Page 156 of Kingmakers, Year Three

“Nine o’clock!” My mother barks, wrenching the wheel to the left to give my father and sister a better angle. They fire at the three soldiers guarding the side gate.

The gate is chained shut and padlocked. Gripping Efrem’s Beretta tight, I roll out of the back of the Jeep and crouch behind the tire. Once my father and sister have dropped the first two soldiers, I shoot the third one in the chest, then I run to the gate. I empty the clip at the padlock until it’s destroyed, then rip the chain away and shove the gate open.

My mother drives forward, only pausing long enough for me to leap in once more before she roars down the dark, winding road that leads along the sea cliff.

I’m about to say, “We made it!” when two black SUVs screech out onto the road behind us, speeding after us at a reckless pace. A heavily-tattooed man in tactical gear leans out the passenger side window to fire at us.

“Stay low!” My mother shouts back at us.

We’re poorly protected in the ancient Jeep with its wide-open back. Worse, the newer and better-maintained SUVs are gaining on us.

“Who are they?” I ask my father. “Bratva?”

Their tattoos look like my father’s.

He shakes his head.

“Malina,” he hisses through his teeth.

My skin freezes.

The Ukrainians are every bit as ruthless as the Bratva—maybe even more so. They’re our dark twins, our twisted doppelgängers. Never have they been more dangerous than since Marko Moroz took leadership by stabbing a pen through the eye of his own former mentor.

“Look!” Freya calls back to us, pointing up into the sky.

Our helicopter swoops up over the villa, passing over the stone walls in our direction.

“Who’s flying it, though?” My father mutters.

The radio on Efrem’s hip crackles.

I snatch it up.

“I’m coming to get you, boss . . .”a familiar voice says.

I grin. It’s Maks, my father’sAvtoritet,and a close friend to me, despite the twenty years between us. I’m almost as pleased to hear that he’s still alive as I am to see him flying to the rescue.

Until I hear a booming shot ring out, and I watch a bright flare arcing across the sky, from the top of the villa directly toward the helicopter.

Like a deadly firework, it hits the tail of the chopper and explodes outward in all directions. The helicopter whirls around and around, the body now wrenched along by the blades. It crashes down to the ground where it erupts into a fireball so immense that I feel the heat blast hit my stunned face moments later.

“NOOO!” I shout.

My father shoves me down as more gunfire whizzes over our heads from the pursing SUVs. Still, I catch a last glimpse of the lone man standing atop our villa, an MK 153 resting casually across his shoulder.

Even at this distance, there can be no doubt of the identity of that goliath figure. It’s Marko Moroz.

My father fires back toward the SUVs, keeping them at bay. He hits the tire of one, and the Escalade fishtails back and forth across the road, but it doesn’t roll. The driver recovers, still following after us.

“Get ready!” My mother shouts.

She yanks the wheel to the left again, pulling us into the overlook above the marina. Directly below us a dozen boats are moored, including our own cruiser.

She grabs her rifle back from Freya and she and my father take cover behind the Jeep, firing toward the approaching SUVs.

“No time to climb down!” She shouts at me and Freya. “You’ll have to jump!”

“Go with them!” my father tells her. “I’ll cover you.”

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