by Anna Zaires
“One mistake?” My voice cracks. “Is that what they’re calling brutal assault now?”
Obenko sighs again, like I’m being unreasonable. “What happened with you was an isolated incident,” he says patiently. “It was the one and only time he lost control like that. I understand that it was a traumatic experience for you, but he’s an asset to our agency and our country. The best we could do was relocate him away from you—and make sure you could move past it.”
“By telling me that he was dead? That you had him assassinated?”
Obenko nods. “It was for your own good. That way you could forget him and move forward.”
“You mean, be of use to UUR.”
Obenko doesn’t respond, and I know that’s exactly what he means. In his mind, I’m not a person. I’m a pawn on a chessboard—one that could function either as an asset or a liability.
“Does Misha know?” I ask, staring at the man I’d once looked up to. “Does he know I’m his sister?”
Obenko hesitates, then says, “Yes, Misha knows. He remembered you from the orphanage, so we had no choice but to tell him about you. He also knows that you turned on us—that whatever happened to you at Esguerra’s compound made you betray your own country.”
My nails dig into my palms. “That’s a lie. I didn’t betray you.”
“Then why did you follow me? Why did you slip me this?” Obenko places his hand on the table and uncurls his fist to show me the GPS chip I planted in his phone.
After a moment of consideration, I decide I have nothing to lose by telling the truth. I’m already a liability in Obenko’s eyes. “Because I wanted to see Misha one last time,” I say evenly. “Because I couldn’t do this anymore.”
“So you were going to walk away.” Obenko gives me an assessing look. “You know, I suspected that might be the case. You weren’t the same after you came back.”
I shrug, not about to explain about my complex relationship with Lucas and my inability to take on another “assignment.” Whatever guilt I’d felt at abandoning UUR is gone, vaporized by the crushing blow of Obenko’s betrayal and Misha’s eager abandonment of the life I fought so hard to give him.
I’ve spent eleven years protecting my brother, only to find out he’s going to end up like me.
I suppose I should be devastated, but the pain is still distant, held at bay by a cold numbness that overpowers everything, even my fury.
“I want to talk to him,” I say to Obenko. “I want to talk to Misha.”
He studies me for a moment, then slowly shakes his head. “No, Yulia. You’ll only confuse the boy. He’s where he needs to be, mentally and emotionally, and whatever you plan to tell him will only make it harder for him. I don’t think you want that.”
My upper lip curls. “So he doesn’t know what Kirill did or how you manipulated me all those years.”
Obenko doesn’t blink. “What Misha knows is that Kirill Ivanovich dedicated his life to this country, just like all of us at UUR—and that you left Misha when he was a baby. Everything else is a matter of opinion.”
“Of course it is.” I should be enraged that my brother believes I’m a traitor who abandoned him in the orphanage, but it’s too much to absorb all at once. It feels like this is happening to someone else, like I’m watching a movie rather than living it. “So what will his opinion be of my disappearance?”
Obenko sighs. “Yulia…”
“Just tell me.”
“You will have escaped,” Obenko says. “Disappeared to South America to be with your lover.”
“Ah, yes. My lover, of course.” I think of Lucas and the way we parted, and sharp agony rips through me. “So when exactly am I going to make my grand escape?” I manage to say. “Today? Tomorrow?”
“It doesn’t have to be this way, Yulia.” There’s genuine regret in Obenko’s eyes. “It’s not too late. We can start over and forget all this. If you prove yourself—”
“Prove myself?” I can’t hold back a burst of bitter laughter. “By doing what? Fucking a few more men for you?”
Obenko’s hand flexes on the table, but his tone remains unruffled. “By carrying out your assignment. You know how important what we do is—”
“Yes, I do.” My mouth twists. “So important that you’d let a rapist train underage girls. So important that you’d lie, murder, and manipulate everyone… even your own adoptive nephew.”
Obenko’s gaze hardens, and he gets up. “Suit yourself,” he says. “You have until tomorrow morning. If you decide to do the right thing, let me know.”
He walks out of the room, and I remain at the table, listening to the sound of his departing footsteps.
* * *
After about an hour, Mateyenko comes in to unlock my handcuffs and bring me to a windowless room that resembles a cell. It has a narrow cot with a thin blanket, a metal toilet without a lid, and a small rusted sink.
“Where is this place?” I ask, but the senior agent doesn’t respond. He just steps out and locks the door behind him, leaving me alone.
I wait for a few minutes to make sure he doesn’t return, and then I use the toilet and wash my hands with the rusty water trickling from the faucet in the sink. I also consider drinking some of that water to quench my thirst, but decide against it.
I’d rather not spend my last night puking my guts out.
I walk over to the cot and lie down, staring at the ceiling. I know I won’t be able to fall asleep, so I don’t even try. My mind spins and whirls, cycling between bitter rage and numb despair. Three facts repeat over and over:
Kirill is alive and training my brother to be a spy.
My brother has been fed a bunch of lies about me.
I will die tomorrow unless I agree to work for UUR.
There’s nothing I can do about the first two problems, but the third one is within my control—if Obenko is to be believed, at least. Theoretically, I could agree to carry out my assignment, and if I prove myself, all will be forgiven.
