Page 86 of Savage Claim

Lorenzo

Santino’s direction led us to an abandoned hospital in the warehouse district. I had been checking the livestream: I had seen Isabella slash that man’s face. But I could also see the same man, pissed at the blood dripping down his chin, as he strapped her to the table. There was no sound in the livestream, but it was unmistakable that Isabella was screaming.

“You know if there’s a single scratch on my wife, I’ll make you wish for death long before I give it to you, right?”

Santino shook his head. “Unless that doctor is cutting out your brat, she’s safe for now.”

I balled up my fist, ready to punch him, but I resisted. I needed him for my plan to work. “Santino is going to get me in the building,” I told Damian and Elio. “You keep watch on the livestream. Once Isabella is off the table, or if you see Coleman making any move toward her, you storm in with the others. I want every fucker in there dead. No setting fires this time until we know for sure.”

Damian nodded. “I’ll tell the men.”

“What about the ones you sent after Artem’s people?” Elio asked. He was coordinating with the team that had been sent on that particular errand.

“They’re to take them straight to our holding cells. Don’t touch them unless they get direct orders from me.”

I shoved Santino out the back of the SUV and forced him to his feet. “Take me in.”

“We’ll be shot immediately,” the man complained. “They fuckingstabbedme. Artem doesn’t need me anymore now that he has her.”

I pushed him. “Quit fucking whining and walk.”

When we were close enough to the hospital, I allowed Santino to take my arm. The men on guard actually laughed when they saw us. “You don’t give up, do you, Rossi?” one joked.

“ThePakhanthought they’d leave you to bleed out for sure,” the other crowed.

Santino was turning an alarming shade of puce, but he kept his head up. “Can I take him to Artem, or what?”

The guards waved us through, still laughing at their own lame attempts at humor. They hadn’t bothered to search me for weapons, probably assuming that Santino had taken them from me.Artem surrounds himself with morons.

Or, more likely, most of his men were already dead, and these were the recruits that he could lure away from Nikolai and the Syndicate.

Once past the guards, I wrenched myself out of Santino’s grip and forced him to walk ahead of me. The lack of noise around uswas unsettling. Had Isabella been gagged? Surely, her screams would be bouncing off the walls in this place.

I shoved at Santino’s back, nearly toppling him to the floor. “Faster,” I demanded. “If you’re leading me in circles?—”

He waved. “I know,” he seethed. “Slow death, yada yada.”

The silence around us was suddenly teeming with noise. It was my men breaking down the doors…which meant that Dr. Coleman had started the procedure. Santino came to the same conclusion and began to laugh, deep and from the belly. “It’s too late,” he taunted.

Santino pushed open a door and gestured, as if to say,now you go look. I shoved past him, grabbing for my gun tucked into a holster at the small of my back, and pointing it out in front of me. When I stepped into the operating room, I had a second to be relieved that I didn’t see any blood.

But then the rest of the picture came into view: Isabella stripped down to nearly nothing and strapped by both arms and legs to the table itself. Artem Volkov wasn’t here; he either fled because of the noise, or he was content enough to watch his own livestream from elsewhere. Either way, he wouldn’t make it out of the building.

Dr. Coleman was standing over her with a scalpel in his hand. His eyes came up and met mine, and for a moment, I saw the relief on his face. He truly didn’t want to hurt Isabella. I aimed and fired, and he dropped to the ground with a scream.

I ran for the table. “Isabella.” There was no response, and the only thing keeping me calm was the rise and fall of her chest. She must have fainted. “Dolcezza,” I called her again, rubbing herarms as I worked the buckles of her straps loose. “Come back to me.”

The sounds of my men were getting closer. I heard the door swing open, and then Elio came into view. “Is she?—?”

“Passed out.” I wanted to see her eyes open…but I couldn’t let Artem get away. “Stay with her?”

Elio nodded. “I’ll get her on her feet.”

I looked down at Dr. Coleman, who was still conscious but only just. “Where is Artem?” His eyes rolled in his head, and I knelt down. “Coleman.” I snapped my fingers in front of his face. “Where is Artem?”

Weakly, he pointed towards the door on the other side of the operating room. “There’s an office.”

I could hear gunfire echoing in the halls now. My men were hunting down Artem’s and greeting them with a hail of bullets.

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