The Alex King Series, A BATEMAN [good books for high schoolers .TXT] 📗

“Don’t!” King warned her harshly.

She still tried to work the action, something in her eyes that told King it was a Hail Mary. Desperation. She was going for it. He saw the bolt pull backwards, the glint of brass as the cartridge in the magazine was exposed. She drove the bolt forwards then dropped to the ground as King fired.

King kicked the rifle out of her loose grip, kept the pistol aimed at her. The bullet had struck her dead-centre. There was a little blood at the edges of the clean hole in her jacket. He saw her look up at him. He had seen the same look before. Too many times to count, but enough to remember. Her right hand rested near her pocket. He remembered her doing this earlier, when he had checked over the rifle. He had thought it strange enough to hedge his bets then. A slight of hand, and the weapon was locked down on an empty breach.

Amateurs and professionals.

The dying and the living.

King stepped onto her pocket. He could feel the form and hardness of the pistol even under his insulated boots. Her hand moved away from her pocket and dropped limply into her lap. She died looking up at him. She didn’t try to say anything, didn’t waste her last moments swearing vengeance or cursing his being. Most people didn’t. The life left her eyes and he turned and picked up the rifle, shouldered it by the strap and made his way over to where the MI6 officer had died.

The squall had cleared the ground of ice crystals, taking the ground down to the last snowfall. The terrain was made up of layers. Snow fell, froze and each time the snow fell a new layer was made. The ice crystals were the result of moistness in the air at the warmest point of the day, then freezing rapidly as the colder night air froze. The crystals cast a layer on everything, like dew on spring grass. It gave the appearance of freshly fallen snow. The squall had blown it all away, no doubt depositing it many miles away when the wind’s strength had blown out.

King could see the blood frozen into the snow. There was a lot of blood, but then a wolf or wolves had feasted on Fitzpatrick’s body. For as long as it took to make forensic detection too difficult. A death camouflaged by nature. King suspected the real Lena Mäkinen had not been fooled by their attempts. That was probably why she had made Senior Constable. And certainly, why she had been killed. Engelmann’s efforts had been thwarted, and whoever this dead female agent was had been called in at short notice. She would have been a dead-ringer for the Finnish police officer, but she would have been a last-minute recruit. Lena’s substitute had clearly needed directions on her phone by way of text message or GPS. She hadn’t been aware of the bullet strike either. That would have been noted by a half-competent police officer as they inspected the crime scene. Somebody had known that MI6 were sending someone to investigate their dead agent. In this case, quid-pro-quo by MI5 in the form of Alex King.

King surveyed the scene. The bullet strike on the tree, the blood in Fitzpatrick’s final resting place. He closed his eyes, envisioned a man cornered, scared, hunted. He looked again at the bullet strike again. Tracked back along the ridge. He estimated the height of the embankment, an average-sized man taking aim with a rifle. The height of the bullet strike. He looked at the distance, estimated it at one-hundred metres. There would be little drop from a hunting round in one of the most likely calibres. He supposed .308 was the most popular hunting calibre. It was certainly the most widely available and covered the most bases in terms of hunting anything outside of the big five African game. The cold would denote a fifteen percent drop in trajectory. He made his way across the clearing and stopped at the top of the embankment. The squall had blown the loose ice away and it did not take King long to find two sets of footprints. He could see from where he stood that two people had paused here. Taken their time. One had stood still, while the other had moved around behind them. King placed his foot over the prints. He stood a shade under six-foot and wore size elevens. There were no hard and fast rules, but he could guess the sex of the owners of the prints. He would estimate average-sized males. One print was lined with modern treads, the other was smooth. The smoother print was shallower. This could denote weight difference, but more likely the smooth prints were from someone wearing traditional indigenous hide boots.

King shouldered the rifle and aimed across the clearing at the tree with the bullet strike. He lined the crosshairs on the mark, lowered it an inch and gently squeezed the trigger. The rifle kicked wildly against his shoulder, the barrel rose, and the clearing was filled with the noise of the gunshot. The echo resonated and cracked off the hard and frozen surroundings. He re-sighted on the strike and saw that he had hit the tree a fraction lower. Just about dead-on where he had been aiming. So, no drop from a .300 Winchester Magnum bullet. He trudged back across the clearing and studied the bullet strike. He touched the new wood underneath the bark which had been removed. The tail of the bullet was visible, almost flush with the wood. He knew the power difference between the .308 and the .300 Winchester Magnum. He could see that it was more likely to have been a .308 or a 30-06. The tree was frozen and the difference in power would have been enough to