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Leonid watches it settle. “We can make false papers.”
“And give them a false route,” I say. “I’ll need a couple of our men. Ilya can watch the exits, and Dmitri can stay with the convoy. Misha never leaves the estate.”
Petrov closes Anton’s payment file. “You’ll let the captains think your son has made you reckless.”
“I’ll let them.”
My phone vibrates.
Vera.
I answer at once. “Are you safe?”
“Yes. Oksana and the children are with Elena, Cara, and me.” Vera lowers her voice. “Sergei gave Irina a medical bag. There are sedative and analgesic ampoules inside it.”
“And?”
“The batch number matches the sedatives that disappeared from my hospital.”
“When?”
Vera goes quiet for one beat.
“Before you were shot.”
27
VERA
Ileave the inner family suite after Elena promises she won’t let Misha out of her sight. Sergei waits outside the door. I carry the medical bag Irina brought me, and Marina’s old message is open on my phone.
A few minutes earlier, Irina had brought the bag to me.
“Are these yours?” she had asked.
I opened the bag, looked inside, and closed it again.
“Yes. Thank you.”
Cara looked up from her work but said nothing. She waited until Irina had left and the door was closed.
“That was reckless for a surgeon.”
I met her eyes. “They aren’t mine.”
Her face changed at once.
Elena came over. “What is it?”
I removed the ampoules of sedatives and pain medicine and placed them in a row on the table.
“Could the men have brought these to knock you out?” Elena asked.
I looked at Misha and Mikhail playing hide-and-seek behind the chairs while Lev rocked in his seat and cooed. A chill ran through me.
“It looks like there’s enough here to put several adults under,” Cara said.
Elena turned one of the ampoules between her fingers. “There’s no price on this.”
