Chapter Eight: The Abandoned Clinic
The clinic near the river had been closed for twelve years.
Elena knew its history.
Illegal surgeries.
Unrecorded gunshots.
Women turned away when they could not pay.
Now the building smelled of mold, bleach, and old blood.
Irina drove.
Luka followed unseen.
Damian stayed behind.
Or so he promised.
Elena did not believe him.
Anton waited in the reception room.
Nikolai sat tied to a chair behind him, bleeding from a cut above his eye.
Six armed men stood along the walls.
Anton smiled.
“Doctor Vale.”
“Let him go.”
“Still direct.”
“Still wasting time.”
Anton stepped closer.
“You know, Damian always chose badly when it came to you.”
Elena looked past him at Nikolai.
“How bad?”
Nikolai managed a crooked smile.
“I’ve looked better.”
“Low standard.”
Anton’s jaw tightened.
Good.
Elena knelt by Nikolai.
She checked his pulse.
Stable.
The blood was dramatic, not fatal.
Anton wanted theater.
Not murder.
Yet.
“Your brother will live,” she said.
Anton crouched near her.
“And will Damian?”
Elena looked at him.
“He has so far.”
Anton leaned closer.
“Because of you.”
She stood.
“No. Because he is difficult to kill.”
The ceiling creaked.
Anton heard it too.
His eyes sharpened.
Damian’s men had breached the tunnels below.
Too early.
Anton grabbed Elena by the arm and dragged her against him.
A pistol pressed near her temple.
Nikolai cursed.
Men shouted.
The front doors burst open.
Damian stood in the entrance.
Black coat.
White shirt.
Pale, but upright.
Not bleeding.
Elena noticed that first.
He had listened to her.
For once, he had come prepared instead of half-dead.
Anton laughed.
“There he is.”
Damian’s gun stayed low.
“Elena.”
She met his eyes.
No begging.
No panic.
Just the plan.
Anton pressed the gun harder.
“Choose, Volkov.”
Elena moved first.
She drove the scalpel hidden under her sleeve into Anton’s forearm.
He screamed.
Damian fired at the hanging light above Anton.
Glass shattered.
Darkness dropped.
Elena fell sideways.
Luka’s men moved in.
Nikolai tipped his chair over and laughed through blood.
When the lights flickered back, Anton lay on the floor, wounded and alive.
Elena had his gun.
Her hands shook now.
Only now.
Damian crossed the room and stopped an arm’s length away.
He did not touch her.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
His eyes closed.
Just once.
A prayer without God.
Anton laughed weakly from the floor.
“She’ll never forgive you.”
Elena looked at him.
Then at Damian.
“She doesn’t need your help deciding.”
Anton’s smile died.
That was the moment Elena knew she had won more than the room.
She had won back choice.
