28. Rashid
RASHID
The smoke's so thick I can't see my own hands. I lie flat on the concrete with my face pressed to the floor trying to breathe, but every breath pulls in more poison. My lungs burn like they're filling with acid.
The fire roars behind me and the heat on my back is blistering me. My shirt is starting to melt against my skin. I try to call for Devid, but my voice comes out as a croak and I can't stop coughing long enough to form a word.
Someone grabs the back of my collar and drags me.
My knees scrape across the concrete, and I feel debris under my legs and broken glass cutting through my pants.
But I can't fight it; I don't have the strength to fight anything right now.
Devid's voice comes through the smoke above me, shouting my name, and his hand hauls me backward across the floor toward a section of wall where the air is marginally clearer.
"Stay with me, Rashid," he shouts, dragging me harder. "Stay with me. Do not close your eyes."
My head hits something hard, and the pain snaps through the fog enough for me to realize Devid is pulling me toward a window on the west wall.
I didn't even know there was a window on the west wall.
The fire hasn't reached this corner yet but it's coming, eating through the shelving behind us, roaring louder than anything I've ever heard.
"Come on, hang with me, boss..." Devid drops my collar and I hear him kicking at something, metal on metal, and then glass shatters and cold air rushes in.
The contrast with the heat is so sharp it feels like being slapped, but it's refreshing.
The air feels clean and pure, making me cough out the wretched smoke I've been inhaling for too long.
Then he grabs me under both arms and hauls me up onto the window ledge.
I get one leg over the frame and then the other ,and then I'm falling.
I hit the ground on my side, knocking the last of the air out of my lungs, but the air I suck back in is cleaner.
It feels like drinking water after days in a desert.
Devid lands beside me and rolls onto his knees, coughing so hard his whole body convulses. He saved my life, though all I can manage to do is roll over and curl into a ball as my body expels toxins.
The warehouse groans and a section of the roof collapses inward, sending a column of sparks and flame up into the night sky. Then heat pushes us back even from out here and I scramble to my feet, grabbing Devid's arm and pulling him away from the building as more of the roof gives way.
"Fuck... come on," I choke out, still coughing. But we're on our feet moving at least, putting distance between us and the mess.
We make it to the car before Devid collapses, falling onto the hood, bracing himself as he tries to get his breathing under control.
His face is black with soot and there's a burn on his forearm where his jacket sleeve melted through.
I lean against the passenger door and cough until my throat feels raw and I can taste blood in the back of my mouth.
"They think we're still in there," I tell Devid, struggling to make my stinging eyes focus as I scan the parking lot. I hear sirens in the distance and know someone has called the fire department in. "This wasn’t just to get to me.They're planning something."
Devid looks at me through watering eyes, and I watch the realization hit him the same way it hit me while I was being dragged across that floor.
The warehouse attack, the ambush, the fire—none of it was about killing us.
It was about clearing the path to my house so Gusev could get to Oleg without me standing in his way.
"They're going for Rostov," Devid says, pushing off the hood and moving toward the driver's side door. "They're gonna kill him."
The only thing that comes to mind is Emory, holed up in that house where her father is… but how the fuck did they learn where? My house is kept secret from everyone. Guards watch my movements to make sure I'm not followed, and I have strict security.
"Get us home," I tell him, climbing into the passenger seat as he starts the engine. "Drive as fast as this car will go, and do not stop for anything."
Devid throws the car into gear and we tear away from the burning warehouse.
The tires scream on the wet pavement as he takes the first corner, and the back end swings out before he corrects it and shoots down the river road.
I pull my phone and try calling the house, but the line rings and rings and nobody picks up.
I try Krispin and get nothing, then the main security line, but it goes straight to a dead tone.
This is terrifying. No one answering me means something catastrophic has happened. It means they're already at my house, with my son.
"Nobody's answering," I tell Devid. "Drive faster." I pat myself down, realizing I don't even have a weapon now. Mine must be on the floor of that warehouse, melting in that heat, and David nods at the glove box.
