I step aside and let him into the room. He goes straight to Sloane and gives her a hug and a kiss, then brushes a thumb over her cheek, gazing tenderly down at her. It looks like he’s about to start spouting poetry.
I throw my arms into the air. “Any day now!”
He turns to me with Sloane tucked under his arm. “Do you want the good news or the bad news first?”
I look at Sloane. “Does he not know his life is in danger?”
She wraps her arms around his waist and gazes up at him. “You should probably just get straight to it, honey. I like you better without stab marks all over your body.”
He shrugs. “All right, if you insist. Malek is the new head of the Russian Bratva.”
That leaves me breathless.
So there it is. The reason Mal wanted me out of Russia.
I recall his hypothetical question about keeping something precious close though it would be dangerous and wish I’d bashed a pan over his head to force him to talk to me.
A mistake I’ll never make again.
Shaking off the tidal wave of emotion that’s threatening to overpower me, I say, “What happened to Pakhan?”
Declan lifts a brow. “What do you know about Pakhan?”
“That he makes questionable fashion choices including wearing real fur and pinky rings. What happened to him?”
Declan lifts his other brow, so now he’s staring at me in open astonishment. “You met him?”
“Yeah. We had dinner together. He’s really sweet. What happened to him?”
“He has cancer. He’s decided to make Malek his protégé.”
Cancer. Oh, no. He was so nice to me. Thinking of our dinner, I say absently, “You mean successor.”
“Excuse me?”
“A protégé is in the process of training. A successor takes over where someone leaves off.”
Sloane says, “She has a thing for words. Just keep going.”
“That’s it.”
Pulling myself together, I say, “What’s the good news?”
He gets a mysterious glint in his eye, like he has a secret. “How do you know that wasn’t the good news?”
I look at Sloane.
She says, “Seriously, honey. Look at that face. You’re taking your life into your hands.”
“Thank you, sis.”
She smiles at me. “You’re welcome.”
“All right…let’s just say Malek and I now have a mutual friend.”
I frown. “You mean the guy Mal visited in New York to get information about how to find you?”
Declan goes very still. He says slowly, “What guy?”
“Some guy named Kazimir. I heard Mal say the name over dinner with Pakhan and asked him about it later.”
His stillness turns to stiffness. Murder flares in his eyes. Through a clenched jaw, he says, “Kazimir told Malek how to find me? So he could kill me?”
Sloane whistles. “Oh, he’s gonna be in so much trouble.”
“What am I missing?”
Grimacing, she glances at me. “That’s Nat’s fiancé.”
“Whoa! Hold on! What the fucking-fuckedy-fuck?”
“Kage—Kazimir—is the head of the Bratva here in the US.”
I can feel my eyes bulging out like a cartoon. “And Nat’s engaged to him?”
“It’s a long story. I’ll fill you in later. Right now, I think the three of us need to get on a conference call.”
Declan roars, “I’m not getting on the phone with that bloody arsewipe!”
Sloane pats his chest. “I meant us three girls, honey.”
Sputtering in fury, he says, “You’re not talking to Natalie! I forbid it!”
Sloane kisses his cheek. “That’s cute.” She holds her hand out to me. “Come on. The sooner we can sort this out, the sooner his blood pressure can get back to normal.”
We leave Declan behind in the room, shouting something in Gaelic that doesn’t sound like it has anything to do with his blood pressure.
45
Riley
I spend two hours on the phone with Nat and Sloane, starting off by saying, “Okay, explain this all to me like I’m a toddler.”
I get a story that makes my eyes cross.
Nat’s former fiancé, David, who went missing on the day of their wedding years ago and who everyone presumed was dead, was actually a Bratva accountant named Damon who embezzled money, turned on his bosses, and went into the witness protection program. With a new identity, he moved to Lake Tahoe, where he met Nat. Fast forward a bunch of years, he’s gone missing, and Nat is still in mourning.