The Hunted

Three syndicate chiefs had been contacted by a Chechen mob that had been hired as underwriters by the source of this generous venture. For good and obvious cause, the benefactor preferred to remain anonymous. A select group of witnesses were invited to a small apartment in the city center, five suitcases of cash were hauled out of a closet and opened for display, though it was far too much to count. But for sure it looked like more than enough. This is it, they were told-this is what five million dollars looks like, up close and personal. Not an empty promise, no bluff, the real deal. Now get out and spread the word.

In a city where five thousand bucks will buy you all the corpses you wish, five million was going to kick-start a gold rush of assassins.

A few bookies put their heads together and gave thought to creating a betting pool. Nope, why bother? There were no competing odds. Open and shut. At five million bucks, Nicky was dead.

At three that morning, Nicky's chief bodyguard-his most trusted lieutenant, a lifelong friend from the same impoverished back alley of Novgorod-gently eased open Nicky's bedroom door and peeked inside. They had raped and killed and pushed dope together for three long, enjoyable decades. They had dodged the cops and KGB, swindled, murdered, and beaten too many to remember. Oh, the warm memories they shared. He snuck quietly inside. He hugged the wall, crept ever so slowly, never setting foot off the carpet. Nicky liked dark rooms. Nicky wouldn't sleep anywhere with windows, and this one was like a coffin. Nicky's loud snores bounced off the walls. The whore sprawled across his legs was shot so full of heroin she wouldn't have heard a T-80 tank pass three inches from her ear.

A pistol was in the bodyguard's right hand with a round chambered and the silencer screwed on tight. A pencil flashlight was in his left hand, with a finger poised to turn it on at the last second. He was ten feet away. Then five and the pistol came up. At two feet away, he suddenly felt something kick him in the chest. He flew backward, smashed against the wall, and crumpled in a bleeding heap on the floor. It was funny, he thought; he never heard the blast until a millisecond after his left lung blew out his back.

A moment later, Nicky was over him, peering down through the darkness into his eyes.

"It hurt?"

"Yeah, like a bitch."

"Why?" Nicky asked.

"Five million," his best friend managed to grunt.

"From who?"

"Who knows? Who cares?"

"For real?"

"Oh, it's real, Nicky."

"Why you?"

"Stupid question."

"Five mil. Yeah, you're right."

"Yeah, and you're dead."

Nicky pumped two more bullets into his best friend's mouth, straightened up, then tossed the semicomatose whore out of his room.

He locked the door behind her and moved a large dresser in front of it. He stopped and thought for a moment. Who put the price on his head? Five million was a very big level of enthusiasm. Who hated him that much? Who had the motive? Who had that much money?

After a split second, a name popped into his brain. Golitsin. It made perfect sense; in fact, no other name made any sense. He lifted his cell phone and dialed a number from memory. A voice answered, and Nicky said, "Georgi, it's me."

"Hey, I heard you got a big friggin' problem." Georgi laughed.

"Word's gotten around, I guess."

"It's five million, Nicky. You're the talk of the town."

"Good point. Here's the deal, Georgi. You owe me two million for that dope deal, right?"

"Hey, I got it right here. Deal was you don't get it till tomorrow night."

"Scratch that."

"Seriously?"

"As a heart attack. Put out the word, one and a half million to anybody who whacks Sergei Golitsin. Rest is yours to keep."

"Maybe I'll whack Golitsin and keep all of it."

"Your option, Georgi. But Golitsin better be dead, or you're next." They rang off.

He returned to his bed, sat down, and cradled the pistol on his lap. Five million!

His best friend was right. Nicky was dead. It might take an hour, a day, maybe a week, but he was, without debate or uncertainty, a dead man walking. By eight in the morning, Tromble had assembled the full team in his office. The usual cast of characters: his pair of compliant hey-boys, Agents Hanrahan and Wilson, Colonel Volevodz, and the head Russian prosecutor, and a fresh pool of INS legal jockeys, now backed up by a pair of eager youthful hotshots from Justice. They sat, pens gripped, notepads poised, and awaited guidance from the great man himself.

"Really, it was to be expected," said one of the Justice boys, named Bill. Bill's area of expertise happened to be anything that happened five minutes before.