Page 165 of Cruel Demands

Nothing.

“Which exit are they using?”

He looks at me and smiles again. I take his hand and bend one finger backward until it breaks. His scream fills the unfinished room.

“Which ambulance?”

He clenches his jaw. I break a second finger.

A voice behind me says, “Mikhail.”

I turn.

Olga stands beyond the plastic sheeting, breathing hard. For a second, neither of us speaks. I did not tell her where I was going. Her eyes pass over the two bodies in the corridor. Then me. Then Orlov tied to the chair with blood running from his mouth and two fingers hanging wrong from his hand. “Mikhail,” she whispers.

Orlov laughs weakly. “Minister,” he says. “You took your time.”

Olga’s face hardens. “Shut up.”

“You knew he would be here,” I say.

“I knew he was inside the hospital.”

“How?”

“This is not the time.”

“It is exactly the time.”

Orlov looks between us with exhausted amusement. Olga steps farther into the room. “I have spent months following his contractors, police officials, and ministry accounts. Hospital contracts. Charitable foundations. Companies that existed only long enough to receive money and disappear.”

“You asked about the private contractors this morning.”

“Yes.”

“The security route.”

“Yes.”

“Whether Orlov would attend.”

“Yes.”

My hand tightens around Orlov’s broken fingers. He inhales sharply. Olga watches me. “I was trying to determine how far his network reached.”

“And you found me.”

Orlov laughs again. “She thought we were partners.”

Olga looks at him. “I thought Mikhail was protecting you.”

“Does this look like protection?” I ask.

“No.” Her gaze moves over the bodies outside the room, then back to me. “It looks like a dispute between men who belong to the same world.”

The conclusion settles between us. “You were investigating me.”

“I was trying to determine if you were a corrupt politician using criminals or not.”