Thirst of Steel

by Ronie Kendig

  “Remember?” she said, pointing to herself. “Not a stylist.” She looked at his wavy-curly hair. She’d always liked his hair. “You sure?”

  Another firm nod.

  With a breath for courage, she slid her fingers into his hair and aimed the scissors. She tried not to cry or realize how close she had to lean in to be an accomplice to this crime. “Start talking,” she said, far too aware of his proximity, “or I leave you with half a head of hair.”

  With a shink of the blades, the first section fell away. She watched it, feeling like it was a piece of him, not just his hair.

  “They taught me a lesson,” he said quietly.

  She swallowed, surprised that he was actually telling her. “What lesson?”

  “You know the strain.” Was his voice husky?

  Another section cut. She shook her head, forcing herself to keep cutting. “I can’t believe I’m doing this,” she whispered, avoiding his beautiful eyes as she angled the scissors.

  “I feel free already.” He held her gaze, mere inches from his, capturing her attention for a few long seconds. “Keep going.”

  She diverted her gaze back to his hair, noting how dark the strands were against her pale skin. “You, too.”

  “The bruises might seem like I was beaten for days. I wasn’t. Only at the end. It’s the Matin Strain. It’s a terrible curse.”

  She hesitated, scissors half through a chunk of hair. “You don’t believe that—you always told me it was a disorder.”

  “And yet,” he said with a sigh, “I have the strain. A curse that, when not managed through drugs, will leave me vulnerable to hemorrhaging. Painful damage to my tissues. My blood unable to clot.”

  “And the vials Omar gave me help, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “You told me about the strain, but you would never say more than that.” She shook out her hand, flicking off the black hair. “How long have you had it?”

  “All my life,” he said quietly. “It’s ancient. It is said the Nizari Ismailis have sought a cure since the days of King David, when it was placed on our line. A way to free us, to make it possible for us to have children without the strain. For centuries, our line dwindled until the early 1900s, when the infusions were designed. The strain so similarly parallels hemophilia that scientists within the Order applied the advancements in medicine to our cause. It worked. Very well. We’ve grown in number in the last century, but the battle is every day. Every injection.”

  “But you take the infusions. How—”

  “They switched my vials.”

  Mercy paused, looking at him. Her heart thudded, realizing there was something . . . not right. Something missing in this story he told. “Why would they do that?”

  “. . . they wanted to make a point to him,” Omar had said.

  “To weaken me, to make me feel the full effects of the strain, remind me why I should not be fighting against them but with them.”

  As his words settled in, so did a virulent dread. Mercy drew back. Considered his marred stomach and side. Then his eyes.

  Startled by what she saw there, she had an epiphany about what was missing from his words, from this story. Hatred. Anger. Why wasn’t he angry about what they’d done to him?

  “You done?” he asked.

  She twitched and snipped off a few more spots, not thrilled with her handiwork. “It’s not far from a hackjob, so if you hate it, blame yourself.” She tossed the scissors on the table. “But you don’t look like a shaggy dog anymore.”

  He ran a hand over his head. “Better.” He nodded. “Thanks.”

  “Ram,” she said, pulling in a breath as he came to his feet and stood practically nose to nose with her. She traced his ridged brow. The sparked eyes. The olive complexion and stubble. “What happened?”

  “I just told you.”

  “No,” she whispered. “You—”

  His arm slid around her waist and tugged her close.

  Sucking in a breath, Mercy tensed, despite the fiery sensations of her betraying body. “Ra—” She choked on his name, so pleased at his touch, so scared at what she guessed of his plan.

  “It’s okay,” he whispered, angling closer.

  It was? She looked at him, startled to find his gaze on her mouth. She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t understand what was happening. “You’re different.”

  He smirked. “What you always wanted.”

  “No, this is—”

  He caught her mouth with his and pulled her against his chest. Splinters of attraction slipped past her concern. Melted her ability to wonder about his urgency. His hands slid up her back, crushing her against himself. The warmth of his skin on hers. His touch. His strength.

  The kiss went from zero to sixty in a second flat. Mercy curled into him, savoring it. Savoring him. He deepened the kiss, nudging her backward.

