The Defender

by Donna Grant

  “You’re probably right,” he conceded. “But I would’ve liked to shove another loss in the Saints’ faces.”

  Her gaze intensified. “Another?”

  Lev hid his smile. He’d known that would get her attention. “You heard right.”

  “Tell me more.”

  He had leverage to get information out of her, but he decided to hold off for now. It was a calculated risk, one that he hoped would pay big dividends. “We killed the scientist who developed Ragnarok.”

  Confusion marred her face as she shook her head. “What’s that?”

  “You must not be very high up in the organization if you don’t know about the bioweapon they had developed to sterilize women.”

  Her nostrils flared as shock reverberated from her in waves. “Was the bioweapon actually developed?”

  “Yes. And before you ask, the Saints will never get their hands on it.”

  “You mean you have it?”

  Lev decided to lie. “It was destroyed.”

  Reyna nodded, her gaze on the floor.

  He remembered when he first heard about the bioweapon. He’d been so astounded that he hadn’t wanted to believe the news. He’d chosen to ignore things, but it was Sergei who made them enter the fight, first by helping Mia and Cullen, and then by joining the entire Loughman family.

  Reyna walked to the table and set the gun down before she opened a cabinet and pulled out a bottle of vodka and two shot glasses. Her hands shook slightly as she poured the alcohol into each glass. Without looking at him, she downed her shot and placed the back of her hand against her lips, her eyes closed.

  Lev dropped his arms and made his way to the table. When he finished off his shot, her eyes were locked on him. She once more had her emotions under control. It was the mark of a professional. The more he watched her, the more he suspected that she was CIA. He’d had enough run-ins with them on the docks in Dover to know their look.

  “Why did you leave the CIA?” he asked.

  She poured another round before she met his gaze. “Sometimes, we have no choice but to walk the path before us.”

  He knew the feeling well. He’d done it himself. “You’ve been on this path for some time.”

  “I’ll remain on it until I’m finished.”

  “Doing what?”

  Instead of answering, she drank the shot of vodka. “Who are you working with?”

  “I’m not giving up names. We’ve gotten the notice of the Saints, though. Between the bioweapon, the scientist, and thwarting an attack on us, we’ve delivered three big defeats. And I’m guessing by your phone call earlier that we’re the reason they’re sending you back to the States.”

  “I didn’t get any info. I was only told there was a problem that needed to be dealt with in America.”

  Lev grinned and downed his shot. “That would be us.”

  “You shouldn’t be happy about it. They’ll be relentless in their pursuit to bring you down.”

  He raised a brow. “They?”

  Reyna closed her eyes in frustration as she compressed her lips. When she lifted her lids, there was resolve there. Lev waited for her to make up some excuse as to why she said they instead of we, but to his surprise, she didn’t.

  She pulled out the chair and sank into it with a sigh. Then she poured another drink and tossed it back. She swallowed, squeezing her eyes closed briefly before she slammed the glass down on the table.

  “For five years, I’ve been careful about everything I’ve done and said,” she told him. “Maybe this is a sign I should get out of the game.”

  “Maybe you knew on some level that you could trust me? Or you wanted to.” He sat opposite her and reached for the bottle. He poured vodka into both glasses and set the bottle between them.

  Reyna shrugged. “There are spies within the Saints. I’ve been one before. They send us to others they’re unsure about, those within the organization who have caused someone to look unfavorably on them.”

  “You think I’m one of those spies?”

  “It wouldn’t surprise me. How else would you have known about the assassination last night?”

  He leaned back in his chair and scratched his jaw. “One of my colleagues found something in a chat room.”

  Her brows snapped together. “No. No, no, no. That’s not good.”

  “What?” Lev asked, confused. “Terrorists do that kind of idiocy all the time.”

  She scraped back her chair as she jumped to her feet. “How did you get to Ukraine?”

  “I flew,” he said flatly. “By plane. Under a fake passport and name.”

  Her gaze moved to the floor. “They tracked you. That’s the only explanation.”

  “Hold up,” he said as he got to his feet. “What are you talking about?”

  Brown eyes met his. “The Saints never broadcast their intentions. Never. You were set up.”

  “Shit,” he mumbled.

  “And by not killing you, they must know I’m helping you.”

  Lev looked out one of the windows. “My COM. Did you shut off communications?”

  She shook her head. “And we don’t wear any.”

  He recalled the radio he’d taken from the soldier. He and Reyna were in the middle of nowhere. The only way out was in the car he’d driven down the drive that was most likely being watched.

  “We need to go. Now.”

  She nodded in agreement. Both sprang into action. Lev went for his jacket, hating that he was in evening shoes and not something better to make a run for it through the forest.

  Reyna tossed him a backpack and pointed at the cupboard. He opened the doors and found non-perishable food and bottled water that he hastily threw into the bag. When he turned around, there were four rifles, ten handguns, three knives, and ammunition for each. She was filling another pack with the bullets and nodded at him to do the same.

  As he did, he tossed some of the food into her pack. Then they each grabbed two rifles and split the handguns, with Lev making sure he took his knives.

  “This way,” Reyna said then grabbed her tablet and walked to the back of the cabin.

