"She goes where he goes." Viktor's voice was flat, immovable. "His orders."
The man looked at me again. I held his gaze. I didn't smile. I didn't look away. After a moment, he stepped aside.
The hallway was narrow, the walls painted black. The red bulbs cast everything in a bloody glow, making the shadows look like wounds. I could hear music somewhere—low bass, a heartbeat rhythm, the kind of sound you feel in your chest instead of your ears. Viktor walked ahead of me, his shoulders broad, his steps sure. He'd done this before. Many times.
The hallway opened into a room.
It had been a dance floor, once. The parquet was still there, scuffed and stained, and the disco ball still hung from the ceiling—dusty, forgotten, catching the light from a dozen candles arranged on tables around the perimeter. In the center of the room, there was a table. A long one, wooden, the kind you'd find in a church basement or a union hall.
And around the table, men.
I counted seven of them, not including Aleksander. He sat at the head of the table, facing the door, his grey eyes finding mine the moment I walked in. He didn't smile. He didn't nod. But something in his face shifted—a small relaxation, a quiet acknowledgment—and I felt my shoulders drop an inch.
He'd been waiting for me.
"Monika," he said. "Come. Stand behind me."
I walked across the dance floor. The men watched me—their eyes sharp, curious, the way predators watch something that might be prey or might be a threat. I kept my eyes on Aleksander. On his face. On the steady grey of his gaze.
I stopped behind his chair, close enough to touch his shoulder if I reached out. I didn't reach out.
"The meeting," Aleksander said, turning back to the table, "can continue."
I don't remember most of what was said.
Names, numbers, territories—the language of men who traded in things that couldn't be bought in stores. I heardshipmentandrouteandpercentage. I heard threats wrapped in pleasantries, and pleasantries wrapped in threats. I watched the men around the table smile at each other like they were friends, while their hands stayed close to their weapons.
Aleksander was calm. He was always calm. He spoke in a low, measured voice, never raising it, never rushing. When another man raised his voice, Aleksander waited. When anotherman made a threat, Aleksander tilted his head, like he was considering something amusing.
And then, without warning, the door burst open.
I didn't see who came through. I saw the flash of movement, the glint of metal, the way the men at the table reached for their guns in a single, synchronized motion. I heard the first shot—loud, impossibly loud, the sound ricocheting off the walls like a trapped bird.
Then I was moving.
Not running—I didn't run. Running was for people who didn't know what to do. I dropped to the floor behind Aleksander's chair, my hands already reaching for my bag, my mind already cataloging. The man on Aleksander's left—I'd seen him earlier, a young man with a shaved head and a nervous twitch—was clutching his shoulder, blood seeping between his fingers. He'd been hit. Not fatally, not yet, but the blood was bright red and pulsing, and that meant arterial.
"Get down!" someone shouted. Another shot. Glass shattered somewhere behind me.
I crawled toward the wounded man. The floor was sticky—drinks, maybe, or blood, or both. My knees slid on something wet, but I kept moving. The man's eyes were wide, panicked, his mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water.
"Let me see," I said. I pulled his hand away from his shoulder. The wound was ugly—a groove, not a through-and-through, the bullet having carved a trench through the muscle before exiting. The bleeding was bright and steady, but the artery was intact. He'd live. If he didn't bleed out first.
I reached into my bag and pulled out a tourniquet—the real kind, the kind Aleksander had bought for me after the warehouse. I didn't think about how he'd known I'd need it. I just wrapped it around the man's arm, above the wound, and tightened.
He screamed. I kept tightening until the bleeding slowed.
"Hold this," I said, pressing a gauze pad against the wound. "Pressure. Hard. Don't let up."
I looked up. The room had gone quiet. The shooting had stopped as suddenly as it had started. The men at the table were standing now, guns drawn, facing the door. There were bodies on the floor—two of them, strangers, dressed in black, their faces hidden by ski masks. They weren't moving.
Aleksander was standing too. He wasn't looking at the door. He was looking at me.
"Viktor," he said. "Get them out."
Viktor appeared at my side, his hand under my elbow, pulling me to my feet. The wounded man was groaning, his face pale, but he was conscious. Two other men—guards, maybe, or lieutenants—lifted him and carried him toward the door.
"Move," Viktor said. I moved.