  Passion alive, arms around his neck, Mercy had the distinct awareness of him aiming her toward the bed. Her heart thudded wildly. Panic and excitement beat against each other as he lowered her to the mattress. Caught her hand. Extended it over her head.

  “Ram,” she murmured, hating herself for not stopping him. For wanting this, liking that he was stretched over her. He kissed her neck and the line of her throat up to her ear, tickling and teasing. He’d never been willing to go here before. That he was now—

  Clink.

  Ram slowed the kiss. Brought his hands to her sides. He lifted his mouth from hers.

  Her brain emerged from the dense fog—alerted her to the pressure around her wrist.

  He pushed off her, his knee digging into the mattress. Met her gaze with a smoldering one. His face was flushed. His lips red. He kissed her again, this one long and slow. Kissed her jaw. “Sorry, Mercy,” he said, his breath hot against her ear, sending electricity through her. “I have to do this.” And he stood.

  Blinking, swallowing, feeling the rawness of her lips, she looked at him.

  He grabbed a shirt. Threaded his arms through it, determination carved into his rugged features.

  “What . . . ?” Mercy sat up—but her arm yanked backward. She cried out and glanced at the metal pipe that ran down the wall behind the mattress. Found her wrist handcuffed to it. She yanked at it. “Ram. What?” She whipped back around to find him lifting a bag and his jacket. “Ram!”

  Head down, he strode out of the warehouse. Out of her view. Her life.

  Again.

  48

  — OUTSIDE MADONA, LATVIA —

  Tzivia could not tell what had happened, but when Tox stepped through the door, he had a confidence that hadn’t been there a moment ago. Nerves frayed, she considered those inside the home. Igor was still huddled with Yefim and another man, their Russian flying so fast, she barely caught a few words. But what she heard made her worry.

  Towering beside her, Tox watched as well.

  She skated her gaze to the other soldiers. “They want to blow it,” she mumbled.

  “Let them.”

  She snapped her eyes to his.

  His expression hardened. “Where does my help come from?”

  She scowled. That . . . was a Bible verse, right? Hadn’t Dr. Cathey said it dozens of times? But how did it end? Where does my help come from? It comes from . . . the hills. Hills? What?

  No, who.

  Through the sheer curtains and past the cement wall, she eyed the sloping ridgeline. The spine was hidden because of the home’s limited view. Was someone up there? Who?

  Who else would bolster Tox’s confidence? His team.

  “No,” she hissed.

  He frowned.

  “If they screw this up and my father dies—”

  “Your father isn’t who he says he is,” Tox growled.

  Confusion raked her. “What do you mean?”

  Tox glanced around. “It’s taken too long, Tzivia. If they haven’t killed him already, then—”

  “He’s been beaten and tortured!”

  “And yet no broken bones, n
o internal bleeding.”

  “What are you saying? That he’s doing this to himself? To me?” She shoved him backward with a growl. “How dare you!”

  Tox stumbled, whacking his head on a clock that hung on the wall. He grimaced and cupped his head. Scowling at it, he stilled. Straightened.

  “What’re you doing?” She eyed the carved wooden clock with a great bird atop it. Inside, barely visible, the figures of a man and maiden— “The clock.” There’d been one—

  “What about it?” barked Igor as he stomped toward them.

  Tox shifted behind the man and gave the slightest shake of his head.

  “I—nothing,” she said. “I just noticed it has the wrong time.”

  Igor growled. “Find the opening, or your father dies!”

  Tzivia had grown numb to their threats, but it still made her pulse race. A little. “If Abidaoud kills my father, I stop looking. Will he risk that?”

  “We are two days from Elah,” Igor said with a shrug. “I think it’s too late already.” He put the phone to his ear, then tensed as the person on the other end answered. Soon, he nodded. “Nothing.” His gaze struck Tzivia.

  A bolt of adrenaline erased her numbness. Tzivia lifted her chin, unable to breathe.

  “I think we have trouble,” Tox said in a calm but clear voice.

