"Dr. Cross," he said, voice cultured in a way that spoke of education and breeding, the kind of Russian accent that had been refined but not erased. "I’m Nikolai Besharov. Pakhanof the Besharov Bratva.” He was Kostya’s brother—had to be. “Please, sit. We have questions."
The chair he indicated faced his desk directly—no angle, no offset, just straight-on confrontation dressed up as conversation. Interrogation positioning. I sat.
Another man sprawled in a leather chair to my left, laptop balanced on his knee, fingers never quite stopping their movement across the keyboard. He was younger than Nikolai but with the same sharp features, the same dark hair, the same capacity for violence dressed up in expensive clothes. His eyes flicked between me and his screen like he was cross-referencing my existence with some database, probably pulling up every digital trace I'd left in the last six months.
But it was the last figure, who sat on the sofa who made my chest tighten with something I couldn't name.
A woman, striking and heavily pregnant. She was glowing with it in a way that made every medical instinct scream to check her blood pressure, ask about swelling, make sure she was taking prenatal vitamins. Beautiful in that effortless way that made me acutely aware of my unwashed hair, my slept-in clothes, the way I looked like exactly what I was—a basement creature dragged into sunlight. But it was her expression that caught me, warm and concerned and genuine in a way that felt like a trap. Women who looked at you with that kind of kindness in places like this were either stupid or dangerous, and something about the way she held herself said she wasn't stupid.
Nikolai saw me scanning faces. “Please, don’t mind Maks and Sophie. They won’t bite.”
Through the corner of my vision, I saw Kostya take position by the door. Not leaving. Not sitting. Just standing there, watching me with those dark eyes that it felt like saw everything. The weight of his attention was almost physical, making my skin prickle with awareness I didn't want to examine.
"You're investigating Dr. Richard Brand," Nikolai said, pulling my attention back to him. No preamble, no warming up. Just straight to the point like a scalpel through skin. "The organ trafficking operation at Brighton Medical. You have evidence—a flash drive that could destroy not just him but his entire network. Excuse us for going through your belongings."
“I’m to blame,” Kostya said. “I saw you pocket the drive. Knew it was something important.”
The words landed like blows. They'd searched me. Of course they had. While I was unconscious, vulnerable, they'd gone through everything. Found the drive Irina had died to get me. The violation of it made bile rise in my throat, but I swallowed it down. Anger was a luxury I couldn't afford.
"And you want it," I said, keeping my voice flat, clinical. The same tone a doctor might use to deliver terminal diagnoses—no emotion, just facts.
"We want to understand it," Nikolai corrected, though the difference seemed semantic at best. "And we want to understand you, Dr. Cross. Why a trauma surgeon with your credentials is operating out of a basement. Why someone tried to kill you last night. Why you've been investigating Brand alone instead of going to authorities."
Each question was precisely placed, designed to extract maximum information with minimum revelation. He already knew the answers—or at least suspected them. This wasn't about information. It was about seeing how I'd respond, whether I'd lie, whether I could be trusted or used or discarded.
"You went through my things," I said, not quite making it a question.
"We secured potentially dangerous materials," Maks said without looking up from his laptop. "The drive could have been trapped. Could have been a small IED. Needed to verify it was safe."
Safe. Right. Like anything in this room was safe, including me.
Sophie shifted on the sofa, one hand resting on her pregnant belly, and the movement drew my attention. There was something in her eyes—recognition, maybe. Like she saw something familiar in my particular brand of exhausted desperation.
I shifted into conference mode—the voice I'd used to present cases to attending physicians, to explain complex procedures to terrified families. Clinical. Detached. Facts without feeling, because feeling would mean acknowledging that every word I spoke was another nail in my coffin.
"Eighteen months ago, I was completing my trauma surgery residency at Brighton Medical Center," I began, hands folded in my lap to hide the tremor. "January fifteenth, a nineteen-year-old named Maria Gonzalez came to me with post-surgical complications. She'd had a routine appendectomy five days prior, but her pain was inconsistent with normal recovery. I ordered a CT scan."
I paused, seeing her face again—round cheeks, scared eyes, the way she'd gripped my hand when I'd told her what was missing.
"The scan showed her right kidney had been removed. Cleanly. Professionally. During what should have been a simple appendectomy."
Maks's typing had stopped completely. Sophie's hand pressed harder against her belly, protective instinct in response to violation. Even Nikolai's perfect stillness had shifted slightly, leaning forward perhaps an inch.
"I pulled her surgical records. Everything looked normal on paper—consent forms signed, procedure notes standard. But buried in the anesthesia timeline was an extra forty minutes unaccounted for. When I confronted the surgical team, they claimed complications, adhesions that had extended the procedure. But adhesions don't result in nephrectomy. And theydon't leave the kind of precise vascular closures I saw on her scan."
The words came faster now, data points I'd memorized through repetition, through sleepless nights trying to make sense of it all.
"I started investigating. Quietly at first, just pulling records of other patients with extended surgical times. Over six months, I identified thirty-seven cases. All immigrants or undocumented workers. All routine procedures that somehow resulted in missing organs—kidneys mostly, but also liver segments, corneas in two cases. They target people who won't ask questions, who can't afford lawyers, who don't speak enough English to understand what they're signing."
"The methodology?" Nikolai asked, voice neutral as if we were discussing stock portfolios rather than human harvesting.
"Sophisticated," I admitted. "Brand developed protocols—standardized approaches hidden in legitimate medical terminology. Protocol Seven-Alpha is unilateral nephrectomy concurrent with scheduled procedures. Protocol Nine-Beta is partial hepatectomy. Each one has specific criteria for patient selection—blood type, tissue compatibility, age range, lack of family support. They have spotters in the ER and clinic who identify targets, flag their charts with specific codes that look like standard medical notation."
My voice stayed steady even as my stomach churned. Professional. Clinical. Like I was describing tumor resection techniques instead of systematic organ theft.
"According to the flash drive, the buyers span globally. Dubai, São Paulo, Moscow, Shanghai. They pay between one hundred fifty thousand for a kidney to half a million for a liver segment. Payment routes through shell companies, medical charities that exist only on paper, cryptocurrency when the buyer is particularly cautious. Brand takes forty percent. The surgicalteam splits another thirty. The spotters and support staff divide the rest."
"Names," Maks said, looking up from his laptop for the first time. "You have names of buyers?"
