Chapter 35
ARTUR
Ivan’s sedan clears the far gate before Katie reaches the stopping point.
Through a scope from the upper floor of the recycling plant, I watch Katie step from the civilian car one hundred eighty yards away.
Morning wind moves the black dress around her knees, revealing and concealing the line of her legs while one hand settles on the roof.
The glass reduces her to a bright, fragile circle surrounded by rusted track and washed-out concrete.
Boris speaks through the receiver beside me, but all my attention narrows to the woman carrying our future across open ground.
The distance reduces her to details I have trained myself to read, from the angle of her shoulders to the speed of one hand leaving the car.
Her face remains pale beneath the morning light, yet her steps hold the same alignment she used at Velvet Fortune while entering a room full of strangers in a costume too small for her body.
I can protect only the edges of this exchange while Katie carries its center. Her first touch on the roof marks arrival, not Cherry’s condition; the signal means nothing until the hostage is visible.
“Ivan changed the south response route minutes ago,” Boris says. “The shared system redirected two units toward the river access.”
“How many followed it?”
“One driver before I caught the discrepancy. The main team is behind the recycling wall.”
Ivan no longer resembles a compromised source or grieving uncle whose judgment has failed. He altered a rescue route while leaving the property where Igor holds Katie’s closest friend.
The betrayal is open.
I keep the scope on Katie rather than wasting a second watching Ivan escape.
A dark shape moves behind the upper glass as Katie raises both hands where the warehouse windows can see them, confirming another armed person inside before Igor emerges through the loading door with a pistol held near Cherry’s neck.
Cherry’s wrists remain tied behind the chair, and Igor drags the chair across the concrete until she sits twenty feet beyond the threshold, then positions himself several steps behind her, using the warehouse wall to protect his left side.
Katie touches the car roof with her left hand again before letting both arms hang.
Cherry is alive. The signal reaches my body before thought, loosening pressure beneath my ribs without removing the fear.
Igor is the only visible captor, leaving another person somewhere inside.
“Second shooter probable,” I tell Boris. “Hold entry until Katie marks position.”
The west team waits behind a wall of crushed metal with rifles lowered to avoid reflection. A medical unit remains two streets away because an ambulance near the yard would expose the rescue, while a third vehicle blocks the northern crossing under the appearance of engine trouble.
Ivan’s route change would have sent the main response beside the river, eight minutes from Katie once Igor began firing. Boris caught it because the altered path ignored the intermediary’s preference for the service gate, a detail Lidia provided while expecting no forgiveness in return.
Every instinct orders me across the yard, but experience keeps me behind the scope because movement too early will place a bullet through Cherry before Katie reaches her.
“Walk forward,” Igor shouts.
Katie leaves the engine block.
She moves slowly, allowing her hips and shoulders to follow the natural rhythm Igor knows from the club. No guard could reproduce the specific way her left foot turns before the right crosses, a dancer’s alignment surviving even through fear.
Igor’s scrutiny of her body proves her argument about the decoy.
“Stop beside the chair.”
Katie obeys, and Cherry lifts her face, blood dried near one temple while terror has widened her eyes.
“You came,” Cherry says.
“Your invitation lacked catering.” Katie’s voice carries through the small transmitter. “I considered declining.”
The dry joke could only be hers, though her pulse moves visibly at the throat.
Igor steps closer. “Remove the transmitter.”
Katie’s hand pauses near her hip.
“I know where Artur puts his toys,” he says. “Take it off, then drop it.”
She lifts the dress, revealing the clipped device without exposing more, removes it, then lets it strike the concrete.
The signal weakens but continues through the ground receiver hidden near the west lane.
“Where is the second shooter?” Katie asks.
Igor smiles with the damaged side of his face. “You do not ask questions here.”
“Then explain the exchange.”
“There is no exchange.”
Cherry’s head turns sharply.
Igor grips the back of her chair. “Ivan wanted Artur distracted while the council prepared to remove him. Pasha wants to cut away the family Artur will sacrifice territory to protect. I want to finish the dancer who broke my face.”
Katie shifts half a step, placing her body between Igor’s pistol and Cherry’s chest.
“You needed a complicated plan to shoot an unarmed pregnant woman?” she asks. “Your reputation has suffered.”
