Something in my chest releases. Only slightly.
“Confirm visually.”
“I did.”
“Again.”
He doesn’t argue. He calls again.
I stand, gun still in my hand, looking at the body near the truck. Blood spreads beneath him, mixing with dirty water and ash.
I have killed men before. Many. Sometimes in anger. Sometimes for strategy. Sometimes because leaving them alive would be untidy.
This one should feel no different, but it does. Because while bullets were flying, I did not think of empire. I thought of my wife.
I thought of her alone in my house, angry at me, alive because I had told her no.
Makar stumbles over, bleeding from a cut above his eye. “We got one alive.”
I look toward the fence where two of my men have a shooter on his knees.
Good.
“Find out who sent them,” I say.
Makar nods.
Viktor studies me. “You’re going back?”
“Yes.”
“The warehouse?”
“Handle it.”
“And the prisoner?”
“Keep him breathing until I decide otherwise.”
Viktor watches me for half a second too long. He knows. Of course he knows.
“You thought they might go for her,” he says.
I don’t answer.
That’s answer enough.
His expression shifts, almost imperceptibly. Not surprise exactly. Concern.
That irritates me.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I say.
“Like what?”
“Like I’ve developed a weakness.”
Viktor’s gaze moves over the burned warehouse, the bodies, the smoke, the men waiting for orders. Then back to me. “Okay, boss.”
