Someone grabbed my jacket. Started pulling.
Every nerve in my body lit up like napalm. I tried not to scream. Failed. The sound that came out was animal. Broken.
“Almost there,” Dom gasped. “Come on, you stubborn Russian bastard. Move!”
I moved. More accurately, they dragged me. Through rubble and smoke and my own blood. Into air that tasted less like death.
Hands lowered me onto something hard. Wet pavement. Rain hitting my face like small fists.
“Med kit!” Luka's voice. “He's bleeding out!”
I forced my eyes open. Rain. Smoke. Fire painting the night orange and red. Emergency beacons strobing through the chaos.
And no Sebastian.
“Where—” My voice came out wrecked. Barely human. “Where is he?”
Dom's face appeared above me. Blood streaming from a cut on his forehead. Eyes hollow. “Viktor?—”
“Where is he?”
The question came out as a roar. Ripped from somewhere deep I'd kept sealed for eighteen years. Since I'd dug a grave for my sister with hands that wouldn't stop shaking.
Dom's expression told me everything before his mouth opened.
“Marcel took him.”
The words hit like bullets. Each one finding its mark. Each one tearing through whatever was left of me.
“No.” I tried to sit up. Strong hands pushed me back down. “No. We have to?—”
“You'll bleed out in ten minutes if we don't stop this.” Luka was doing something to my thigh. Tightening a tourniquet. Pain exploded. White. Blinding. “Stay still.”
“I don't have ten minutes!” I grabbed his wrist. Squeezed hard enough to feel bones grind. “He has Sebastian. He has?—”
“I know.” Luka's face was carved from stone. “But you're no good to him dead.”
I wanted to argue. Wanted to throw them all off and tear throughwhat was left of the mansion until I found the tunnel. Found the convoy. Found him.
But my body wouldn't cooperate. Blood loss made the world tilt. Swim. Fade at the edges.
“How long?” I managed. “How long has he been gone?”
“Five minutes.” Dmitri's voice from somewhere to my left. “Maybe ten. Thermal picked up his convoy for ninety seconds. Then dropped off grid. Pre-staged jammer.”
Pre-staged. Marcel had planned this. Planned to lose. Planned to take Sebastian as insurance.
And I'd let it happen.
I'd failed.
Again.
The realization settled into my bones like concrete. Heavy. Permanent. Final.
“Viktor.” Dom's hand on my good shoulder. “Stay with me. We're going to find him.”
“I lost him.” The admission tasted like poison. Like admitting I'd killed him myself. “I was supposed to protect him. That was my job. My only job. And I?—”