Igor’s scar darkens, and the insult draws him toward the weak left side of his vision, exactly where Katie wants his attention.
I have watched her use anger this way before, offering a man enough insult that he stops examining the space around her. At the club, Igor lunged after her heel broke his face. At the freight yard, Katie turns the same wound into a blind corridor behind his shoulder.
Her hand moves behind Cherry’s chair.
Through the scope, I see her fingers reach the plastic restraint. She angles her shoulders as if protecting her stomach from Igor while using the position to hide the work.
“Team one, prepare west entry,” Boris says.
The warehouse roofline remains empty; a shooter must be inside, positioned beyond Katie’s view or behind the rail shed near the service gate.
Cherry looks past Katie’s right shoulder.
Her face changes.
She sees what Katie can’t.
Cherry throws her body sideways, driving the chair into Katie’s legs as a rifle fires from the upper loading window.
The muzzle flash appears behind dirty glass less than a second before impact. I move the scope toward it, but Cherry has already recognized the angle, deciding with her entire body before any signal can travel across the yard.
Katie falls behind the chair, twisting to keep her stomach away from the concrete.
The bullet enters Cherry below the left ribs, tearing through her side before throwing her against the concrete. Blood spreads across the pale fabric of her shirt with terrifying speed.
Katie’s face disappears behind the chair as she falls. For one breath, I see only black fabric over Cherry’s body. Fear empties every sound from the receiver except my own pulse.
Then Katie rises onto one knee, one arm protecting her stomach while the other reaches for Cherry.
“Enter,” I tell Boris.
I fire toward the upper window as the second shooter adjusts for Katie. Glass breaks around him, forcing his head down while Boris’s first team crosses the west wall.
Katie crawls to Cherry, pressing both hands over the wound while Igor moves around the chair. His pistol angles toward the back of her head.
“Katie, left,” Cherry gasps.
Katie turns.
A red fire extinguisher hangs from the warehouse column beside her. She tears it free by the hose, swings from below, then drives the metal cylinder into Igor’s left cheek before he can track the movement through his damaged peripheral vision.
The blow reopens the old orbital injury, and as blood runs from the corner of Igor’s eye, he staggers before Katie strikes again with enough force to knock the pistol beneath the loading ramp.
He catches the extinguisher on the second swing, wrenching it from her hands. Katie retreats toward Cherry rather than pursuing him, placing the chair frame between her body and his reach.
Igor throws the extinguisher aside and reaches for Katie’s hair. She turns from his damaged left eye, slipping the first grab before his fingers catch her sleeve. The fabric tears along her shoulder, but Boris’s breach charge detonates against the west lock before Igor can pull her upright.
He understands the timing immediately because cowards who survive long enough become excellent at recognizing the moment violence no longer favors them.
The upper shooter appears again.
I have one clear angle through the broken window, though Katie’s dark hair moves below his rifle line. He leans farther out to aim past the frame.
I fire once.
The round enters under his chin, his rifle falling first to strike the loading roof before his body collapses against the sill.
The west door gives, and Boris’s team enters.
Igor looks toward the service gate, where no Dymov unit waits because Ivan changed the response route. He runs behind the rail shed while the first guards reach Katie.
I leave the recycling plant before Boris announces the escape.
The stairs jar my ribs with every step, while my right ear turns the gunfire into distant impacts beneath a constant high note. Outside, the west team has cut the chain across the nearest gate, leaving a narrow route into the yard.
Igor’s dark figure appears beyond the rail shed, moving toward an idling vehicle concealed beside the tracks.
I can reach the pursuit car in seconds; the northern road gives him one exit before traffic, and two teams could close it if I lead them now.
Igor killed men at the club, organized the apartment attack, fired through Dally’s parking lot, then placed Katie beneath a rifle while pregnant. Every old version of me believes ending him now would protect what remains.
The ambulance can’t enter until someone confirms the yard is clear. Katie has blood across her stomach, Cherry has seconds until pressure fails, and the northern road grows more distant with every breath.
Revenge offers a visible target, but saving Cherry requires me to turn my back on it while trusting other men with the pursuit I want for myself.
Cherry screams behind me.
The sound ends the calculation.
I run toward Katie.