Page 33 of The Enemy's Defector
She’d shot two men this week. Shewasa killer, trained by none other than me on how to handle a gun in the first place.
But she wasn’t in any position to handle this situation without me.
I didn’t want her to.
Holding her hand tightly, I ran until we reached a dumpster in the alley. Shots fired off the metal surface, protecting us, and I leaned up to shoot at the masked men.
“Of course,” I growled, scowling at the men. They were all hiding their faces, dressed the same in militant gear in all black. It would’ve been nice to see someone I could identify, but whoever was targeting me was letting an independent contractor firm do all their dirty work.
“Nik. Come on.” Katerina tilted her head toward a parked car, indicating for us to use it to get away. Getting into the cargo van that we’d left in the garage wasn’t an option.
Volleying my attention between the men behind us and the car, I nodded once and backpedaled toward the driver’s door. Ironically, she was the one who’d looked up how to hotwire a car and taught me and my brothers that. She’d always been so quick to learn and entertained by technological or mechanical challenges.
She dropped to grab a brick then smacked it against the window while I covered her back, the gun trained in the direction of the men who had yet to creep toward us. “Hurry.”
She grunted, perhaps annoyed with me for telling her what to do. I didn’t need to order her to hurry, but it came out anyway, as a warning to the world. I needed her to get this car running for us so we could escape to safety—because I neededhersafe. And with me. The men shouting at each other to “get her” was all I needed to hear. They weren’t aiming for me, but Katerina. She was their target.
It was pointless to direct her. Within seconds, she’d smashed the window and yanked the door open. The car was old, not some new thing that would be trickier to mess with. As she crouched low to get to the wires, I knocked off the shards of glass to fall away from her.
“Got it.” She reared back as the lights turned on over the dashboard. Without giving me a chance to reply, she slid into the seat and took the wheel.
I ran around the car, keeping the gun poised in the right direction, then got into the passenger seat. Just like before, in the van, she sped off without my having the time to close the door. It swung wildly, banging against another dumpster, but that was in my favor. With the metal panel cracked away, I had better access to lean out and shoot at the men behind us.
She sped down the narrow street, then began a twisting, turning, and complicated series of changing directions once we entered the city roadways. I knew she was doing it to lose anyone potentially tailing us, and it worked.
Checking behind us once more, I was satisfied that we’d gotten away. Barely. Again.
I sat back and tried to catch my breath from the rush. “I need more ammo.”
She nodded, saying nothing as she focused on driving.
“Give me your phone.”
She furrowed her brow. “It’s not traceable.”
Of course, it wasn’t. She was the one who’d helped me configure my phone to be a trackless device. “I wasn’t saying it was.”
After she handed it to me, I typed in the general location of an Ivanov facility where we’d be left alone. Once I gave it back to her with the directions showing, she frowned at me. “Why can’t you just go home?”
I shook my head, checking over her for any sign of injury. That paleness was still there, and she looked even more guarded than before. Then again, we’d just run with fear fueling us. I could cut her some slack. “It’s too soon.”
“If you need more guns or ammo, you’d get it there.”
I would. “I am not going home until I know who ordered me to be taken. I need to have answers so I can protect anyone else from being taken.”
She huffed. “And you can only figure that out while you’re on the run?”
“I’ll have better chances with them not knowing where I am at all.”
“Your brothers can’t help?” she asked, frowning again.
“I don’t want them to be exposed to danger. They know I’m alive. I’ve been sending a line of code to my computer for them to see as proof of life.”
“Fine. Then how about I get another car and go my own way? That would prevent you from being in danger near me.”
Jerking around to face her, I narrowed my eyes and tried to believe she’d actually said that. That she’d be that stupid. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“It’d be harder for those men to find us if we separated.”
