Singapore Sling Shot - Andrew Grant [99]
The earplugs were a necessity because we knew there would soon be a lot of noise. Effectively, Jo was to be my spotter. I had a mixture of projectiles in the eleven-round magazine already in the gun. The rounds included a tracer. A tracer fired into a petrol tank had a very good chance of creating a fireball, and that was most desirable. Sami had a fully loaded spare magazine beside him. There was a round in the breech of the rifle and with two magazines of eleven each; simple math said I had twenty-three rounds to play with to do the job. When they were gone, we would move out fast.
Behind the scope again, I settled and eased the crosshair onto the advancing vehicle. The Range Rover was driving straight towards us. The point where the river and the dirt track bisected was ground zero for me. The scope was calibrated to absolute zero at three hundred metres.
The bugs buzzed and the sweat droplets formed and streaked their way down my cheeks, but I was locked in the zone. My concentration on the job in hand was total.
At four hundred metres, I could plainly see him at the wheel. Dimitri Chekov was his name. He was a Russian bear and he was as big and as mean as one. Chekov was known as “the Headhunter”. This former KGB colonel was one of the most vicious killers in the dirty game we all played. Following his KGB and intertwining military career, he turned his talents to crime, big crime. Chekov had been based in Asia for the past five years with a hard-core Russian mafia made up of mostly former Spetsnaz troops and a few local thugs.
Drugs and arms were Chekov’s currency. He had become a major player and a major problem for both my people and the Americans, both of whom wanted Chekov taken out with all due prejudice. That was why I was lying there sweating my bollocks off in the godforsaken Cambodian jungle.
“Three hundred and fifty,” Jo called from above. I settled my breathing. The first shot would be aimed at Chekov sitting behind the wheel. Sun rays were falling on the windscreen and flaring back at me. I cursed. It didn’t matter. Sun flare or not, I knew where the driver was seated. That was where I was aiming.
The Range Rover arrived at the ford and slowly started across. The 300-metre mark was dead centre in the stream.
“Now!” I whispered. I took the trigger pressure and the big rifle kicked and thundered. The Barrett has a real bellow, but the kick and muzzle-rise are negated by a lot of trick modifications, including an enormous muzzle brake. The flame of the first shot was away. A crimson streak sliced through the thick air and terminated in the front left of the vehicle’s windscreen. The sun flare vanished, as did the windscreen. I fired the second round to the same spot and then shortened my aim, settling on the front of the vehicle.
The tracer and incendiary rounds that followed all hit home. With an engine that no longer functioned and with flames bursting from under the ruined bonnet, the Range Rover slewed side on and ground to a stop in the middle of the stream. Sami was handing me the full magazine. I changed and went after the fuel tank. Had I got Chekov? I had to believe so.
When the second incendiary from the fresh magazine hit its target, the Rover’s fuel tank exploded. In seconds, the vehicle became a complete fireball. I hammered the remainder of the magazine into the driver’s compartment. The Barrett wasn’t going back across the river with us and when the ammunition was finished, that was it.
“No sign of life,” Jo called from above as I stood. It was done. The Range Rover was a gutting mass of flame. Burning fuel was flowing downstream. Reeds and grasses at the water’s edge were catching fire. We were out of here.
I pulled out my earplugs and pushed them into my pocket. Long tubes of shiny brass covered the ground around the Barrett. The cartridges had been wiped clean of any fingerprints and had been loaded into the magazines by gloved hands. We were