3. Victor
VICTOR
Iturn onto the correct street. The only streetlight flickers as I drive past it, causing the shadows to shift around me.
I kill the engine and settle back into my seat, fingers tapping against the steering wheel as I look around.
Bogdan's house sits ahead, larger than the surveillance photos suggested. It's two stories with clean white paint. It's a respectable-looking Romanian home. One wouldn't think it belongs to a piece of shit human trafficker.
I hear a dog bark somewhere in the distance, and it causes me to look over my shoulder in the direction of the sound.
The sudden turn makes my side throb. The skin pulls tight against the surgical tape beneath my shirt. The doctor told me if I was going to do anything strenuous, to tape the area to keep the skin from moving. I'm not sure it's working.
Either way, I do what I've done since it happened, ignore it.
Besides, pain's just your body telling you you're alive. At least that's what my dad used to say to us. Maybe the one good thing he did.
I glance down at the dash, and the digital clock reads 12:11 a.m.
Any minute now.
I adjust the rearview mirror, checking the empty street behind me. No movement. No cars. Just the occasional flicker of television light from behind curtained windows from the neighbors.
At exactly 12:17, headlights sweep around the corner. A black sedan comes crawling up the street. I lean back in my seat as the car passes.
I pop my head up and watch as the car turns into Bogdan's driveway and stops with a squeal from the brakes.
There he is.
I stay low and watch as Bogdan hauls himself out of the driver's side. He's gained some weight since the photos were taken. Thick around the middle, shoulders hunched forward. He slams the car door and fumbles with his keys, nearly dropping them twice before he gets the front door open.
He swings it open, and a light turns on in the entryway. He walks inside and shuts the door.
I count to thirty in my head, watching, waiting. Finally, the upstairs bathroom light turns on and he walks over to the window and pulls the curtain across.
The bathroom light stays on, and I can see his shadow moving around.
I reach for the black leather gloves on the passenger seat and pull them on, flexing my fingers to work out any stiffness. The leather creaks softly as I grip my gun. I check the magazine even though I already know it's full, then slide my gun into my holster.
I grab my silencer and slide that into my pocket. I take a look at myself in the rearview mirror.
I'm ready.
I open the car door and slide out, easing it shut with barely a sound. My shoes make soft clicks against the asphalt as I cross the street in a low crouch.
I move past the front door toward the side of the house where a narrow alley runs between Bogdan's property and his neighbor's fence. A security camera is mounted above a side window, its red indicator light dead. I pause beneath it, tilting my head back to examine the angle.
That's odd.
The camera points directly at this window, covering what should be a vulnerable entry point. But the light's off. No mechanical whir of tracking movement or motion sensors. Nothing.
This fucking idiot has a security system and doesn't use it.
Or maybe he's too cheap to pay the monthly monitoring fee. Either way, I'll take it.
Just as a precaution, I reach up and smash the camera housing with the butt of my gun. Pieces of plastic and glass fall, scattering on the ground. The sound is louder than I'd like, but no lights flick on.
The neighborhood doesn't react to the noise, probably assuming it's one of the stray cats in the neighborhood causing trouble, so I continue.
The window is old, the kind with a simple latch lock that anyone knows can be bypassed with a bit of pressure.
I pull a knife from my pocket and apply pressure in the middle of the window where the lock sits and push until I feel the lock separate from the latch.
The window slides up with a low groan, and when it's up, I pause and listen.
The only sound I hear is water running through the pipes to the shower upstairs.
I put my knife away, grip the window frame, grit my teeth, and jump inside.
I land in a crouch in what appears to be a laundry room. The tiles are cold beneath my palms. The room smells like fabric softener.
I straighten slowly, drawing my gun and letting my eyes adjust to the darkness inside. A washing machine sits against the wall to my left. Above it, shelves lined with detergent bottles and cleaning supplies. Ahead is a door, partially open, revealing a hallway.
The water continues running upstairs. He's in the shower now, but he won't be for long. I need to move. But I need something first.
On the drive out here from Bucharest, one of our contacts reached out and told me they managed to pull intel suggesting Bogdan kept records. Files. Possible evidence of Elena's abduction and his dealings with Cornel. Maybe even information about other operations, other buyers, other victims.
It would all be on a hard drive somewhere in this house. Probably in an office poorly hidden because men like Bogdan always underestimate how easily they can be found.
I figured since I'm in the neighborhood, I might as well grab it.
I move through the laundry room into the hallway, keeping my back to the wall. The house is dark as I pass a kitchen on my right, dishes piled in the sink, empty beer bottles on the counter. A living room on my left with an old brown couch and a huge sixty-inch flat-screen bolted to the wall.
I continue moving and find a small bathroom, but no office. So I've got to go upstairs.
I reach the base of the staircase and stop, tilting my head up toward the second floor. The bathroom light spills into the hallway up there from under the door, casting a yellow rectangle across the carpet.
I stare at it and can see the steam drifting out from beneath the door.
He's still showering.
I need to check the upstairs for an office. If I'm lucky, I can find the hard drive, grab it, and put a bullet in that motherfucker while he's still got soap in his hair and be on my way.
The easiest hit I've done to date.
I place my foot on the first step, testing it. The wood is solid, no creak. I pull out my silencer and screw it into the barrel of my gun, feeling the threads lock fully into place.
I take the second step slowly, raising the gun, aiming up the staircase at the landing above. Finger resting along the trigger guard, breathing slow and controlled.
As soon as my foot hits the third step, a floorboard creaks above me.
I freeze.
The shower is still running. The bathroom door is still closed. But that creak came from somewhere else. Down the hallway. Away from the bathroom.
Fuck.
Someone else is in the house.
My mind races through possibilities. A girlfriend maybe? My intel said he lived alone. My surveillance confirmed no regular visitors. No second car. No other name on the utility bills.
But intel is only as good as the information available, and clearly, I missed something.
I remain motionless on the third step, gun raised, every muscle coiled tight. The creak doesn't repeat. The shower continues its steady hiss. There's no footsteps, voices, or a door opening or closing.
Maybe it was nothing. Old houses settle. Pipes expand.
Or maybe someone is standing in that hallway right now, listening just as intently as I am.
I take another step, then another. My eyes scan the landing above, searching for movement in the shadows. The yellow light from the bathroom doesn't reach far enough to illuminate the other doors. Two, maybe three additional rooms up here based on the layout.
I reach the landing and swing the gun from side to side, covering the hallway. Three doors. Two closed on the left. One partly open on the right.
I'm pretty sure the creak came from the right.
I move toward it slowly. My heart beats steady in my chest. Not racing. Not panicking. This is just another variable to account for. Another problem to solve.
I reach the door and listen.
Nothing.
My left hand reaches for the doorknob while my right keeps the gun trained center mass on where someone would be standing if they're waiting on the other side. I push the door open in one smooth motion and sweep the room with my gun.
It's a bedroom. Unmade bed. Clothes on the floor. Curtains drawn. The window is open slightly, cold air filtering in and stirring the curtains.
But most importantly, it's empty.
I exhale slowly through my nose and back out of the room, pulling the door partially closed again.
Damn false alarm.
Suddenly, the shower shuts off.
I turn toward the bathroom as the pipes groan and shudder. Shit, he's getting out.
I move quickly now, crossing to the closed door on the left side of the hallway. I push it open and slide inside just as the bathroom door opens.
I glance around. It's the office.
A desk sits against the far wall beneath a window that overlooks the backyard. A computer monitor, keyboard, scattered papers. Filing cabinet in the corner. Bookshelves lined with binders and folders that probably haven't been opened in years.
I take a step and I'm suddenly pushed.