"Take my backup," he grunts, running a red light without slowing down.
I reach into his glovebox to find his Makarov fully loaded and ready, and I chamber a round so I'm prepared as soon as this car stops. Gusev thinks he's going to get away with this, but I will slaughter every last person in this city if he touches my son or the woman I love?—
The word feels strange, even in my thoughts, but the fact that it comes to mind instantly is just proof of how true it is.
Devid takes the car up past a hundred and twenty on the straightaway along the canal, weaving around the sparse traffic with both hands locked on the wheel. I try the house again, but the phone rings a few times before the line cuts out and goes to dial tone.
"Fuck!" I scream, smashing my hand on the dashboard so my screen shatters, then I grab the door handle as we round a curve.
Devid takes a shortcut through a residential block, bouncing over a curb and cutting through someone's side yard before slamming back onto a main road. The tires lose traction on the wet surface, and the car fishtails for a sickening second before he corrects it and guns the engine again.
"I don’t know, boss... If Gusev hit the house the way he did the warehouse..."
"Shut up and drive," I growl, not allowing myself to imagine that evil. I'll kill them all.
We hit my street and I can see the house from two blocks away.
The front gate's wide open, and there are vehicles I don't recognize parked across the driveway.
The security lights are on but half of them are shot out, and the ones still working paint broken shadows across the yard.
I see muzzle flashes through the front windows before I hear the gunfire, and by the time Devid skids to a stop I already have my weapon raised and my door open.
"Go around the back," I tell Devid. "Hit them from behind. I'm going through the front."
"Rashid, wait for me to get in position?—"
"There's no time to wait." I'm out of the car and running toward the gate before he can argue.
The gravel crunches under my feet and I see a body near the front steps—one of Gusev's men face down with a hole in his back.
One of my guards is slumped against the gate post with his rifle across his lap and his chin on his chest, but I don't stop to check if he's breathing.
The front door is blown open and smoke pours out of it.
I move through the frame with my weapon up, and the first thing I see is the hallway torn apart.
The walls are cratered with bullet holes and the floor's covered in broken glass and shell casings.
A painting has fallen off the wall and its frame is shattered across the tile.
Gunfire erupts from the living room, and I press against the wall as rounds chew through the doorframe beside my head. I lean around the corner and fire, then hear a body hit the floor. Someone shouts in Russian from deeper in the house, and more shots ring out from somewhere upstairs.
"Krispin!" I shout down the hallway. "Where's my family?"
A voice comes back from behind the kitchen door; he sounds strained and out of breath. "Marta got your mother and the boy into the panic room," Krispin shouts. "They're locked in and safe, but Gusev has the girl."
My blood goes cold. "Where?" So I wasn't wrong. They weren't trying to get me out of my house just to kill me. They’re coming for Oleg and Emory.
"Living room—he's got her and Rostov and two of his men. I can't get a clean shot from here." Krispin is panting, grunting in pain, and though I can't see him, I assume he's been hit. I pray it's not badly enough that it turns fatal, but I don't have time to doctor him.
I creep down the hallway, stepping over debris and a second body that I recognize as one of Gusev's crew. The living room doorway lies ahead of me and I hear voices behind it. And when I strain my ears I hear Emory's crying.
When I round the corner and take in the scene, my body tenses from head to toe.
Gusev stands in the center of my living room with his arm around Emory's throat and a pistol pressed against her temple.
His face is flushed and sweating and his eyes have a wild look, like he's realizing this might finish him instead being his victory.
Two of his men flank him, one near the window and one near the overturned couch, both with weapons drawn and pointed at the doorway where I'm standing.
"Welcome to the party, Mr. Krasnov. It's about time the guest of honor showed up." Gusev doesn't even look at me when he talks. He's facing down the man he came to kill.
Oleg's on his knees between Gusev and the fireplace, hands raised in front of him, talking frantically. "You don't have to do this," Oleg says, and I can barely understand him. "I can still get you what I promised. Just let her go and we can work something out."