Photos of Aurora are scattered across the tables. There are pictures from the college, the restaurant, walking to the car withFedor, and one of the two of us entering Dr. Miller’s clinic. A copy of the course catalog from the hospitality program, probably taken by the operative following her during the visit, sits on the corner of the table, and finding it here among Karpov’s operational materials chills me. They were spying on every detail, including her private dreams. Bastards. Rage surges through me.
The comms crackle. “Team Two in position at east entrance and entering now,” says Maxim, apparently deciding radio silence is no longer useful. They must have made some noise when they took down the sentries. Someone knows we’re here now.
“Proceed. Converge on the center of the building.”
I clear the next corridor with Viktor one step behind me and the others spread out around us. We find two more rooms. The first has Ludo Cassarian waiting with a gun. A well-placed shot from Viktor neutralizes him, removing Karpov’s righthand man forever. The second room has a cot with a blanket and a half-eaten meal on a folding chair. Someone was sleeping here recently, but that doesn’t mean it was Aurora. There are no external locks on the rooms, so it’s unlikely the half-eaten meal belongs to her.
The building is larger than the satellite imagery suggested, with a maze of storage rooms and utility corridors that branch off the main hallway. Every closed door is a risk, and every corner requires me to choose between speed and discipline.
I choose speed because somewhere in this building, Aurora is either waiting for me or handling the situation herself, and both possibilities demand that I move faster.
A third guard appears from a side corridor twenty feet ahead. He sees us, raises his weapon, and I put two rounds in his chest before he fires. He falls backward through the doorway he came from, and I step over him without breaking stride. Viktor checks the room behind the guard and signals clear.
Then I hear her. She’s fighting, not screaming. She’s sharp and furious, and her voice echoes from somewhere ahead and to my right. A crash echoes from something metal hitting concrete, and then Aurora’s voice again, louder this time, carrying words I can’t make out but a tone I know instantly. She’s attacking.
I move faster than strategy dictates I should. Viktor calls my name once, quietly, as a warning to maintain discipline, and I hear him without heeding it because discipline is a tool I’m using selectively right now. The only thing that matters is reaching Aurora before Eric does something that can’t be undone.
I round a corridor, skidding slightly despite the traction of my tactical boots because I’m moving so fast. There’s an open door ahead, and light spills into the hallway from inside. Scuffling comes through the open door, then a grunt, followed by Eric’s voice saying something I can’t quite catch. Aurora’s voice cuts through it with enough clarity to make me falter.
“Get off me.”
I clear the doorway and enter the corridor beyond it. Two of Karpov’s men are down, with one slumped against the wall holding his neck and the other face-down on the concrete. I recognize Team Two’s work from the east entrance as I step over them and follow the sounds.
The next corridor opens into a wider hallway with overhead lights. I stop when I see Aurora fifteen feet ahead of me. She’sbloodied, with her hair tangled, and her clothes torn from the struggle. Eric has one arm locked around her from behind, dragging her toward an exit at the far end. A guard is slumped against the wall a few feet from them, dropped by my advance team and not yet cleared, his sidearm visible on the concrete near his hand. Eric has a gun in his own free hand, pressed against his thigh rather than pointed at her. He hasn’t raised it to her, so he’s still deciding.
Eric sees me first. He freezes, and his face broadcasts his thoughts. He recognizes what I am, what I’ve brought with me, and what happens next if he makes the wrong choice. Aurora sees me a second later. She doesn’t call my name or reach for me. She gets still, and the stillness is tactical, meaning she’s ready for whatever happens next.
The three of us stand in a triangle of silence where every possible outcome balances on who moves next. Eric’s arm is around Aurora, his weapon still at his side. The dropped guard’s sidearm is on the floor a few feet from where Eric is holding her, and my Glock is aimed at Eric’s head.
Nobody moves. The overhead light hums. The sound of water against the dock pilings is faint but audible through the building’s walls.
I hold Eric’s gaze and wait for him to decide how this ends. He doesn’t have long to make that decision, and there’s no way he walks away from this operation alive. I won’t give him an opportunity to continue stalking and harassing Aurora even if he stands down.
25
AURORA
Eric returns sooner than I expected. The lock clicks, and the door swings open. I adjust my posture before he’s fully through. I keep my wrists behind my back, cord dangling loose from my left wrist but looking intact from the front, head bowed just enough to suggest compliance without surrender. The corroded bracket is pressed flat against my right palm, hidden behind my thigh.
He’s carrying a bottle of water and a protein bar, which tells me he’s entering his caretaking phase. I’ve seen this cycle before. Aggression, retreat, guilt, and then a gesture of kindness designed to erase the aggression from the record. During our relationship, the gesture was usually flowers or a home-cooked meal. Today, it’s a protein bar and water in a marine storage facility. The scale has changed, but the pattern is identical.
“You should eat something.” He sets the water and bar on the floor beside me. “You’re carrying twins. You need to keep up your strength.”
“Yes.” I keep my voice flat, stripped of the fury I showed earlier. Fury got me grabbed. This time, I need information which comes from letting him talk. “You mentioned Karpov’s plan. What is it exactly?”
He sits on the floor three feet from me, which tells me he’s relaxed slightly since the guard intervened. He thinks the earlier confrontation shook me into something more cooperative. He’s wrong, but I let him believe it.
“Karpov wants Adrian drawn to this property.” He says it with the clinical distance of someone briefing a colleague rather than explaining a murder plot to the intended victim’s pregnant partner. “Adrian will figure out where you are. Karpov is counting on it. When he comes, Karpov’s men will be waiting. The building is defensible, and the access road is the only approach.”
He pauses. “If Adrian dies here, Karpov agreed there’s no need to interrogate you for what you might know. He’ll be able to destroy the evidence incriminating him and take what he wants from Adrian’s operation. You’ll be free to go.”
“Free to go.” I let the phrase sit between us. “You actually believe that?”
“Karpov has no reason to keep you once Adrian is gone. You’re leverage, not a target.”
“I’m a witness, Eric. I saw Adrian kill Dominic. I know the locations of his properties, his security protocols, and the names of his operatives. Karpov would be an idiot to let me walk out of here with all of that in my head, and I doubt he’s an idiot.”
Eric stiffens. He picks at a loose thread on his pants. The gesture is nervous and deeply familiar. He used to do the same thingat our kitchen table when I asked questions he didn’t want to answer. “Karpov gave me his word.”
