The first vehicle comes off the road and across the ditch without slowing. It’s one of Aidan’s Range Rovers. The driver’s window is down, and Matty is leaning out with a rifle, and he fires three times before the wheels hit the grass. Three of Viktor’s men drop.
The second vehicle follows. Aidan behind the wheel. More men pouring out the back doors before the car has fully stopped. Conor Reilly’s people. The Brennans. Armed and moving and angry and alive.
Viktor’s line breaks.
I don’t wait. I don’t think. I cover the fifteen feet between us in four strides, and I hit Viktor Tarasov with everything that’s left in me.
We go down together. His body under mine. His coat bunched in my fists. My forehead connects with his nose, and I feel the cartilage give, and his blood is on my face, in my mouth, hot and copper-bright.
He’s fast. Faster than a man his age should be. His knee comes up into my ribs, right where they’re already broken, and the pain whites out my vision. I lose my grip. He rolls, gets on top of me, and his fist catches my jaw hard enough to split the inside of my cheek against my teeth.
I taste blood. Mine. His. Mixed.
His hand goes to his belt. A knife. Short blade. He brings it up, and I catch his wrist with both hands, and we’re locked there, his weight pressing down, the blade inching toward my throat.
Gunfire all around us. Men dying. But the sound is far away, belongs to another fight. This one is just us. Just me and the man who took everything.
I twist his wrist. He’s strong, but my hands are bigger, and I have both of them on his one, and I torque the joint until something gives, and the knife drops. He goes for it. I don’t let him. I pull him toward me instead, hook my arm around his neck, and roll.
Now I’m behind him. My forearm across his throat. He claws at my arm. Digs his nails in deep enough to draw blood. His legs kick. His body bucks. But I have the angle, and I have the leverage, and I have twenty-seven years of being told I’m not enough, fuelling every pound of pressure I put on his windpipe.
“You think this ends with me?” Viktor’s voice is a rasp. Barely there. Air forced through a closing gap. “You’ve barely met the real power.”
I loosen my arm. Just enough. Not mercy. I want to hear what comes out of his mouth.
He sucks in air. Coughs. His body shakes with it.
“The Bratva,” he says. “I’m the middleman. Expendable. There’s someone above me. Already here. Already watching.”
“Who?”
“Let me go, and I'll tell you.”
I tighten my arm again. He chokes.
“Try again.”
His hand reaches up. Finds my face. His fingers are cold.
“Volkov,” he whispers. “His name is Volkov. And he’s already here.”
I break his neck.
The sound is small. Precise. A single crack that gets lost in the gunfire. His body goes slack. Heavy. I hold him for another second. Then I let go, and he falls face-first into the wet grass.
Around me, the fight is ending. Viktor’s men are down or running. Aidan’s people and Conor’s crew are sweeping the field in pairs. Matty is walking between the bodies, checking. Methodical.
I try to stand. My knee gives out. I catch myself. Try again. My ribs won’t let me take a full breath. The cut on my side has soaked through my shirt and down into the waistband of my trousers. My hands are shaking.
I make it to my feet.
One step. Two. The field tilts. The burning car and the bodies and the dark sky all slide sideways like someone’s pulled the ground out from under me.
I go down hard. Knees first. Then my hands in the wet grass. Then nothing holds, and my face hits the earth, and the cold of it is the last thing I feel.
Voices. Far off. Someone saying my name.
Hands on my shoulders. Rolling me over. Aidan’s face above me, or what I think is Aidan’s face, blurred at the edges and doubling.
