Viktor stepped to my side, his shoulder brushing mine. “Nice work,kotenok.”
CHAPTER 14
Dubai, present day
Andrei
The night air outside Revenant’s tower tasted like dust and exhaust.
We burst out into the open behind the loading docks in an uneven wave of bodies and guns, boots slamming onto the cracked asphalt. The door slammed shut behind us, muffling the alarms but not silencing them completely.
Above us, the tower loomed, a slab of glass and steel stabbing into the sky, its gleaming facade now smeared with smoke from the server room explosion. On any normal night, it looked untouchable. Tonight, it looked a little wounded and that made me happy.
“Keep moving,” Dmitri snapped, already scanning the perimeter. “They’ll be on us in seconds.”
He wasn’t wrong. Floodlights snapped on along the back of the complex, bathing the loading bay in harsh white light. A siren system separate from the internal alarms kicked on outside. Somewhere beyond the concrete barriers, I heard the metallic clatter of weapons and the thud of boots pounding in our direction.
We weren’t out yet.
Not even close.
Kara blew out a breath and checked her weapon. “We need cover. And preferably a car. Or ten.”
“We have cars,” I said. “And cover.”
“Define ‘cover,’” Roman said, flexing his shoulders.
I tilted my chin toward the sky. “Ask her.”
Katya, standing just to my left, already had the controller in hand—if you could call it a controller. It was a slim tablet device, custom-coded interface, dark screen flaring to life with a quick swipe of her fingers. She had tied it into the drone guidance system earlier, back at the Markov receiving warehouse.
We’d only had time to prep four drones. Four was enough. It had to be.
Viktor dropped to one knee, bringing up his stolen rifle, eyes narrowing. “Company incoming. Four… no, six.”
Lev shifted to the side, taking up a position behind a rusting shipping container, his movements smooth and economical. “More than six. There’s a full response team swinging around the north side.”
“How close are they?” she asked, not looking away from the screen.
Viktor fired a warning shot toward the sound of approaching guards. “Close enough to be irritating.”
“Sixty meters and closing,” Lev added, voice cool and unshaken.
I looked at her. “You ready?”
She didn’t answer. She didn’t need to.
Katya tapped a command.
Somewhere beyond the edge of the property, four dark shapes lifted into the night sky on whispering rotors. They had been tucked out of sight behind a service shed at the end of the back service road, pre-positioned by one of our main men, Grigor Petrov.
The drones rose like sleek black predators into the sky. Their lights were off. From the ground, they looked like moving shadows. Our tech guy, Demyan Vostrikov had programmed them to work on our command.
“Flight paths locked,” Katya said, voice tight with focus. “Targets assigned.”
“We only get one shot,” I reminded her.
She smirked in my direction. “Then let’s make it spectacular.”
