“Who will she think we are?” Vadisk asked with what might have been resignation in his tone.
“Solntsevskaya Bratva.”
“Layno,” Maxim cursed.
That sounded enough like the Polish word for “shit” that Jakob was fairly certain of the translation. And he heartily agreed with the sentiment.
“When we find her, I will approach Zasha.” With that, Leonid opened his door.
Ten minutes later, rifles had been dispersed to Leonid, Maxim, and the bodyguard. Jakob and Vadisk were unarmed, but he didn’t mind. He was better in hand-to-hand combat.
The fact that Leonid had a weapon would be concerning if they didn’t find his sister alive. In his grief, mistakes might be made.
The house Ava had rented was fifty meters from where they parked. The whole road seemed deserted, no doubt because the city of Teplodar was originally created to provide housing for workers at an atomic thermal power station. However, development of the station was postponed after Chernobyl and completely halted in the nineties.
Using hand signals, Maxim, who had taken point, split them up. Vadisk, Leonid, and the guard were going around the side to find alternate entrances, while Jakob and Maxim were taking the front door.
The two-story white house was blocky in the way of Soviet buildings, and like the houses around it, there were signs of neglect. The overgrown foliage, the rutted gravel driveway that was more weeds than rock. But there was a car parked just in front of the small stoop. Ava was here.
Jakob snuck forward, using the untamed bushes and tall grass in what may have been a well-landscaped yard. Crouching down next to the car, he quietly unscrewed the valve stem and depressed the valve, air whooshing around his fingertip. He could have knifed the tires—he had a long matte black knife in a holder on his back—but if they were wrong and Ava wasn’t here, it would be better to do something that wouldn’t raise the alarm. One flat tire would be enough to slow down her getaway.
Maxim seemed to understand because he watched Jakob, and then nodded.
It felt as if hours had passed, but in reality he knew it was less than two minutes before he and Maxim rose and ran at a crouch around the car and up the front steps. Jakob flattened himself beside the door and gingerly tested the handle. Locked.
Maxim passed Jakob the gun, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a set of lock picks. Forty seconds later, they were in, the door swinging open with a loud, rusty squeal.
But that sound was drowned out by the screams that echoed up from somewhere deep in the house.
Jakob checked the urge to run in, waiting instead for Maxim, who could see into the house, to raise two fingers and do a quick double point. Jakob slid past him, pressing the rifle into his hand even as he drew his knife, holding it in a reverse grip, the blade along his forearm.
The house was far nicer than the outside would have suggested, with pleasant furnishings and clean, if well worn, floors. Jakob didn’t bother to stop and check the rooms. He wasn’t law enforcement, not really, and his training had focused on getting the job done, no matter what it took, and with little to no regard for his own safety.
The scream had been muffled, which meant interior room or the second floor. Vadisk and Leonid passed by an open doorway ahead and on the left. They were being more methodical in their search, but everyone was headed to the stairs.
In a quirk of construction, the foot of the stairs were toward the back of the house, closer to where Vadisk and Leonid were. Maxim was behind him, and when Jakob looked back, he saw Maxim half turned to cover their rear, gun in place with the butt against his shoulder, but the barrel pointed down.
Jakob headed for the stairs, planning to follow Vadisk and Leonid—the bodyguard had taken position in an opening where he could see the stairs and the back of the house.
He passed the opening to a dining room and a small door to an under-stair closet as another scream echoed through the house.
He paused, head swiveling. The sound had come through the small door.
Not upstairs…but down. In a basement.
Jakob raised a hand, forming a fist. Everyone stopped, and he leaned in to the door.
He could just faintly hear voices. One rose in volume, though not enough for him to make out the words, and then there was another scream.
It didn’t sound like a scream of fear, but more like one of rage.
Jakob started to ease the door open. Leonid tried to knock him out of the way, but Vadisk grabbed him, slapping a hand over his mouth. For a moment, Leonid’s eyes were wild, and Jakob’s heart went out to him. Vadisk held the other man easily—a testament to exactly how strong he was—and whispered something in his ear.
Jakob shot a glance at Maxim, who nodded.
Resettling his grip on the hilt of the knife, Jakob went through the door, as a vision of Annalise and Walt, the way they’d looked last night as the three of them had come together, flashed through his mind. He’d been in dangerous situations before, even faced down death, but it had been easier back then. Because he’d never felt like he had so much to lose.
There was a tiny landing, really more of a wide step, just inside the door, then stairs so steep they were almost a ladder. Lights were on in the basement, illuminating a section of the gray concrete block floor and walls.
Jakob went down two more steps, until his feet were nearly in the light, then stopped. Bracing the hand not holding the knife, he leaned as far as he could, taking a quick glance at the room and silently jerking back up before processing everything he’d seen.
Two women, one medium height with hair a color somewhere between brown and blonde, the other dark haired…and locked in a cage. Ava held what looked like a spear, but it might have been a knife taped to the end of a broom handle. Zasha, the woman in the cage, was bloody, her clothes ragged and each slice in the fabric rimmed in blood, some of it old enough to have dried black.
Was Zasha…holding a knife of her own?
Ava was standing to the side of the stairs, which meant she would most likely see any movement. The best option would be to have Maxim shoot her.
Both women were panting, Zasha occasionally letting out a little sound of pain.
Jakob looked back and held up two fingers, hoping the others, who were crowded above him, Vadisk still in the hallway since there was so little space, could see.
Jakob held up one finger, and then changed it into a gun.
Target one, neutralize by gunshot.
Maxim nodded, but Leonid vehemently shook his head, pointed at the rifle he held, pantomimed using a sight, then shook his head again.
Jakob nodded once, fairly certain that Leonid was saying they weren’t precision rifles. He didn’t want to risk his sister.
There was enough space between them, and they were close enough, that it would take only a mildly adept marksman to hit Ava without getting Zasha…unless the rifles were loaded with buckshot. Leonid called them hunting rifles. They might have scatter-shot cartridges.
Jakob gritted his teeth in frustration, and then tucked his knife back into his scabbard. This was going to have to be a surprise attack.
Repositioning himself so his hands were on the walls of the stairwell, his feet braced on the narrow step, Jakob looked over his shoulder, hoping they could read his expression, then jumped.
His palms skidded down the walls, controlling his descent to some degree. When he hit the ground, he rolled, not away from, but toward Ava.
An enraged scream was all the warning he got before the makeshift spear stabbed the floor where he would have been had he rolled the other way. Bracing his elbows, Jakob swept out one leg, taking Ava down at the ankles.