Nikolai is the only one who can keep up with the way my mind moves when I’m like this—obsessive, relentless, unwilling to rest until I have answers. He stands beside me, tracing a line between two faces, eyes sharp. “We’ve accounted for almost everyone. But this one—” He taps the grainy ID photo of a flight attendant. “Elena Morozova. She was working first class. We were going to check her out before everything went to hell and Irina’s people grabbed Bella.”
Her name comes back to me. She was the one who was watching me on the flight. Something about the way she looked at me didn’t sit right with me.
“She disappeared after the flight,” Nikolai continues. “Didn’t sign back in at her apartment, didn’t call in sick. We have a last known address—could be nothing, could be she’s already halfway to Cyprus.”
A pulse of energy cuts through my exhaustion. “We can go check her out right now,” I say.
We drive in silence, Nikolai at the wheel. My shoulder aches with every bump in the road, but adrenaline keeps me alert. I keep replaying the timeline in my head, every minute on that plane, every face in first class.
Elena’s building is a squat, anonymous complex in a working-class part of town. Nikolai parks a block away and we walk the rest, blending in, keeping our heads down.
We buzz up, no answer. The lobby smells like floor cleaner and burnt toast. Her apartment’s on the fourth floor, end of the hall. I don’t bother with the doorbell—I can see the splintered frame before I even reach it.
“Someone got here first,” Nikolai mutters, low.
The door swings open when I press it. Inside, the place is chaos. Couch overturned, drawers yanked out, clothes and papers strewn everywhere. A TV sits cracked on the floor. Even the refrigerator stands open, a carton of milk leaking across the tiles. This isn’t a search for valuables—it’s desperate, unhinged. Someone looking for something very specific, or trying to make a point.
I scan the room, adrenaline humming. “Check the windows,” I say.
Nikolai heads to the back, careful not to step in anything wet. I walk the living room, picking up scattered IDs, a torn flight schedule, a single gold earring. Every sign says Elena Morozova left in a hurry—if she left at all.
Nikolai calls out from the bedroom, voice grim. “Aleksander.”
He’s by the window, curtain pushed aside. The sill is smeared with something dark. He touches it with a gloved finger, brings it up to the light.
“Blood,” he says.
I study the latch, the faint streaks down the side of the building—someone climbed out, or was dragged. There are red droplets leading to the fire escape, fading fast, but not so fast they’re old.
“Someone came for her,” I say, piecing it together. “They didn’t find what they wanted.”
Nikolai scans the alley below, already calculating. “Either she ran and got hurt, or they took her and she fought.”
I look at the mess around us. “Somebody’s tying up loose ends,” I murmur.
I take one last look at the room—the shattered phone on the kitchen counter, the keys still in the lock, the open suitcase spilling uniforms onto the floor.
“Elena Morozova knows something,” I say. “Something worth killing for.”
We slip out the back entrance of the building, boots echoing on the grimy tile. The hallway is narrow, the kind of place you’dmiss if you weren’t looking for it—emergency exit, fire escape, a perfect route for anyone running scared or trying to disappear.
Nikolai checks the landing for footprints or blood. I scan the door for scratches, broken locks, any sign Elena made it out or someone forced her. My pulse thumps in my ears, adrenaline sharpening every sense.
Suddenly, footsteps thunder above us—quick, heavy, too loud for anyone meaning to be quiet. Nikolai swears under his breath, drawing his weapon. I do the same, my shoulder aching but steady.
“Down!” I hiss, flattening myself against the wall as a dark figure barrels into view on the stairwell.
Gunshots explode, ricocheting off cinderblock and metal rail. I duck instinctively, glass shattering overhead. Nikolai returns fire, two quick pops, his face grim.
The figure stumbles, hits the banister, and in a blink they’re tumbling—legs, arms, a flash of a pale hand, the clatter of a gun. They land hard at the bottom of the stairs, motionless.
Smoke stings the air. I keep my weapon trained, moving down the steps with Nikolai behind me, every muscle coiled.
The shooter’s face is twisted, blood pooling beneath them, their eyes wide and unseeing.
For a moment, all I hear is the wild rush of my own heartbeat. I turn, scanning for movement. Then, above me, a soft laugh echoes—a woman’s laugh, cool and amused.
I glance up.
