Page 102 of Filthy Little Fix

"With me," I say, and he obeys with a clouded gaze. Even more than I remember, he doesn't hide it now. He looks at me as one would look at a god.

The silence is already broken. I pull a pistol from its holster.

I tap my earpiece. "Dmitry. The route through the back is compromised. Give me the alternative."

My brother's voice answers instantly, calm. "North sector. Loading Dock 3. It leads to a maneuvering yard. The containment team is already moving there. It's your only way out."

I turn to my men, who are already positioning themselves at the broken door.

"Yury, Abram," I call out. "Sal is your shield." I ignore Sal's low cry. Abram presses his arm firmly to keep him still. I look at Luca. "The boy. You've got him." I grab Nyx's arm, who is still staring at me with those feverish eyes, and push him towards Luca. "Don't let anything get near him. And keep him on his feet."

Luca nods, immediately placing himself between Nyx and the door.

"I'll clear the way," I say. "Hold formation. Move!"

We don't take three steps out of the room before the first Malakov guards appear at the end of the hall, shouting orders.

There's no time for careful aim. It's suppressive fire. The sound of my shots and my men's echoes off the concrete, deafening. Splinters of the wall fly past my face. I duck behind a metal pillar, reloading.

"Cover!" I yell, as Luca pulls Nyx behind a container.

I see more men arriving from the east junction. We're outnumbered, cornered at the back of their territory. Exactly where I didn't want to be.

But now, with Nyx behind me, the fury is fuel.

"Luca, on my signal, suppressive fire on the east junction," I say over the gunfire, through the comm. "I'm advancing on the left."

He responds with a burst of shots. It's my signal.

I break from cover, running low. Every meter towards the north dock is bought with bullets and blood.

One of Malakov's men, who was rising to shoot, falls with two holes in his chest from my bullets. But there are too many of them. They keep coming, using the mess of machinery and containers like a maze.

I dive behind a rusty forklift. Enemy bullets chip away at the metal near my head. Luca crawls to the cover beside me, pullingNyx with him. Across the hall, I see Yury and Abram exchanging fire, using a terrified Sal as a quivering human shield.

We're pinned down. Cornered. For every man we take down, two more seem to emerge from the shadows.

"Dmitry," I call into the comm. "I need suppression on the central sector. Use the snipers."

Dmitry's response is immediate. "Understood."

A dry crack comes from outside, from above. It tears through the air. One of the skylight glass panels in the warehouse ceiling explodes in a shower of shards. The Malakov guard who was on the catwalk, pinning us down with heavy fire, disappears in a red mist, falling like a doll to the floor below.

The Malakov men stop shooting for a second, confused, looking up at the ceiling, trying to understand where that shot came from.

Three more cracks from outside. Cries of pain. The west cargo door goes silent.

It's the window we needed. A moment of hesitation from the enemy.

"Now!" I roar to my team. "Move!"

I break from cover first, shooting at anything that moves. Luca follows me with a firm hand on Nyx's back, pushing him forward while firing with the other. Yury and Abram provide cover, dragging Sal with them.

We run through the open area. Bullets buzz from all sides, but the enemy fire is sporadic, disorganized. They're afraid of the ghost on the roof.

We reach a new line of cover, behind a stack of wooden pallets. The corrugated door of Loading Dock 3 is just twenty meters away. So close.

Alexei Malakov's remaining men start to regroup. They're furious.