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I turn and sprint over to her, ignoring the heat searing through my knees. As I pass, I tackle one of the men assaulting Dima and put a quick bullet in his throat. Dima finishes the other one, then we both hurry to kneel by my sister’s side.
“Mila! Mila, it’s…fuck.”
It’s bad. Really bad.
“I’m fine,” she says, but the blood seeping through her shirt says it’s not fine. It isn’t fine at all.
Dima falls to his knees on her other side. “Fucking hell, Mila! Why did you jump in front of that bullet?”
Her eyes find his. “Because if I didn’t, you’d be the one bleeding like a stuck pig.”
“I can take it.”
“So can I,” she snarls before turning to me. “What the fuck are you doing here? You should be chasing Benedict. I thought I saw him by that door.”
“Mila—”
“Go. If he leaves with them, all this was for nothing,” she insists. “Go!”
Dima grabs my shoulder. “I have her. I’m gonna make sure she’s alright.”
I can see the promise in his eyes. I nod once and take off, a handful of Zakharov men trailing at my back.
Benedict’s door leads to a broader passageway that takes a sharp turn. At the end of it is another door, cracked open slightly.
“Come now, Ilarion,” Benedict calls from out of sight. “Let’s have a gentlemanly conversation, man to man. What do you say?”
I glance towards my men, giving them the silent signal to stay put. Then I enter the room with my gun dangling casually from my hand. He’s standing in the center of the empty room and, for a moment, I wonder if I’m even hunting the right man.
“Fucking hell. Benedict?”
He grins, a sight made all the worse by his rotting teeth. “Have I changed so much?”
“You’re fat,” I say bluntly. “And old.”
“Yeah, well, years of being hunted like a rat can do that to a man.” His teeth make another horrible appearance as he pulls back his lips in a growl that looks more like a grimace. His beady eyes flicker over my shoulder. “I’m guessing my men are dead?”
“Most of them. Soon enough, the rest will be, too.”
“Did they at least get a few of yours?”
I shrug. “Nothing that won’t heal.”
The room Benedict stands in is relatively well-kept. But I can smell the staleness in the air. As if the windows have been kept shut too long and mold is starting to creep into the crevices.
“This place smells like your death, Benedict.”
He flinches, then sneers. “I think you’ll find that I still have a card or two up my sleeve.”
“Where are they?”
“The boy,” Benedict murmurs. “Is it my imagination or does he look an awful lot like you?”
I regard him with a disinterested gaze, even though my insides are boiling. If I let my expression falter for even a moment, I will confirm his suspicions and he will have a stronger trump card than Celine.
“What boy?”
“The one clinging to your sister-in-law,” Benedict says, his eyes never leaving my face. “She’s a pretty one. Not as polished as Celine, but still, that kind of raw beauty doesn’t go unnoticed. Did you fuck her?”
