Killing for the Company

He lowered the sight to see Sean examining the ground in front of them, snow gathering on his beard. ‘One set of vehicle tracks, freshly laid. That’s the Transit. Snow could have covered any others, but I can’t see any indentation. I’d say fuck all else has come up here in the past four or five hours.’

‘Footprints?’ Chet asked.

‘Yeah. A deer. Maybe a wild boar. No sign of humans.’

Chet nodded and turned to Luke and Marty. Their faces were intent. Alert. ‘When we get down there, two groups. Sean, Marty, head to the east side of the house and secure any exits there. If Ivanovic knows we’re coming for him, he’ll most likely try to escape that way. You grab him if he does.’

‘It’ll be a pleasure,’ said Sean.

‘Luke, we’ll take the front. Identify the main power supply and kill the lights. Then house clearance room by room. I want any guards dead before they have the chance to shout out. We’ll flush the fucker out that way.’

Luke nodded.

Each man performed a final check on his weapons, engaged his NV and turned to Chet, waiting for the word.

‘OK,’ he breathed. ‘Let’s move.’

TWO

18.49 hrs.

The road to the lake went gently downhill, but in the snow it still took ten minutes to travel it. They were fifty metres from the house when Sean and Marty veered off to the east so they could get round to the back.

Chet and Luke continued to follow the line of the Transit’s tracks. When they reached the van — parked about fifteen metres from the front entrance of the house, its exhaust still warm from its journey — Chet spoke.

‘Cover the door,’ he said. ‘I’ll find the power.’

Luke nodded, then settled down on one knee in the firing position while Chet silently approached towards the house.

Now he was closer, he could make more sense of the structure. It was an old place, timber-clad. The paint — he couldn’t tell what colour it was in the dark — was peeling and the window frames rotten. Of the two lights that were on, one was on the ground floor and the other on the first. Chet kept away from those parts of the snowy ground where the windows cast light.

There was no electricity pylon leading to the house, which meant there must be some other power source. As Chet crept round to the northern side, his ears began to tell him what it was: the low hum of a petrol generator. He found it in a small outbuilding. The warmth of the generator had melted the snow for a metre around the building; inside, the air was filled with the greasy stench of fuel. It took Chet only a few seconds to locate the pump, with a plastic isolating valve at one end. He turned this. The engine spluttered, and the buzz of the generator died away immediately, to be replaced by total silence.

He made his way back to Luke, who hadn’t moved from the firing position, his rifle aimed firmly at the front door of the house. ‘Anything?’ Chet whispered.

Luke shook his head.

They gave it a minute. A minute for raised voices or someone inside to walk out and check the genny. A minute for them to walk into a flying bullet from Luke’s suppressed M16.

No one came.

Why was no one coming?

Chet spoke into the radio. ‘Sean, Marty?’

‘Roger that,’ Sean’s voice filled his earpiece.

‘Any movement your side?’

‘Negative.’

Chet and Luke looked at each other. ‘If Ivanovic and his numpties are just hiding out here, they probably don’t know how the house works,’ Luke suggested.

Again Chet peered towards the house, then spoke into his radio. ‘We’re moving in.’

Chet’s voice rang clearly in Sean’s earpiece. Situated near the eastern wing of the house, Sean was about twenty metres from the back door, just behind a metre-high wall that marked the end of a back yard. His right knee was pressed firmly into the snow, the butt of his rifle was tight into his shoulder and the weapon was trained on the exit. Marty was in the same position, another ten metres along the wall. Fifteen metres behind them both was a line of tall spruce trees, heavy with snow. Both men had their NV goggles engaged, and the IR-filtered Maglites on their weapons lit up the area in a ghostly green haze, for them but for no one else. Not that there was anyone else. The whole place was as silent as a graveyard.

Something nagged at Sean. It was so quiet here. He knew these fuckers were in hiding, but still…

He spoke into his mike. ‘Go careful, fellas.’

‘Roger that, buddy,’ Luke’s voice came over the radio.

Sean suppressed a shiver. Chet and Luke were good, but the anxiety still gnawed at him. This op should be like shooting fish in a barrel. Marty looked over at Sean briefly before returning his gaze to the house. He couldn’t see the younger soldier’s eyes but he could sense that the kid was anxious too.

Sean thought back through the events of the past hour. He had seen Ivanovic’s man staggering out of the bar. From the white Skoda he had watched the guy weave along the pavement, pissed as a parrot. Once in the Transit van, he’d pulled carelessly out into the traffic and sped off.

Sped off.