Page 57 of How Much For a Life of Lies?

“Go ahead Sierra Base,” I responded.

“This isn’t good,” he said, and Luca glanced up from the photos he was skimming on his tablet. What? he mouthed.

“Patching you in with Sierra Six,” I warned.

“Sierra Six comm live,” Luca acknowledged.

“Okay, this photo…” A photo appeared front and center on my screen, and Luca sat next to me again. A security still time-stamped an hour ago showed the side profile of Kai, plus a full face of a big man, light hair in this black and white surveillance world, who was holding on to Kai’s arm, bent over him, scowling. The touch was territorial.

I hated it.

“Who is it?”

“Facial rec puts this as Kozlov’s nephew—the sister’s kid.”

Luca whistled. “It’s a family affair, then?”

“What do we know about him?” And why does Ethan sound stressed?

“Former VDV.” Russian Airborne troops. “This man is a ghost, left VDV, turned up again in… but this isn’t good.” Ethan sounded frustrated. “Shit!”

Good? The man was gripping Kai’s arm as if he was just about to drag him outside and… kill him? Worse?

“Shit, what?” I snapped, aware that Ethan using the word shit with that much shock in the single syllable couldn’t be a good thing.

“He has a redacted CIA file. He’s… I need to run this up to Sanctuary ops, this doesn’t look good. Hold…”

Luca went out to the kitchen and came back with coffee, but I couldn’t face drinking when my stomach was in knots. Why was a former Russian military with a redacted CIA file working alongside his homicidal uncle, and near my team?

My Kai.

TWENTY-THREE

Kai

Exfil was still forty-eight out, and I hadn’t expected another flight so soon—all intel had pointed to them being five days apart, but nope, we were called up that same night, after a heated exchange between Kozlov and a frustrated Indigo.

The mission began like any other. We left the base under the cover of darkness, the ’korsky slicing through the night sky as I skimmed the treetops. The familiar hum of the engine filled the cabin as Yuri sat next to me in silence.

I couldn’t shake the feeling of apprehension, a nagging sense something wasn’t quite right about this delivery, but I did what I was told, or rather KD did what he was told. The coordinates had been fed into the nav with half hour to spare—almost as if they trusted me with the intel. Idiots. My doubts revolved around Yuri, because after the whole Yuri/Kozlov thing, I had huge trust issues with Yuri. Kozlov had issues with whatever relation Yuri was, and Yuri clearly disrespected and ignored Kozlov.

The drop zone tonight was northwest of the previous one, and I ran through the angles in my mind, triangulating location and deciding Zach was better at math than I was. Hopefully, the transmitter I’d planted back at Kozlov’s base would right now be feeding intel, and would do so without exposing me until I got out of here.

“Change plan,” Yuri said, reaching over and placing something on the heads up which caused it to glitch. Static in my ear made me wince, then the comms were silent, until there was a click and Yuri’s voice was in my ear. “Your people are digging into my people.”

“The fuck?”

“Just fly.”

“What did you do?” He stared, with his Sig pointed at my belly. “You’re going to shoot your pilot in the gut?” I drawled.

“I okay fly,” he said, with a shrug, as if I was expendable. Which, at this moment, I guess I was.

“Not if I’m a dead weight on the controls when I bleed out.”

He muttered something in Russian, pressed the gun to my side, and I went with the flow because what the hell else could I do?

“So you’re hijacking Kozlov’s cargo? What’s your end game?” No response. Not even a twitch. “Because, dude, let’s be realistic here—family or not, Kozlov will kill you, and then me, or maybe me first because I’m flying the damn helo to wherever the fuck you’re taking us.” Still nothing. Time to exert some pressure. “So I’m guessing you’re Kozlov’s son, maybe one of many, the failure he hates? Is that why he demanded you be beaten?”

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