“Shit! Lev, get Tati out of there, they have your position and they’re arming a fucking rocket launcher! Go!” I hiss into the headset.
“Copy that,” Lev says tersely. I hear Tatiana’s voice in the background, coldly insisting “The last one.”
“They are ready to fire!” I shouted, forgetting to keep my voice down. “Gonow!”
The rock outcropping tears apart in the explosion and only Alexi’s grip keeps me from breaking loose and running for her.
“We’re out,” Lev’s voice comes over the con, “no thanks to your sniper. But the last man is down, blow the charge.”
“It’s our turn,” Alexi smiles. It is a smile that I hope is never directed at me.
I’ve been in a firefight before. I remembered most of it as a blur of color and sound. It’s not the Toscano way, we prefer more subtle methods but we were getting our people out of South America where they’d been targeted by a local drug lord.
Time seems to slow down, then speed up when we’re inside. “This way!” Aleksandr shouts, and Alexi moves past him, firing short, controlled bursts from his AR-15. There are still more soldiers than we expected, and when I glance at the staircase, I see ten surrounding someone hurrying up to the second floor.
“That has to be Leonid!” I call to Alexi. He nods and gestures to a group of his men to peel off and join me. I pull a flash-bang grenade - holding it up to warn my group - and launch it right behind the clot of soldiers taking that old bastard up to either a safe room or another way out of here.
Eight of the Rostova guards are mowed down in seconds, and we charge up the stairs going after the last of them. But there’s more on the second floor, soldiers step out from different rooms down the hall, firing as their fearless leader runs as fast as his legs can carry him. Something that feels like a fist smashes into my left thigh and I grit my teeth.
My first gunshot wound.
Ahead of me, I see Jun and Meiying appear at the top of the steps from the back of the house, and their sudden appearance with their group sends Leonid and his bodyguards in a different direction, turning to their right and down another hall. Meiying waves her arm in a circular motion over her head, and I know she remembers our signals from a Leader’s challenge last year.
“Drop!” I shout to my men, “They’re going to lay down cover fire. We’ll go low.”
They keep the new guards pinned down as my group gets past them, racing down the new hallway. There’s a huge set of double doors that the bodyguards are trying to close in time, but we ram through them, shooting his last two men.
“Get your fucking hands up!” I shout, looking at Leonid’s red, furious face. He’s breathing heavily and it’s clear this is more exertion than he’s had for some time. He raises them slowly, grinning at me.
“I had heard you were fucking the Aslanova girl. Is all this fuss really over keeping her? I don’t mind sharing.” He screams as I shoot him in the knee, dropping like a bag of dirt.
“We’re just waiting for word that your captives are freed,” I said, “and then I’m going to take a little target practice with all your joints and finally, that tiny pecker of yours.”
“Me first.”
Aleks steps up behind me and it takes my attention off his father just long enough for Leonid to pull a gun from his jacket. The searing punch of the bullet’s impact knocks me off my feet.
“Son, help me!” Leonid’s writhing on the ground, still clutching his pistol. “My boy…”
There’s a haze of agony that’s making it hard for me to concentrate. Aleks raises his gun and shoots his father in the shoulder, making him drop his gun.
“Go get it,” he tells Meiying. She’s staring at him, shocked, but she’s over by Leonid and grabbing his weapon in moments.
“You taught meotets,father, that there is only one way to rule over a Bratva. With fear. I intend to follow your example by being the most ruthlessPakhanour family has seen.” Aleks shoots his father again. And again, each time inflicting the maximum amount of pain as the old man screams and writhes. When the floor is covered in his father’s blood, he stands over him, smiling. “And this one is formoya mat',my mother.”
The Glock Aleks is using packs a powerful punch, and there’s not much left of Leonid’s head. Jun looks a little green, but Meiying is looking at Aleks with appreciation.
“Gentle giant my ass, I knew you had it in you.”
Aleks looks over at me. “Oh, fuck!” He scrambles over, ripping a throw blanket off the couch and pressing it to my neck and shoulder. “Fuck!” he roars. “Get the medic!Hurry!”
I see Meiying’s frantic face; her hands are pushing on me and I close my eyes. Just for a minute.
Chapter Thirty-Four
In which Tatiana will not let go.
James Arthur - Say You Won't Let Go
