Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 107079 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 535(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 357(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107079 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 535(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 357(@300wpm)
A shot rang out, and we ducked for cover. Gennadiy shot back, downing a guy half-hidden behind the van. But more men ran in from deeper in the building and opened fire as well. Gennadiy pulled me protectively behind him. “You and Mikhail go and find the donors,” he told me, pointing to a hallway. “We’ll take care of the guards.”
Part of me automatically wanted to argue, resenting being kept away from the action. But he had a point; we had to make sure the donors were safe. I nodded and hurried off with Mikhail and the dogs, but I threw one last, worried look back over my shoulder as I ran. Please, Gennadiy, be careful!
We found an office and then a couple of basic treatment rooms with gurneys in them. But there was no sign of the donors. We kept going, past more offices and then a break room. And surprisingly quickly, we reached the end of the hallway. Where are they? The only place left was the garage where the firefight was going on, and they weren’t there.
My chest tightened. What if we were too late? What if Grushin had already killed them and taken their organs?
I looked at Mikhail, but he looked as worried and confused as me. We backtracked, and then he put a hand on my arm to stop me. He went into the break room to grab something he’d seen: a t-shirt, too small to be an adult. The boy! But where was he now?
Mikhail bent and held the t-shirt out to one of his dogs, muttering a command. The dog sniffed twice, then charged to the end of the hallway and sniffed at the wall, thumping its tail excitedly.
I took a closer look at the wall. Its paint wasn’t exactly the same color as the others, as if it had faded less. A big photocopier was pushed up against it. “Help me move this,” I said, and together we heaved it out of the way.
Behind the photocopier, a fake wall had been built. A section near the floor had been hinged, like a human-sized cat flap. I pushed it gently open...and looked right into the face of the boy I’d seen at the warehouse. I felt myself sag in relief. Then I looked behind him, and my stomach knotted. All of them were there, men and women packed together in a bare, windowless space only about ten feet square. There was bottled water and a bucket in the corner for a toilet. Jesus. “Come on!” I waved them over. “We’re getting you out of here!”
One by one, they crawled out through the hole. The little boy started to cry, mumbling in Russian, and Mikhail, normally so happy, looked completely overcome. He scooped the boy into his arms and held him, shh-ing him and talking to him in Russian. “He wants his mother,” he said to me. “There, there, little one. It’s going to be okay.”
One of the women heard the gunfire from the garage area and nervously plucked at my sleeve. “You...from other gang?” she asked.
I looked down at myself. I guess I didn’t look much like an FBI agent anymore. In fact, maybe another gang was closer to the truth, now. “You’re safe now,” I told her.
But the gunfire from the garage area didn’t seem to be dying down, and that was the only way out. Something must have gone wrong, and that thought made me go cold inside. Gennadiy!
66
GENNADIY
Fuck.
It had all started well. We’d rushed in and taken care of two of Grushin’s men straightaway. But we’d pushed deeper into the garage too quickly, and when another four men popped up out of nowhere, I’d been cut off from the others. The gunfight had turned into a stalemate, and I was pinned down behind a rack of spare tires.
Footsteps. I froze, listening. One of them was creeping around the rack from the left. I whirled that way. Then I heard more footsteps, this time from the right. They were coming at me from two directions, knowing I couldn’t face both ways at once.
All I could do was keep stubbornly facing to the left, the patch between my shoulder blades itching, knowing I’d be shot in the back any second. I stood there motionless, gun raised, waiting…
Grushin’s man leaned around the rack, and I shot him in the chest. Then I dived for the floor and rolled over to look behind me, knowing I’d be too late. And I was. Another man was already standing there, aiming down at me, and I couldn’t get my gun on him in time. I winced—
There was a gunshot, and the man crumpled to the floor.
Finn swaggered into view, smirked, and offered his hand. I sighed...and took it. “Thank you,” I told him.
From there, the fight started to go our way. A few minutes later, Valentin took down the final one of Grushin’s men...and he managed to take him alive.