Chapter 49

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A journey that should have taken twenty minutes became a detour of nearly an hour.

While Yuri drove, the sun sank toward the west, bleeding into a deep twilight before darkness swallowed the road completely. Without the high beams, the world outside was a wall of ink. It felt as though he were carving a path through the raw night. Despite the gloom, the circuitous route back remained quiet. An unnatural stillness pressed against the windows, almost as if trying to soothe him into a false sense of security.

Just as he began to hope he had shaken any tail, headlights flared in his rearview mirror.

He had just reached the forest road leading into central Big Fox, exactly ten minutes from Cherriot’s cottage. It was a winding, narrow route that cut through the dense woods immediately after the highway exit. A little farther down, the pristine lake would appear, bringing to mind Cherriot’s brilliant, welcoming smile. It was the same lake that remembered the first time they had kissed.

Few people used this road. The thick pine forest lining both sides offered countless places to hide, making the vehicles that suddenly appeared feel as though they had been lying in wait. Two gray Fords—common models seen everywhere, both stripped of their license plates—closed the distance.

Yuri’s mind went icy cold as he calmly assessed the threat. The rat from the pharmacy had undoubtedly been nosey, asking around to confirm Cherriot’s presence in the area, and spotting Yuri had provided the final confirmation. They knew Cherriot was in Big Fox, but not his precise location. They had been patrolling the surrounding area when Yuri crossed their path, and now they immediately fell in behind him.

The road narrowed to a single lane in each direction. The two Fords drew up close, aggressively narrowing the gap. One pulled into the oncoming lane and surged forward. As it drew level with him, its passenger side nearly scraping Yuri’s driver-side door, Yuri jerked the wheel sharply to the right before they could box him in.

Tires screamed, leaving thick black streaks across the pavement.

CRASH.

The lead Ford rammed his rear bumper with a deafening impact, sending a violent shudder through the frame. Yuri fought the wheel to maintain control, steering off the pavement and straight into the dark forest. His SUV was never built for off-road driving; the wheels bounced violently over the uneven ground, shaking his vision into a chaotic blur.

A quick glance in the rearview mirror showed the car that had pulled alongside him still pursuing closely. The forest surrounding Big Fox was not particularly vast, but the trees grew close together—a single miscalculation would send him headfirst into a trunk.

Fortunately, Yuri’s eyes adjusted unusually well to the dark. He navigated through the dense foliage until he realized, with a jolt, that a short drop into the lake lay directly ahead. He glanced behind him. The pursuer had nearly closed the gap.

Yuri floored the accelerator. The mercenaries increased their speed to match, sensing cornered prey. But immediately before reaching the lip of the drop, Yuri threw his entire weight into wrenching the wheel to the left.

The vehicle veered sharply, sliding sideways into a massive oak.

CRUNCH.

Metal shrieked as the SUV slammed to a halt. The entire passenger side crumpled, the window shattering into a rain of glass. Yuri closed his eyes briefly against the flying debris and stamped on the brake.

The pursuing car continued straight over the edge. It plunged nose-first, striking the rocky shoreline almost vertically. A massive boom echoed through the quiet night as the vehicle folded in on itself like a crushed accordion.

Someone would soon notice the wreckage.

Hah… Haa…

Harsh, ragged breaths tore from Yuri’s throat. Because the impact had struck the side rather than the front, the airbags had not deployed, leaving him free to move. But he had been thrown hard against the driver-side window while straining against the wheel, dislocating his left shoulder forward.

Gritting his teeth against the white-hot flare of pain, Yuri released his seat belt and forced the driver-side door open with his right hand. The SUV was ground so completely into the tree trunk that there was no hope of driving it again. Yuri scrambled awkwardly over the tilted center console and hauled himself out to survey the area.

There had been two cars. One remained.

Headlights were drawing closer in the distance. The second vehicle had evidently fallen behind during the high-speed chase.

I have to deal with that one too.

Silencing his breathing, Yuri checked the pistol at his waist, then leaned his back against the crumpled metal of his car for support. It’s been a long time since I dislocated a shoulder. Or did anything like this.

Taking one brief, deep breath, he stretched out the useless left arm. He reached his right hand behind his back, gripped his left wrist, and yanked hard.

CRACK.

The joint popped back into its socket. A blunt, sickening wave of agony washed through his shoulder. Yuri’s jaw clenched so hard that the veins along his neck stood out in sharp relief.

…Haa.

He swallowed the groan and lowered his head, cold sweat beading across his forehead. He felt exhausted by something this minor simply because his physical condition was worse than usual. Apparently, he really was getting older. Or perhaps he had lived too comfortably for too long.

By the time his shoulder settled, the headlights had stopped a short distance away. Seeing only the deep tire tracks and the wreckage of the first car, one of the pursuers climbed out and shouted into the dark.

