“I’ll do my best.”
The vent cover comes free with a soft scrape of metal. I ease it aside and lower myself through the gap, hanging by my fingertips before dropping silently onto a stack of crates.
From here, I can see the meeting more clearly. The laptop is maybe twenty meters away, partially obscured by Kozlov’s bulk. Four guards in the immediate area, plus Marsh and the nervous man. Marsh isn’t armed, at least not visibly, but his men almost certainly are.
I need a distraction.
My eyes scan the space, cataloging options. There’s an electrical panel on the far wall, there’s the fire suppression system. The?—
One of Kozlov’s men looks up.
Directly at me.
For one frozen heartbeat, we stare at each other. His eyes widen. His mouth opens.
I shoot him in the throat.
Go time.
The suppressed Glock coughs twice, and he drops without a sound, but the damage is done—the other guards are already turning, already reaching for their weapons, and my cover is blown to absolute shit.
“Contact!” I yell, dropping off the crates as gunfire erupts around me. “I’m made! Multiple hostiles!”
“Extraction en route,” Bayo’s voice crackles. “Four minutes, Mia. Stay alive.”
Four minutes. I can do this.
I roll behind a forklift as bullets splice up the concrete where I was standing. Two guards are advancing on my position, moving with professional coordination. Behind them, I can see Kozlov being bundled toward a back exit while Marsh grabs the laptop.
No. I need that!
I break cover, firing as I move. The first guard takes two rounds to the chest—center mass, body armor, he staggers but doesn’t drop—and I adjust, putting the third round through his left eye. He crumples to the ground.
The second guard is faster than I expected. He’s on me before I can redirect, his hand closing around my gun arm, and suddenly we’re grappling, my back slamming into a support beam hard enough to rattle my teeth.
He’s big, strong, and trained.
But I’m better.
I drop my weight, letting my knees buckle, and as he lurches forward to compensate, I drive my elbow into his throat. He chokes, grip loosening, and I twist free, pulling one of my knives from its sheath and burying it between his ribs in a single smooth motion. The blade scrapes against bone as I angle it upward, into the heart. His eyes go wide, confused, like he can’t quite believe this small woman just killed him.
They never believe it. Not until they’re bleeding out on the floor.
I wrench the knife free and keep moving. Marsh has disappeared through a side door, the laptop with him, but I don’t have time to pursue—two more guards are coming from the east side, and I can hear shouting in Russian from somewhere deeper in the warehouse.
“Bayo, I need an exit and I need it now!” I yell.
“Yes. Okay. Uh, uh…loading dock, fifty meters northeast. Kat’s repositioning.”
I run. I run like hell.
Behind me, bullets spark off metal and punch through cardboard boxes. I return fire over my shoulder—not aiming really, just suppressing—and duck through a gap between shipping containers.
My knife is still in my hand, slick with blood, the Glock has maybe eight rounds left, and somewhere in this labyrinth of crates and shadows, at least six more men want me dead.
I’ve had worse odds.
I think.
