Cold Blood by Alex Shaw

happened?” Varchenko held a cup to Ruslan’s lips and he drank thankfully.
    “We followed the BMW as you ordered but as soon as we got near enough to ram them they opened fire.”
    Varchenko had been given some information by the ‘tame’ local militia who had found the wreckage of the G Wagon and Ruslan but he wanted to hear it first-hand.
    “We had no chance; their weapons were automatic. I think I managed to return fire then my front tyres blew and the next thing I can remember, the jeep is rolling off the road.”
    “But it was armour plated!” Varchenko gave him another mouthful of water.
    “Then the bullets were armour piercing. Valeriy Ivanovich, I did my best… What of the others?”
    There had been three others in the Mercedes, each armed with Glock hand guns. As employees of Varchenko’s security firm Getman Bespeka, he had personally met their families and dependants and provided financial recompense. “They are all dead Ruslan. You are the only survivor and that, I presume, is because they wanted you to live.”
    Ruslan swallowed hard and closed his eyes. “I will kill them!”
    “No Ruslan, you will not. They want me not you.” Varchenko placed his hand on that of his injured employee. “You will be well looked after here.”
    Varchenko left the hospital and climbed into his waiting car. What he was dealing with here was more serious than he had imagined. He had to find out who these people really were and to do this he has to lose face and call his old subordinate, Genna.

 
    SIX
     
    City Centre , Kyiv , Ukraine
     
    Breathing deeply but steadily Snow pumped his legs up the hill and past the Ukrainian parliament, the Verhovna Rada. It was 7:15 a.m. and he was half way through his morning run. The guards outside were used to seeing joggers in the park opposite but Snow was the only one to run on their side of the road and directly past them. It astonished Snow how close he actually was to the entrance yet was never challenged. Cresting the hill he increased his pace and ran past the Presidential administration building. His route, which he had now perfected, took him down Pushkinskaya, across Maidan and along Khreshatik, up the hill past the Hotel Dnipro to the Verhovna Rada, the Presidential administration building and back down the hill this time via the Ivana Franka Theatre, through Passage before finally running uphill again and into Pushkinskaya.
    On days that he felt he needed to push himself he would stop halfway at the Dynamo Stadium and complete a few laps of the track before continuing on his way. However today he felt hampered by a mild hangover. It was Monday morning and was to be Arnaud’s first day at Podilsky, yet they had both decided the night before to have ‘a few’ pints at Eric’s. Snow was glad that Mitch was in Belarus on business and that Michael Jones had not made it; otherwise it would have become a heavy session. Fifteen minutes later he was stretching outside the front of his building as the street sweepers made their way towards him.
    “Fancy a coffee?” Arnaud was on the balcony above, cup in one hand waving. Snow needed no second invite and within minutes was walking from the shower to kitchen. Arnaud had made toast and was busy buttering a thick slice as he read an old issue of the Kyiv Post .
    “You should have told me you were going to jog, I’d have come too.”
    Snow finished drying his hair and dropped the towel on the empty seat. “After what you drank last night?”
    “Hmm, maybe not.” Arnaud bit into his toast. As Snow poured himself a coffee Arnaud noticed a faint long scar on Snow’s right leg stretching from just below his boxer shorts to just above the knee. “How did you do that?”
    Snow sipped his coffee. “I was in a bad car crash a few years back. Lucky to survive actually.”
    “Sorry, I didn’t know.”
    “How would you?” It was too soon for Snow to share his past with his new friend. Snow surveyed the table. Arnaud had made