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"Who? What?" I groan, trying to understand the chaos. I'm lifted onto something firm, laid flat, and strapped down. I can barely move before but now I'm restrained. The metallic tang of panic fills my mouth.
"Put me down, stop," I gasp.
"Relax." A gloved hand pats my arm. "We're here to help."
Twisting my neck I squint into the flashing red lights. They belong to an ambulance. Paramedics. They must have heard Ruslan's gunshot and come to check it out. Against all odds, I'm condemned to live.
They lift the gurney; I see Kostya splayed in the snow like a rag doll. Bitter shame swells in me, muting my pain. "Wait! Don't leave him here!"
"He's dead," one of the men holding me says. It's delivered as a simple fact.
I can't accept that Kostya, who risked his own life for mine, could be forgotten in an abandoned suburb like this. It's wrong—he deserves better.
The gurney jolts roughly, blinding me with pain. My view of the red lights and dark sky shifts, becoming the inside of the ambulance. It's crowded, multiple faces swaying close to mine. Some avoid meeting my eye. One of them, a gaunt man with a full mouth and ear-gauges, is strangely familiar.
He catches me staring—looks at me, then away, quick as a blink.
Do I know him?
"Hurry up," someone shouts, banging on the divider between the rear of the ambulance and the driver's section. "We can't waste time. He'll die before he's supposed to."
Something’s not right.
Focusing on the man from earlier, I dig through my memory, trying to remember where I've seen him. One of the others is fumbling with an oxygen mask. He pokes a button, sets it off, scrambles to shut it down as the others laugh mockingly.
Sharp fingernails creep up my spine. The ear-gauge man glances at me again—and suddenly I remember. I've met him before, long ago, when I was still Yevgeniy’s brigadier.
Shit.
My pulse speeds up; I tense on the stretcher, curling my hands into fists. These aren't paramedics! They're Yevgeniy's men! Rocking side to side I struggle to break free of my bonds. Everyone notices what I'm doing, two of them launching forward to hold me down.
"Get away from me!" I wheeze. Moving is making the bullet wound stretch; warm blood gushes through my shirt.
"Hold him still!" Hands seek purchase on my shoulders. Another pair grips my knees. I'm weighted down as heavily as when I was fading into unconsciousness in the snow. I can't break away, but I'm sure as hell going to try.
Gritting my teeth, I flex my biceps, shifting my weight from the right to my left. The men loosen their hold on me; I rock again, the other way. The gurney crests upward as it sways. Yevgeniy's men gawk with rising dismay. Their worry gives me strength. If I can just tip over, the restraints might snap!
A sharp prick in my inner arm startles me.
"That should calm him down," someone laughs.
I spot the needle just as it withdraws from my skin. A man sneers down at me and flicks the needle away.
"Enjoy it, Arsen Kirilovich, it's the last peaceful rest you'll experience before what the real Pakhan has planned for you."
"Fuck you," I rasp. I try to reposition myself. Nothing happens. The others look relieved, moving away to lean on the walls of the ambulance. Come on! Move! I scream internally, working to force my hand to make a fist. My fingers tingle as they go numb.
I do my damnedest to flex my legs, my neck tensing from my effort. Move, come on, move! The only motion comes from the vehicle as it drives over the road.
No... this can't be happening. Once Yevgeniy gets his hands on me, I'm done for. All of my efforts over the years to bring him down have been wasted—ended by a scared child. I was planning to kill him.
Maybe this is karma.
The ambulance jerks sideways so suddenly that medical supplies topple off the wall, raining around us. "What the fuck!" a man cries. The world inverts—I'm floating. I've never felt so light, and though everyone around me is shrieking, I'm relaxed—detached from reality—like all of this is a dream I'll wake up from any moment.
Everything slams to a halt. All the men in the ambulance somersault around in boneless heaps, their cries cutting off abruptly. Metal crunching on metal fill my ears; it's all I hear. Glass shatters, shards of it bouncing against my face and limbs. Some of it dusts into my hair.
The sensation of flying continues on even though we've stopped moving. Around me comes the soft groans of those lying in piles of twisted legs and arms.
