Harbinger jogged toward the car, and Smith did a slow count to sixty before he ordered the staff forward. Harbinger was at the door and had the kitchen staff on their knees, shaking and terrified. “Get up!” Harbinger hissed in Russian, and they pushed the staff onward. They used the same process in the passenger cars.
Smith gathered people, shoving them out into the hall. A gun in the face silenced them all too quickly. He opened a door and found his parents. “Get up and get out.” He spoke in Russian, the barrel of his weapon pushed against his father’s temple.
His father hissed, “Komal will kill you for this.”
“He’ll have to find his way out of hell first,” Smith hissed and grabbed his mother, shaking her awake. He pulled her from the bed and shoved her to his father. “Move.”
They passed through the game car, into the dining room, and then to the bar car. Harbinger yelled at everyone to go to their knees.
“Why are you doing this? Are you robbing us?” One of the women sobbed, and her husband hushed her.
Harbinger laughed. “No. You just picked the wrong train, lady.”
Smith’s mom snorted. “No, you did. This train is carrying Bratva. My family will find you and kill you for this.”
It was Smith’s turn to laugh. “Family means that much to you?”
“Family is everything. I am Nadia Solntesevskaya. You’re as good as dead.”
“You’re an outcast. You’ve only started to repair your reputation with the family, which is probably why you were tasked with escorting Komal to Beijing. A menial job that the lowest foot soldier could perform. No wonder you hated him,” Smith growled the words.
Both of his parents paled. Smith pulled the hammer back on his weapon. The metallic click was deafening in the quiet of the railcar. Harbinger cleared his throat, “Dude, they aren’t sanctioned.”
“I’m not going to kill them.” Smith smiled. “But I will find out why they were traveling with Komal. Why is the Bratva interested in a man who uses children to wage war? Or is it the sex trade that the Bratva is interested in?”
His mother’s eyes closed, and she turned her head at that comment. His father looked down. So, it was the sex trade they were involved with. “Komal is dead. He died under your escort. No one will be pleased, not the Bratva and not the people he was meeting in Beijing.”
Hoss opened the door. “Smith, H, we’re done. Two sat phones and a radio. All are destroyed.”
“Smith! I knew you’d turn out this way,” his mother hissed. “You’re just like your father.”
His father’s head jerked, and he hissed, “He isn’t mine. He’s just like that bastard you slept with. He’s bloodthirsty, just like him. I told you he would be.”
His mother threw back her head and laughed almost manically, and Smith put a bullet through the roof, silencing everything. “We have a sharpshooter watching this train. If anyone leaves this car, you’re dead.” He backed out after Harbinger and closed the door.
They sprinted to the front of the train, where Hoss’ team was ready to decouple the cars from the front of the train. Smith walked across the transition and stood beside Val. They watched as the team uncoupled the car, and the rest of the train slowed. Harbinger clapped a hand on his arm. “If those were your parents, you’re better off without them.”
He didn’t say a word. No wonder his father had turned him out. Events from his life started falling into place. The reason he didn’t look like his father or his sisters and only minimally like his mother had been explained. When the others left, he moved behind Val and circled her waist with his arms. She leaned back into him. His eyes held the horizon until the disconnected cars were nothing but a memory.
Val turned in his arms and looked up at him. “Are you ready to start the rest of your life?”
Smith stared down at her.Was he? God, yes. He glanced back at the horizon and spoke the truth, “I’ve waited a lifetime for this moment.”
19
Smith stared out the window of the luxury apartment he now occupied with Val. He was still amazed at how his life had changed in the last few months. He watched the flashing lights from the Christmas tree twinkling in the corner of the large living room and allowed a smile to form. Val was a force of nature. She’d seen something in him that no one else, including himself, had seen. She said he was her rock, her steadying force, but in reality, the woman was his salvation.
“What are you doing up so early?” Val padded across the floor and almost fell into him. He wrapped her up in his arms.
“It’s Christmas.” He couldn’t recall when he’d been that happy or content. He was excited about the holiday for the first time in his life.
Val leaned back and narrowed her eyes at him. “Barely?”
He smiled and dropped a kiss on her lips. She smiled up at him. “Come to bed, and I’ll give you your first Christmas present.”
He dropped a kiss on her lips. “Go ahead. I’ll be there in a minute.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Are you sure?”