The Hunted by Brian Haig Read Free Book Online Page B

than average record for work of this nature, one the firm loudly advertised.
    Regarding his current client, at the top of the threat chain were the usual suspects for a Russian tycoon: Mafiya thugs, hit
     men, and various forms of independent crooks or assassins intent on blackmail, or fulfilling a contract from a third party.
     They were effective and often lethal. They were also crude, obnoxiously brutal, notoriously indiscreet, and with their clownish
     affectation for black jeans and black leather jackets, usually ridiculously easy to spot. Bernie had already swept the cabin
     twice. No likely suspects of that ilk.
    Next came business competitors who stood to benefit by eliminating an entrepreneurial juggernaut like Konevitch, followed
     closely by investors disgruntled for any number of reasons. His business was privately owned. Two limited partners, that was
     it. He owned eighty percent of the shares and neither partner was dissatisfied, as best the firm could tell. Really, how could
     they be? Konevitch had made them both millionaires many times over.
    His estimated worth—a combination of cash and stock—now hovered around 350 million dollars—in all likelihood a lowball estimate—and
     growing by the hour, despite generous and frequent contributions to local charities and political causes. He had his fingers
     deeply into four or five mammoth businesses, was contemplating a move into two or three more, and his personal fortune was
     multiplying by the day. The construction firm he began had given birth to an arbitrage business—initially for construction
     materials only, then for all sorts of things—that bred a prosperous bank, then a sizable investment firm, part ownership in
     several oil firms, a car importing company, a real estate empire, ownership of two national newspaper chains, several restaurant
     chains, and myriad smaller enterprises that were expected to balloon exponentially as Russia fully morphed into a full-blown
     consumer society.
    As fast as Alex made money, he poured it into the next project, the next acquisition, the next promising idea. Whatever he
     touched spewed profit, it seemed. In the estimation of the firm, that remarkable growth rested firmly on his own deft brilliance,
     his own impeccable instincts, his golden touch.
    Take him out and Konevitch Associates would fold. Maybe not immediately, maybe it would limp along for a few anguished years.
     But with the brain dead, the body would atrophy. Eventually the pieces would shrivel and be sold off for a fraction of a pittance.
     Alex was a money-printing machine; surely his partners knew this.
    Next came possible political enemies, and last, though not insignificantly, the obligatory threat for anyone with heaps of
     money—family members who might hunger for an inheritance and/or an insurance windfall.
    Nearly all rich people dabbled in politics to a greater or lesser degree; this client was in it up to his neck. According
     to the dossier, Konevitch was very close to Yeltsin, had apparently backed his rise to the presidency, and he continued to
     throw cash by the boatload at Yeltsin’s hungry political machine and a few of the reformist parties ambling in his wake.
    The old commie holdovers were resentful, angry, and plentiful. Konevitch had played it smart and hid in the background—the
     mint behind the throne, an underground well of money—going to great lengths to keep his contributions invisible, or at the
     very least anonymous. But there were those who knew. And among them, it was assumed, were some powerful people who might wish
     to settle a historical score. A nasty political grudge couldn’t be ruled out.
    He had a serious ten million dollar term life policy with Carroy-thers & Smythe, a financially plump, highly regarded insurance
     company. That firm shared Malcolm Street Associates’ intense concern for Alex’s health and secretly informed its partner agency
     that his wife was the sole beneficiary. No