Part of it was the timetable. K had moved his plane up two days. Renzo's Thursday pickup would have found Bianchi's dark.A man who counts his Thursdays didn’t fly into a city that just gutted his pipeline unless he likes the odds.
It’s Fin, my brain supplied.He’s not beside you. You’ve gotten attached, Aleksi.
And it was true. Usually, before a job, I was at my sharpest, itching for the chance to stick it to someone who deserved it, but this time my mind wasn’t on the job. It was back at the apartment with Fin, wondering what he was doing, what he was wearing. Was he worrying about me? What if something happened, and I didn’t come back? Who would take care of him? Would he cry for me? Come to my funeral? I imagined him in the houndstooth suit I’d bought for him, weeping over my casket, and I fucking hated it. It was the first time I’d ever pictured my own death and recoiled from it wholeheartedly.
I can’t die here. I have to get back to him. That’s all this is. I’m going soft over a mouthy Scottish tailor with nine fingers. Fucking hell.
The plane came in low over the tree line, lights blinking, wheels reaching for the strip.
"Here we go," I said into the comm. "Nobody moves until the car does."
The plane touched down hard and ran out long, engines reversing, and taxied back toward the fuel point with its lights sweeping the strip. I watched it through the windshield. It swung around tail-first and sat there a minute with the propellers winding down. Then the door opened, and the stairs came down.
Two men came off first, bodyguards probably. Then a third, heavier, slower, in a dark coat. It was too far to make out the face, but the walk was right, and the case was in the third man's hand.
"Target’s off the plane," I said into the comm, low. "Wait for the car."
They crossed the tarmac to the SUV. The interior light came on when the doors opened, three shapes loading in, the case going in last across someone's lap, and then the doors shut and the light died and the SUV's headlights came on full.
"Wait for it."
The SUV pulled away from the strip slowly, gravel popping under the tires, and came down the access road toward the gate. EJ's shape rose up by the gate as it passed him, and I watched him shove it shut behind the car, exactly like I'd told him.
The car’s brake lights went on with the shut gate, and I growled, “NOW!” Our car swung out from the hiding spot behind a bush and fishtailed as we sped into position, blocking the Italians’ retreat. Dmitri rolled out from his position, blocking the road forward. Both cars threw open their doors, and the crew from either side unloaded their guns into the trapped car. The windshield spiderwebbed and then shattered along with the back window, and the bodies inside slumped over. A river of red ran from under the rear passenger door, dripping onto the pavement.
I came out from behind my door with the Makarov up and crossed to the SUV to confirm everyone was dead. Behind me, the kids were already loose on the road behind me, running their mouths, high on it, alive.
I yanked open the rear passenger door, gun ready.
There were four dead men inside. I scanned their faces. No. No. Not him… The last one was turned away from me so I reached in and adjusted the body so I could see his face, and when I did, my blood went cold.
It wasn’t Kastelani.
Kastelani wasn’t even in the fucking car.
Then where…
The back of my neck went cold as I realized what was happening, and it was fucking genius because it was exactly what I’d have done.
“Cover,” I said and backed away. Then I turned to shout over my shoulder. “GET DOWN! GET TO—”
And then the trees around us opened fire.
I dove behind the rear of the car. It wasn’t ideal, but it was better than being out in the open. But it was arguably the worst position to be in because now I was pinned down in the perfect spot to watch all my men die.
They hit Dev first. He didn’t even get his gun up before the high-speed SMG rounds tore through his chest and stomach, opening him as cleanly as a surgeon’s blade. He went down, guts half out of him before he hit the pavement.
Fuck.
"Get behind the cars!" I popped up and got a few rounds off with the Makarov, but it was no fucking use. The Italian crew was made up of cowardly ghosts, hiding in the dark. A strobe of SMG fire answered, pelting the cars and peppering my crew.
Tomas took one in the throat and went down, making a wet choking sound. All that laugh, and it ended in a sound like a drain. Leonid was firing from behind Dmitri's car and doing it right, short and low, and for a second I thought one of them at least knew how to live through this.
Then a round came through the door he was using, and he dropped.
I got the slide racked and came up over the trunk and put two into a muzzle flash and got nothing back to tell me I'd hit anything. Dmitri was still in his car, down across the seat the way I'd told him. Everyone I'd told to get out and shoot was dead on the road.
Then something hit my shoulder and sent me spinning. I hit the pavement, and the pain from that registered dull andthrobbing before the hot, searing pain of a bullet wound made itself known in my ear.