Page 60 of Deadly Knight (The Bratva’s Elite #2)

Vanessa parks beside an industrial warehouse with broken windows that’s as abandoned as half the other buildings in the area.

“This it?” I lean forward in my seat to get a better look up the side of the building.

“No, it’s farther down there.” Vanessa points straight through the windshield, towards the end of the block.

“We’ll go the rest of the way on foot since there’s likely to be people inside monitoring.

” She twists in her seat to regard the two rows of people in the SUV, looking first to Anastasia.

“Lev pulled the blueprints of this place. There’s a side and back entrance.

Take the back. I’ll go through the front with Katya.

” She points to the soldier beside Anastasia.

“You’ll come with us. Protect her”—she gestures to me—“above all else. Everyone else, side entrance through the courtyard. It’s three floors.

Offices, kitchen, visiting area, and communal areas.

Top two floors have cells. Not sure where he’ll be, nor who’s inside.

Katya and I will head up to the cells, second floor first and will deal with anyone in our way.

Ana, find Mikhail and Andrei. I suspect they’ll be cozying it up in an office in-between torture sessions. ”

Torture sessions. My stomach flips with the reality of what I’m about to do.

My hand reaches into my pocket, folding around the knife.

I’m about to do what I never could in the past, and fight.

“Everyone understand?”

We all nod, yet she stares at me, ignoring my response and only accepting a verbal murmur of agreement before opening her door. Everyone follows, and with a deep breath, I do as well, my sneakers thudding to the cracked sidewalk.

Beside me, Anastasia removes her gun, keeping it low by her side. The soldiers behind us do the same. Vanessa steps to my other side, taking the lead, but not before screwing something cylindric to her gun. The others have them on as well.

“Silencers,” Anastasia explains when noticing where my attention’s gone. “Shouldn’t attract nearby attention, nor alert others in the prison we’re here.”

Vanessa crooks two fingers in the air for us to follow. “Eyes up. We don’t know who’s in the surrounding buildings watching. How much warning Mikhail and Andrei will have.”

“I’m not shooting,” Anastasia announces. “Not until we know who else is trying to overthrow you. How many more ridiculous attempts by your father’s people there will be.”

“Hopefully this is it.” Vanessa’s lips pinch. “I’m thirty seconds away from rounding them all up and dealing with them as one. After this, I want my biggest issues to be with what Zeno and Serafina are dealing with.”

“Yeah, well, my father’s free game. Have at it. Lev left our papa’s fate up to me.”

Vanessa doesn’t reply, instead placing a finger against her lips as we approach another building, this one with a faded sign, the words Penitentiary barely legible. She gestures at the side of the building and two soldiers take off. Anastasia winks and runs after them, lifting her gun.

Vanessa and the final soldier remain, each taking a position on either side of me. “Knife out,” she whispers. “You see someone, you stab. No questions asked, okay?”

“Okay.”

She presses against the metal door, checks we’re all in place, and then tests the handle before finding it unlocked. She throws it open, the soldier behind me catching it with one hand as Vanessa slips inside, a thud immediately following.

I step into the dim light, nearly tripping over the body Vanessa’s bent over, checking pockets before sliding the man’s gun into an empty leg holster.

“I presume each exit has one.” She stands, her expression grim as she gestures for me to follow her down the empty, eerie hallway.

Behind me, the soldier’s steps are nearly silent. Vanessa sticks to the shadows as she studies the open space. In the centre, there’s metal tables surrounded by a ceiling high fence, but above it are two floors, balcony style so any guard could see all the cells.

She cranes her neck, twisting every which way to see as much as possible. “He must be above us. All the cells I’m able to see are open.”

Shouts come from afar and Vanessa curses, meeting the guard’s eye behind me.

They seem to have a silent conversation before she guides us into the open space, gun raised, while scanning for anyone on the balconies.

No one shoots back, and we reach the wide metal staircase on the other side of the room.

Vanessa streaks up them and I follow, my steps slowed because despite taking self-defence classes, it turns out I’m nowhere near fit enough to tackle these stairs. I pity the soldier behind me, but he doesn’t appear bothered by my slow speed.

She gestures in the direction of the next set of stairs that go to the third floor. “Check up there,” she orders him. “Signal if you find him. We’ll check this floor.”

He nods and takes off and Vanessa tugs me along the wall, scanning downstairs for anyone who might attack, while my eyes pass over every open cell to our right and also across to the other side, the building design at least helpful in that manner.

