Chapter 20 #2
And everything goes to shit.
The man in front of me is fast. Military-trained fast.
He punches me in the shoulder. I’m not expecting it.
Attackers usually go for the obvious. The nose, the kidney, the temple, maybe the junk if they’re a real piece of work.
The hit to my tendons has me softening my grip on my gun, and he seizes the opportunity to grasp my wrist and press at the sensitive ligament on the side.
I know this move well and trained not to react. I don’t let go of my protection and throw a punch into his gut. He groans, but it’s not enough.
We grapple and fall to the ground, evenly matched in strength if not in size. My gaze darts behind him where his colleagues are executing the rest of Misha’s soldiers. Arkadi is nowhere in sight.
“If you’d just stop fighting me, this would go so much easier.”
“I’m not going to let you kill me and take it lying down,” I seethe.
“I’m not here to kill you. I’m here to save you.”
His words are too foreign for me to understand and I send another jab to his nose. I’m not above playing dirty to get what I want, and what I want right now, is to kill thieves. They’re as good a substitute as any for all the bottled up resentment I’ve been accumulating.
Tires screech on the asphalt as two black vans stop in front of our truck and hangar, trained fighters jumping out in gear and masks.
This is much bigger than I thought.
“Kill them all!” Arkadi bellows from somewhere inside the now almost empty place of concrete and dirt.
I act on instinct, raising my gun. The soldier I was fighting with drops to a crouch and rolls to the side, stealthy and fluid like a shadow. But I don’t care about him. I take aim at Arkadi’s head.
And shoot him in the back of his nasty skull.
I’ll explain to Misha he got killed in the attack.
It’s one less abuser on the long list of the men who need to be erased from the Earth.
It's nothing in the face of the horrors he inflicted upon so many souls. But it’s something.
And ending his life just gives me a new found purpose.
It’s like a weight, ever so small, has been lifted off my chest and my belly isn’t so full of lead anymore.
“Glad to see you’re still on our side,” the soldier says with a smirk. He speaks Russian and his comment confuses me.
“Who the fuck are you?” I point my gun at him, but he’s not remotely concerned.
He jerks his chin to somewhere behind me. “I work for Aleksei Dobrev. Your welcome committee's here.”
When I turn, a lean man all dressed in black tactical gear stalks toward me and removes his mask.
Blond strands fly around his face.
And baby blues take me captive.
For a breath, we both stop moving. I think I stop breathing.
Until I shake my head, and close my eyes. “I’m hallucinating.”
I repeat the words over and over, but when I blink my eyes open again, he’s stepped closer to me.
I tackle him to the ground.
“You’re not real,” I yell in the face of the ghost who’s haunting me.
“Am I not?” he answers.
And pulls me in, pressing my lips to his in a vicious kiss that shatters everything I thought I knew about myself, about him, about what I should have done.
The past three years are erased with a single taste of his luscious mouth. I have forgotten the taste and the feel of it. They’re nothing like I remember. There’s no softness in this kiss, no pliant submission and supple tenderness. It’s harsh, violent and almost cruel.
When Julian releases me, my eyes must be saucers.
Fear spreads into my system and I dart my gaze all around me, trying to see who saw, who in Misha’s ranks is still alive to take Julian’s life, to threaten him, to take him to my brother for him to be pulled apart and tortured over the course of months.
“You can’t be here,” I say.
“I am. And you’re coming with me.”
I shuffle back, falling on my ass and pushing away, standing haphazardly. I’m a fawn on his first day on Earth, stumbling on shaky legs.
“You can’t be here.”
“My love…”
I shake my head.
“He’s going to find you. You need to leave. Now.”
Julian follows me as I step away from me, stalking to me faster than I expected and seizing my biceps. “I’m here for you. I won’t leave unless you come with me.”
“You don’t understand.”
I’m hyperventilating, pulling at the roots of my hair, trying to escape the man I had to stay away from. Doesn’t he see? Doesn’t he know? I did all this for him. And I deserve to die for all the crimes I’ve committed to keep him safe.
