to shoot whoever might poke his head around the corner to investigate.
Seconds ticked by. Nothing. No one.
He donned the vest, ignoring the blood that stained it, put on the helmet, strapped on the chin guard. He angled his head for maximum shadow on his face and walked toward the other black-clad man stationed in front of the Saints Salon.
A gun crashed from inside. The man turned to look, distracted.
Val leaped, grabbed, wrenched. Crunch, the man’s vertebrae gave. The man flopped to the ground, neck snapped, shitting himself.
He did not recognize this one. Thank God.
The door to the Saints Salon was ajar. Val prodded it with the gun barrel until it swung further open. He peered around the door frame.
His breath froze in his lungs. Tamar hung from a rope by her arms in the corner of the room, her tangled hair falling like a dark curtain around her battered, beautiful face, a stark mask of pain and mute endurance. Still alive.
It wrenched something inside of him loose. Grief, rage, and terrified hope. He had been trying to brace himself against finding her dead. Trying and failing. But hope was more cruel than despair.
Three men were down on the ground. Four were on their feet, one of them Luksch. Val’s knife flew into the throat of the nearest man, and he spun, arms windmilling, glass crunching beneath his boots before he crashed to the ground.
Val dove, tucked, and rolled to dodge the bullets, but when he somersaulted back up into a crouch, still more bullets thudded into his chest, bam, bam, and flung him backward, like huge, punching fists. He slammed to the ground, wind knocked out, and rolled onto his knees without air, gasping for oxygen. He brought the gun up, took aim at—
Henry. Blue eyes and square jaw. Henry. Holding a gun on him. Val’s muscles locked for a fraction of a second—
Bam. His weapon spun uselessly out of his hand into space. It sailed in a high arc, bounced, skidded across the carpet.
Then, the numb, cold burn. The trickling heat of blood. Shot in the arm. Fucking shit. Henry had shot him. His friend.
“Valery.” Henry’s face looked distant, sad.
Val focused on the gun muzzle in the foreground. Henry’s face faded to a blur. “You?” he whispered.
“You weren’t supposed to be here,” Henry said dully. “I wasn’t supposed to have to face off with you, buddy. There was no reason for it.” Henry’s eyes flicked past him, focusing on someone behind Val. His voice muted. “But I can’t change things now.”
“Why?” Val demanded, his voice hard.
“Money,” Henry said matter-of-factly. “A lot of it. Hegel told you. We would have been happy to share, but it just didn’t work out. Your dick prevailed, man. But no woman is worth millions.”
Val’s eyes flicked up to Tamar’s bright gaze. It blazed down, unquenched. An instant injection of passion, of power, straight into his muscle fibers, his nerves, his mind.
So beautiful. So precious. Her intelligence, her courage, the steely endurance beneath the smooth, seductive curves of her tortured body.
Tears slid down her cheeks. She rubbed them angrily against her stretched arms. So tough around her secret core of tenderness.
Worth millions. Worth anything, everything. His life, his soul, his heart. But Henry would never understand that.
Not this Henry who he had really never known at all.
“…would have helped you save Imre,” Henry was saying.
“Imre is dead,” Val informed him. “I am here for her now.”
Henry shook his head. “You can’t save everybody, Val. I’m sorry. I was hoping you would stay the hell away from here, but you just had to poke your nose in. It’s just business. My friendship for you was real.”
Val glanced pointedly at Henry’s gun. “Do not talk of friendship and hold a gun to my head.”
Henry’s mouth tightened to a colorless line. “It’s just business,” he repeated, his voice hard. “Good-bye, Val.”
Val stared up at Tamar, locking eyes with her. He had never feared death before and did not fear it now. What he felt was piercing grief for the life he had thought he might live with her. An improbable fantasy, destined to end with a bullet to the brain, but even so. That fleeting fantasy, that brief hope had been the sweetest, finest thing he had ever known. Even so, he was grateful.
He braced himself. Waited for it, his eyes fixed on Tamar’s.
“No,” said Georg suddenly. Glass crunched under his feet as he started walking toward them.
Henry glanced at the other man, alarmed. “What?”
“Don’t shoot,” Georg said slowly. He gazed at Val, an expression of discovery on his face. “Not quite yet. I want him to watch first.”
Henry frowned. “Watch what? Do you mean…oh, no. For God’s sake, you can’t be serious. Now?”
“Yes. It’s perfect.” Georg’s eyes were gleaming with wild excitement. “He’s the perfect audience. It will be the sexual experience of a lifetime. Here, bring him closer so he can see everything. Hold him. He watches. Kill him when I come. Exactly when I come.”
Henry’s mouth twisted in distaste. He gestured with his chin for to the other black-clad man to approach. “Hold your gun to his head,” he ordered the man curtly. “If he moves, blow his brains out.”
The man held his gun up to Val’s temple. Henry stepped behind him and wrenched Val’s wounded arm back, then the other one, hyper-extending the mangled, wounded shoulder. Torquing them into a tense, shaking hammerlock of pure pain.
Val’s lungs jerked, in hard, shuddering gasps. Blood ran down, dripping off his fingertips. The wound in his shoulder had torn open again. He felt the warmth, the sting. Hot liquid, spreading.
Henry dragged him toward the corner where Tamar was hanging. The man with the gun to Val’s head accompanied them, step for step.
He was a couple of meters from her now. Henry behind him, the gunman to the side, and Tamar before him, staring down, eyes blazing.
“This is your life, from now on,” Val said to his former friend. “Pandering to that crazy sadist’s whims. Kneeling to kiss his stinking ass for your money. Enjoy it, Henry. You deserve it.”
“Do not fuck with me,” Henry hissed. “I did not choose this.”
“Yes, you did,” Val said. “You bought it. And you will pay for it.”
But all thoughts of Henry vanished from his head as Georg started toward Tamar, massaging his crotch.
As if she needed more of a fucking challenge. As if things were still a bit too tame around here, too easy. Now Val had to show up and put himself in mortal danger.
Damn