“Vince! Where the hell are you? Did you find that bastard?”

It was the voice from the pharmacy. The rat who had prowled around gathering information preferred dipping his toe into danger from a safe distance rather than leading the bloody work himself.

Yuri drew his pistol, crouched low, and melted into the shadows. He had learned to move silently through forests while serving Igor. Whenever autumn approached, Igor often took his subordinates hunting, teaching them to slip through the woods without startling the wildlife. Yuri had never imagined that one of the old bastard’s lessons would prove useful on a night like this.

His eyes, now fully adjusted to the gloom, easily detected the dry leaves and fallen branches scattered across the forest floor. Avoiding them, he set down the balls of his feet before slowly lowering his heels, creeping closer.

The pharmacy rat was not alone. The driver-side door of the second Ford opened, and a tall figure stepped out.

“Marty, shut up. What if that bastard’s hiding nearby?”

“It’d be better if he showed himself. We need to catch him and beat the target’s location out of him.”

Yuri was fewer than ten paces away. He crouched behind a boulder nestled between two large trees and watched them, calculating his options. It would be ideal if these people split up. If they remained together, he would have to strike first and disable one before dealing with the other.

“Think Vince is dead? He’s not answering.”

“Leave him. One fewer man means a larger share for us.”

“Hmm. Two hundred fifty thousand dollars each, then.”

Listening to their vulgar conversation, completely devoid of loyalty, Yuri moved the moment one of them leaned into the passenger side. He aimed at the calf of the man staring toward the cliff where the first vehicle had fallen.

Yuri fired without hesitation.

BANG.

“Aargh!”

The gunshot cracked through the forest. The man screamed and collapsed. The second man hurriedly drew his weapon and aimed toward Yuri, who dropped safely behind the boulder.

“Fuck! Marty, I’ve been shot in the calf. Where is this bastard? Find him!”

“Shut up for a second.”

A flashlight beam soon swept toward Yuri. The man must have retrieved a heavy lantern from the passenger side; the harsh white light swept over Yuri’s head and illuminated his wrecked SUV.

“Look at that car. The bastard can’t be in good shape either. Stop whining over a leg wound and get up.”

“Asshole.”

“You went through worse in Iraq.”

“How many fucking years ago was that?”

They appeared to know each other, likely working for the same private military contractor. Yuri remained motionless behind the boulder even after the light passed. With Marty’s help, the wounded man rose, limping and releasing hissing groans through his teeth.

Yuri did not waste the opening. He emerged from the shadows and aimed at Marty. Years of training guided the muzzle naturally toward the man’s head, but Yuri hesitated.

Yuri, don’t aim for the head. Pay attention.

Cherriot had said he sought Yuri because he could not bear the thought of anyone dying. Yuri wanted to act according to Cherriot’s wishes; he did not want Cherriot to learn of this later and grieve. Even by mistake, Yuri could not aim at the abdomen, chest, or head. A thigh wound might strike an artery. He would have to disable their movement by shooting calves or arms.

During that brief split-second decision, Marty spotted him.

The man snapped his head around and saw Yuri’s weapon aimed toward him. He shoved his companion aside and ducked. Yuri fired a second too late; the bullet slammed into the driver-side door.

Marty understood the situation instantly and fired several rounds toward Yuri’s position. Two struck a tree, one ricocheted violently off the boulder, and another grazed Yuri’s side—crossing the exact scar Cherriot had once kissed and marked.

Fortunately, it only clipped him, leaving a long, burning laceration. The smell of copper rose as Cherriot’s white shirt began turning red.

Yuri took cover again, then used the trees to widen the distance. Bullets struck the earth behind him as he retreated.

“Hiding like a rat, were you?” Marty muttered, advancing.

Even while running, Yuri searched the ground. A forest like this inevitably contained exposed roots capable of tripping someone. Unless Marty was running with night-vision goggles, pursuing a target through total darkness would eventually cause a mistake.

The instant Yuri heard a magazine being changed behind him, he stopped, turned, and fired toward Marty’s arm. Two rounds went out in rapid succession.

BANG.

One clearly struck flesh.

“Fuck!”

A retaliatory bullet immediately whizzed back toward Yuri.

After several minutes of exchanging fire, Yuri reached rougher terrain. As before, he increased his speed, deliberately inviting Marty to chase more aggressively. Yuri jumped cleanly over a thick, moss-covered root. Marty, following blindly, caught his foot and crashed down.

Now.

The instant Yuri recognized the mistake, he stopped retreating and rushed back. He kicked first at the hand holding Marty’s pistol. But Marty was too experienced to lose his weapon from a single strike; he tightened his grip and aimed upward.

The black muzzle pointed almost directly beneath Yuri’s chin.

A chill raced over him. Yuri twisted his neck aside the moment the trigger moved.