  He watched as she checked the cameras through the tablet. There wasn’t any sign of anyone. Yet. But both of them knew the Saints were coming.

  “The call this morning was to get your location,” he said.

  Reyna shook her head. “I have it so that my location shows in Kiev.”

  “Are you sure no one followed us last night?”

  “No, I’m not sure of anything anymore. We should wait until dark.”

  He raised a brow. “I wouldn’t suggest that.”

  “We’d have the cover of darkness.”

  “And they’d have night vision.”

  She smiled and pulled something out of her pack.

  He grinned when he saw the night vision goggles. “I still think we should go now. Get out before they even get close. You must have set up a plan if you ever needed to leave quickly.”

  “We need to get to the Baltic Sea.”

  Lev calculated the distance in his head. “That’s nearly seven hundred miles.”

  “Passing into Poland.”

  “And once we’re at the Baltic?”

  Reyna adjusted her backpack as she put it on. “We travel by boat.”

  Lev clenched his fist at the thought of getting on a ship. No matter how many times he’d tried, he got violently seasick. Just what he needed.

  6

  Loughman Ranch

  Texas

  “There’s something wrong,” Callie said to the group before her as they stood in the underground bunker beneath the barn on the Loughman property.

  Her gaze went to the eldest Loughman brother, Wyatt, who she’d fallen in love with. He stood silently, but she knew from experience that while he might look as if he weren’t interested, his mind was working a million miles a minute.

  “Should we call Sergei?” Mia asked.

  Callie looked into Mia’s black eyes and shrugge
d. “I would.”

  Cullen, the youngest of the Loughman brothers, shook his head of dark brown hair. “I disagree. Sergei and Lev have a special bond. If Sergei thinks Lev is in trouble, he’ll go find him.”

  Dr. Kate Donnelly’s gray eyes widened in surprise before she frowned. “As we should all want to go find Lev. He’s one of us.”

  “Of course, he is,” Orrin Loughman said to soothe her, taking her hand in his and giving her a smile. “And we do.”

  It warmed Callie’s heart to see Orrin so happy. He’d taken on the role of father-figure when she realized that her family lacked anything remotely good in them. It was Orrin who had recruited her for the private contract business, Whitehorse. Though none of them could have possibly imagined that it would progress to hunting down a clandestine global organization out to determine who got to have children and who didn’t.

  Each of them knew this was just the first step in the Saints’ plans. It was anyone’s guess what they would do next if they succeeded.

  Callie’s gaze shifted to Owen and his wife Natalie, who had yet to say anything. As the middle brother, Owen usually kept the peace between everyone. Although, thanks to the Saints forcing the family back together, the past had been forgiven, truths had been discovered, and healing had begun.

  “I’ve seen Lev in action,” Owen said to the group, his dark brown eyes sweeping over each of them. “He’s not easily killed.”

  Yuri Markovic, a Russian major general who’d left his country to fight against the Saints, snorted from his chair. His gaze was on the mug of steaming coffee in his hands.

  “Yuri?” Orrin urged.

  The Russian lifted his blue eyes after pouring a healthy dose of vodka into his coffee. “I told you all from the beginning not to send anyone to Ukraine. I said it then, and I still hold to the fact it was a setup.”

  Callie tried not to be offended, or feel like this was somehow her fault, but she couldn’t seem to shake it. “I triple-checked everything. The chatroom and thread were legitimate.”

  “None of that matters,” Natalie said. Her green eyes looked first at Owen and then at the rest of them. “If it was a setup, the Saints played us good. If it wasn’t, then we need to know what went wrong. And, bottom line, we have to discover if Lev is alive.”

  Owen smiled as he kissed his wife’s temple. “You’re exactly right, sweetheart.”

  “If this was a trap by the Saints, then they would’ve made sure we knew Lev was dead,” Wyatt stated.

  Cullen frowned. “You’re assuming they know who all is helping. And that they would’ve figured it out despite Lev traveling under a false name.”

  “They know,” Orrin said, his voice soft but carrying through the bunker.

  Yuri nodded solemnly. “Da.”

  “Even Maks?” Kate asked.

  All eyes turned to Callie. She threw up her hands in frustration and from a growing concern in the pit of her stomach. “I tried to keep track of Maks, but he ditched the tracker I planted on him.”

  “As well as the one I stuck in his pack,” Wyatt added.

  Callie blew out a breath. “I’ve never seen someone become a ghost like Maks.”

  “Where was he going again?” Natalie asked.

  Once more, they looked at Callie. She hated not having answers. “All he said was that he was headed to do a little investigating on his own and that he’d be in touch.”

  “That was two weeks ago,” Owen said.

  Wyatt moved to stand beside Callie. He linked his fingers with hers, giving her the support she needed. “Maks can take care of himself. Trust me on that. Our focus needs to be on Lev.”

  Mia’s lips twisted. “We just said that the Saints probably know each of us. That means they’ll know Lev’s connection to Sergei, regardless of what name Lev flew under.”

  Cullen, Owen, and Wyatt all exchanged a look. It was Cullen who pulled out his phone. “I’ll call Sergei.”

