In For the Kill (McClouds & Friends #11)(108)

“They won’t kill you!” Sveti’s eyes glowed with fervor. “I won’t let them! We’ll get you back to America. My friends will help protect you!”

Sam suppressed a snort. Sveti had a rosier idea of the extent of her adoptive family’s generosity than Sam did. He could imagine how Tam, Val, Nick, and the others would feel about nurturing the drug-addled offspring of a mafiya vor, with bloodthirsty goons out to whack him. With their children toddling around them? Nah. No matter how much Sveti loved the guy, that was going to be a very tough sell.

Sasha read his mind. His shadowy eyes darted to Sam and away again. “I do not think they will be so happy to see me, Sveti,” he said.

“They’ll help you, for my sake! You’re like my brother! Mama would have wanted to help you, too. She wrote to me about how she saw you when she came to Italy. She loved you.”

“She told me once that if... if you save others, you save yourself, too,” Sasha said. “But I n-n-never save anyone, Sveti. I . . . t-try, but I only put people in danger. You, Misha, Mongelli. And your mother.”

“My mother?” Sveti’s voice was fearful. “What about her? Why did Josef come hunting me? Why did he ask about Mama’s photos?”

Sasha struggled to speak for over a minute. His painful throat clearing and false starts were the only sound in the room. “Your mother . . . your mother . . .” He kept trying, but the sound strangled itself.

“What? What about her?” Sveti’s voice was getting high and thin.

Sasha forced out a sharp breath. “She was killed because of me.”

Sveti knelt on the filthy floor, paper white and immobile. Sam’s skin prickled. He felt as if the building were a tomb, sealing itself around them.

“How?” Sveti asked.

“My fault.” Sasha lifted his face. His eyes were wet. “She was here investigating the lab. That was why she came to Italy.”

“What lab?” Sam prompted. “Spit it out, for Christ’s sake!”

“The lab that my father . . .” Sasha coughed again. He looked at Sveti. “Does he know? About your father?”

“Only that he ran afoul of a guy who gutted him,” Sam said.

Sasha coughed, struggled. He looked at Sveti, gesturing at Sam. “You tell him,” he said. “The lab, in Nadvirna. Tell him.”

“My father was undercover,” Sveti said, her voice without inflection. “Investigating Zhoglo. They were doing illegal medical experiments with radiation. Killing people. My father blew up the lab, the scientists. He destroyed the research.”

“They killed him,” Sasha added. “And kidnapped you.”

“Mama tried to investigate,” Sveti went on. “She said she found a mass grave, but they never found any bodies. Paranoid delusions, they said. They locked her up. What does it have to do with Mama’s death?”

“They opened a new lab,” Sasha said. “Here, in Italy.”

Sveti’s hand drifted up to cover her mouth. “Oh, God.”

“Yes, they d-d-did it all again. The research, the testing. It was my fa-fa-father’s idea. He had ties with the local mafiyas, the Camorra, Cosa Nostra, the ’Ndrangheta, to provide test subjects. But these were not mental patients and orphans, like Zhoglo used. They used refugees from Africa, coming ashore in Italy. He bought boatloads directly from the traffickers. They put ashore, were met with food, blankets, and herded into trucks to be taken to a refugee camp. Or so they thought.”

“And you were involved?” Sam asked.

Sasha’s mouth twisted in a bitter smile. “He tried to involve me. That was why he called me back, when I was . . . v-v-visiting Sveti. He brought us down to Rome, he bought that house. He thought it would do me g-g-good, to be involved. That it would make a . . . a m-m-man of me. But I . . . I refused, to p-p-participate. He was . . . so angry at me.”

“Oh, Sasha,” she whispered.

Sam suppressed the urge to say something sarcastic. Sarcasm was all that could distance him from this tale of utter wretchedness.

“I still don’t get it,” Sveti said. “Where did Mama fit into this?”

“She contacted me while she was looking for the lab,” Sasha said. “She wanted my help, to take them down. But they were watching me, after I came back from America. She found it on her own. I met with her only once, while Josef was gone on some other job. She gave me copies of the pictures. And I . . . I told her about the thermal generators.”

“Why?” Sam asked. “Why did you involve her at all?”

Sasha’s smile was bitter. “I did not have many . . . p-p-people to . . . confide in. I had to do something, but I . . . could not do it alone. Sonia came up with a plan. To steal the thermal generators right out from under them. She was amazing.” His eyes had a wistful glow of hero worship.

“You couldn’t have just called the cops?” Sam asked.

“Sonia tried that once before and ended up sedated in a mental institution for three years,” Sasha said. “She insisted. First, the press. Then the police. So there could be no cover-up.”

“Okay,” Sam said. “So you came up with a plan. And?”

“She came up with a plan,” Sasha specified. “I just did what she told me. I monitored, as they were moving the generators. We saw an opening. Ambushed the truck. We stole The Sword of Cain. Just the two of us.” There was pride in his voice. The words slid out, unimpeded.