"For the next two seconds," she shoots back. "Shift change in three… two… One. There." Another two Cartel members emerge, trade a muttered line, pass a clipboard, then peel off. I know in her head, Oksana is keeping count like a dealer. "That’s four on the south lane, two on the roof. Where’s your right-hand building?"
"Right there," I tell her, tapping the screen. "Ettoro, swing right. The long block with the old skylights, does it look more heavily guarded than the others?"
"Yeah," he whispers. "They doubled the fence, new padlock on the side door, and an external camera that is actually powered. That’s a first."
"Crawl closer," Oksana demands.
He doesn’t move. "I can't clear that open ground without a distraction."
"Coward," she hisses with pure venom in her voice.
I laugh, I can’t help it, that woman is a sheer daredevil. "Down, Tempesta di Sangue."
"I told you I should have gone," she fires at me.
"And I told you you’re not going anywhere with stitches," I stand my ground.
"Funny how you didn't care about them when you were fucking me earlier," she hisses. Ettoro laughs.
"There are some risks that can be calculated," I press out, hating how she brought our sex life into the open for all to hear. Funny how I would have never cared before. This woman is full of firsts.
"Exactly," Oksana trumps, always needing to have the last word.
"When you two are done, what do you want me to do?" Ettoro is still snickering under his breath.
"Can you creep down that ditch?" I ask. The fence will give him some room there to get closer to the building.
He starts moving, the camera moves with him, and gravel whispers under his elbows and knees. Floodlights sweep. He freezes; the light slides on. We all hold our breaths. Up again, three feet, two, then it moves right over him. He palms a tiny disk from his vest—a listening device the size of a coin—and holds it to the window seam of the target building. The audio spikes—hisses, then shapes. Breathing and the steady beep of a machine we all recognize. A hospital monitor.
"Someone’s in there," I say. My heart is suddenly a fist.
Oksana is vibrating, electric. "Drone footage," she orders.
I thumb my phone; the second screen blooms with thermal from earlier. One heat source in the building, elevated but not moving much. The rest of the base is dotted with patrols and small knots. But that room: one bright, steady sun.
"That’s got to be him," she breathes. "Nico."
The name hits me in the sternum like a hammer I didn’t see coming. I haven’t seen my brother in years. Now there’s heat on a screen and breath in a box somewhere, and all I can think is we were here today kissing while he might be dying thirty yards from a steel door.
Ettoro shifts the mic higher. Footsteps approach, two sets, unhurried. Women.
"…patient’s pressure keeps dipping."
"Blood loss, I told you. Keep him sedated until El Arquitecto says otherwise."
"We need more saline."
"Not until midnight rotation. Make do."
Oksana’s eyes flare like a match. "That tracks. He was shot in the stomach. He must have had surgery. He said they would patch him up."
My mouth is dry. "If he’s that unstable, we can’t move him by car."
"We’ll risk his life if we try," she agrees, already calculating. "We need a helicopter."
She turns to me with a grin that belongs in a bad omen and gives me all kinds of foreboding images. "That’s how we get in. We parachute."
I stare at her. "Have you ever even—" I see the look in her eyes and cut myself off. "Never mind. You’re not jumping out of a fucking chopper."
