The storage facility looks exactly like our intelligence suggested it would, with a chain-link fence, razor wire, and industrial buildings sprawling across several acres of cracked asphalt. Yet the moment I step inside the main warehouse, unease crawls up my spine because something is fundamentally wrong with this picture.
It’s too quiet. It’s not the kind of quiet that comes from good noise discipline or professional operations, but the hollow silence of a place that’s been abandoned for months or years. The air smells like dust and rust and old motor oil, though there’s no trace of recent human occupation. There’s no cigarette smoke, no food odors, and no lingering scent of fear or sweat that always accompanies a hostage situation.
I speak into my comm while scanning the empty space around me. “Alpha team, report.”
Dmitri’s voice crackles back through the radio. “East wing clear. Nothing but empty storage units and debris.”
“Beta team?”
“West wing clear. Found some old furniture and shipping crates, but no signs of recent activity.”
Maksim appears at my shoulder with his weapon trained on the shadows between support columns. “This doesn’t feel right.”
I nod without taking my attention off the warehouse interior because every instinct I’ve developed over fifteen years in this business is screaming that we’ve been led into a trap, though not the kind I was expecting. This isn’t an ambush waiting to happen but misdirection designed to waste our time and resources…unless it’s more than that. I recall the last trap he set for us, springing it once we were in a vulnerable position, and having his marksmen fire on us. This feels delayed, not just like a delay.
Not ignoring my instincts, but pressing on with business for the moment, I say, “Gamma team, status report.”
A voice answers a moment later. “The basement level clear. We found what looks like old surveillance equipment, but it’s been offline for a long time.”
I key my comm again. “Delta team, talk to me.”
Silence stretches through the radio frequency, followed by more silence that feels ominous. “Delta team, respond.”
Antov’s voice cuts through the interference, tight with urgency. “It’s dead here, but I have a bad feeli—” The transmission cuts off just as a distant explosion rocks the ground beneath my feet, and the sound rolls across the industrial complex like thunder, followed immediately by a wail of car alarms and the distinct crackle of burning debris.
I’m already running toward the exit before I finish speaking. “Delta team, respond. Pavel, what’s your status?”
Raw, agonized screams that turn my stomach and send adrenaline flooding through my system echo through my earpiece while someone shouts about structural collapse. In the background, I hear the roar of flames and the groan of twisted metal that tells me we’ve lost people.
I sprint outside and immediately see the black smoke rising from what used to be the south entrance to the complex. The section of the building that housed Delta team’s entry point is partially collapsed, with debris scattered across a hundred-yard radius.
I grab Pavel, from the Gamma team, by the shoulder as he stumbles away from the destruction with blood streaming from a cut across his forehead. “How many?”
He looks at me with a stunned expression. “There were four men on the Delta team, all inside when it went off. We got three out, but Sergei…” He shakes his head. “Didn’t make it.”
The words strike me like bullets to the chest because Sergei Volkov was twenty-three years old, married for six months, with a baby daughter on the way. Now he’s gone because I followed false intelligence into a carefully orchestrated trap.
Dmitri approaches with a tablet in his hands and a grim expression. “Sir, we’ve detected drone surveillance over the blast site. Someone’s been watching our response.”
I grab the tablet and study the real-time feed. “How long has it been active?”
“At least twenty minutes and maybe longer.”
“Can you trace the signal?”
“I have our tech people working on it, boss. The drone’s transmitting to a relay station about two miles southeast of here, but the actual control signal is coming from…” He pauses to check his readings. “A warehouse complex approximately one mile from our current position.”
Maksim leans over my shoulder to look at the screen. “Show me the exact coordinates.”
The tech specialist brings up a satellite map with GPS markers indicating the drone’s flight path and control signal origin, and the moment I see the location, recognition strikes me like a fist to the gut.
It’s the same building where we found Yaraslov’s body ten years ago. The same concrete floor where my brother bled out while Vadim and his people made their escape, with the same loading dock where I knelt beside his corpse and swore an oath of vengeance that shaped every decision I’ve made since.
As I stare at the screen, it fuzzes out before a message appears: Plan B.
“He knows his first attempt failed, so he’s…inviting me to the fallback location,” I say softly.
Maksim grunts after reading the message. “Bastard always did like a fallback plan.”
I nod and hand the tablet back to Dmitri before turning toward our vehicles while calculating our tactical options. “How many men do we have operational?”
Maksim spends a moment check in with the team through the headsets before answering. “Twelve.”
“Weapons and equipment status?”
After another minute, he says, “Full tactical load, minus whatever we lost in the explosion.”
It’s not enough because against a prepared position with unknown numbers of defenders, twelve men is barely adequate for reconnaissance, let alone a full assault. The smart play would be to call for backup, wait for additional teams to arrive, and conduct proper surveillance before committing to action, but smart isn’t an option when every minute we spend regrouping is another minute Sabrina remains in Vadim’s hands.
