I pushed back my chair and extended my sore legs. Almost four days had passed since we’d buried Harris, but every muscle I’d used to dig his grave still felt like it was punishing me. My back groaned as I reached above my head. There had to be someone Patricia trusted enough to confide in. Someone who might know where to find her.
My arms froze midstretch.
Pilates.
The note Patricia had slid across the table had come from a woman she knew from her weekly Pilates class—Andrei Borovkov’s wife. Patricia had said they were only acquaintances, but that had clearly been a lie. If Patricia felt close enough to this woman to refer her to a contract killer, it was possible she trusted Mrs. Borovkov with other sensitive information about her life … like where she’d planned to go after paying me to murder her husband.
I slid my chair back toward the computer, preparing for the usual barrage of social media hits as I searched for Andrei Borovkov’s wife. But the first hit—and almost every hit after—was the headline of a news article about a recent triple homicide.
I remembered Georgia talking about that crime scene weeks ago; three local businessmen had been found with their throats slashed in a warehouse in Herndon. According to the headlines on my screen, the case had resulted in a mistrial.
Every article I scrolled through featured the same photo—two men ducking into a limo at the bottom of the courthouse steps. One was formidable-looking, with a bald head and hooded eyes. The other was polished and well-dressed, probably his attorney. It was taken from the same video clip I’d seen on the TV in Georgia’s apartment.
I zoomed in on the image, leaning closer to see.
My stomach dropped.
These were the same men who’d been driving the Lincoln Town Car. The same men who’d jammed the knife in Patricia’s back door.
That’s why Andrei’s name had felt so familiar when I’d read it on his wife’s note. Because I’d heard it before. On the news. It had been playing in the background at Georgia’s house when I’d picked up my kids the night we’d buried Harris.
Andrei Borovkov wasn’t just any problem husband. He was the murder suspect OCN had failed to convict. The one Georgia’s friends had been so upset about. He’d been acquitted that morning, the same day Harris Mickler was killed.
According to the article, Irina Borovkov’s husband worked as a bodyguard for a wealthy businessman named Feliks Zhirov—a man with known ties to the Russian mob.
I slapped a hand over my mouth to stifle a gasp.
You work for Feliks?
That’s what Harris had asked me in the bar, when I’d casually suggested we belonged to the same vague financial group. He’d looked sick when he said it, and I’d assumed it was because of the drugs. Patricia didn’t just know Irina Borovkov from Pilates. Their husbands were in business together—mafia business.
Harris had been stealing from the mob.
I cleared the search from the screen with shaking hands, afraid someone might see it. Then I cleared my entire search history, unsteady when I shot to my feet. Andrei Borovkov wasn’t just a bodyguard. Bodyguards protected people. They didn’t get arrested for slashing up businessmen in warehouses. They didn’t leave death threats on people’s back doors when they thought someone had stolen their boss’s money.
I’d been hired to kill an enforcer for the Russian mob.
Suddenly, I wasn’t sure which was scarier—the possibility that I’d be caught by the police for a murder I didn’t commit, or the likelihood I’d be murdered by Andrei Borovkov once he learned what his wife had done.
* * *
I slammed the door to the kitchen and fell back against it, my breath racing out of me. The lights in the house were off, and Vero’s car was gone from the garage. I bolted the door and kicked off my shoes, taking the stairs to my office two at a time. I shut myself inside, my fingers clumsy and trembling as I locked the door behind me.
The kids were safe at Steven’s house, I reminded myself. And Andrei Borovkov’s wife had no idea who I was. As long as I didn’t call the number in Irina’s note, Mrs. Borovkov’s very scary husband would never know who his wife had hired, or how to find me.
A pink flash caught my eye. One of Vero’s sticky notes fluttered, taped to my computer screen: HOT DATE. DON’T WAIT UP. I’LL BE HOME IN TIME FOR DELIA’S PARTY.
Crap. Delia’s birthday party was at eleven A.M. tomorrow. In all the chaos, I’d almost forgotten. A loose-leaf sheet of notebook paper lay across my keyboard, titled “My Birthday Wish List” in Delia’s oversize careful letters. Only one wish made the list … a puppy. Under it, I found another certified letter from Steven’s attorney. I didn’t have to open it to know what was inside.