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Gunfire sounds from the hallway. The acrid smell of gunpowder hangs in the air.
The cooks are workers. The men are part of the gang, but the old woman gets paid to prepare their meals.
“Go,” I say to her, motioning at the back door next to a storage area.
Instead of running, she grabs a pot from the stove and flings it at Leonid. The boiling liquid barely misses his shoes. With the distraction, the bravest of the cooks grabs his paring knife and throws it at one of my men, who ducks. The knife falls with a clatter on the floor.
Pop, pop, pop.
The three men drop like flies, each with a hole between the eyes. The barrel of Dimitri’s gun is smoking. The woman goes berserk, grabbing a steak knife and charging at me.
Really? A steak knife? For fuck’s sake. Give me a break.
Pop.
She falls on the floor, next to her minions.
I lower my gun. I don’t feel bad about shooting a woman. I gave her a choice. She made it.
More shots come from the back room. It sounds like fireworks on New Year’s Eve. They’re giving it their all. We’re not here to take prisoners, and they know it.
“Cover me,” I say to Leonid.
I stealthily approach the door and steal a glance around the frame. The hallway is empty. Our targets are in the back, trapped inside the room. There’s no way out but through the door we used or through the one in the kitchen.
Leonid takes an automatic rifle from one of our men. He sends a spray of bullets at the doorway of the back room while I move down the hallway. A man who dares to stick his arm around the frame gets his hand shot off. A howl of pain lifts above the noise of the gunfight. Another man dashes forward, firing blindly, but he goes down before his bullets can do any damage.
My men follow on my heels. By the time we’re at the door, the shooting from inside has stopped.
“We surrender,” someone calls from inside.
“Come out,” I say harshly. “One at a time. And don’t fuck with me, or I’ll brick up every door and window and let you rot inside.”
We line up on either side of the hallway, our weapons aimed.
The first man steps out, his arms hanging loosely at his sides.
“Put your hands behind your head,” I say.
He sneers and reaches for something behind his back.
A sequence of rapid gunfire goes off.
His chest explodes, the gun he pulled from his waistband falling with a clang on the floor.
“Hold your fire,” someone shouts from the room. “We’re out of bullets. Unarmed.”
“Come out now and I’ll finish you off quickly,” I call back. “You know you’re dying here today.”
A man walks out with his hands in the air. He’s as tall as he is square, his puffed-up muscles steroid-induced. He wears a black shirt and pants with Italian shoes, apparently trying hard to imitate a crime boss. His shaved head shines under the bulb that dangles on a cable from the ceiling. A black tattoo of an eight-pointed star sits in the center of his skull.
Every muscle in my body goes taut with a need for violence. It takes all my self-control and then some not to off him right away.
Stopping in front of me, he spits at my feet. “Fuck you.”
Three of my men filter into the back room while the others grab the man. He struggles at first, until they’ve tied his wrists and ankles with cable ties. Then he lies grunting on the dirty concrete.
“What’s your name?” I ask, suppressing an urge to kick in his teeth.
“Vadim,” he says with defiant pride.
He’s brave but stupid. If he had one clever brain cell in that thick skull of his, he would’ve never laid a hand on Katerina.
One after the other, my guards shove the men from the back room through the door. There are four of them—three older men and a lanky young one with a dark stain on the front of his pants. The old men leer as they’re brought to stand in front of me. They’re hardened, old-school gangsters. They’re not going to bow to me or anyone else. Too bad I don’t give a fuck about their resilience.
Vadim went after Katerina, and these men are culpable by association.
I give the order with a nod of my head.
My men know what to do. They take them to the kitchen to finish them off. Only because of their age do they get to die quickly.
“Leave this one,” I tell the guards, motioning at the one who’s pissed himself.
He stares at me with owl-sized eyes, shivering in his shoes.
I point my gun at the bald-headed piece of filth on the ground. “Tie his ankles.”
In a few seconds flat, Vadim has a thick rope strung around his legs. He hurls insults as Leonid and one of the guards drag his heavy weight to the bathroom. I grab the arm of the thin guy, tugging him along.