BANG.

The bullet grazed his throat. He had nearly died; a fraction slower and the shot would have blown away his head. Of all the bodies Yuri had seen, those missing their faces had been the most difficult to look at. The sight became a lifelong nightmare for whoever discovered them. He did not want his father, Alyosha, or T-Mac to feel that way upon seeing his corpse.

If you die, take the bullet through the heart. The body will be easier to clean up.

After warning himself not to lose focus, Yuri stamped down on Marty’s wrist with enough force to crush it.

CRACK.

The man screamed as Yuri ground his full weight into the joint. Marty’s stubbornly clenched hand whitened and lost its strength. Keeping his own pistol trained on the man’s head, Yuri bent and took Marty’s weapon. He looked down into the same brown eyes from the pharmacy—the contemptible eyes that had been hunting for Cherriot.

“Who ordered Goodnight’s death?” Yuri asked quietly, the muzzle pressed to Marty’s forehead.

Marty stared at him for a moment, then let out a breathless, bloody laugh. “You don’t look like you can pull the trigger.”

“That’s what you hope.”

“No. You had the opportunity to kill both me and my partner from cover, but you deliberately missed. With marksmanship like yours, there’s no way those shots went wide by accident at that range. Which means you never intended to kill us.” Marty smiled, as though he had read Yuri completely. “You’ve got brains, but not the guts to kill. In the end, one of the men you spared will put a bullet through you.”

Yuri merely looked down at him. His blue eyes showed neither agitation nor uncertainty, watching Marty like a dark, sunken sea. After staring into those eyes for some time, Marty abruptly shuddered.

“No. You’re—”

Before he could finish, Yuri shot him through the left shoulder.

BANG.

“Ah! Fuck!” Marty tried to clutch his shoulder, but Yuri was still crushing his right wrist under his boot.

“Who ordered Goodnight’s death?” Yuri’s voice had not changed.

Marty looked up through a face gone pale with pain. “Fuck! We… Hah… We don’t know.”

An obvious lie. Apparently, he could still withstand more.

Yuri looked down at Marty’s wrist and considered how to open his mouth. There was no tattoo marking him as former special forces or a Marine; he probably had no real resistance to torture.

“I see,” Yuri spoke without emotion. Then he fired directly through the back of the hand beneath his boot.

BANG.

The gunshot was followed by a scream far louder than the first.

“You fucking psychopath! This is close to town. Someone might hear! Someone comes, then the police come… Hah… That’ll cause problems for you too!”

“Who ordered Goodnight’s death?” The question fell for the third time.

Marty lifted his sweat-drenched face and examined Yuri’s icy blue eyes again. Panting, he finally spoke with revulsion, “Even if he escapes us now, that man is going to die. Our client is a serious player. The longer we fail to catch him, the bounty increases by a hundred thousand dollars a day. It’s already five hundred thousand. Tomorrow it’ll be six. Ha! Compared with what the client gains when the bastard dies, the bounty is nothing.”

“Give me the name.”

“I don’t know that much! The order came from headquarters in New York. I was simply asked to take the job. You know how it works, don’t you? The people above us don’t tell men like us anything important.”

So that was it. Yuri considered Marty’s words.

If someone would receive an enormous profit from Cherriot’s death, then the client was likely among those who would divide his trust after it dissolved. Heather’s suspicion appeared increasingly likely. It was his family after all.

Poor Cherriot.

When this insanity ended, Cherriot would lose someone from his own bloodline, and Cherriot would undoubtedly grieve. Yuri wanted him only to smile. Imagining his sorrow filled Yuri with a mirroring grief. Why did terrible things always happen to good people?

Yuri slowly lowered the pistol and stepped away from Marty’s wrist. Freed at last, Marty could not decide whether to grab his ruined shoulder or the hole in his hand. Eventually, he clutched his shoulder with his wounded fingers.

“If you don’t reach a hospital quickly, you’ll never use your right hand again. Waste time following me and you’ll live crippled.”

“…I’ll kill you if I ever see you again.”

Yuri walked past him without interest. Behind him, Marty struggled and groaned as he attempted to stand. Before returning through the forest, Yuri turned and shot him once more in the calf.

BANG.

He avoided the Achilles tendon and major ligaments; the bullet passed cleanly through muscle.

Marty’s scream followed Yuri as he returned to the road where the men had left their car. The companion Yuri had shot earlier sat propped against the vehicle. He must have heard Marty’s distant screams, because the moment Yuri appeared, the man raised both hands in immediate surrender.

Before Yuri could act, he shouted, “I’ll leave quietly. Just stop.”

The man had lost a considerable amount of blood and looked deathly pale. A clean calf wound was less dangerous than most gunshots, but it was time to let him treat it. If Yuri left him until he bled to death, there would have been no point in carefully avoiding his vital organs.