  There were tense seconds until Cullen gave a nod as Sergei answered. It was a quick conversation where Cullen warned the old Russian to be vigilant. Then Sergei asked about Lev.

  “We lost contact with him during the mission,” Cullen told the mob boss.

  Callie turned to her computer and sat down. She had been monitoring news outlets in Ukraine, looking for any sign that the assassination attempt on Denys Stasiuk had either failed or succeeded. Oddly, there had been nothing since she’d lost contact with Lev.

  But all that changed with a click of a button. She stared in shock at the picture of the theatre bathed in red and blue lights as the authorities sent in tactical units.

  “Uh, guys,” she said. In seconds, everyone surrounded her.

  Kate asked, “What are they saying?”

  “It’s Ukrainian,” Yuri said. “They’re talking about a terrorist group who stopped the ballet to make a speech.”

  It was exactly as Callie had read would happen in the chat room on the dark web. Was Yuri right? Had this been a setup? Had they sent Lev to his death?

  Callie didn’t need Yuri to tell her what the reporter was conveying now. It was obvious by the spray of bullets that the authorities were fighting the Saints.

  The gunfire was over quickly. Almost too quickly.

  “Most of the Saints must have already left the theatre,” Orrin said.

  Mia shook her head sadly. “The authorities never stood a chance. They walked into a trap.”

  “I still don’t understand how this helps the Saints,” Kate said. “They went into a theatre and killed someone. They didn’t say they were the Saints, so what do they gain by this?”

  It was Wyatt who said, “Power.”

  “He’s right,” Callie said. “Stasiuk had made quite a bit of traction within his political party against the Saints. The fact that he ignored numerous threats on his life, as well as his family’s, made others realize they should, as well. Stasiuk and those who stood with him believed that they had won against the Saints.”

  Yuri made a sound in the back of his throat. “And Stasiuk discovered tonight what it’s like to walk into a den of vipers.”

  It was easy for them to feel as if they had made headway against the Saints since they’d won a couple of skirmishes, but the simple fact was that the Saints were a global organization.

  They had infiltrated not just governments around the world, but also intelligence organizations and police and military forces. Callie feared that the Saints had been building their infrastructure for decades. How were they, just a dozen people, supposed to stand against that?

  And win?

  As if reading her thoughts, Wyatt put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. They’d just begun their life together. She wanted a future with Wyatt. To grow old together, take trips, get married, possibly have kids. They might not get any of that.

  But if they didn’t stand against the Saints, then who would?

  “Now we know why we lost contact with Lev,” Owen said into the silence.

  Callie sat up straighter when the news camera zoomed in on some paramedics wheeling someone out on a gurney, but the sheet covering the face was all the answer she needed.

  The room went deathly quiet when they heard the reporter say Stasiuk’s name. Each of them knew in that instant that Lev hadn’t been able to stop the assassination. But they had yet to determine what had happened to him.

  “He’d claw his way up from Hell to get back to Sergei,” Cullen said.

  Callie turned her chair to face them. “Sergei will see this.”

  “If he hears from Lev, he’ll let us know,” Orrin stated.

  Mia raised a brow, her lips flattening. “I’m not so sure.”

  “Then we need to remind him we’re working as a team,” Wyatt declared and looked at Cullen.

  Orrin’s youngest rolled his eyes. “Fine. I’ll call him back.”

  “No,” Mia said as she took Cullen’s phone. “I’ll do it.”

  Callie returned her attention to the computer. “Have they said a
nything about other bodies?”

  “Yes,” Yuri replied.

  Owen asked, “Names?”

  Yuri shook his head.

  Callie popped her knuckles and rotated her shoulders. “They’ll be identifying them soon. That means I get to hack in and find out before the rest of the world.”

  “Good luck, baby,” Wyatt whispered before he gave her a quick kiss.

  7

  43 Miles from the Polish border

  Reyna couldn’t remember a longer day. Or one where she was so tense. To her surprise, somewhere between rushing from her cabin into the forest, walking ten miles before hitching a ride in the back of a truck full of manure, and then walking twelve more miles, she had stopped questioning Lev.

  She wouldn’t say that she completely trusted him, but it was close enough. He’d had plenty of chances to kill her, and he hadn’t. That said something—in her mind at least.

  “There,” he said when they reached the edge of the line of trees.

  Across the road was a rundown building that served as a bar in the remote location. Reyna spotted the transport truck. It was covered, which would give them both time to get a little sleep. There was only one problem.

  “We don’t know which way he’s going or when he’s leaving,” she said.

  Lev lifted one shoulder. “Does it matter when he’s leaving?”

  “Yeah,” she said and shot him a flat look. “I’d like to get on the water quickly.”

  Lev’s icy blue gaze slid to her. “Why?”

  “You can’t be that dense.”

  “The Saints know by now that we’re gone. They’ll be looking everywhere for us, especially at the border crossings. Between tonight and tomorrow, they’ll double their lookouts.”

  Reyna blew out a breath. “It’s actually worse than that. There are places people used to be able to cross without going through checkpoints, but both the Ukrainian and Polish governments have installed cameras to catch anyone in the act.”

  “I suspected as much. There is always a way. We just have to find it.”