  Igor turned as shots erupted outside. Amid the chaos that arose in the house, men darting to the windows to steal glances outside, Tzivia noticed one thing: Tox. He hadn’t been taken off guard. Hadn’t been surprised.

  He’d anticipated it.

  It wasn’t that he’d anticipated. He’d just known. Crazy, but when you’ve been in combat and seen evil work its wiles in men, a soldier had a sense for things.

  Okay, that and the Morse code sent via light flashes that warned of a rogue element. That element must’ve seen their communication and chosen to engage. When he saw the first of Nur’s perimeter guards eat lead, Tox knew.

  He shifted to Tzivia, her gaze skipping around the room and landing on his with panic. “Tzi—”

  “No!” She gripped his forearm and held tight, terror rimming her brown eyes. “Wraith can’t do this. My fa—”

  “Not my guys,” he whispered, pulling her aside and positioning himself to face the door. He monitored the entrance. Waiting, expecting bullets to pepper the wall so sunlight could poke into the room.

  “What trouble?” Yefim asked, glancing back at them with suspicion.

  “You idiot,” Igor called. “Get away from the—”

  Crack!

  The curtain fluttered. Yefim stumbled back.

  In the split second the man had been shot, Tox spun toward Tzivia, feeling the splat of warm blood as he did. He curled around her, pushing her to the floor in a crouch.

  “Shooter on the ridge!” someone shouted outside.

  Tox didn’t know who was firing, but they weren’t his guys. And that worried him, because he could be a target just like the rest. “Stay down,” he hissed into her ear, checking his six. Twelve. Then the door.

  Hands pawed at him. “Get up, you dog! This is your doing.”

  Tox was thrown forward by a forceful shove. Two guards leapt in, wrangling his arms. “What’re you doing?” he demanded. “There’s a sniper—”

  “Yes,” Igor growled. “And you’re going to be my shield getting out of here.”

  Planting his foot, Tox wheeled. Drove his elbow back.

  A rifle butt flew at his head. Nailed his temple. The explosion of pain slowed his thinking, muddied his response. Made him stumble. “Wait,” he groused, holding a hand to his temple. “I—I don’t know who’s shooting. If they—”

  “Either way,” Igor said, “I don’t lose. If they’re not yours, you die first. If they are, they let you live.”

  “You don’t want to do that,” Tzivia said. “You need To—Kazimir alive.”

  “Do we?” Igor mused, arching an eyebrow. “Why’s that?”

  In that second, Tox knew what she was going to do. “No.” His heart thudded. “Tzivia.”

  “He knows where the sword piece is.”

  “I don’t,” he growled, wondering if there was any piece of Tzivia Khalon left that had a conscience.

  “The clock!” she said quickly.

  Igor hesitated. Looked at the elaborate timepiece on the wall. “What about it?”

  “There’s one just like in Dr. Cathey’s house.”

  “So?”

  “I . . . I don’t know,” Tzivia conceded, then indicated Tox. “But he does.”

  “Shooting stopped,” one of the guards called. “Incoming chopper!”

  When Igor’s phone dinged, he glanced at the screen. Grunted. “The boss is here.”

  Nur. This just couldn’t get any worse. Tox glowered at Tzivia, before he was shoved toward the door, his back needled with a muzzle.

  “Let’s go.” Igor guided him out the porch, then down the steps, all while making good on his promise to use Tox as a shield.

  Dirt and rocks crunched beneath his boots as they forced him into the fading afternoon light. A weight knocked into him—Tzivia. She’d been pushed. Caught his arm for balance.

  “I’m surprised you haven’t killed one of them yet,” Tox gritted.

  “I’d love to, but they have my father.”

  But did they?

  A chopper swung in across the skyline, racing fast and hard ahead of another slower, larger helicopter. The distinctive coaxial rotor system helped Tox identify the first bird as the Kamov Ka-50 “Black Shark.” The single-seater Russian attack chopper swooped across the valley floor, a comparatively quiet bird compared to the Mil Mi-8 bringing up the rear.

  Oh no. No no no.

