Chapter 20 Luka
LUKA
I am already running when Misha shoves through the last double doors, the corridor folding sound into a tight drumbeat that hammers under my skin. The fluorescent lights overhead pulse in rhythm with my footsteps, each one marking the distance between me and the hell waiting at the dock.
Albert's voice bites through the radio clipped to my shoulder, all business and a bare edge of panic I do not permit myself to match. “White van. Decal on the door. East lot. Plate unknown. Moving north. Blocker to gate two now.”
“Albert, hold your position at the hospital,” I command into the radio. “Keep Sage inside. No one moves until I’m back.”
“Understood,” he replies.
My breath tightens, lungs working overtime to fuel the sprint. Every second that passes is another second Hope travels farther from safety, and another second Sage's world fractures beyond repair. I cannot allow that. I will not allow it.
“Lock everything,” I order into the radio. “Full lockdown. All cameras live. Two vehicles at the ramp. Move.”
The command echoes down the line, my men responding with affirmations that barely register. My focus has compressed to a single point: find the van, stop it, bring Hope back before Sage's trust in me shatters like glass under a boot heel.
Misha vaults the service steps ahead of me. His weapon is already drawn, finger resting against the trigger guard with trained instinct. “Kolya's on the lower level,” he reports over his shoulder, his voice even despite the exertion. “He heard the alarm. He's moving.”
I follow him down the steps two at a time, my own hand finding the familiar grip of my pistol beneath my jacket. The metal is cold against my palm, a reminder of what this life demands. Violence when necessary. Control always. Failure never.
We burst through the service exit into the mountain air, and the cold hits my face like a slap. Pine and frost cut through the sterile hospital scent like knives. My eyes adjust to the sudden brightness, scanning the parking area for threats, movement, or any sign of where they have taken Hope.
Vega runs at my side, nails ticking on the concrete, his presence a tether to focus.
The dog keeps pace effortlessly, trained for exactly this scenario, ready to pursue or attack on my command.
But I cannot take him. Not this time. There is a room in this facility where one life is more vital than any tactical advantage I could gain from his teeth and loyalty.
I lift a hand and press him by the collar, fingers hard against his warm fur. “Stoy,” I instruct. Stay. The command carries the force of absolute authority. “Guard Sage. Do not leave her.” He meets my gaze, intelligence burning in his eyes, and I know he understands exactly what I’ve told him.
The words feel wrong even as I utter them.
Hope has been stolen by men brazen enough to stage a kidnapping in broad daylight.
And Sage needs someone to stop her from doing something reckless like charging after her sister without a weapon or backup.
Vega will keep her safe, even if she fights him on it.
He rests his head against my palm for one brief moment, an anchor in a world spinning rapidly toward chaos.
Then he turns, obedient, and melts into the hospital doorway, disappearing into fluorescent lights and antiseptic corridors.
Every inch of me wants to stay, to go back inside and find Sage, and see with my own eyes that she is unharmed.
Instead, I climb into Kolya's vehicle, strap the belt across my chest, and the chase becomes oxygen.
Kolya sits behind the wheel already, engine running, hands positioned at ten and two with the casual readiness of a man who lives for moments exactly like this.
His jaw is set, eyes fixed on the road ahead, waiting for my signal.
I slam the door, and he tears us out of the dock with an acceleration that makes the tires scream against the pavement.
The road unfolds into switchbacks that climb with smug indifference toward the foothills.
Gravel throws itself aside as the pavement narrows, the guardrails becoming the only thing between us and a long drop into pine-filled ravines.
I ask for the east lot feed, and Misha answers with a screen full of live tiles, each a tiny window into what is becoming a larger lie. His fingers work the tablet, pulling up camera angles and scrubbing through footage with the speed of a man who has analyzed hundreds of operations.
The east lot shows a gate arm ripped clean off its hydraulic base, and the guard booth door half-open, swinging in the wind.
The white van is a smear moving north on the access road, the hospital decal on its side a sloppy forgery that might trick a civilian glance and nothing else.
The plate is obscured by glare and distance, gibberish in the poor resolution.
“Rewind three minutes,” I tell Misha. “Show me where it came from and who it passed.”
He scrubs the tape backward and narrates cold facts as they appear.
Two figures in masks, movements synchronized with military precision.
A truck was positioned to block camera two at the crucial moment.
A looped recording replaced the live feed at the exact second the wheelchair exited the building.
His fingers keep time on the tablet, pulling up angle after angle.
“They used a maintenance truck to blind the camera,” he observes, his voice flat with professional assessment.
“One man driving the van. They kept it small. Less to track.”
The words confirm what my gut already knows: this was planned meticulously, every angle accounted for, every contingency mapped.
Someone spent time studying this hospital, its security protocols, its blind spots, and its patterns of movement.
The chaos wasn’t reactionary. It was orchestrated to the second.
And in the middle of it, a fake nurse walked Hope out of the hospital.
We hit the main access road, and the van comes into view ahead, white against the dark green of towering pines.
The driver pushes the vehicle hard, the tires squealing on curves designed for half this speed.
He clips a concrete bollard at one intersection and keeps moving as if the world owes him a clear path.
The recklessness speaks of desperation or stupidity, possibly both.
“Unit two peel wide,” I direct into the radio, my voice clipped and emotionless. “Unit three stagger behind us. If they try to run the tree line, I want eyes on the slope.”
Acknowledgments crackle back through the speaker. Men I have trained and fought beside respond with the discipline that comes from years of operating in situations where seconds determine outcomes. They know what is required. They will deliver or die trying.
Kolya takes the bends with a driver’s arrogance, tires hissing over worn asphalt.
