The first shot tears past my shoulder. I fire back—center mass. One man folds; the other dives for cover. Gunfire cracks like fireworks, hot brass pinging off steel.
Mary screams. Timofey drags her toward the open car.
“Anton!” she yells, twisting, fighting. Her heel snaps off, skitters across the concrete. She’s barefoot, slipping, face flushed with terror and fury.
Timofey laughs again, wild now. “Look at you—chasing a woman instead of a payday. You really have lost your edge.”
“Maybe,” I say. “But I still hit what I aim at.”
I fire, clipping the mirror beside his head. He flinches, shoves her into the SUV, and slams the door.
The driver guns it. Tires scream. Smoke floods the bay.
Fuck!
I lift my gun, fire once more, but the bullet only shreds the taillight. The car vanishes into the night, Mary’s voice still ringing in my ears.
Static. Silence.
36
Anton
No. No. No. Mary. I lost her.
The words beat against my skull with every step. My fault. My fucking fault. I should’ve ended this before it began.
I’m already running before the echo of the last shot dies. The bay door is wide open, smoke curling into the night. Tire marks slice the concrete.
Two of Volkov’s men step out from behind a truck—stupid enough to think they can slow me down.
The first gets a bullet to the throat. The second makes it three steps before I snap his neck and keep moving.
Out in the alley, red taillights vanish around the corner. Gone.
“Fuck,” I hiss.
Bootsteps behind me. Controlled. Not enemy.
Dima.
He takes in the mess with one look. “You lost her.”
The words hit harder than the bullet did.
He hisses, already signaling his men to strip weapons and burn IDs. “We’ll clean. You chase.”
I grab the first SUV still running, shove the gear into drive, and floor it.
The alley screams past. Smoke, neon, the reek of fuel.
I grip the wheel, focusing on the road ahead.
Guilt isn’t introspection tonight. It’s a weight behind my ribs, a cold engine. I put it to work. I brought her into this. I brought her close enough to catch a bullet that wasn’t meant for her. That thought thumps like a second engine.
The dash lights smear. I fiddle one-handed for the phone—thumbs on glass, map open.
The map glows on my phone—blue blip, hard left, then straight into the freight yard. Two miles from the hotel, east along Fremont, then a hard left, then the freight yard. Her tracker.
