a second to double-click the send button of the radio transmitter in his inside pocket. A whisper came through his wireless flesh-colored earpiece.

The assassin made a quick hand signal to his partner and they burst into the room. The first went in fast and low so the second could fire over him as he followed directly behind. The first man swept the left-hand side of the room, the other the right. Maximum speed, aggression, and surprise to make anyone inside defensive, stunned, slow to react.