The engine answers his demands like a beast pleased to be moving, the acceleration pinning me back against the seat.
The van jerks hard around a sharp corner, overcorrects, and gunfire erupts from the passenger window.
Bright flashes follow, wild shots slamming into the guardrail and ricocheting off rocks with angry whines.
Kolya corrects our trajectory, weaving through the storm of bullets with movements that border on precognitive. The SUV reacts like a living thing beneath his hands, nose low, weight distributed perfectly, and torque ready to respond to his every command.
“Do not give them a target,” I tell him, though he already knows. “Window down a centimeter only. Keep it narrow.”
He adjusts without acknowledging, his focus absolute. This is what he was born to do, and every instinct in his body prepares for it. The thrill of pursuit, the mathematics of speed and trajectory, the raw adrenaline of combat at eighty miles per hour.
A white SUV materializes ahead like a thought shaped into metal and intent.
It cuts across the lane, lining up on us instead of the van.
Muzzle flashes burst from its windows, the sound rolling toward us in a sharp, rhythmic roar.
Kolya reacts instantly, swerving to angle our bulletproof SUV against the onslaught.
Rounds hammer the reinforced glass, sparking off the hood and guardrail in a rain of fire, but the vehicle holds steady beneath the barrage.
Misha lowers his window and returns fire.
“Unit two, engage!” I bark into the radio, my voice cutting through the chaos.
The second team answers instantly. Their vehicle closes in on the white SUV, bullets shredding its front tires and punching through the engine block. The SUV jerks sideways, flips, and rolls, landing on its roof in a mangled roar of metal and glass.
Kolya swerves, forcing our SUV against the van’s flank.
Metal grinds, sparks bursting where steel meets steel.
The van veers, clips the guardrail, and loses its balance.
It tips, tilts, and slides over the edge.
For one breathless second, the world tilts with it, and then reality ruptures as the vehicle plunges over the lip and disappears into the ravine below.
The sound of tearing metal and shattering glass echoes off the canyon walls, a symphony of destruction that continues long after the van vanishes from sight.
Silence arrives first inside my lungs and then in the world.
Kolya cuts the engine, and we spill out into the cold mountain air, our boots hitting hot asphalt that still smells of burned rubber.
My heartbeat is loud in my ears, adrenaline singing through my veins with chemical intensity.
My weapon is drawn before a second thought arrives.
I run to the guardrail and peer over the edge, assessing the descent.
The ravine drops away sharply, a canyon of brutal angles and unforgiving stone.
Basalt shelves jut out at intervals, decorated with scrub brush and stunted pines that have somehow found purchase in the hostile terrain.
The van lies on its side, perhaps twenty feet down, a white ruin with spiderwebbed glass catching the late morning sun.
Without hesitation, I swing myself over the guardrail and begin the descent. My boots find purchase on narrow ledges, my hands grasping exposed roots and stone protrusions. The wind grabs at my jacket and makes it billow like a banner, trying to unbalance me with each gust.
The distance closes in careful increments, each foothold tested before I commit my weight.
Loose rock skitters away beneath my soles, tumbling down to bounce off lower formations with hollow clicks.
The cold seeps through my clothes, reminding me that winter is coming to these mountains, whether we are ready or not.
I reach the van and shove at the dented driver’s door.
It gives with the groan of folded metal, the hinges protesting but ultimately surrendering to force.
The driver slumps forward against the deflated airbag, his head lolling at an unnatural angle.
Blood has run from his nose and mouth, pooling on the crumpled dashboard.
I press two fingers against his neck, searching for a pulse I already know will not be there.
Dead on impact, probably. The broken angle of his spine suggests the crash finished what the fall started.
The passenger didn’t fare any better. He’s half-sprawled across the shattered window, his body twisted, a bullet wound darkening the front of his shirt.
His weapon lies inches from his hand, useless now.
One look tells me he never made it out of the firefight alive. The fall only sealed the certainty.
Misha crouches on the lip of the ravine above me, his pistol leveled at the wreckage even as his jaw works through calculations. He doesn’t waste words, just calls down, “Is she there? Hope?” His voice is even, but I can hear the strain beneath it.
“She isn’t here,” I answer, the words dry and heavy in my throat.
The truth hits clean and brutal. Hope isn’t here. She was never meant to be here.
The realization burns through me, fury taking root where reason should be. We’ve been played. While we hunted this decoy down a mountain road, the real kidnappers walked out of that hospital with her, unseen and unchallenged.
I climb back up, hauling myself over the lip of the ravine. Every joint complains about the abuse, muscles burning from the exertion. The world above feels too bright with the sun slanting indifferent through the pine branches, and the trees watching like a silent jury judging our failure.
Kolya waits by the SUV, the engine still idling, every tendon taut with readiness for whatever comes next.
His eyes find mine, reading the answer in my expression before I speak.
Misha steps away from the edge and touches his radio, already coordinating the cleanup crew that will remove this mess before civilian authorities arrive with questions we cannot answer.
“Decoy,” Kolya remarks, the single word a verdict that condemns us all.
I lift my chin and scan the ridge, the road that has just given up its terrible secret, and the trees that might be hiding more than wildlife.
My stomach tightens into a knot I have carried for longer than I care to admit.
The thought does not need to be completed to be dangerous, but I complete it anyway because ignoring the truth has never saved anyone.
They have Hope. And we are exactly where they wanted us to be, chasing ghosts while they move the real target beyond our reach.
“They wanted us looking in the wrong direction,” I tell Misha and Kolya. The words slice through the silence, cold and certain. “Whoever planned this will answer for it in blood. But first, we have to find them. And time is a luxury we no longer possess.”