Free SEVERANCE KILL by Tim Stevens Page B

‘Haven’t decided yet. I’d like to find out what’s so important about this Gaines guy, this Brit. Why they want him so badly.’
    ‘The Worm has no idea?’
    ‘Says he’s working on it. Meantime, I want to do my own investigating. I’ve got a feeling this umbrella guy has something to do with it, is involved somehow. If you believe Janos and his boys, this wasn’t just some wannabe hero who jumped a bunch of hijackers. He was a pro, armed with a shiv, who put down one of Janos’s men, injured another and almost stopped them getting away.’
    ‘The Russians will be looking for us, too.’
    ‘Fuck the Rusáks .’ He glowered at his empty plate. It was true, though. He didn’t care much that a civilian had been shot in the crossfire on the tram. Shit happened. But the Worm said the man had been SVR. Russian intelligence. They didn’t drop it, when you’d killed one of theirs. Now his bargaining power would be limited. He’d demand a high price for Gaines. But he’d also have to insist on the Russians staying off his back in future.
    His phone went off. Bartos listened.
    ‘On my way.’
    He put the handset away, was already rising. ‘Son of a bitch. They’ve spotted the umbrella guy.’
     
    *
     
    The man Bartos Blažek called the Worm was at that moment sitting with his eyes closed, picturing Calvary.
    A British agent, sent to capture or kill an expatriate Brit who was wanted by Moscow. Was wanted so badly that the unofficial SVR was in charge of taking him.
    The Worm didn’t enjoy his dealings with Blažek. He found the man’s coarseness revolting, his arrogance a character flaw of such magnitude that it would surely bring him down one day. But he paid well. Paid magnificently, in fact. And however much Blažek might despise the Worm in turn – and it was obvious that he did – it was clear that he valued their association.
    The Worm’s information had led to Blažek’s interception of the product – the Brit, Gaines – but the problem was that neither the Worm nor Blažek knew why Gaines was so important to Moscow. The Worm had the better chance of finding out, but even he would struggle. Until Gaines’s precise value was established, Blažek couldn’t enter into a transaction with the SVR.
    Couldn’t, or wouldn’t. The Worm found the man’s stubbornness infuriating. Gaines was of critical importance to the Russian state, of that there was no doubt. Blažek would be able to command an astronomical price even without knowing the full details. But Blažek was a businessman, as he never failed to remind the Worm. And a good businessman never did business without being fully aware of the stakes. Blažek had made clear, furthermore, that until he’d sold Gaines to the SVR, the Worm wouldn’t see a penny of his payment.
    So the Worm had his work cut out.
     
    *
     
    The hospital was a modern structure of glass and steel, the emergency department obvious even to someone like Calvary who didn’t read the language: a large forecourt crowded with ambulances arriving and departing, a steady flow of pedestrian traffic through the main sliding doors. It was southwest of the Old Town, fifteen minutes’ walk.
    Llewellyn would want a progress report later that evening. Calvary didn’t know when the first editions of the newspapers went to press in Britain, but suspected it couldn’t be much later than midnight. If he hadn’t found Gaines by then, at least he might have enough of a lead to persuade Llewellyn to hold off. A skim through the online news sites, British and international, had told him that either the Songwriter’s body hadn’t been discovered yet, or at the very least the press hadn’t got hold of the story. Calvary thought the Chapel had probably secured the man’s flat, had kept the police away.
    Had opened the dead man’s eyes to increase the impact of the photograph. God. Llewellyn was sick.
    For a moment another pair of eyes stared into Calvary’s. Also dark brown. But not