“I don’t see him.” Helplessness seeps into my tone. “Vanessa, he isn’t here!”

“He’s here. Somewhere.” She leans across the balcony, whistling to gain the attention of the soldier she sent upstairs, but he only shakes his head before pointing towards the stairs.

Vanessa runs back that way and I follow.

There’s a sudden slap against the cement behind me, one not in the same pattern as Vanessa’s steps, and I’m partway turned around when I notice the figure following.

The soldier comes out of nowhere, presumably hidden in one of the other cells, his arm linking around my waist.

I yell for Vanessa while recalling everything Bailey’s ever taught me, my actions driven by panic and instinct.

Knife in hand, I stab downwards intending to hit any part of him.

He howls when I score his arm, loosening just enough I’m able to position an elbow into his chest and a knee into his groin, kicking at the same time as shoving away.

There’s a small distant bang, and then he’s falling with a thud, a bullet hole cleanly through his forehead, dark eyes dead and vacant.

“Badass.” Vanessa grabs my wrist, pulling me away from the dead man. “He must have been hiding, sorry. You okay?”

Panting, I nod, and Vanessa's man appears at the top of the staircase taking everything in. “Everything alright, Pakhan?”

“As fine as it can be.”

He scans me up and down, more clinically than anything, before nodding. “Upstairs is empty. Think Lev had it wrong?”

“Doubt it.” Vanessa rubs a hand down her face. “We’ll go back down and find the others. There must be more to this place that didn’t show up on blueprints. Text Lev if you’re able to and see if anything else can be dug up.”

She leads us downstairs, and though my legs are burning, I push on and don’t say anything, not even willing to relive the near-attack upstairs that had my heart racing both in fear and adrenaline.

Dimitri wouldn’t give up looking for me, even if he had to walk the continent to do it, so I’ll have to fall dead before I do.

“Is there a reason there’s so few guards?”

“They wanted us to find him. You saw the note. They’re banking on a trade.”

Ivan being freed into the world is terrifying. To have the source behind my attack walking around isn’t what I want, but if I had to choose, I would do it. For Dimitri.

“Will you?”

“Fuck no. Knife up.”

Vanessa turns a corner, almost colliding with a figure. Anastasia lowers her gun, the other soldiers coming up behind her, each gripping the arm of a man, his body limp with blood trailing from his nose and ears.

“We got rid of everyone they had. Killed Andrei, but not before he squealed there’s a basement. That’s where they have him locked up.” She holds up a key on a thin chain. “Kept this one alive in case you want to chat with him.”

“Lock him in one of the cells upstairs,” Vanessa commands her men. “Then stay with him. I’ll be there shortly.”

They drag the limp man away whose head lolls, no fight given.

“You doing okay?” Anastasia touches my arm. “You look like you’re about to pass out.”

“Feel like it too, but I’ll manage.”

“Someone was hiding upstairs and grabbed her. She got out of his hold by the time I managed to lodge a bullet between his eyes.”

She whistles before turning to jog the way she came. “Mikhail, with some encouragement, pointed out the basement door before I knocked him out.” She taps on the door she stops in front of, its broken window blackened with dust and age.

She descends the stairs first, then me, and Vanessa brings up the rear. It’s nearly pitch-black, but Anastasia finds a switch, bathing the hall in a dull, yellow light.

It’s a hallway of six metal doors. The stone wall is cracking, the lights flickering every few steps we take. It’s eery, a chill of death settling on the space making me shiver, bumps sprouting on my arms.

“How do we figure out which one he’s in?”

Vanessa tests the door nearest her and it opens a few inches. “That’s how. Check each handle.”

We spread down the hallway, pulling on each door. It’s the fifth handle I tug on that doesn’t budge. Despite being locked, hope surges through me because if it’s locked it means it can be unlocked and he’s right there.

“Here!”

Anastasia rushes for the door, jamming the key inside. It unlocks with a click and she hauls the door open. I push past her, uncaring about the darkness until Vanessa hauls me back with an arm around my waist and places me beside her, angling to go first.

“I get what you’re feeling, believe me, but we don’t know what’s in there. So before you run headfirst into danger…”

The two enter first, Anastasia reaching on either side of the doorway to search for a switch. In the centre of the room, there’s a large glow—a TV?—lighting up the bars of the cell it sits feet away from.

Anastasia locates the switch and lights the disgusting room up, revealing the flatscreen on the stand in the centre of the room, and the four-by-four cell that Dimitri’s inside.