“Elena gets you out of the bathroom, I’m waiting outside. Wheelchair, back exit, car ready. We find the bunny, we find the drive, we disappear before anyone’s the wiser.”
He shifts, rage boiling over. “Except your girl got lucky. She had a knife. She cut me. Screwed everything up. I had to pull back.”
Bella winces as his arm tightens again, his gun digging in.
“I did it because I knew what that drive was worth,” Nikolai finishes, voice low and vicious. “More than Irina would ever pay. More than you’d ever give me. It was my way out. My life. My future. And you”—he nods at me, eyes burning—“were too blind to see any of it.”
I take another half-step closer, gun steady, heart pounding. “Let her go, Nikolai. It’s over.”
“Is it?” he taunts. “Because from where I’m standing, you’re the one who’s about to lose everything.”
He starts edging back, dragging Bella with him, using her body to cover his. One wrong move and he puts a bullet in her head before any of us can blink.
“Put the gun down,” I say. “Walk away, and maybe?—”
“Maybe what?” he snaps. “You’ll forgive me? Take me back? You’re pathetic, Alek. You always were.”
He takes another step.
The shot cracks the air before I can fire.
Nikolai stiffens. For a heartbeat he just stands there, eyes wide, then blood blooms across his chest. The gun slips from his fingers. His arm falls from around Bella and she stumbles free, gasping, dropping to her knees.
Nikolai hits the ground hard.
I spin.
Irina stands a few meters away, arm still extended, gun smoking, face calm like she just swatted a fly.
“You were always an emotional fool,” she says, her voice flat. “You were going to let him get away.”
I stare at her, mind blank, adrenaline still screaming through my veins.
He was my brother in all but blood. He betrayed me. He held a gun to the woman I love. He was about to disappear with everything.
Bella stumbles across the tarmac, eyes huge, breathing ragged, and throws herself against me. I catch her automatically, gun finally lowering as her arms go around my neck. She’s shaking so hard it jostles my ribs.
“I’m okay,” I murmur, not sure if I’m saying it for her or for myself. I wrap one arm around her waist and pull her in tight. For one sick, bright second, I saw her brains on the concrete. That image is going to sit in my skull for a long time.
I don’t let her go.
Around us, Irina’s men still have their guns raised, but no one fires. Nikolai’s body is a dark shape on the ground, a spreading stain around him.
Irina’s voice cuts through the wind. “Where is the drive?”
I keep my arm around Bella and look at her. She looks back, eyes wet, cheeks streaked. I could lie. Pretend I don’t know. Push this another day.
I’m done.
“It should be in the car we drove over,” I say. “Nikolai didn’t have any time to hide it.”
Irina flicks two fingers at her men. They peel off toward the SUV we arrived in, open the back door, and start searching.
I glance down at Bella. “Where is Lily?” My voice comes out urgent.
“With Selene,” she says, breath still shaky. “I left her inside, in the terminal. Selene’s keeping an eye on her.”
Thirty seconds later, one of Irina’s men holds something up.
