Page 59 of Bought By Sin

I nodded, holding my arms up as Lev stood back, arms crossed as he silently supervised my being fitted for a vest.

“And you understand where to go?” Alexei asked without turning his back to face me in this control room within Lev’s house.

I nodded again, but since he wasn’t looking at me, I said, “I do. I’ve studied the sat images.”

Nikolai paced back and forth, checking the slim body cam gear I’d be fitted with. “And you’re familiar with how to use these now?”

“Yes.” I should. We’d spent the better part of the day and last night going over how to use the tech.

The expectations weren’t hard to follow.

Get in.

Capture as many photos and videos as I could of the layout as I went to find Yusef.

Place a tracker on his vehicles.

Scan any documents that I could find.

And get out.

It was deemed far too dangerous to launch a full-scale attack on the compound, and if Yusef wasn’t actually there, it wouldn’t be a very well-honed message to send to Gregori.

I wasn’t an assassin, at any rate, but if they wanted me to kill for them, I wasn’t sure that I’d be hard-pressed to reject that command.

I never disobeyed an instruction, no matter how new or unfamiliar they might be to me. The high-stakes spying exercise tonight would be something different for me, but I wasn’t afraid to go through with it. All throughout the prep for this mission, I couldn’t stop thinking back to how Nikolai had put me on the spot about my commitment to the Volkov Bratva.

I was committed to my “employment” here, but the tie I wanted to embrace and accept with Lev was a temptation I couldn’t allow in my mind right now.

I had to be focused. I had to center myself for a difficult task, and just like I used to when I was sent out as one of the front-liners or scouts on a smuggling run, I did my best not to let any distractions disturb me.

Hours later, after the tense and quiet ride toward the location, I blew out a deep breath and knew this was it.

“Mila—”

I nodded without facing Lev. “I’m ready.”

“But are you, really?”

I swallowed and looked at him. “Are you questioning my willingness to follow your orders and to obey Adrik’s leadership?”

“No.” He furrowed his brow. “Not at all.”

“Then you would know I’m ready.” I dipped my chin once, like a final stamp of an okay on this. Then without delaying any further, I reached for the door handle and got out. A comms unit would reside in my ear and give me a tether to reach him and the others who were placed around here. Nikolai was positioned in another car with an additional soldier—just in case things turned south and I had to escape from the compound in another direction.

Not having me rigged and set up with too many devices was all part of the plan. If they had the tech and security layers to detect anything incoming, I’d be spotted.

Let’s go.

Get in and out.

You can do this.

You will not panic.

You will succeed.

Go.