I could also promise to carry out the assignment, but run instead.
It’s a tantalizing idea, except it won’t be easy. I admitted to wanting to disappear, so if they do decide to let me out into the field, I’ll be kept under close observation. They might even put some kind of trackers on me, the way Lucas planned to.
My despair gives way to bitter amusement. It seems I’m destined to be a prisoner one way or another.
A shiver rattles my body, and I realize I’m cold again, my hands and feet frozen and stiff. Rolling up into a small ball, I pull the blanket over my head and pretend I’m in a cocoon where nothing bad can ever touch me, where I can sleep and dream of a different life—a life where Lucas looks at me the way he did that last morning before his trip, and I don’t have to leave.
A familiar pain pierces my chest, and I close my eyes, letting the memories come. Our relationship had been wrong in so many ways, yet there had been so much right about it too. And now… now none of the wrongness matters.
All I’m left with are the memories and a potent, impossible longing to see him one last time before I die.
* * *
The blanket is pulled off me, and strong hands tug at my underwear, tearing it off as my dress is flipped up. A heavy male body presses me down, and my wrists are pinned above my head. At first, I think I’m dreaming of Lucas, but then I smell it.
Cologne.
Lucas never wears cologne.
My eyes snap open on a surge of panic, and a hoarse scream bursts from my throat—a scream that’s instantly muffled by a large palm over my mouth.
“Quiet now,” Kirill whispers as I writhe hysterically, trying to throw him off. “We don’t want to disturb anyone, do we?”
His hand over my mouth is crushing my jaw, and his other hand is squeezing my wrists so hard I feel my bones grinding against one another. With his legs pinning mine to the bed, I can’t move or kick, and nauseating terror rips through me as I feel his erection rubbing against my bare leg.
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“We’re going to have a little fun,” he says, his dark eyes gleaming with cruel excitement. “For old times’ sake.”
And forcing his knee between my legs, he lowers his head.
22
Lucas
I raise my fist, signaling for Diego and Eduardo to stop as I peer through my night vision goggles at the building in front of us. For a black site, it’s surprisingly small—just a ramshackle one-story house in a heavily wooded rural area.
“Are you sure this is the place?” Diego whispers, crouching next to me. “It doesn’t look like much.”
“I’m guessing most of it is underground,” I say, keeping my voice low. “I see two SUVs in the shed in the back, and I don’t think Ukrainian villagers drive SUVs.”
We left our own car in the woods a half-mile away to scope out the location and figure out our plan of action. Whatever we do, we need to be quick and discreet, so we can be out of the country before UUR realizes we were here. Thanks to Peter Sokolov’s contacts, we landed at a private airport undetected, and we have to be able to leave the same way.
“Go around the back and keep an eye on the place from there,” I tell Eduardo, who has come up behind Diego. “I’m going to try to hack into their computers remotely.”
He nods and disappears into the bushes, and I take out the device I brought with me. One of the benefits of working with Esguerra is having access to cutting-edge military intelligence technology—like this remote data skimmer.
Opening my laptop, I sync it with the device and tell Diego, “Good news: we’re within range. Now we just need to let the hacking program do its magic.”
It takes more than an hour to break through the firewalls, but gradually, my screen fills with all kinds of data, including blueprints of the house and a live video feed of a dimly lit hallway.
“Is that from inside their building?” Diego asks, looking over my shoulder.
“You bet,” I say, watching as two men walk past the camera. One of them looks unusually young, barely a teenager, which throws me for a moment—until I remember that UUR is in the habit of recruiting children.
I click on the next video feed and see what looks like an interrogation room. It’s empty except for a metal table and two chairs. Next, I access a camera in what must be a security room. There’s one heavily armed man sitting there in front of a row of computers. I click to the next feed, which shows yet another hallway, and several more feeds that reveal cell-like rooms. To my disappointment, all those rooms are empty.
This facility must not be heavily used.
I click through a few more camera feeds, comparing the rooms I see to the blueprints on my screen, and jot down notes on how everything is positioned. In the process, I come across two more men—one that’s built like a heavyweight wrestling champion and a leaner one who appears to be in his forties.
“Only five agents so far, and one of them is a kid,” Diego says over my shoulder. “If that’s all, we might be able to take them.”
“Right.” I click through a few more feeds, making notes on the interior of each room, and pause when I come back to one of the empty cells—or at least a cell I’d thought empty before. Now I see I was wrong: there’s a small mound on a cot covered by a blanket.
“Is that—”
“Yes, looks like they have a prisoner there,” I say, peering at the grainy feed. It’s definitely a person-sized mound; I should’ve noticed it the first time. “Hold on, let me see if I can get a clearer image.”
Activating the hacking program’s remote control feature, I isolate the portion of surveillance mechanism that controls the camera in that room. Carefully, I angle it so it’s pointed directly at the cot. The person, whoever it is, is unmoving, as if passed out or asleep.
“Okay, so six people,” Diego says, “if we count this prisoner as a threat. Pretty decent odds, especially if we catch them by surprise.”