I glance behind me, taking stock of the carnage around us. Men lay in pools of crimson red while others are already busy divesting them of their weapons and ammunition. The soldier from earlier watches me warily, hands at the ready over his own gun.
And Julian…
Julian watches me with agony in his eyes, jaw set and eyes dark, so different from last time I saw them. “We’re ending this. Today.”
“You need to leave.”
“I’m never leaving.”
The conviction in his voice sends a shiver down my spine. A very real bodily sensation reminding me I’m made of flesh and blood and have strong emotions that I’ve had a hard time destroying over the past years.
“You need to leave.”
I stand, turn and march towards the exit but my path is blocked by a row of soldiers, waiting for their order. I don’t even have my gun. I don’t know where it is. I left it somewhere behind me. My brain has finally betrayed me. Making me see things that don’t exist.
I drop to my knees, a wave of dizziness making my vision whiten.
I stumble to the side but never make it to the ground.
Strong arms encircle me, holding me up. He still smells the same. Sunshine and brine, and… potential. Dreams we’ve had. Dreams crushed.
“How are you here?” I breathe the question into his neck as he keeps me up, letting my hands grab his arms and shoulders.
“It’s a long story, my love.”
“Don’t call me that.”
I can’t meet his eyes so I leave mine on his jaw, the muscles working as he clenches his teeth.
He wants to argue. Of course he wants to argue.
Julian Bartoli is nothing if not a talker.
The reminder of who he used to be has a new wave of realisation spreading through my guts.
I’m still dizzy but urgency laces my words.
“We need to get going. Misha has spies everywhere.”
“So do we. We’re not leaving until your brother rots in the fucking ground.”
It was always meant to come to this. The man I love and the man I used to call family head to head.
It only ends with the blood of one of them running through the dirt.
As I finally feel strong enough to lift my eyes to take in his beautiful face, I observe the grey sheen over Julian’s skin, the sallow skin under his eyes, the dull shine of his blue eyes, and the premature wrinkles on his forehead.
“What happened to you?” I breathe more for myself than for him.
“Your brother happened. And we’re ending this. He’s a rot that needs to be taken down, Igor. We can’t let him live. We need you for that. I need you.”
“As much as this little reunion is cute and shit, we gotta get moving, babes,” a man with a posh British accent says from his standing posture above Julian and I.
I recognise Dante Ventura immediately. Between his presence, the soldier saying he works for Aleksei Dobrev and Julian, the last kernel of hope I hid behind dissociative states and murder grasps my lungs, shaking me to my core.
“Is she here?” I ask Julian, who smiles softly.
“Yeah. She’s here. The rest of our coalition is waiting just outside the city.”
“He’s going to kill you all.”
“Not if we kill him first.”
Julian stands and takes me with him. The shock wears off, but adrenaline pumps in my veins, sharpening the vision around me.
Fifteen of Misha’s men were with us on this transaction and two officials, plus the five working this side of the docks, the only ones not on Misha’s payroll.
All accounted for, dead a few meters away. It’s carnage.
One that feels justified and doesn’t fill me with shame, but righteous energy.
“How many men do you have?”
“Eighty.”
I grimace. “Misha’s property has fifty, but I can count on at least ten to abandon their posts on my order. The problem is the reserve two kilometres away from the property. It’s one hundred strong.”
“Almost two to one,” the soldier who first fought me off. “We’ve had worst odds. I’m Ilya. Aleksei Dobrev’s second-in-command.” He holds out his hand and I shake it, lips slightly parted.
“Let’s get you to Mrs Moretti, Petrov.”
He slams his hands on my back and I wince at hearing him call me by my last name. It’s the name of my brother. The name of the man who took everything from me. My husband, my friends, my dignity. My sanity. I don’t ever want to hear it again besides my given name.
As we drive towards Lana and the rest of their crew while clean up happens behind us at the docks, Julian links our fingers together.
I’m convinced that my brain is playing a trick on me.
It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had vivid dreams of being saved by the man I loved.
But my blood pulses where our fingers interlock, and no matter how many times I’m pushing my body to wake up, it doesn’t.
Before long, his steady presence sends me into a dreamless sleep.