“We were told this job would be easy,” the man said, his voice trembling. “We volunteered. If we’d known we would take losses like this, we wouldn’t have come. I have children. So does he. Let us live.”

Listening to the pathetic appeal to his conscience, Yuri asked one question, “Does someone have leverage over you? Is that why you do work like this?”

“What?”

Otherwise, Yuri could not understand how someone volunteered so readily to murder another person. The man looked baffled by the unexpected question, then narrowed his eyes. “Of course it’s for money.”

“You could earn money without doing this.”

“Don’t be an idiot. A dishonorably discharged soldier gets no pension. I have to do jobs like this if I want to eat.” The question seemed to remind the man of something he preferred to forget. Pain entered his eyes, followed quickly by anger at the person who had touched his shame. “Aren’t you the same? You take money to guard that man and kill people for him.”

Marty and this man had both looked at Yuri and asked whether he was any different from them. Yuri frowned and stared down at him for several seconds. Then he raised his pistol.

The man squeezed his eyes shut.

“The car key.”

“…What?”

“Is the key inside?”

The man slowly reopened his eyes. With difficulty, he pulled the key from his pocket and tossed it over. Yuri caught it and motioned for him to move aside. Groaning, the man supported his injured leg with one hand and crawled away.

Yuri tipped his chin toward the direction where Marty lay. The man seemed to understand and began dragging himself into the tree line. He could still change his mind, so Yuri remained prepared for an attack as he briefly returned to his own vehicle.

It was utterly destroyed.

The crumpled black Ford SUV had been the first used car Yuri repaired for himself after moving to Vancouver. He had restored it with the resolve never to return to his former life, never to burden anyone, and to live and die quietly by himself. Now it had been crushed beyond salvaging.

Yuri searched the trunk, passenger compartment, and glove box. The book that might have identified him remained safely at Cherriot’s cottage. All he had here was the black coat in the trunk and the hard weapons case on the passenger-side floor. After gathering them, Yuri looked toward the bag of alcohol lying on the seat.

The paper had torn apart. The neutralizer, prosecco, and vodka bottle had apparently flown free when the window shattered; they were nowhere to be seen. Fortunately, the beer Cherriot wanted remained intact. Amazingly, the cans hadn’t even been scratched. They had been shaken so violently that they would need time for the carbonation to settle, but he could still give them to Cherriot once he returned.

Yuri carried the pistol in his right hand and the beer bundle in his left. He wedged the hard case and coat beneath one arm, causing the grazed wound along his side to flare with maddening pain before subsiding again. Come to think of it, he had injured his left forearm last time and his left side today. His left side clearly reacted more slowly than his right. For a moment, Yuri wondered whether the scars accumulated over his lifetime were gradually killing pieces of him.

When he returned to the road, the wounded man was gone. The quiet forest no longer looked like the scene of a firefight. Except for the dark pools of blood staining the ground, it appeared as though nothing had happened.

Yuri climbed into the driver’s seat of the mercenaries’ car, placed his belongings on the passenger side, and let out a long sigh. Fatigue washed over him, but he had no time to rest. The one fortunate thing was that no one had reached Cherriot yet; these men had ultimately failed to discover which cottage he was using.

Yuri inspected his abdomen. When he clicked on the interior light, the sight of his white shirt matted with scarlet stopped him cold. The fabric had torn along his side, and he knew instantly that even if the blood could be scrubbed away, the garment was beyond saving.

After a brief moment of resignation, he pulled the shirt off and peered at the torn, angry flesh along his ribs. He pried open the glove box, grasping for anything that might prove useful. Inside, he found a roll of heavy-duty tape and a bundle of plastic cable ties—clearly intended for Cherriot’s abduction. He noted several other items, but he pushed them aside for later inspection.

With a sharp tug, Yuri tore a strip of tape with his canine teeth and wound it tightly around his torso. He concealed his mangled, exposed skin beneath his coat, though the heavy fabric felt deeply repulsive against his bare flesh. He checked his phone, which had miraculously survived in his pocket.

Far more than the promised hour had slipped away. The display read ten o’clock. Then, a missed call from an unfamiliar number caught his eye. Red text usually signaled danger, but this time, the warning never came. Yuri knew instinctively whose number it was.

He dialed back.

He was waiting for me.

Urgency clawed at his chest. Cherriot must have been counting down the minutes, waiting for that beer, and Yuri had stayed away far longer than promised without a word of explanation. The thought that he had given Cherriot another reason to suffer ate at him.

He hates being alone.

Imagining Cherriot sitting in the cottage, his bright face drained of all energy, made Yuri’s stomach churn. He had left a man so prone to loneliness abandoned for far too long. He scolded himself under his breath and hurried back, the thought of the smile that would greet him making his own pain feel suddenly trivial.

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