Alessandro is beside me. He moved the moment the gun came up—a lateral displacement, sliding three feet to the right to put the folding table between himself and the shooters. His Beretta is drawn. He isn't firing blindly. His eyes are scanning the chaos, processing the vectors.
"Left column," he shouts, his voice close to my ear. "Two of Volkov's. They have an angle on Rocco."
I look. I see them. Two operatives are using a massive steel support beam as cover, directing automatic fire upward toward the catwalks to keep Rocco’s team heads-down.
"Moving," I say.
I break left. The concrete is slick with hydraulic fluid and the oil of decades. My boots skid, finding purchase through sheer momentum. I stay low, my center of gravity dropped, moving in the crouch that Yosef taught Alessandro and experience taught me.
I circle the column. The operatives are focused upward. They are disciplined, but they are distracted.
The first one sees me when I'm four feet away. He spins, his submachine gun swinging toward me.
Too late.
I fire. Two rounds. Center mass. The Glock bucks in my hand, a familiar, jarring rhythm. The rounds punch through his vest. He drops without a sound.
The second one turns. He screams something in Russian.
Alessandro's Beretta barks from across the dock. A single, precise shot. It catches the operative in the shoulder, spinning him around. It destroys his stance.
I close the distance. I don't shoot him. I step into his guard and drive the barrel of my Glock into his sternum. He folds. I pistol-whip him across the temple. He goes down and stays down.
"Volkov's moving!" Alessandro yells.
I look toward the harbor.
The eastern opening of the dry dock is a gaping maw of darkness. And moving toward it, calm as a man walking to a business lunch, is Kazimir Volkov.
He isn't running. Running communicates panic. He is walking, flanked by his two remaining personal guards. Beyond them, on the black water of the harbor, I see running lights.
A boat. A rigid-hull inflatable, engines idling, waiting at the base of the ladder.
He planned for this. The meeting was a contingency. The execution of my father was a distraction.
I move.
The dry dock is a gauntlet of crossfire. Bullets chip the concrete around my feet, sending stinging sprays of grit into my face. I step over a body—one of ours, a Kavanagh soldier clutching a wounded leg, cursing through grit teeth. I don't stop. I can't stop.
Volkov is ahead of me. He is fifty yards away.
The first of his rear guards turns to engage me. He has a Škorpion submachine gun. He plants his feet, bringing the weapon up.
I am in the open. Fifteen feet of exposed concrete between me and the nearest cover.
I don't take cover. I accelerate.
The rounds snap past me.Thwip-thwip.I feel the displacement of air against my cheek. One round clips the shoulder of my jacket, tugging the fabric.
I am inside his guard in three strides. I grab the hot barrel of the gun with my left hand and redirect it skyward. I drive a palm strike into his nose.
Bone crunches. It’s a wet, sickening sound. He staggers, blinded by pain and tears. I strip the weapon from his hands, reverse it, and smash the stock into his temple. He collapses.
The second operative is bigger. He steps between me and Volkov. His weapon is holstered. He wants to fight. He wants to buy time with his body.
I hit him.
I don't use technique. I don't use finesse. I use mass. I slam into him at full sprint, driving my shoulder into his chest. We crash to the ground, a tangle of limbs.
