Fuck. This is bad news.
“Please,” the man on the ground begs. My lips tremble.
I don’t have it in me to kill him. He’s already down. Only doing what soldiers do. Aleksei doesn’t have such compunction and executes him in a heartbeat. The man’s head snaps back, his body limp on the floor.
“You can’t hesitate, Lu. We don’t have that luxury.”
I shake my head and continue onwards. The inside of the house is a bloodbath. Aleksei’s chief-of-security is ex-MI6 and his team are trained assassins, fast and moving like shadows. Men fall to their knees on all sides.
A man aims at Irina but she’s focused on someone else. I aim and shoot. My target jerks back, hit through the chest. As carefully as I can, I make my way to the fallen soldier and shoot in between the eyes.
Most of us are wearing kevlar, and I can’t take my chances. It’s kill or be killed. Now is not the time to have a conscience crisis. I take one second to mourn the girl I used to be and a life wasted.
Then, I move on.
My cousin’s team is clearing the house, room by room.
People cry as they die.
Bullets are fired on all sides, breaking pieces of walls in the sinister house. The smell of blood and gunpowder invades my nostrils, the scent all consuming. Particles of dust and plaster float in the rare rays of light making their way inside. My brain can’t compute decor or absence thereof but there’s no mistaking the coldness of the place. Its rotten core.
Through mayhem and death, our enemies die. And silence descends around us. My breathing is loud in my ears, my heartbeat erratic. Flexible on our knees, Irina, Aleksei and Imove towards a door at the back of the house. Black. Closed. Ominous.
I swallow.
“Are you ready?” Irina asks.
I nod, incapable of words.
“I’ll come with you,” my ex-husband says, instructing Irina to return to Dante and continue a sweep of the house for any remaining Croatian Bratva or prisoners and trafficked people they might keep on the property.
Aleksei and I descend the stairs together, side by side, our weapons in front of us, poised for use at the first sign of aggression from anyone.
This place smells like death, and I dry heave before covering my nose and mouth. Silence reigns, eerie and suffocating. My hands are moist on the handle of my rifle, and my heart is seconds from leaving my chest through my throat. I don’t fear the boogeyman coming out of one of the locked metal doors. I’m scared of what I’m going to find behind them.
We clear each room one by one. Most are empty, two have lone prisoners in them, dirty and shivering. Aleksei’s second-in-command and his team clear the cells, taking the skinny and obviously abused people to safety. Their hollow cheeks and vacant eyes scream of the horrors they survived here.
I try to breathe but it comes in choppy pants.I can’t lose it now. I chant the words in my head like a mantra. I find strength in Aleksei’s assured gait just in front of me, in his cold eyes and calculated movements. A man made for pain and waging wars. He’s won many before, as the scars on his face show. With him by my side, I’m more confident that I can save the man who means everything to me.
We enter another cell, kicking the door open with the force of four men throwing their weight on it over and over.
And my heart stops.
Two men of equal build lay on the floor, one with chains around his neck, the other chained with them to the floor. There’s so much blood. Toma’s side is coated with it.
I slide the rifle around my shoulders to rest at my back and push the men who entered before me aside.
“Toma!”
Everything he said to me to protect me falls to the background as I fall to my knees in front of him. My hands hover over his chest, trembling. Fresh tears fall on my cheeks and I blink fast to clear my vision. I’m of no use if I can’t control myself. I clench my jaw and remove my rifle, then my top layer, pressing the fabric of the shirt onto the biggest injury on his side.
As I use force on the wound, the man below groans in pain and hope lurches violently inside my chest. “Toma.” I choke on his name. “I’m here.”
His eyes are shut, massive blue bruises around the brow bone and underneath, but from his crackled lips, my name falls. Over and over, like he can’t stop saying it.
“Angel. My rose. My Lucie.”
An unhinged laugh escapes me, but we’re not out of the woods yet. A scuffling sound behind me drags my attention to Irina and Dante, standing in the doorway with grim faces.
