He looked up. It was Madeleine. Her skin was pale, and she was pushing herself along on a rolling chair with her right foot while her left was supported by the cushion of the chair. Her left ankle was wrapped thickly in gauze. She had a thin red streak down one cheek where a stream of blood had coagulated.
“Felix is in the ambulance,” she told him in a monotone. “He’s on his way to the hospital now.”
“Yes.”
Madeleine pushed herself closer and put a hand on his shoulder. “How are you holding up?”
Hugo shrugged. “I’m fine. I just can’t believe what happened. To Felix and—and this.” He swept his hand around the room.
“I know.”
“Who would want to do something like this? Does Novus have any enemies?”
Madeleine’s face tensed. “I have a strong suspicion of who it was. In fact, I’m pretty sure I know who was behind it.”
“Who?”
“A wry little German bastard named Klaus Horst.”
Hugo waited for her to continue. She spat on the floor.
“He contacted us two weeks ago. For a job. We accepted, but he gave me a bad feeling right from the start. We started doing some research, but the more information we got, the more sure I was that he was using us as bait.”
*
A young woman entered the room and walked over to Madeleine.
“Hey, how are you?”
Madeleine erupted. “Freya! You’re alive!” A big smile spread across her dirty face, and she pulled the woman in for a long hug. When she released her, there were tears in Madeleine’s eyes. She glanced at Hugo and said, “Freya, this is Hugo, Felix’s brother.”
On instinct, Freya stuck out her hand for Hugo to shake, as if it were any other ordinary day at work. Instantly realizing what she was doing, she shook her head sheepishly and began to retract her hand, but Hugo reached out and took it, shaking it gently.
“Nice to meet you,” he said with a smile. Freya had blonde hair in a disheveled ponytail. She seemed nervous but unharmed.
“I heard they took him to the hospital; hope he pulls through.”
“So do I.”
Freya looked down at the floor and the pool of blood Felix had left there. She pursed her lips and turned away. “That was a lot of blood he lost.”
“Yeah, it was.”
Freya turned to Madeleine. “Everyone in the basement is okay. When the alarm went off, the automatic doors closed, and they’re only now opening.”
Madeleine slapped her hand on the table edge. “Ah! Who was down there?”
“Three people besides me: Mikko, Sussie, and Tony. The police are debriefing them now.”
“Great. Well, that’s some good news, at least.” A tear slid down Madeleine’s cheek, and she hurriedly wiped it away. “Let’s gather everyone in the conference room as soon as possible. We should go over everything together.”
Hugo stood and wiped his bloody hands on his jogging pants. “Good idea. I want to be there.”
Both women looked at him in surprise.
“Why?”
“Because I want to know who did this to my brother. And to you.”
Freya saw the anger blazing in Hugo’s eyes and felt the suffering he’d gone through. There was an inferno burning inside him It contrasted sharply with the snow that was falling even harder now, visible through the windows behind him.
Freya looked at Madeleine and then said, “Okay, Hugo, come with me and I’ll show you the way to the conference room—or what’s left of it, anyway. And maybe we can find you a shirt somewhere.” To Madeleine, she said, “I don’t think the elevators are working, so we’ll have to get you down the stairs.”
“It’s fine—don’t worry. I can manage.”
Freya raised her eyebrows in a “yeah, right” expression and said, “I don’t think so. Come on, Hugo and I will help you. You can just hop all the way down.”
It was slow going, with a few breaks needed to ease the burning in Madeleine’s hopping leg, but the three of them finally made it to the conference room. Four other people waited there, one of them a police officer. The sharp smell of smoke was less intrusive here.
The cop stood when Freya and Hugo entered the room. To the other three, he said, “Thanks for the information. I’ll be right back.” Then he exited the conference room, leaving the gathering in silence. Freya helped Madeleine to a chair, and Hugo studied the reasonably harmless collection of people. One of them was a man of about his size. He had a thick but well-trimmed beard—and, Hugo couldn’t help but notice, he was wearing a sweater on top of a white dress shirt. The man approached Madeleine and took her hand. She smiled.
“Mikko. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
Mikko answered in a weak, Finnish accent, “It was pure luck, nothing else.”
Hugo smiled and offered his hand to Mikko. “Hey, I’m Hugo.”
Mikko returned the smile, shook Hugo’s hand, and looked the other man up and down. “You okay there, Hugo? You look like you’ve been in a brawl.”
Hugo looked down at his bare torso and the blood dried on his arms, hands, and chest. “Uh, yeah—it was pretty rough up there. Hey, any way I could borrow that sweater for a little while?”
Mikko’s mouth fell open, and his eyes flitted to Madeleine’s and back to Hugo again. “I . . . sure, yes, of course.” He pulled the sweater over his head and handed it to the blood-smeared stranger.
“I appreciate it, friend,” Hugo said. “I’ll be sure to have it cleaned and get it back to you pronto.”
Another woman and a man walked up to Madeleine and embraced her.
“Sussie, Tony,” Madeleine said. “Are you guys all right?”
They both nodded shakily.
“Good.” Madeleine gestured toward the oval table. “Let’s all sit,” she said. Dust and dirt were strewn across the table, and on the far end lay a part of the collapsed ceiling. Hugo pulled up a chair and sat down beside Freya. Everyone’s eyes were fixed on Madeleine. She cleared her throat and steeled herself. She was on the edge of exhaustion, but she had to hold it together a little longer, just until she’d gotten this discussion over with.
“We’re down for the count, no doubt about it,” she said, looking steadily into each person’s eyes in turn. “We’ve lost more than half of our team. Tom, Lena, and Ilsen are dead.”
At this, Sussie gave a little cry. Mikko gasped audibly, and the others stared at Madeleine, frozen in place.
Madeleine continued, “Emma, Jens, Felix, and Caesar are injured—they’re at the hospital now.” Bitterness flooded every word that left her mouth. Novus was her creation; it was she who had hired every single one of the names she’d just mentioned. Hugo could almost physically feel her red-hot wrath; he recognized it to be the same as his own.
“For the time being,” she went on, “the police are going to put a lid on as much of this as possible. The press is already outside trying to find out what happened.”
Hugo pounded the table with a fist.
*
“What happened?” he shouted. “You were almost eradicated, that’s what happened! And I want to know why! My brother is fighting for his life!”