only spent a few weeks of the year in their expensive log chalets during the ski season. It was a place where few people knew their neighbours and where no one was surprised to see strange faces and vehicles. Victor, coming and going frequently, never appeared suspicious.
At one of the world’s most expensive grocery stores he bought whole milk, free-range eggs, a selection of fresh vegetables, English cheddar, soya and linseed bread, and smoked salmon. He resented having to pay the extortionate amount of money to the woman behind the counter, but he knew it served him right for living there.
He walked through the rest of the village with the two bags and his attache case held in his left hand. He used the side streets instead of the main road. There were few people about, and when he was finally sure he wasn’t being followed, he headed off into the trees, moving in a half-circle around to where his chalet lay a mile away from the main cluster of buildings. He moved carefully through the dark forest, knowing the way without needing to see properly.
When he saw through the trees the chalet illuminated by the moon and starlight he wanted to rush inside and collapse on his own bed. He desired nothing more than to sleep, than to forget his life for eight hours straight, but discipline made him stop and squat down, looking for signs of intruders. It was almost impossible to believe that anyone would know where he lived, but after Paris he was taking no chances.
He placed the shopping down and spent an hour circling the building until he was satisfied no one was inside or nearby. The chalet was sheltered on all sides by dense pine trees, with a single narrow path only usable by rugged four-wheel-drive vehicles leading to the main road. Victor’s own Land Rover was parked in a freestanding garage. It was too dark to see any recent tracks in the path or footprints in the snow around the building, but he saw and heard nothing to suggest anyone was nearby.
Inside the ornate wood and steel-reinforced front door, he breathed a little easier but still took the time to check the interior thoroughly. The chalet was five years old, Victor the only owner, and it was built in the traditional Savoyard chalet style with slate roof, wooden beams, stone walls, and a log fire. Its two storeys had four bedrooms, far more than Victor really needed, but chalets here were not built with a single occupant in mind.
It had no conventional alarm. If someone broke in Victor did not want the authorities alerted and snooping around. Instead he had custom-made motion sensors linked to high-resolution security cameras, and sensitive microphones that covered every corner of the building. Each item was carefully disguised, and the cameras and microphones were programmed to only begin recording two minutes after they were tripped. In this way they should remain undetected by anyone sweeping for electronic bugs when they first entered a room.
All the windows were fitted with three-inch-thick polycarbonate and glass laminate windowpanes that would stop even high-velocity rifle rounds. The reinforced front and rear doors and frames would take more than a hand- held ram to get through. Few windows opened and none fully.
Victor examined every room in a set order in a set way. Everything was in its place, and nothing was there that did not serve some purpose. There were no photographs, no items of any personal significance. Nothing to show who he was or where he had come from. If anyone ever did get into the chalet, they would leave with almost no information about him.
He was pleased to find nothing had been recorded by his security system. He opened the door to the small boiler room and checked the control box for tampering. Should he enter a certain code it would set a three-minute timer that would detonate the C-4 carefully positioned around the ground floor. One day he might have to leave in a hurry and never come back.
Once he was satisfied, he put the groceries away and was finally able to relax. He treated himself with a long shower. Outside his chalet he never took them. Back to the door, naked, unarmed, pounding water blocking all other noise — even the most skilled target was defenceless in one. Victor had killed enough people in them to know they were death traps. Here it was safe though. His body ached. He noticed he’d lost a couple of pounds too, but two days on the run tended to make an effective diet programme. Plenty of decent food and rest would put him right in no time. He had no significant injuries, and, considering what had happened, he knew he was fortunate to be in one piece. Thinking of food made his stomach groan.
When he couldn’t ignore the hunger any longer he dried himself, checked the house once more to satisfy his paranoia, and made himself a large cheese and salmon omelette with the groceries he’d bought. He followed it with a protein shake loaded with vitamins and minerals before taking a half-empty bottle of Finnish vodka from the freezer. He went into the lounge, sat down in front of his rosewood piano, and tore the seal from the bottle.
Victor poured himself a glass of vodka and rubbed a smear from the piano with his sleeve. The piano was an 1881 Vose and Sons Square Grand he’d found rotting in a Venetian dealership. He’d bought it for a good price and had it couriered to Switzerland to be repaired but not restored. Victor found a certain beauty in the absence of perfection. The piano had existed for several times longer than his own life span, and it wore its battle scars proudly. He played a little Chopin until he found his eyelids drooping.
Later, he poured the last of the vodka into the glass and used the piano to help him stand. He headed upstairs slowly and lay down on his double bed, the single pillow hard beneath his head.
He fell asleep with the glass on his chest.
CHAPTER 17
Munich, Germany
Tuesday
22:39 CET
Alvarez shivered as he left the building and nodded to the German police officer smoking a cigarette nearby. The officer’s return nod, Alvarez noted, was somewhat half-hearted. Evidently he did not appreciate the task of questioning the building’s occupants that Alvarez’s presence had won him.
German intelligence had been very cooperative and had agreed to Alvarez’s request on just the vague information the company have given them. News of the Paris shootings had reached across the border, and the Germans were keen to help.
As with the French authorities, he told them nothing of the missing flash drive. His priority was to recover it rather than to apprehend Ozols’s killer, but it wouldn’t do to tell that to members of another nation’s intelligence service. They would want to know what information the memory stick contained, and the best way to answer that would be to take possession of the drive.
He climbed into his rental car and drove back to the hotel. It had been a long two days, and the strain was showing in the face that looked back at him in the bathroom mirror. He had another progress report to give to Langley, but he would need an hour’s sleep before he started it.
His achievements were limited at best. A man matching the assassin’s description had been let inside the building by a neighbour. There was no evidence Ozols’s killer had been inside Svyatoslav’s apartment or had found or taken anything, but that didn’t surprise Alvarez. Svyatoslav’s financial and phone records were being assembled, and Alvarez did not relish the thought of having to pore through them.
The neighbour, Mr Eichberg, had provided another description and aided a sketch artist. The assassin had shaved his beard and cut his hair, but the remaining identifying features could’ve been anyone’s. He couldn’t have had the decency to have a big nose or a cleft chin, Alvarez thought bitterly.
A drawing had been issued to police forces across Germany, but Alvarez knew the killer would not have hung around. He was most likely out of the country long before Alvarez had even arrived. All CCTV footage at airports and train stations were being checked by the authorities as a matter of course.
Alvarez took the hair clippers from his suitcase and gave his head a once over with the number two attachment. He had a brief hot shower and afterwards lay down on his bed to sleep but couldn’t make it happen. A few years ago, when he couldn’t sleep, he would have grabbed the phone and spoken to Jennifer, but there was no one to speak to these days. Alvarez kept people at arm’s length without having to try, and, even when he made an effort to bend his elbows, he just found his arms were still longer than those of most people.
Some women seemed to like the challenge of getting close to him, but once they realized it wasn’t going to happen they bailed. Mostly sooner, but in Jennifer’s case later. He thought about calling to speak to Christopher, but it was hard talking to his son when he saw so little of him and the kid called someone else daddy.
