It took five minutes. Maybe six.
I crouched at the maintenance panel on the wall under the camera and counted the screw heads. Four. I slid the plastic in and turned it slowly. The screw was stubborn the way stupid men are, resisting in all the wrong ways. I leaned my weight just so, felt the give, turned it again. Once it moved, the rest grew easier. Once I worked the other three free, the panel dropped with a soft kiss onto my thigh.
Inside: nothing that would save a life, but enough to make a man like me happy. There was a wiring harness, a thin aluminum cover plate, two L-brackets, and the sweetest thing I’d seen all morning—a coil spring pressed into a clip to absorb frame vibration. I worked the spring free with my fingers.
I heard footsteps again. Closer this time. Not the patrol. A different cadence. Someone wearing heels. The commander wouldn’t wear heels. He’d wear shoes that didn’t make a sound.
I slid the panel back into place, left one screw in to hold it, let the other three lie on the concrete under the bed, buried in shadow. I tucked the spring into the waistband of my pants.
Keys. A card swipe. The buzz of the magnetic lock releasing. The door opened about twelve inches. A woman in a slate suit peeredin. She wore her hair in a severe twist and her eyes glared at me in a look that said she liked to catalogue pain.
“Mr. Dragunov,” she said.
“I wasn’t expecting anyone to visit me.” I kept my tone easy, the one that made bouncers relax and gamblers confess.
“Well, I’m here now.” She took in the room with a glance. “The commander will see you shortly.”
“Define shortly.”
From the look on her face, she was considering whether truth would cost her anything. “Eight minutes.”
He was predictable. I could have set my watch by him.
“Wonderful,” I said. “Finally. I’ve been dying for the chance to discuss his customer service policies.”
“We don’t discuss policies with detainees.”
“You should start. Morale can’t be stellar in an organization that kidnaps its own partners.”
Her mouth didn’t twitch. That told me more than if she had smiled. Revenant didn’t consider us partners. We were assets. Assets break and then you can replace them.
“Kneel at the back wall when the guard arrives,” she said, as if talking about weather. “Hands on your head. Mouth closed. It will make the next hour go faster.”
“I prefer to make my hours go slower.”
“I’ve read your file.”
“You must get a long lunch break.”
That made her pause just long enough to satisfy me. She closed the door without slamming it. The lock hummed and thumped home.
Seven minutes.
I went back to the bed, slid the panel free again, and took the second L-bracket. It wasn’t much, but it had a hard edge. The spring I wound tight and slipped into my palm. I left the panel cover leaning against the wall.
I stood under the light, eyes up, shoulders easy, just like a man waiting his turn at the dentist. My heart beat like it had something to prove, but my breathing stayed slow and even. I pictured Katya’s face, the spark in her eyes that smug men would confuse with surrender. She would be somewhere in this building. It had been too much to hope for to keep us together. They weren’t a romantic lot, Revenant, but I’d bet my life that she’d still be alive. They liked leverage more than corpses.
Or so I hoped.
I closed my eyes and took a breath.
Don’t think about Katya. Don’t think about her mouth, or the way she wraps those pretty lips around your cock. Don’t think about how that hot little pussy milks your cock every time you’re inside her.
Cold showers, Viktor. Siberia. Shards of ice in an empty glass. Your gym teacher back from high school taking a shower.
Footsteps again. Three sets. Two heavy, one that could possibly float. A key. A swipe. The lock buzzed. The door opened wider this time, the width of a man’s shoulders. The first guard that entered was the kind that lifted his own body weight at the gymfor kicks. The second had the build of a runner. The third didn’t come inside. He stayed at the threshold.
The lifter barked, “Kneel.”