“Yes, I think so,” I say, clicking over to the next image. Originally, I planned for us to just gather data and leave, but I can’t pass up this opportunity. It’s possible that one of these agents knows Yulia’s whereabouts. My ribs choose that moment to twinge with pain, but I ignore the dull ache.
Even with me injured, we should be able to take five or six opponents.
Turning on my earpiece, I say, “Eduardo, I need you to plant some explosives on the northwest and southwest corners of the house. Use enough to take down the walls but not destroy the whole house. We want to capture as many of them alive as we can.”
“Got it,” Eduardo replies, and I turn to glance at Diego.
“We’re going in right after the first blast,” I say. “Get ready.”
He nods, taking out his M16, and I turn my attention back to the computer. Within a minute, the hacking program takes control of the surveillance feeds outside, replacing the image of Eduardo stealthily approaching the house with a nonthreatening view of night-darkened trees and bushes.
Now we just need Eduardo to set the charges.
As we wait for that, I check all the internal video feeds again. On the hallway feed, I see one of the men walk toward the cell with the prisoner. It’s the agent who’s built like a wrestler, alone this time. With mild interest, I watch him enter the cell, place his gun in the sink on the other side of the room, and step toward the covered figure on the cot. He bends over it and, to my surprise, unzips his jeans.
What the fuck? My attention sharpens as he pulls the blanket off the figure—which I now see is female—and flips up her dress. With the way he’s standing, the camera doesn’t allow me to see much of the prisoner, yet my chest tightens with anxious premonition.
“Kent?” Diego says, but I’m not listening to him. All my attention is on the computer screen as I frantically work to angle the camera.
The man straddles the prisoner and grabs her wrists—thin, delicate wrists that look impossibly breakable in his bear-like grasp. The camera tilts, angling to the left, and I see tangled blond hair and a beautiful pale face.
My heart stops for a split second; then feral fury blasts through me.
Yulia.
She’s here—and she’s being attacked.
23
Yulia
Kirill’s breath is hot and fetid on my face, and his massive bulk is like a mountain on top of me, crushing me into the cot. My insides heave with horror and disgust, and I feel my mind sliding toward the dark place where I don’t exist and can’t feel this.
No. With stark clarity, I know that if I go there, I’m lost. I’ll never emerge from that darkness. I have to stay conscious. I have to fight.
I can’t let him destroy me again.
Suppressing my instinctive inclination to struggle, I let myself go limp, my wrists relaxing in Kirill’s brutal grip. I don’t react as he drags his tongue over my cheek, and I don’t tense as he parts my legs, settling heavily between them. He needs to think me dazed and tamed.
It’s my only chance.
I feel his cock, hard against my bare thigh, and nausea rises in my throat, my long-ago meal threatening to come up. Just a second longer, I tell myself, keeping my muscles relaxed. Don’t rush it. Wait for the right moment.
The right moment arrives when he shifts on top of me and his face ends up directly over mine. I peer at him through a tiny crack between my eyelids, and when he lowers one hand to grab my breast, I strike.
With all my strength, I jerk my head up, smashing my forehead straight into his nose.
Blood spurts everywhere as Kirill recoils with a startled shout. Any other man would’ve clutched his broken nose, but he just rears up, snarling, “Bitch!” and smashes his fist into my jaw.
My head whips to the side, the blast of pain stunning me for a second. I see stars at the edge of my vision and taste coppery blood. But Kirill is not done with me yet.
“Fucking bitch!” The next blow is to my stomach, his fist like a wrecking ball hitting my kidney. “Always thought yourself too good for me, did you?”
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I can’t reply; I can only wheeze through the agony as I curl up to protect myself. He let go of my wrists to hit me, I realize dazedly, and as he raises his fist again, I twist my upper body to the side. His fist grazes my cheekbone instead of shattering it as he’d likely intended, but my ears still ring from the blow. I twist again, trying to throw him off, but his lower body is like a boulder on top of me.
Fight, Yulia, fight. The words are like a desperate chant in my mind. I strike upward with my fist and manage to hit his jaw, but his eyes just glitter brighter as he catches my wrists again. I can see the rage and madness in their dark depths, and I know I won’t walk away from this alive.
“You’re going to pay for that,” he says in a low, guttural hiss, and I feel his hairy balls on my thigh as he forces my legs wider, his fingers cutting off all blood flow to my hands. His cock presses against my entrance, and I scream, bracing for the inevitable horror of violation.
Boom!
For a moment, I’m sure that he hit me again, that the deafening noise is my facial bones cracking, but the dust and plaster raining down on me dispel that impression. Kirill jumps off me with a curse, his cock sticking out of his unzipped pants, and staggers back a couple of feet as another explosion shakes the room.
Seizing the chance, I roll off the cot and scramble to my feet, ignoring the throbbing pain in my face and side. There is a sharp crackle of gunfire above us. Kirill freezes in place, his gaze swinging madly between me and the door. He has to realize the facility is being attacked, and I feel his hatred for me warring with his sense of duty. He should be out there, defending his colleagues, but what he really wants is to make me suffer.
The latter impulse seems to win out.
“You fucking traitor,” he grits out, the veins in his forehead bulging, and then he steps toward me, his fist raised for a blow.