22. Mila
MILA
Preparing for this task force took up every spare minute of our days. For the better part of a week, Lev and I went over all the logistics of how to get close enough to the compound where we assumed that Yusef Antoniv was basing his operations out of for now.
Satellite maps didn’t paint a full picture of what was there in the remote landscape halfway between the desert and the coast. Mountains complicated the ability to have a drone do reconnaissance.
With all the walls and secure structures that were no doubt put in to block anyone from spying in the sky, it was a secretive location.
It reminded me of the first few Cartels I’d been sold to. Top-secret. With lethal violence within the shrouded secrecy inside the walls.
“Are you prepared to go this deep undercover?” a soldier asked me as I was fitted for gear.
We’d head out tonight. Lev, Alexei, and Nikolai would remain in a vehicle nearby while I would sneak in and try to get as close as possible to Yusef or anyone else in his inner circle.
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.
My heart raced as I dropped into a run along the outcropping of rocks that made up the jagged terrain around here.
Under the darkness of the night, I was a blur of shadows.
Geared up in black and running with the stamina and speed I would never slack on keeping top-notch, I sprinted in the direction I’d memorized.
All last night, I’d pored over the satellite images.
I envisioned moving through this area and covering ground without detection.
So far, so good.
No patrolling units caught sight of me, not even when I reached the fence and used the bolt cutters to snip a small opening for myself.
In.
I was supposed to report in if I could, but as I roved my gaze over the inside of the compound, I was too scared to speak.
I was too scared to even breathe loudly.
Crouched over and duck walking where I could, I was mindful of passing through here literally like a blur.
No sounds. No footprints in the dust. And hopefully, no heat image if they had sensors like that at the perimeter.
The vest I wore had a deflecting property that could remove my heat mark.
I didn’t need to tell Lev and the others that I was in. They were tracking me anyway.
Now go.
Go find the offices.
Go see what you can record.
Riding the steady rush of adrenaline kept me mobile and cautious, trespassing according to what I’d memorized.
Buildings stood just where I thought they might. Low-lying, hangar-like spaces showed up where I expected them to be. Structures came into view according to what the satellite images had prepared me for.
But what I hadn’t counted on was the violence and hell that I could hear and smell.
The metallic stink of blood and fecal matter and sweat as I passed what had to be a prison.
The blood-curdling screams and moans of pain as people were whipped, tortured, and threatened from within the walls of what was likely a dungeon of sorts.
Keeping to the shadows wasn’t only for the necessity of being able to get in as far as I could to spy.
It was a matter of survival. Because as I trespassed further and truly went deep undercover to sneak in here as a spy for the Volkovs, I knew that if I was spotted, any lie to explain my presence here wouldn’t stand up.
I would be killed.
Tortured and treated like I was when I was first sold into slavery for crime families.
Holding my breath and getting impatient to find an office building or even a place that suggested it was for lodging, I moved in. I stuck to the shadows and waited as patrolling men passed by.
All that I could see was captured via the small cam sewn into the hat I wore. On my invasion here, capturing all that I could, I knew that Lev and the others would witness the same gore and hell that I did.
How each building I passed showed men raping chained-up women. Through the cracks of windows and doors that I peered through, countless examples of brutality and unspeakable inhumanity were evident.
So many captives beaten.
A room where someone was cutting off someone’s tongue.
Another building where a mixture of men who looked like defectors from Cartels and gangs were drinking and whipping a woman to dance for them.
I hardened my heart the best I could.
I shielded my conscience with every step of the way.
Above all else, witnessing the brutality of these criminals banding together in any part of Gregori’s network solidified my hatred of them, my scorn and deep abhorrence that this was what happened when the wrong people had too much power.
My moral compass would never be reset to anything a “normal” person could have.
Yet even I could see this hell and be sickened and angered that it could happen unchecked like this.
Reminded of the misery that I’d faced when I was first sold into slavery, when my parents gave me over to the Cartel just so they could have some money for a quick hit of drugs, I tried to shut it all out.
The memories of being so scared in a terrifying environment.
The hopelessness of knowing my family had given me up for their own selfish needs.
The lost sensation of not mattering to anyone.
Stop.
I hunched over near the taller building that I hoped would hold an office.
Stop thinking.
Don’t go back there.
Don’t panic.
Don’t…
I focused on breathing. One long inhale sucked in, then that shorter one to follow before a long exhale. The dizzying threat of fear faded within a couple more minutes.
“Mila.”
I latched on to the sound of Lev’s voice. It came through the tiny comms unit in my ear.
“Are you with me?”
His deep baritone whisper sliced through me.
I wasn’t.
After spending so much time with him, I wasn’t with him right now. He wasn’t here to guide me. I’d been sent in solo for this spying expedition. I couldn’t rely on his brutal strength and power.
But hearing him helped.
He asked if I was with him, like checking that I was alive. Still here and with it. He was probably worried when I had been still on the tracking app he was no doubt watching along with the live feed from my cam.
Just the sound of his voice pulled me out of the dreadful memories. He yanked me back to the present.
I couldn’t speak. I wouldn’t dare this close to what had to be the main building. I couldn’t risk someone hearing me. Instead, I moved. I stepped closer, plastering my back along the wall and letting the motion be my answer.
I held my hand out in front of me, giving a thumbs up after the inactivity of crouching down and panicking, or coming as close to it as ever. He could see my gesture in the camera’s feed and know that I was with him.
I was.
I was with Lev and here for the sake of his family.
Reminded of my purpose here, I resolved to bring back as much intel and as many pictures as I could. Because I was committed. To them. I was committed to helping them because they were nothing like this lawless hell of the militants hidden here for Gregori.
If this was the kind of operation Yusef Antonov was heading up as Gregori’s lieutenant, I would do my part to fight back and end them.
Narrowing my eyes as I watched for anyone patrolling near this building adjacent to the barracks where a loud party carried on, the men gang-raping a couple of women, I tensed and braced to burst inside the offices.
If there were pictures, I’d copy them.
If there was any hard evidence to capture, I’d record it.
Whatever it took to assist the family I never expected to find.