Chapter 44
Harper clutched the stolen keys so tightly in her fist the metal teeth cut into her palm.
Someone had drawn a sun in yellow paint on the wall years ago, a wide smile and crooked rays, and now the erratic fluorescent light made the painted smile jump strangely across the wall.
The women gathered behind her.
“Stairs,” Olga muttered from behind, gun held low and ready.
Harper gave a nod, even though her hands were shaking. Somewhere below, gunfire cracked again—short, controlled bursts that echoed up through the old school like the building itself had become a drum.
The women flinched as one.
“Move,” Harper said in Russian. Her voice came out rough, but it carried. “Stay together. No shouting.”
She didn’t know if she sounded calm. Her stomach was knotted, and her feet were numb against the freezing concrete. A contained explosion punched through the building somewhere below.
Several women screamed. The walls jumped. Dust sifted from the ceiling in a soft, filthy fall, and the fluorescent strip above wavered before grinding back to a dim, unstable hum.
Fox. Or Zak. Or—
No.
She couldn’t let herself believe something just because wanting it made breathing easier. But something was happening. The compound had been under tight control when they locked her away. Now it was shouting, gunfire, alarms and men running.
Something was tearing through the compound. She pushed through double doors onto the stairwell. The air here was even colder, if that was possible, nipping at her skin.
Lena released her hand. Harper pivoted, but Lena backed away until she hit the wall.
“No.” Lena shook her head. Her eyes were huge and unfocused. “No. No, I can’t. They’ll kill us.” She slid to the floor and buried her face in the stuffed rabbit.
The surrounding women bunched up, worried chatter spreading through them. A corridor full of terrified bodies and nowhere to go.
Olga’s jaw tightened. She looked at Lena, and for a second something human cracked through the flinty shell of her face. Then it vanished. She turned to Harper. “Leave her. You stop for one, they take all of us back.”
“What?”
Olga’s mouth was set, the gun still aimed toward the stairwell, but there was a cost in her eyes now. Calculation fed by old wounds. “If we stop, we all die.”
“Don’t move.” Harper stabbed a finger at the floor, then hurried to where Lena crouched on the floor.
For one heartbeat, she almost said it. You’re going to be okay. The lie reached her tongue and stopped there. She didn’t know if that was true. Concrete bit her knees as she dropped in front of the girl.
“Lena.” Harper slid a finger under the younger woman’s chin. “Look at me.”
Lena shook violently, barely pulling in air.
“Lena.” Harper locked both hands on Lena’s shoulders and held her there. “Look at me.”
The girl’s eyes dragged to hers, pupils blown wide with fear.
“Breathe with me.” Harper slowed her breathing by force. “In. Out. Again.”
Another burst of gunfire ripped through the building below them. Lena jerked, a sob breaking loose.
“They always come back,” she whispered. “They always find us.”
The men outside don’t lose.
Men like me don’t last.
Both sentences collided in Harper’s chest, brutal and cold, and for a moment all she could see was Pav barefoot, coming for her through too many men because the world had given him every reason not to, and he had come anyway.
Barefoot. Bleeding. Coming for her like nothing on earth would stop him.
Harper pitched her chin higher. “Listen to me. They’re afraid now. That’s what you’re hearing.”
Lena stared at her. Harper dug her fingers into Lena’s shoulders. “I’m right here.”
It wasn’t courage. Courage sounded too clean for what this was. This was terror with its teeth gritted and nowhere left to go but forward. Lena took a shuddering breath. Then another. Her fingers closed around Harper’s wrist.
Harper pulled her up, allowing herself a slow exhale. Thank God.
“Good,” she said. “That’s it. Stay with me.” She offered Lena her hand, and Lena nodded, her fingers closing around Harper’s.
Harper led her back to the front of the group. Olga’s face was impassive. She looked at Lena once more, then turned away. “I’ll cover the rear.”
Frantic Russian carried up from the corridors below. Smoke climbed the stairs in thin, dirty ribbons, bringing with it the sting of cordite and dust.
The school was coming apart at the seams as something ripped through it. A door slammed somewhere below. Harper took hold of the handrail and descended to the half-landing.
Someone shouted and something hit the wall below with bone-jarring force—enough to make the stair rail vibrate under Harper’s hand.
The women froze as one. Olga swore from the rear of the group.
“It’s okay. Stay behind me.” Harper eased Lena behind her and started down the stairs.
A guard staggered into view on the landing, backpedaling fast, blood sprayed across his face. His rifle clattered against the wall. He shouted something Harper didn’t catch, voice high and broken, terror carved into his features.
A man came after him through the shadows. For one terrible second, it was a stranger, and every nerve in her body screamed run.
This man was blood and movement and lethal purpose. Weapon up. Face streaked black with blood, mouth split, eyes flat with focus. Violence had stripped away everything unnecessary and left only the part of him that knew how to end threats.
The guard faltered as the man’s face came fully into the light.
Pav.
Her mind failed to join the pieces together.
Blood.
Smoke.
Those eyes.
The guard tried to run.
Too late.
The shot cracked through the stairwell before the guard finished turning.
Efficient. Final.
The air shifted as the women recoiled. Someone whimpered. Lena’s nails dug painfully into Harper.
Harper froze, some animal instinct reacting to the man coming out of the haze and gunfire below them.
Pav’s head snapped up. His eyes found hers.
The violence in him broke open. Every dangerous part of him reoriented in a single breath around the fact that she was alive.
“Harper.” Her name left his mouth rough and torn.
His gaze flicked past her. To the women. Lena clutching her hand.
The gun remained in his grip. The danger was still there. But it was no longer aimed at her.
Harper stared at him, heart punishing her ribs, the frightened women crowded behind her.
His rifle lowered first.
Blood still marked his face.
Harper went to him anyway.