The Soviet Comeback by Jamie Smith (best ereader for academics TXT) 📕

into the bottles of Merlot were in the advanced stage. One of the most toxic plants in the world, the mottled red rash spreading across Zurga’s face and the diarrhoea were some of the more visible symptoms. Inside, Nikita knew, his organs were failing and quickly. A fact illustrated as Zurga lurched to the side and vomited. It was heavily laced with blood.

Nikita moved towards him, knife in hand.

“Save me,” Zurga pleaded, wheezing heavily as foam bubbled at the corner of his mouth.

“This is the only salvation I can give you now,” Nikita replied, and thrust the knife into his heart.

Zurga’s eyes widened in pain and shock and he grabbed Nikita’s arms, pulling him closer. “Who are you?”

“I am the Black Russian,” whispered Nikita coldly, remembering Giorgos and Maria, and pulled out the knife, the hook pulling chunks of heart muscle and sinew with it. He forced himself to watch as the light in Zurga’s eyes faded.

Once Nikita was sure he was dead, he began his gruesome work with the cruel knife on the former double agent, to ensure it looked as grisly as possible as per his instructions from the ambassador. Wiping his hands on one of the only remaining blood and excrement-free patches of bed sheet, he turned away from the horrific scenes in front of him and headed down the stairs and out onto the lawn.

When he got outside, he saw Cato and Maria faced by a pair of angry, and apparently hungry, Alsatians. Cato was cowering, with Maria over one shoulder, and was trying to back away. Nikita briefly thought how leaving him to the dogs could make his life easier, but immediately thought against it. That’s an ending I wouldn’t wish on many, he thought to himself and drew his tranquillizer gun, quickly unloading two darts on the dogs who staggered briefly before collapsing and falling still.

Cato looked at him gratefully before he realised that Nikita had a gun raised at him.

“You have seen me; I cannot let you live. It is a matter of national security,” Nikita said softly.

Cato nodded knowingly. “I suspected as much, though which nation’s security, I wonder?” Then, tilting his long sloping head, he added, “You do not have the eyes of a killer.”

“Neither do you.”

“My killing was done to protect my family and the people I love,” he replied, looking sadly down at Maria.

“Mine also.”

Cato nodded gently. “Then be careful it does not claim your soul. It claimed mine.”

“I think you are wrong; I see a lot of soul in you. I am truly sorry about your friend,” he said, nodding at Maria.

Tears welled in Cato’s eyes. Then, smiling benignly, he closed his eyes for the bullet.

Nikita raised the gun and knew what he must do. As he looked down his arm at the old man looking so serene and accepting of his fate, he lowered his arm.

I’m an assassin, not a murderer, he thought to himself.

Cato’s eyes opened slowly.

Nikita was gone.

CHAPTER 11

Nikita strode back down the track, taking a brief diversion to collect the wire cutters he had buried in the undergrowth after cutting his way into the compound only thirty minutes earlier. So much had happened so quickly. It did not take long to kill.

He was in a daze. So much killing he had carried out, and the deaths of two good islanders were on his hands now too. He thought suddenly of Elysia and felt sick.

It all felt at a distance, like the work of someone else. He didn’t like it, but didn’t feel overly burdened by it. Becoming colder than a Siberian winter, he thought to himself.

He brushed it all from his mind as he pulled a huge mobile phone from his ammo sack and carefully dialled Kemran. “It is done; the site will need to be cleared.”

“First a photographer is needed to help spread the word.”

“That is your concern; my assignment is completed.”

“Do you require extraction?”

“No, I will find my own way.”

Nikita ended the call, turned to face the track and began his journey home. Ordinarily he would work to remain hidden after such a mission, to keep his identity secret and leave no connection to the scene of the crime. But in such dark and rural territory he would be able to see and hear any vehicle or person approaching long before they were able to see him.

In the warm night, Nikita prowled the dusty road, hearing the buzzing of the cicadas, noticing the feather-light fluttering of bat wings overhead. Now a true assassin, he was tightly wound and saw everything.

Sometime later he arrived back at the turn off to his hotel. The moon was cloaked by clouds, rendering the hotel complex almost invisible, with only a couple of lights dotted around the site.

He circled around to the back of the hotel, making his way through rough, hard soil and tough tufts of grass, and entered slowly, keeping to the dark shadows. His skin prickled; something didn’t feel right. Nothing visible, only a feeling. He approached his apartment cautiously, eyes alert for tripwires or traps. After satisfying himself there were none, he padded silently to the door. He turned the key soundlessly and drew his handgun from the hip, easing the safety off with a tell-tale click before moving sharply through the doorway, gun aloft and covering the whole room as rapidly as he could. It was clear.

It was only after he had checked all of the remaining rooms that he was able to release a long breath.

On the living room table was a thick envelope, and next to it were two bottles — one of vodka, the other of Kahlua: the ingredients for a Black Russian. Kemran’s joke was not lost on Nikita, but he did not smile. Next to the bottles was a note: Everyone