UCHIN WALKED ALONE, his rifle in his right hand, muzzle down. Up ahead he could hear the baying of the hounds. It really wouldn’t matter, though, whether the animals were able to get on the track or not. Scents up here were problematic because of the terrain and the composition of the underlying rock. He felt certain that a man like Shaw would have experience in dodging even experienced scent hounds. This was a chess match and one had to think of the current and at least four future moves. Kuchin had followed traitors through the muck, mud, ice, and waters of Ukraine as part of his duties with the KGB. He had almost always succeeded, aided by an internal desire never to concede defeat. It was the same attribute that had fueled his swift rise up the security agency’s ladder. Superiors loved men like Kuchin, because they made them look good to their superiors.

He had long debated how to do this. Part of him strongly wanted to tie each of them naked to a table and then pull out his little metal suitcase. He wanted to peel off their skin, cut out their intestines, and put them through torture that Abdul-Majeed, mutilated as he was, could never have imagined. But he had finally decided against that. He had done so principally because unlike Abdul-Majeed, they had shown courage. They had confronted him directly, risking their lives. They had not hidden like the Muslim and let a drugged-out lackey attempt to do the killing. For that Kuchin had grudging respect for the group. Rice was another matter. He would die either way, but Kuchin had placed him with the others solely as a matter of convenience. He did not intend on wasting too much time with Alan Rice. The man did not deserve it.

That left only the hunt. Here, on his home turf, Kuchin had given them a sporting chance, if a poor sporting chance. He was not a fool. He would survive this, they would not. But at least they had an opportunity to postpone their deaths a bit. And it wasn’t as though Kuchin would escape either. In a way he’d come full circle. They knew about his little room at his penthouse. Others undoubtedly knew of it too. They were probably there right now gathering all the evidence they needed to send him to Ukraine to stand trial, with his execution the inevitable outcome.

My fellow countrymen will probably tear me limb from limb.

His days of hiding were over. Evan Waller was dead. The Canadian businessman was a pale imitation of the man Fedir Kuchin really was. When it was over, he would not run. He was through with hiding. They would have to take him here, at his last stand. They eventually would win, through superior numbers, but he would take many with him. It was a fitting way for an old warrior to go out. On his terms.

He smiled. And perhaps this would result in his finally being written into history. The true Butcher of Kiev. But that would come later. He had four lives to extinguish tonight. He did not expect them to die easily, especially Shaw and the woman. They would fight hard. They were survivors. Well, so was he. And he intended to save the woman for last. He had special plans for her. She would take the longest to die.

He stopped, raised his rifle, and drew a bead through his electronic scope on a caribou a few hundred yards distant. The Soviets had excelled at killing via long range in Afghanistan with their snipers and attack choppers. They might have won the war if the Americans hadn’t equipped the mujahideen with handheld rocket launchers and a mountain of RPG rounds. Kuchin could take some solace in the fact that some of these same weapons were now being used against the Americans. But only some solace. The simple Afghans had brought down the mighty Red Army and with it a superpower.

If he pulled the trigger on his rifle he could have killed the large animal that was wandering over the ground in front of him searching for food. But, as before, he had no interest in extinguishing that life. He trudged on, his eyes alert, all his senses heightened.

Alan Rice had been a disappointment, but at bottom Kuchin really should have expected it. He had taken over the business of his mentor by violent ways, so why should he expect any different treatment? Ambitious men who wanted something took it. The chief difference was that Kuchin was the sort of man who could achieve that goal. He had nerve and skill. Rice had failed on both counts. His skill was not good enough and his nerve had been nowhere near where it needed to be to topple a man like him. Which was why Kuchin had hired him in the first place. Never bring in a man more ruthless than yourself.

He knew they were up ahead of him, jogging, trying to pace themselves. They would reach a point where they would question their own tactics, perhaps argue among themselves. That would waste time, diminish the lead he had given them. They might change directions on him, believe that he was herding them in a particular direction for some purpose. He had put that into his calculations too, along with several other factors.

He checked his illuminated watch. Because it was summer and they were at a high latitude the nighttime would not last much beyond six hours. Kuchin expected it to be all over by then. The remains would be taken to the ocean, weighted down, and dumped in, never to be seen again except by the sea life that would devour them.

He lifted the rifle to his shoulder once more and checked the reticle, which most people would know simply as a “crosshairs.” Kuchin for years had used the SVD Type model favored by Russian snipers. Two years ago though he had managed to obtain the American military’s widely deployed Advanced Combat Optical Gunsight, or ACOG. It was an illuminated telescopic reflex sight. The shooter used the ACOG with both eyes open instead of closing one because the brain would automatically graft the image in the reticle from the dominant eye to the other pupil. This ensured normal depth perception and a complete field of view. A lot of fancy terminology, but the result was that Kuchin could acquire and terminate a target much faster than before. And since he had four targets that needed acquiring and terminating, a few seconds saved would be invaluable on the battlefield.

Kuchin was carrying a weapon that would kill with one shot whatever it hit. But he didn’t want that. Slow was the key here. Timing was everything. He had every right to be angry, furious with people who had done their best to kill him. But he was too wily to let this become too personal. When emotions dominated your mind you almost always lost. He would let his skill and reason rule the hunt. The emotion, the joy, could come later, when it was done and four more people lay dead by his hand.