  Tox stopped. Didn’t care about the crack against his skull. Locked onto that helo. Prayed that what he expected to happen wouldn’t. God, please—

  The Black Shark fired a cannon at the mountain where Wraith had been holed up. Another quickly followed. Then another.

  Frozen in horror, Tox could do nothing in the several heartbeats that crashed against his ribs as the incendiary rounds pummeled the mountain. The very spot from which the mirrored messages had been telegraphed. The same spot where Wraith lay in wait.

  Boom!

  He sucked in a breath as fire and black smoke shot into the sky.

  Boom! Boom!

  His knees buckled as the green hillside became an inferno. “No,” he whispered. No way could anyone survive that.

  Exultant shouts went up from Nur’s men. Tox stared hard, begging for a glint. A glimmer. Any sign that his men hadn’t just been blown up. His limbs took on the weight of those lives, the hopes, the dreams, the loves, the losses. He couldn’t move. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t—

  They’d moved. They’d seen the chopper and taken off running. Right?

  Please. God.

  Those were the best men he’d ever known. Men in love with their lives as protectors of innocents, of their families.

  Cell. Thor. Runt. Maangi.

  He was going to be sick.

  “Kazimir!” Tzivia pointed to something.

  He shifted, glanced back—wind and dust swirled in a vortex of agitated elements stirred up by the landing Russian Mi-8. Dirt peppered his eyes and face. He turned to shield himself—

  A fist came at him.

  He tensed but had no time to protect his face. The punch landed. Connected. Spun him to the side. His legs, still heavy with the adrenaline of watching his team die, went rubbery. He landed on a knee. Touched the ground to catch himself. It took only a second to clear his head. Let the deaths of his men be the ignition source.

  Grief-fueled anger shoved him upward. Awareness flared—five muzzles aimed at him. He stifled his response. Lifted his hands. Eyes connected with the man who had punched him.

  Nur Abidaoud wiped his bloody hand with a cloth. “You have a hard head, Mr. Rybakov.” His expression morphed to a sneer. “Or should I say, Mr. Russell?”

  49

&nbs
p; — OUTSIDE MADONA, LATVIA —

  “Did you seriously think we didn’t know?” Nur complained.

  After months of mission success and with the end in sight, Tox had failed two days before the final confrontation. His gaze hit the still-burning mountain, praying his ineptitude hadn’t cost his men their lives.

  “You are both fools to think we would be so easily cowed by your machinations,” Nur said.

  “I told you he wasn’t Rybakov,” Tzivia growled, “but you wouldn’t listen!”

  “It’s interesting how flimsy loyalty is to Americans.”

  “Just as flimsy as those working for you,” Tox said, but the shame was his own. He had tried to work the deals to keep them both protected, provide just enough information to throw off suspicion but not endanger either of them.

  “What was your goal?” Nur asked with a smirk. “To kill me?” He shook his head. “No, had that been your objective, you would’ve tried long before now.”

  Tox shifted his gaze to the Mi-8, where a man hopped out and yanked another, older man out of the bird. The second man stumbled, collapsing to his knees. He cried out. With a fierce scowl, the first hauled him up, spinning him around.

  Tox tensed. Yared Khalon.

  With a primal cry, Tzivia surged toward her father.

  “Nyet,” a guard snapped, jerking her back.

  But Tox saw something he wasn’t sure how to translate. How to read. The man dragging Mr. Khalon forward had lost his vigor, his ferocity.

  Tzivia came off her feet, writhing for her father. “Abba!”

  Nur nodded, pleased with this display. “I thought it good to remind you what you are fighting for.”

  “It’s a ruse, Tzivia,” Tox said. “Your father’s not a captive.”

  Wearing a smile that made even Tox’s stomach squeeze, Nur turned to Yefim, who handed him a gun. With a flourish, Nur turned and fired. Right at Mr. Khalon. Watching the old man wail and drop, cradling his leg, Tox flinched.

  In a rage, Tzivia jerked so violently she freed herself. “Augh!” she screamed, pitching herself at Nur.

  Four guards tackled her.

  Nur made a show of checking the magazine. “Ah, plenty more. Shall I aim a little higher this time?” He pointed the gun at Khalon’s temple.