I check my weapon and adjust my tactical vest. “Maksim, load everyone who can still fight into the vehicles. We’re moving now.”
He doesn’t argue, which tells me he understands the calculus as well as I do. “No backup? No additional support?”
“No time. If we wait for reinforcements, she’ll be dead before they arrive. Call for them, but they’ll either be cleaning up behind us…or Vadim.”
He scowls. “What if it’s another trap?”
Part of me thinks it is, but I can’t wait. “We’ll deal with it when we get there.”
I climb into the passenger seat of the lead vehicle while Maksim coordinates the rapid deployment of our remaining personnel, and through the windshield, I see smoke still rising from the destroyed warehouse. I think of Sergei and vow to avenge him.
As we speed away from the storage facility toward the real location where Sabrina is being held moments later, I force myself to think like the predator I was before I started.
Maksim navigates through industrial streets toward our destination. “ETA six minutes.”
Six minutes to cover the distance between where we are and where Sabrina is being held, to plan an assault against unknown defensive positions, and figure out how to extract her safely from whatever death trap Vadim has prepared.
“What do we know about the target building?”
Maksim glances at me while taking a sharp turn. “Warehouse complex, multiple entrances, good sight lines for defensive positions. Three stories, reinforced concrete construction.”
“The same building where—”
“Yeah. Same building.”
I close my eyes and reconstruct the layout from memory because I’ve been to this warehouse more times than I can count over the past ten years. There’s a loading dock on the east side, office complex on the second floor, warehouse space occupying most of the ground level, and multiple stairwells providing access between floors with plenty of places to establish chokepoints or fallback positions. It’s a defender’s paradise and an attacker’s nightmare.
“Approach vector?”
“Multiple options. We could split the team and hit from different angles or concentrate our force on a single entry point.”
I consider the tactical options. We don’t have time for splitting our forces. “Single entry point. We hit fast and hard through the main loading dock. No subtlety or complex coordination. Just overwhelming violence applied with surgical precision.”
He grimaces. “That’s a hell of a risk.”
I sound calmer than I feel. “Everything about this is a risk. At least this way, we control the variables.”
My phone chimes, indicating an incoming call from an unknown number, and I answer without hesitation because I know exactly who it will be.
Vadim’s voice is smooth and conversational, like we’re old friends catching up after a long absence. “Nikandr, I’m disappointed you escaped the storage facility.”
Rage builds in my chest like pressure in a boiler, but I keep my voice level though I don’t engage in the conversation he seems to want. “Where is she?”
“Safe for now. She’s not quite what I expected. She’s much more spirited than her photographs suggested, though not half as interesting as Irina, who is here with me now.”
I absorb that information but don’t respond. He wants to unsettle me or distract me with the temptation of getting revenge. My focus remains on Sabrina. “If you’ve hurt her—”
“You’ll what? Storm my position with your remaining men? Hunt me down and make me pay?” He laughs, and the sound grates against my nerves like fingernails on concrete. “You’re welcome to try, but you should know any aggressive action on your part will result in immediate consequences for your lovely girlfriend and your unborn child.”
The threat hangs in the air between us like a blade. “What do you want?”
“What I’ve always wanted. Justice for what you and your family have done to mine.”
I shake my head. “You’re out of your mind. You’re the one who went after Yaraslov for our territory. This is between us, Vadim. Let her go, and we’ll settle it however you want.”
“Oh, but she’s already settled it by being here. You see, Nikandr, the woman you love is going to watch you die, just like I had to watch your brother kill my nephew twelve years ago.”
The connection ends, leaving me staring at my phone with hands that shake slightly from suppressed fury because Vadim isn’t just planning to kill me. He’s planning to make Sabrina watch, to traumatize her so completely that she’ll never recover from witnessing my death unless I kill him first.
His words filter through my rage, and I want to deny what he’s claiming, but maybe there’s some truth to it. Yaraslov was always…coy about the dispute with Vadim, claiming it was over territory, but maybe there was a more personal component he never shared. If my brother killed Vadim’s nephew, it would explain why he went to the such lengths to draw Yaraslov out using Irina so he could kill him.
I think about Sabrina tied to a chair somewhere in that building, probably terrified but trying to stay strong for our daughter’s sake, the nursery we’ll never finish if I fail here tonight, and Sergei’s wife, who doesn’t yet know she’s a widow because her husband followed me into a trap.
It’s suddenly clear. Vadim’s reasons don’t matter. Even if my brother killed his nephew, he already had his revenge ten years ago. Sabrina has nothing to do with any of this, and I’m determined to kill Vadim and Irina before the night is through.
All of it comes down to the next ten minutes.
I check my weapon one final time as we pull up to the warehouse entrance. “Maksim, if something happens to me in there—”
“Nothing’s going to happen to you.”
I give him a quelling look, not wanting empty reassurance right now. “If it does, make sure she knows I died trying to get her home.”
He nods grimly as we prepare to breach the building where this all began, where my brother died, and where it’s finally going to end forever.
